Reply #58: more replies...

[gorfle]

then I'll have to guess at the reason. You are repeatedly told that NO records are kept about ANYONE's medical conditions other than in their medical files, and you keep saying crap like that. Incapable of understanding fact, unwilling to stop misrepresenting fact ... or just trying to pretend that voluntary inclusion of voluntarily disclosed information in a database just isn't quite the same thing as involuntary disclosure of private information for involuntary inclusion in an irrelevant database ...?

Let me clarify: Obviously no actual medical records are kept in the NICS database. What I mean, and what should have been obvious, is that a record of mental unfitness is kept in the NICS database. Apparently it is a binary system - either on or off. If you have a disqualifying trait, a flag in your NICS file is turned on. Otherwise it's off.

If I at some point in my life suffer a mental illness that requires that I be involuntarily treated, there will be no government databank, where I'm at, with that fact sitting in it, for absolutely no valid reason, and for my lifetime, where it could leak out at any moment. It will be a matter between me, my health care professionals and their overseers, unless I choose to make it otherwise.

And this is the fatal flaw in your licensing system. For all the flaws of our NICS system, at least it has mandatory reporting of certain disqualifying mental histories. Yours relies on voluntary disclosure.

The Canadian rejection/revocation rate appears to be about 1.1% as a proportion of licences issued (slightly lower as a proportion of all applications/licences held). Given the much greater effort an individual must go to, and the much greater disclosure s/he is required to make -- i.e. the greater deterrent effect of the Canadian system -- I don't think I'd be saying our screening process is less effective.

Frankly, I think NICS probably sucks at screening mentally defective people, as evidenced by the NIU shooter. That said, given the data you quoted, we have an average rejection of 2.06% Your rejection AND revocation rate combined is only 1.1% So it would appear, based on the limted NICS data quoted, that NICS is marginally rejecting more people. If NICS were patched up so that relevant medically disqualifying information was as uniformly and centrally reported as law-enforcement data, I have no doubt that it would be vastly superior to any system relying on voluntary disclosure of mental health information.

Edited to add:

Basically, your system and our system seem to be roughly equivalent in terms of the percentage of people they prevent from obtaining firearms - somewhere from 1% - 3%, within a couple of percentage points.

This does not surprise me. Each system is probably equally effective at catching criminals, because of the centralized reporting and record keeping mechanisms they both have. Likewise, they both probably are poor at catching mentally unfit people, yours because of voluntary reporting, and ours because of lack of consistent and procedures for reporting and the relatively lenient mental health requirements.

What very much does suck is your attitude toward people with mental illnesses. Quite revolting, in fact.

You know, with all the insults and innuendo you have tossed at me if the worst you can pin on me is that I use the pejorative "crazy" to describe people with mental health problems, I guess that's OK. I admit it: sometimes I get lazy and it's easier to type "crazy people" than "people with mental health problems" over and over again.

One of the objections to the proposal to incorporate ever more personal medical information into these databanks is that it will deter people from seeking health care when they need it.

As you chastised me for earlier, no personal medical information is actually stored in these databanks, only a record that a disqualifying condition exists.

Nonetheless, so long as mental health information is going to be a qualifier for firearm ownership (and I believe it should be), this is going to be an issue no matter if that information is garnered voluntarily or not.

Yes, this may result in some people refusing to seek mental health treatment. The alternative, to turn a blind eye to mental health issues with regards to firearm ownership, is not acceptable in my view.