We Deserve An Apology.

Since February 15, we haven’t seen or heard any apology from President Trump concerning his harmful comments regarding the mentally ill community in regards to the shootings in Florida.

With the exception of few mental health specialists and advocates whom publicly defended us as a non-violent community and mentioned the damaging comments adding stigmas that we do not need. For them, I am forever grateful.

Then why am I so angry? Angry is not the word, furious is more adequate. I don’t know who infuriates me more; the entire American and European mental organizations, foundations, associations or others. The President’s demeaning words towards our community and stigmatizing even more mentally ill people while so many are trying to break them.

From our side, none of these organizations stepped up to the plate, fought for us and demanded an official apology They are a disgrace as well as despicable and should have their status of non-profit organizations removed and pay taxes as any other companies as they are not, non-profit organizations in my books. Their nonaction speaks louder than their seminars. They hide behind our misery to make money in a tax-free environment. It’s simply outrageous. It dawned on me that economics were the reasons for keeping quiet, they have too much to lose by rocking the boat.

We will build our own organization run by mentally ill people. It will be the only way to get something done. I am currently looking at what would be the best legal structure to form our entity. I am looking into NGOs since I am so close to all the International Organizations in Geneva but I’m contemplating as well at Foundation and others.

By letting this go by without a word let alone a fight from us, we cannot afford to allow them to add one more layer of acidic stigma to settle on top of us. We are now killers| What’s next?

Are we going to stand for this? No, we’re not. We have a right to be heard. Whether they like it or not, we are humans and part of the general population. Furthermore the President, self-described as “a very stable genius” should have absolutely no problem understanding our claim and how sensitive it is. He has to realize the harm that he has done with his comment, he has alienated us even more and deepened the cleavage between the mentally ill community and the rest of society. We deserve an apology.

A small parenthesis; associating Trump with “very stable genius” in the same sentence looks like an oxymoron, doesn’t it?

One should be reminded that mental illness spares no one and strikes all races, all ages, male, female, LGBT, religions, social economic status. Despite our large number, we are mute, we are never considered or included in political campaigns and legislation. We do not have the same legal rights as others. I spent time reading 57 pages of The European Convention On Human Rights of 2002 and not once are we mentioned except for incarceration.

I have contacted the White House on February 22nd, 2018.

They have a site for issuing petitions and explaining the process. First, you need to send an email with a relevant question, which I did. My questions were; can a non-American resident file a petition and can the signatures required be issued by non-American residents. I should get the answer shortly.

Like I said if we don’t do ourselves nobody else will.

Let’s assume that we can go forward. We will need from the day the petition is filed, 100,000 signatures within 30 days. I don’t mind leading this project but I need to know beforehand if we have a chance to collect so many signatures.

For this, I need an answer from all of you, as I am too inexperienced with the blogging community and I don’t know if we have this kind of firepower.

Peace and serenity,

Lawrence

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Advertisement