Anti-psychotic drugs.

[NewMoonTherian]

This is an old story, but it's something I've been meaning to post on. Kids in the United States are prescribed anti-psychotic drugs at six times the rate kids in the United Kingdom are.

Here's the story on CBSnews.com

Does this highlight fundamental social differences between the two nations? How much of an effect do these social differences have on violence, compared to gun laws? Just a couple of questions, humbly submitted for discussion.

[SteveM]

1. Hard to decide on social differences because of this study...

But Great Britain since the 1800s has had a low level of civil violence. Yet, citizens there had ready access to firearms until the wave of gun-bans started in earnest during the early 1920s. To hear some gun-control advocates, one would think that the bans caused the low violence rate. More likely, any "relationship" can be summed up by this saying about Harvard University: "they graduate the best because they accept the best."

I think this country is over-medicated. For a society which doggedly maintains a destructive and corrupt "War on Drugs," we can't seem to get enough of the "legal" stuff. We have a severe "Saturday night/Sunday morning" ethic informed by vulgar Puritanism in which prohibitionism thrives; guns being the latest object in the game of "hide the smelly undies." Of course, prohibitionism doesn't work, but morally we "feel" better.

There is so much "feel" attached to our notions of law & policy.