Coincidentally to this article I'm re-reading Anne Deveson's book about her son's mental illness. (Tell Me I'm Here). In it she discusses the dilemma of the rights of the mentally ill to live in the community verses the rights of the community to be safe and the ill to get treatment, even if by force. The book was written in the early 90's yet even now approaching those who appear to be at risk to themselves or a risk to others still seems to be in the too hard basket. If you're diagnosed with cancer 'the system' whisks you away for treatment, kicking and screaming if needs be. If you're diagnosed with a mental illness the system goes into reverse and shuns you despite any amount of kicking and screaming.

I recently experienced depression and wrote to a family member for help. She was alarmed when she couldn't raise me by phone and called the police (I don't live near her). The cops arrived on my doorstep and accused me of 'writing letters'. I felt criminalised by my act of communication but the event gave me an insight as to how those who enter the system might feel. In the future I'd be more circumspect having now learned that self-disclosing can be risky. But I still like Mondays.

Hmm... there's some good points here, but as always, it's about drawing a vague line in the sand (yes, that's an oxymoron of sorts, but bear with me).

Gut feelings are awfully subjective, though if it's based more on behaviour than what is written by these students, then I guess there's some validity there.

For a time I was a creative writing student, and my leanings were to the macabre side of fiction, I simply found it more interesting subject matter, after all, at the root of all interesting writing lies conflict.
Are we to be at all suspicious of the many readers or writers who favour authors such as Stephen King?
That being said, my behaviour was outgoing and in no way hostile.

But, even if I were to have been more shy and insular, would my writing be taken as a sign of some kind of latent psychological distress? It's hardly a recipe for identifying potential killers.

I guess this identification comes down to aggression and abuse, be it verbal or physical - and lets face it, this is hardly a revelation.

There is a fine line to be drawn between nurturing freedom of creative expression and nurturing rage leading to action. Thoughts and actions are often great distances apart (any politicians will attest to that). I think that we are too concerned with risk to others and not concerned enough about why people are inspired to think such violent thoughts. Do we know if there was a teacher or student at Virginia Tech who may have abused Cho Seung-Hu? If I was the teacher in receipt of his plays, the first place I would look was around him, not at him! That might have been the KEY to prevention rather than FOCUSing on a cure.

Peter, I remember Deveson's book and the untimely death of her son. You're right. If you had cancer, people know how to react but with mental illness, it's still very much stigmatised.

Last year the Senate released a massive report in to the state of mental health in Australia and Howard has allocated over $3b to helping suffers. That should filter down through services over the next few years.

Behind many of my articles, here and else where, there has been one theme. Our institutions and organisations are in deep trouble, mainly, I think due to the markets addiction to performance as well as the messages we send our selves, ie, 'must do better', 'must try harder', 'be a better mother/father', etc.

I know this sounds 'crazy' but most people don't need to work 60 hours a week, win the Nobel prize or rear Einstein to be happy and successful.

There will always be murders and no one can gauge the intention of another. Even so, Stephen King aside, creative writing programs are excellent sites to 'vomit' out vendettas; to release on paper, film or whatever, not what we would call an attempt at a creative product, but rather in a minority of cases, the templates for actual murder.

I am not suggesting that we ban creative writing at universities. Far from it. Most of the great writers of the past 50 years never went to creative writing schools, and as far as I know there is no connection between creative writing programs and murder - although some school students in the US have used web diaries and blogs detailing murders they have comitted.

I am suggesting that teachers need to be taught how to deal with students who are clearly unwell.

Malcolm aka Cheryl

It's clear that creative writing courses don't involve grammar.

"The play ends with the boy ramming a cereal bar into his father-in-law's mouth, who responds by killing the boy."

The father-in-law's MOUTH killed him?

Creative grammar courses?

I just heard a fascinating discussion between an academic and a psychologist on Radio national this morning about the phenomenon of mass shootings. The psychologist-from Melbourne, but can't remember his name, but he has dealt with Martin Bryant, had a fascinating take on the subject. His view is that this is a grandiose script for suicide. That the intention of the shooter is to die, but in what he (and its usually a he) sees as a blaze of glory. He drew an analogy with a phenomenon in pre-colonial India where certain young men used to run amok (its where we got the word, apparently) and attack people with knives until they themselves were killed. The British stopped the problem by simply keeping these young men alive and imprisoning them, thereby frustrating the desire to die. The practice died out as a result. He also theorised that the fact that Martin Bryant did not die ( and lives a much publicised miserable and isolated life in prison, I daresay) is one reason why his actions did not spark any copycat events. However, he also cited the fact that we also tightened gun laws post Port Arthur as another reason, and pointed out the obvious thing that seems to escape the Americans, that we will always have loonies, but at least we can make it harder for them to get guns, particularly automatic weapons.
Interesting to think that if police at least tried to shoot to cripple rather than kill these young men - before they get a chance, hopefully, to kill themselves- and then they suffered the fate of ignominious and endless incarceration that it might actually be a deterrent.

Ena, I reckon if the Virginia Tech shooter was captured he'd face the death penalty given the enormity of the crime and that Virginia executes more people who commit capital crimes than any other US state - with the exception of Texas. I don't know if pleas about his mental health would stand a chance in court.

I think that creative writing and drawing students who obsess about murder should be cause for concern. In the same way that students who talk or write about killing themselves should be grounds for concern. In both cases we see a tragic loss of life and it may be prevented with medication, counselling or both.