I feel the need to start #wombsplaining things, and I hope my smart writerly researching friends will do the same.
1. The medical system and social care network obviously let down a boy who grew up to become a murderer of 17 people yesterday in Parkland Florida. If you look at a picture of him, you can see that there may be physical reasons for the adjustment problems he had. He looks like he may have some of the characteristics of FAS. He was adopted. Both of his adoptive parents died. He’d been expelled from school and identified as a potentially dangerous individual to the school. Our system let him down and because of that 17 people, thus far, are dead. Hundreds or thousands have been traumatized because of this one mass murder.
https://youtu.be/uUZ6LBbaML4
2. I am nauseated when I see Governor Rick Scott talking about the well-being of his constituents. This man has no concern for people, he was the CEO of Columbia/HCA during the time when the company committed the largest Medicare/Medicaid fraud in U.S. History. The company paid $1.6 billion criminal and civil fines for Medicare fraud. The people who committed this crime went, literally, Scott-free. Corporate crime takes money away from the healthcare and social support systems that is desperately needed for dealing with the health and well-being of the cast-offs of American society (rightists often call thsee things entitlements.)
3. The crimes committed by Scott’s company occurred when yesterday‘s shooter was in utero and a small child. Now this immoral corporate white man is “guiding” the state in which there have been two mass shooting recently and dodging questions on gun safety.
4. If the shooter was given up for adoption, unwanted, and suffered from birth defects, I wonder if his birth mother thought about abortion? I wonder if she had access – physical and economic – to all the medical care she needed? (I am allowed to say this as I was an unwanted child and was psychologically tortured by my mother because I was unwanted. No child should have to live with knowing they are unwanted. It warps them.)
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Perhaps corporations should be killed (dissoved without the ability of owners/board etc. to reform corporate entities) when they do things that kill.
Perhaps immoral people like Scott behind corporate crime should not be allowed into leadership positions ever again.
Perhaps we should not allow weapons of war designed to kill great numbers of people rapidly to be sold to civilians.
Perhaps people should be able to get the healthcare they need regardless of their SEC.
Rebecca Forstadt Olkowski
That’s sad to hear that both of his adoptive parents died. Kids are left on their own after 18 in those cases with no support system. It’s tragic not only for the kids he killed but that the system failed him.
Nancy Hill
Exactly. We failed him. We failed all those kids. We must ACT.
Beth Havey
Nancy, I decided I couldn’t post today, but I did go to Midlife just to see and found this. Thank you for your brave stance, researched ideas and open heart. I agree with everything you wrote. Yes, things are complicated, but not ALL that much when you begin to break it down. Scott when asked about the shooting and guns by a reporter threw out the mental health excuse and the “it’s not TIME to talk about this.” For the GOP it is never time as they open their online accounts to make sure they got their current check or whatever from the Koch Brothers. YES IT’S TIME to talk about this and WOMEN get that, need more power. We are empathetic. We carry children in the womb and YES if this young man’s mother wasn’t going to be there for him, allow abortion or help her during the process, follow her mental health and his physical health. In the most powerful country in the world, this should not be a crap shoot–good luck with raising that kid. Because a child should never be pushed aside. Sandy Hook is another example. PLUS the gun craze in this country is insane. AND YES, people need healthcare and some of the programs that already exist are not entitlements. We worked for them. But the big guys are run by corporations and the bottom line is never a human life, never.
Nancy Hill
Thank YOU Beth. I didn’t know whether I should post or not. But I had to. It is all interconnected. Monied corporate interests are promoting “laws” that are murdering our babies. There is never a wrong time to discuss how to protect our children and keep them safe, from birth on.