A lot will be discovered about 20-year old Thomas Matthew Crooks over the next few weeks. The would-be assassin’s background, actions, and interactions leading up to the shooting at Donald Trump’s Pennsylvania rally on July 13, 2024, will be dissected in great detail to identify whether or not he suffered from some mental health disorder.
We’re not here to discuss Crooks.
Instead, today’s editorial is a call to action for America to come together with a vehement focus on our collective mental health. The unsettling event from this past Saturday will have impacted people in varying ways. PTSD and trauma has certainly been experienced by many in attendance at the rally, but levels of trauma will also be elicited in those who watched it all unfold from their TV screens and smartphones. Related emotional responses will also manifest hours or days later as America is inundated with around-the-clock media coverage. Further responses will be evoked as strong opinions are expressed over workplace water-coolers and grocery store lineups where tabloids blast images of Trump’s raised fist, stars-and-stripes flapping in the background.
Meanwhile, the current call for “unity” by pundits and the desks of FOX and CNN newsrooms will once again be replaced by the barb-throwing that has become so ubiquitous with political commentary. Conspiracies will infect social media and people will dig their heels into beliefs to the point that they cannot maintain civil discourse with loved ones, much less a stranger on the 405 who has a bumper sticker that disagrees.
Let’s not let that tired narrative win this time around. Instead, let’s recognize that despite differences in ideologies, we may find common ground in the emotions we are experiencing. Are you angry and irritated? Anxious and stressed? Do feelings of depression wash over and interrupt your ability to maintain a positive outlook? Your neighbor is going through the same thing.
Those of us old enough may recall what the days after September 11, 2001, were like. In the nation experiencing unprecedented trauma we came together, bonded by sorrow and patriotism. Whether we rode donkeys or elephants into voting booths beforehand, we rode together for awhile. It didn’t last of course, which returns us to the point we made above. We can either let this recent event and all that bookends it rip us further apart, or we can finally learn from yet another American tragedy to make a change.
While you have no power over what politicians, parties, and their strategists will do from here, you can each attain domain over your own mental facilities. You can learn to better manage your thoughts and emotions, and inspire others to do the same. If each individual pledges to do so, communal mental wellbeing will follow. Don’t wait for others to take the first step, as that strategy has proven ineffective in the past. Reach out to a coworker, neighbor, friend, or loved one that you know has differing beliefs and embrace them. Show them kindness, respect, and understanding. Some of you may be able to do this right away. Some may first require help in managing thoughts and emotions so as to not be triggered by the words of others. Counselors are on standby as we speak, ready to talk to you as an individual or household. We don’t care if you use our online services, or a that of a licensed mental health provider near you. Just take action by focusing on your mental health, together with the rest of America.
“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation’s wounds; to care for [one] who shall have borne the battle, and for [their widowed] and orphan – to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations.”
Abraham Lincoln
Be kind, together.
~ Kindbridge Behavioral Health ~
