Two unrelated news stories today are decidedly not unrelated.
Many of us opened up our favorite news portals to find that beloved designer Kate Spade died from suicide at age 55. I don’t know about your friends, but mine posted many thoughtful, loving posts offering support and a friendly ear to anyone suffering from depression, low mood or suicidal thoughts. Some posted numbers for suicide help lines. Fortunately, I don’t go places where someone would say things like “She had everything to live for! All that money!” or worse, “She took the coward’s way out.”
Because that was the norm not all that long ago. I remember when a prominent politician in the District of Columbia also died by hanging and one of my editors at the time actually uttered the “coward’s way out” line and to this day, I have no idea how I restrained myself from punching him in his smug face.
Someone “with potential” who has “contributed to society” makes us all sad when they die from their depression. I’m still not over Robin Williams. This collective grief and heartbreak and desire to help others is a good thing and I am not saying otherwise because in just a generation’s time, we have grown a little but important bit.
But mental illness isn’t always easy. It isn’t all depression. It cannot all be hugged away. Some mental illnesses are hard on loved ones, too. Sometimes, that person you fell for decades ago becomes someone you don’t recognize anymore. Sometimes, that child you bore and loved and wanted to become a doctor becomes more bizarre and unhinged as schizophrenia overtakes them.
Mental illness is a tough subject. We need to adult-up as a society and recognize that, if someone with depression deserves love and humane treatment, then people with schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder and a whole host of other conditions do, too.
But too many times, we cannot be bothered.
Not two hours after reading about Kate Spade, another story crossed my Facebook page, courtesy of Shaun King.
Sheriff’s deputies in Marion County, Oregon — each of them the size of an Abrams tank — pounced upon a young, homeless man who was, to be sure, becoming an interference during a serious investigation.
So of course, the cops descended upon him and beat him, pulling him to the ground so one of the tanks could pound him repeatedly in the back of the head. The deputies were not in any way under physical threat of violence by a wisp of a 28-year-old man, so “Blue Lives Matter” bullshit does not apply. He was found to be carrying a knife, which he never displayed, but that discovery only came after 1200 pounds of cop meat descended upon him.
The man that those deputies beat senseless is someone’s son. His name is Kevin Straw. He may be a brother, an ex-husband, a veteran. He might feed the pigeons with the scraps that society throws him. I don’t know because he’s not Kate Spade and I cannot go on Wikipedia to find out all the particulars of his life and why he was so suddenly concerned about military takeovers and wild cats on the loose.
What I do know is that he seemed genuinely concerned for the welfare of others, even if what he thought was happening was not really happening.
He did not deserve that beating. Not one bit. This is not good policing. This is thuggery. The officers involved should be tried, convicted and fired. Their colleagues — and every peace officer everywhere including security guards — should be trained in how to handle difficult mentally ill citizens who do not deserve to die because squads of armed, bus-sized manbeasts don’t know what else to do.
We have the social wherewithal to improve our policing. We just need to demand that it be done.
