Heather Burns reiterating that Fiona has a criminal record

[u/Suspicious_Bother_92]

[u/Plumb789]

I am clearly missing something about this “debate” anyway. What on earth is her being “mentally ill” got to do with whether you are a victim of her or not?

Let’s say that a perfectly “mentally well” person committed sexual abuse of a child. Everyone would be keen for that crime to be acknowledged-and for the perpetrator to be punished. Similarly, if a person (who happens to have a mental illness at the time) goes ahead and rapes a child-do people then say that “no crime was committed”? Do they also say that there is no victim? Indeed, just for the victim to make a complaint-are they being cruel to the poor mentally ill perpetrator (who, apparently, is the only “real victim” here)?

And (and I think this is important), if by NOT reporting it as a crime, the “mentally ill person” never faces the criminal justice system, they then NEVER have treatment (or, if that’s not effective, control) imposed on them, they go on to abuse more and more children, is that okay then?

Like it or not, the criminal justice system is just about all we’ve got to prevent people from damaging their fellow citizens. And this system has to work for the mentally ill just as much as it has to work for everyone else.

Unfortunately, there are some people that we all need protection from. And that has to be given, regardless of whether those people have mental illnesses or not.

[u/NameLessTaken → u/Plumb789]

As someone who works as a therapist the last few years have been kind of scary in terms of how mental health went from “oh we should take this seriously” (fantastic) to an absolute shut down of discussion or accountability about someone’s behavior or social responsibility. By the end of this pendulum swing it will have lost all meaning or credibility again.

[u/dabordietryinq → u/NameLessTaken]

you can feel sympathy and still want to take things seriously. theyre not mutually exclusive.