Society's Mixed Message On Mental Health

Disclaimer: I am not a mental health professional. My opinions are based on my own experiences and may not be relevant or helpful to you, feel free to ignore them. This post may come off as preachy and self-righteous, if so, mission accomplished. 

I've been paying more attention to the news and social media over the last few months and apparently that's a good sign for my mental health. When I'm feeling depressed, my world shrinks. I talk to less people, do less things and yet somehow have less free time. Lately, I've been feeling better. I've restarted some hobbies. My schedule is fuller, yet I still have more time for less important things like politics, news and social media. 

With the recent school shootings and high profile celebrity suicides, mental illness has gotten a lot of play in the media and on social networks lately. There's so much talk about awareness and ending stigmas, that I question who is not aware and where is the stigma? It seems like everyone is posting their personal struggles with mental illness online and this is supposed to be a good thing, but is it really? 

I see so many posts from people who suffer from the same conditions I have and my typical response is "if that guy has it, there's no way I have it. I don't want to be anything like him". But, that's just me, the stuck up guy who can't even share my mental illness. There's a bigger problem out there. 

Whenever a celebrity commits suicide, the internet gets filled with posts saying things like "Everyone should know they're loved and if you're ever considering taking your life, you can always call me at -----------". I see that and I think "aww, isn't that nice. I'm not buying it". Yes, I am cynical. So, I look at the profile of the person who posted it (usually on twitter) and almost without fail, I can find something else they posted within the past few days along the lines of "Politician X doesn't agree with me about Y, he's worse than a nazi and I hope he gets cancer and dies a miserable, painful death". We're all so supportive of each other, until a restaurant makes a mistake on our order and we go straight to yelp and instagram on a personal vendetta to destroy the person who dared to be human (I'm trying hard not to go off on a restaurant tangent here, suffice it to say that I'm really happy I got out of that business, but wish I hadn't had to). 

That behavior, which is pervasive online, makes me think that people don’t really care, they just want to make themselves feel good. The real troubling part for me is how we treat people who do something wrong. It seems like every day there’s a viral video, or news story of someone getting caught doing something bad. Of course, it's always caught on camera and next thing you know, someone's momentary lapse of judgement just became the defining moment of their life. 

Some of these people did really bad things and they may deserve punishment. The problem is that we're taking people's worst action and using it to define them as a person. This is only one example of how we do this and it's an extremely unhealthy behavior IMO. 

For me, one of the hardest parts of dealing with mental illness, is not believing the bad things my mind tells me (for example, let's say my mind is telling me that I'm a bad person). It's easy enough to believe when my mind tells me something negative with no foundation. Easier still, when there's evidence to back it up (maybe I did something bad) and really easy if society is there nodding along (maybe it got caught on video). 

If we judge ourselves, or others, on our worst actions, who has a chance? We need to remember that we (and others) are not just who we think, or what we do, or want to do, or try to do. We are the sum total of our experiences, our actions, our goals, efforts, successes and failures.

No, that doesn't go well with our two second sound bite society, but if we're serious about mental health, that's how we have to see people. Sadly, I don't believe we're really serious about it as a society. We're all for talking about it, raising awareness, doing a 5k, etc. but who really changes? And we wonder why suicides keep going up.

If we're serious about mental health, I say we need not do anything more than treat each other as people, imperfect people who are going to make mistakes. Instead of always looking for someone to burn at the stake, let's try to let things go. Let's remember that we could easily be the person whose life we're so casually destroying. Or not. It's a lot easier to fool ourselves into moral superiority. We can retweet the suicide prevention hotline and feel like we made a difference...but who are we fooling? 

You're Really Not That Special

I've been thinking about restarting this site for a while now. The title doesn't exactly make sense anymore, being that I'm not living in Israel anymore, but who cares? 

I read an article a while ago that I'm not sure I agree with, it's been stuck in my head since and and maybe writing about it will help me figure it out. The article posited that the key to happiness in life is realizing that you're not extraordinary and accepting that you'll never be, or need to be, more than mediocre.

We live in a society where any rando can post something on Youtube or Instagram and become a nearly instant celebrity (yes, I just said rando, I'm technically a millenial, so it's chill). Everyone is told that they're special and it seems like they believe it. At the same time, everyone wants to be different. So much so that it's considered weird to be normal . From my viewpoint, most of the "different" people are exactly the same. It reminds me of one of my favorite Oscar Wilde quotes:

"Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation."

I wonder what that says about one who quotes it :)

I've always wanted to be the best at something. Pretty much anything that I decide to do, I go into with the attitude that I'm going to do it better than anyone else. Humble, I know. So far, I haven't achieved that level of mastery in anything. I've done things to put myself in smaller percentages, like getting my pilot's license (something like 0.002% of the population in the US) and running a marathon (0.5%). Even so, I know many pilots and runners who are better at both than I will ever be (maybe).  

The harsh reality of life is that most of us will never reach a level of extraordinary anything. For every professional athlete, or movie star, there are tens of thousands of people who tried and failed. The same is true in every other area of life. The success stories we hear are the exception, not the rule, which is why they're notable. Yet, so many of us think that can be us and we continue to chase our dreams, despite all the evidence showing us that it's futile.

On the other hand, there are many people who have simpler expectations out of life. They know what they want, they set attainable goals and they meet them.

Who do you think is happier?

On a side note. In spite of my argument that most people are the same and not particularly exceptional, I do believe that every person has exceptional power that is inherent to being human. Simple acts that we do on a daily basis can change lives and consequently the world. Something as small as saying "good morning" or letting a car merge in front of you in traffic can have a tremendous snowball effect. Kind of like pay it forward, without the kid getting stabbed. 

It's easier to see in other people. If an 18 year old came to me asking me for career advice, I'd probably tell them to go to college, become a doctor, lawyer, if I thought they could do it. Yet, if I could go back in time, I wouldn't make the same choice for myself. 

I still dream big and set goals that others would call unrealistic. The evidence is currently showing me that they may be right. It's not too late for me to settle down into mediocrity. To start a career with predetermined limits, with less stress and uncertainty. Still, I don't feel that's being true to myself (what does that even mean?). I don't know that I can be happy working a 9-5 job, reporting to a boss. Accepting that I can be successful, but only to a point. So, what to do? Is there some kind of compromise? Am I hypocritical for thinking that people are made to be mediocre and then refusing to accept mediocrity for myself?

Living in Terror

For most of my life I watched the news of terrorist attacks in Israel from the safety of my home in America. The stories were terrifying to be sure. Restaurants and buses blown up by suicide bombers, a family of five being murdered in their beds, teenagers kidnapped and murdered, the list goes on and on. As horrendous as all these stories were, I was far removed from them. Most of the time I didn't have any close relatives or friends in Israel and I hadn't even visited Israel until a couple years ago. I had an image of Israel as this scary place where everyone's always on edge, wondering if they're going to be attacked. 

When I finally came here for a visit, I found a completely different reality. Aside from the soldiers and armed guards around town, I didn't feel much different than I would in any american town. After a couple of days here, I wasn't concerned about terrorism and I was comfortable going around town on my own. 

Two things really surprised me about Israel. The first is that it's common to see Arabs on the same buses and trains as Jews. At the mall near my apartment it would be unusual not to see a lot of Arabs shopping and having their kids play with Israeli kids in the play areas. With all the news coverage from America, I didn't expect this. The reality is that aside from isolated incidents of violence by radicals, Arabs can freely and safely move around in Israel without attracting attention. The second surprise was how much land the Arabs have. I always thought that the vast majority of the land was Jewish with a few small Arab sections. The size of the Arab territories was a complete shock to me. 

Living here this year, I've often said that I feel safer than I did living in Detroit. There were only a couple of times that I felt unsafe. Once on my way to the Kotel, I accidentally went through the Arab Shuk (marketplace), which at the time was safe, except that I didn't know where I was going. I was going to turn around and go back where I came from, but a Jewish family saw me looking lost and offered to walk with me. More recently, when the rock throwing attacks escalated, I accidentally drove into an Arab town and before I could turn around a group of Arab men approached my car and one of them pulled my door open. I'm fairly certain that they were trying to help me, or at worst harass me for money, but I didn't know that the neighborhood (Beit Safafa) was safe and I was scared, so I got out of there in a hurry. 

Recently there's been a huge surge in terrorist attacks. People were stabbed and killed in the same "safe" areas of the Old City that I walked through when I got lost. There have been stabbings and rock attacks (more like boulders and bricks) all over Israel seemingly on an hourly basis. Going out around town has a different feel for me, sirens are blaring constantly, police cars are speeding by. I'm on edge, always looking around for threats. I told myself I wouldn't change my routine, the chance of being hurt or killed by a terrorist is still relatively low and if we're too scared to go about our lives, they get what they wanted. 

I'm trying, but I'd be lying if I told you it wasn't scary. I was getting dressed this morning and I had the thought "I don't want to be seen wearing that if I'm in a terrorist attack" (Yes, I am that vain). Maybe that's my anxiety speaking, but who wouldn't be anxious living like this? When you know people are trying to kill you, solely because of your religion and the world isn't holding them responsible for their actions. When any man, woman, or child can be a terrorist trying to kill you. When you can't walk down the street, or drive down the road without being a target. That's not a way of life anyone should have to tolerate. Yet, when I do go out, the buses, streets, restaurants and stores are still crowded and everyone seems to be going on with their lives as if nothing is wrong. 

I'm not one who believes that Israel is perfect and can do no wrong. There are bad people in every country, religion, society, etc. to expect or believe that Israel is different is foolish. I like to see both sides in an argument and I can understand plenty of the complaints against Israel. That said, you can't claim this is all about "settlements" or any other rational complaint. This is about killing Jews and wiping out Israel, plain and simple. 

The scariest part is that there's no end in sight. There's no attempt to make peace by the other side. They don't want peace and why would they? They're getting exactly what they want. They're able to kill Jews and terrorize the whole country with no repercussions. In fact, it's likely that they'll be rewarded for their actions. The world doesn't care. They've bought into the whole Gaza and "illegal settlement" propaganda, facts and logic be damned. Why is it so hard to come up with a better plan? The land for peace idea is old and played out. It doesn't work. It's not some land that they want, it's all the land. Why does everything have to be either far right or far left? Why can't we have compromise? 

We go on living our lives, we survive. Eventually (hopefully) things calm down and go back to "normal" and we move on with our lives until next time. Please G-d can't we try something different for once?! 

I'm only here for a year, so as hard as it is, I'm not thinking of leaving. I can't imagine how people who live here permanently make it through all these terrorist uprisings every couple of years. One thing is for sure. When I go back to America, I won't be able to look at terrorist attacks in the same disconnected way. 

Why I hate davening

To be fair, it’s not davening (praying) itself that I hate, it’s doing it in shul (synagogue). It’s been drilled into my head since 5th grade that if you don’t daven with a minyan (quorum), your tefillos (prayers) are less likely to be answered and you're pretty much a bad Jew. That probably has something to do with why I rarely go. 

I find it hard to concentrate on davening to begin with. If I go to a shul that davens fast, I feel rushed and don't know what I'm saying half the time. If I go somewhere that davens slow enough that I can concentrate on what I'm saying, I get bored and leave early.   

Then there are the distractions. The worst is the guy that davens louder than everyone else, but only for a few words at a time. I'll be in the middle of concentrating on my tefilos and all the sudden I'll hear him and completely forget where I was. Then there’s the obviously needed repair to something in the room that hasn't been done. There’s one shul I davened at once (I wish it was just one) that was in such a state of disrepair that I spent the entire davening imagining how I could fix it up. Throw in a few talkers and shushers, and chances are I won't concentrate at all. 

When I daven at home, I don't feel like my tefillos are being ignored. I feel like I can have more concentration (at least when Matis isn't there “davening" with me), go at my own pace and overall have a more sincere and meaningful conversation with G-d. Isn't that what davening is all about? 

It doesn't help that staying home is a lot more convenient. I wouldn't make a big deal about all the minor annoyances that go along with going to shul (weather, leaving the house, seeing people, being seen by people, talking to people, finding a seat), if I felt the davening was good. 

People talk about shuls as a family of sorts, or at least as the center of a community, but that hasn't been my experience. I went to the same shul for well over 20 years and by and large nobody there would know if I completely disappeared, least of all the Rabbis. One day around Rosh Hashanah, one of the Rabbis made a speech saying that when you daven alone, you're judged on your own. When you daven in a shul, you're judged by everyone there. I took a look around the room and said to myself “Darn, I'm screwed” and that’s when I finally realized it was time to leave that shul. I realize that it wasn't a mature or nice response, in reality the majority of the congregants were good people, but at the time I couldn't see past the few I had issues with. 

Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are hard times for me. I understand the severity of the days and I want to be in shul, davening in a way that is fitting for such days. I finally found a way to do that. A new shul opened that I actually enjoyed going to. The pace was nice, the people were friendly and actually spoke to people they didn’t know. Unfortunately, it was only for Shabbos and Yom Tov, which are times that I generally go to shul anyway. Even more unfortunately, all I've heard about this shul from anyone who doesn’t go there has been negative. So much negativity. I constantly have to remind myself that I'm not religious because of how religious people act or talk, I'm religious because of what I believe. 

I find myself once again, the day before Rosh Hashanah, dreading going to shul. I’m in a strange land, which I like, but which lacks the comfort of my hometown shul. I have to choose between going to a YU yeshiva and a French shul. The yeshiva will likely be overcrowded and I don’t believe there’s a way to reserve a seat. I’ll be uncomfortable the whole time, because I’ll feel like I’m in somebody’s seat, but at least they speak English. The French shul is confusing. All those French language courses I took for a couple weeks only taught me how to harass ladies who don’t want to go out for drinks with me. Quite useless, as I’ve never had a French lady refuse drinks with me. I’m leaning towards going to the French shul and davening at my own pace and nusach. I always feel like everyone there is staring at me, they probably are, can’t say I blame them, just look at me :). 

Here’s to next year being better. Maybe my doctor will finally let me take some ADHD medicine and I'll be able to find a way to enjoy going to shul (not sure I can blame it all on ADHD and OCD, but maybe?). Until I figure that out, I'll just have to trust what we say in our tefillos, that G-d knows the thoughts and intentions of all men. 

Shana Tova! 

SANDSTORM!

I woke up Tuesday morning, to an apartment flooded with a weird orangish light. I went out on the mirpeset to see what was going on and was greeted by the scene in the pictures below (sorry for the spot in the middle, I think my iphone lens is scratched) . There were police and ambulance sirens all around the roads below us, but we couldn't see what was going on. I checked the news and found out that there was a sand/dush storm that came from Syria (does Syria ever export anything good?). 

The air pollution in Jerusalem on Tuesday and Wednesday was rated 999, the worst possible score. They said that young kids, the elderly and anyone with asthma should stay inside. Of course nobody (myself included) listened and over 300 people had to be treated for severe respiratory issues. Fortunately we rented a car so we could get around and run errands before Yom Tov, so we were able to get around without breathing too much air. The one time I had to walk outside with Matis, someone from our building picked us up on the side of the road and gave us a ride. 

Even without spending too much time outside, my lips are drier than they get in the Detroit winters and my throat has been itching like crazy. Thursday was a little clearer so I was outside more and when I came back home it felt like there was a layer of dust in my lungs, not fun. The air pollution is down to somewhere in the 300s (normal clean air is 50 or lower), but they don't know when the air will be clear again. It doesn't help that the temperature has been close to 100 every day this week. Is it too early to pray for rain? 

Banning Tesla

In my last post I wrote about causes of death and injury in America. One of the things that resonated with me was the number of deaths (over 30,000 per year) and injuries (around 2.3 million per year) from car accidents. While this is a huge improvement from the numbers just a few years ago, we obviously have to make driving safer. Which begs the question; why did Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Texas, New Jersey, Michigan (I'm disappointed in Rick Snyder, but I don't blame him, it's career suicide to go against the big 3 and the "we need to save the automakers" mentality), Maryland and Virginia all effectively ban the company (Tesla) that made the safest car ever (according to NHTSA testing)? 

If you guessed something to do with lobbyists and political contributions, you're absolutely right. The issue in dispute is Tesla's sales model. They sell directly to the consumer from their small showrooms which seem to be modeled after Apple stores. Car dealerships are not really worried about losing business to Tesla. Only a small segment of the population can afford one, they only produced 35,000 cars in all of 2014. Compare that to the 2,480,942 sold by ford alone and you see how insignificant they are to the overall industry.

What is it that they're worried about? They claim to be worried about the precedent. That GM, Ford and Chrysler will realize they can copy Tesla and cut out all the car dealers. That sounds more than a little far-fetched to me. They also claim that car dealerships have such investments in their communities, so they care more about them and offer better service. Even if you buy into their first claim, that doesn't make the second claim true. Why would a dealership owned by a car company care less about their customers? 

It seems to me that what this is really about is protecting themselves and their profits from higher demands made by their customers. If people see that they can walk into any Tesla store and buy a car at the same price and pay the same amount for service at any store, with transparency, they may wonder why other dealerships make the whole process so difficult and muddled. If you've ever bought a car, you're undoubtedly familiar with the sales games that go on("My manager is so mad at me for giving you this deal (even though it's $2,000 higher than the dealer a mile away), you better take it before he changes his mind") and the maintenance/repairs are even worse. 

To tell you the truth, I'm a little sympathetic to their concerns about cutting out the middleman. My father is a computer reseller and when Dell came out with their direct to consumer sales model, it practically eliminated all reseller profits on computer hardware. The result of that was that prices for computers dropped drastically and more people were able to afford them. Resellers had to change their business model to either make up for the lower margins, with higher sales volumes, or sell services instead of hardware. 

If the computer industry had the same laws that the Auto Dealers have successfully lobbied for, there would be no Apple stores and  more depressingly, no Microsoft stores. Jokes. If the government is going to be involved at all, it should be to increase Tesla sales and make them more affordable for the average consumer. If that happened, it wouldn't take long for the other car manufacturers to add the safety and technology features that Tesla already has. Tesla does not have a monopoly on ingenuity and I wouldn't be surprised if one of the other manufacturers came out with a car fairly soon that improves on just about everything that Tesla has. In the meantime, let the people buy the cars they want and let me keep dreaming about being able to afford one (I like to pretend that the reason I don't have one yet, is that I'm waiting for longer battery life).

In case you don't know what all the Tesla hype is about, check out this video. If you can get through Elon Musk's geekiness (I really like watching him talk, b/c he's so excited about what he's saying), it pretty cool. If you can't, here's a short summary of the Tesla model S  features:

• Completely battery powered, no gas at all. 
• Automatic emergency braking, blind spot warning, lane departure warning.
• Traffic-aware cruise control, automatic lane centering, self parking.
• Autotpilot (some features not available yet): automatically follows the road, steering around curves and varying its speed to match the flow of traffic.  Automatically change lanes by tapping the turn signal. Parks itself, on private property it can even pull into and out of your garage without you being in the car. 
• Uses radar, cameras and sonar to protect you from objects you can't see. The cameras can see stoplights, red lights and speed limit signs and take action based on those. 
• Two trunks (there's no engine)
• 250 mile range.
• Stereo that goes up to 11. It's cute and most people will like that, but I have an OCD thing about radio volume numbers and just knowing that it goes up to 11 might be enough to keep me from buying the car. 

Guns Kill

It seems like almost every day there's a tragic story involving mass shootings or some form of "gun violence". Shootings in movie theaters, schools and churches. These horrible acts strike fear in the hearts of the public. These stories are heartbreaking, especially when we have almost instant access to the life stories of everyone involved and frequently, videos of the attacks. It feels personal to a lot of us. 

Along with these new stories, there's always a fight between those calling for gun control and those who believe more guns would help thwart potential future attacks. In the last week, I've seen a lot of stories about how guns kill and America is so far behind the rest of the world on this issue. Even as a fairly right wing conservative who would own a gun if he felt he could do so responsibly, it's hard not to feel like we're doing something wrong as a country that's contributing to these attacks. The statistics thrown out by the news and activist groups are quite alarming. 

Before changing my mind and joining the anti-gun movement, I decided to do some research to see if this is in fact as bad as it sounds, or if it's just emotional response to emotional stories. I found that the CDC puts out extremely detailed information on the causes of deaths and injuries year by year and it's fascinating. I spent hours reading about how people die in our country. It's a bit morbid, but I think it's good information to have and could help you avoid joining the statistics. Every year in America roughly 2.5 million people die, here are the top 10 causes of death. 

Number of deaths for leading causes of death (2013 CDC)

• Heart disease: 611,105
• Cancer: 584,881
• Chronic lower respiratory diseases: 149,205
• Accidents (unintentional injuries): 130,557
• Stroke (cerebrovascular diseases): 128,978
• Alzheimer's disease: 84,767
• Diabetes: 75,578
• Influenza and Pneumonia: 56,979
• Nephritis, nephrotic syndrome, and nephrosis: 47,112
• Intentional self-harm (suicide): 41,149

The CDC estimates that almost 260,000 of those deaths are preventable. I would argue that it's significantly more than that. Cigarettes alone cause 480,000 deaths per year (including 41,000 deaths from second hand smoke). Obesity, unhealthy diets and lack of exercise cause even more deaths than cigarettes (there's definitely an overlap). Overall there were 821.5 deaths per 100,000 people in 2013, the worst since 2005, but significantly better than any year from 1940-2004. 

If I understand correctly, only two of the top 10 causes are not heavily influenced by obesity or smoking: accidents and suicide. The majority of accidents are from falls, drugs, car accidents and alcohol abuse. 

In 2013 there were 35,369 deaths as a result of car accidents (1/3 estimated to involve alcohol). This is significantly better than the average from 1962-2008. There were 46,471 deaths from drugs (0 from Marijuana)  and 29,001 from alcohol. 41,149 deaths were by suicide (21,175 from self inflicted gunshot wounds), a significant increase. Suicide, drug poisoning and older adult falls are the only categories that saw an increase in deaths since 2005. 

While that's all fascinating (at least to me), let's move on to gun violence. In 2013 there were 11,208 (3.5 per 100,000) homicides by gunshot. In terms of non-fatal injuries, in 2013 there were 62,220 injuries by gunshot (with intent to harm). That's less than half the amount of "Assault/Cut/Pierce" attacks and is not in the top 20 causes of injuries. Compare that with the roughly 2.3 million injuries as a result of car accidents (source: NHTSA). 

My takeaway from all these numbers is that there are a few major issues that need to be addressed to make our country safer, in this order:

1. Obesity: In addition to causing hundreds of thousands of deaths it increases insurance costs for private insurance purchasers (i.e. those of us not getting insurance from the government) by $1140 (heart.org) and costs our economy up to $250 billion. Only 20% of adults meet the federal guidelines for physical fitness.
2. Smoking: There's nothing redeeming about cigarette smoking. Not only does it kill hundreds of thousands of smokers a year, it also kills those who live around smokers. If you want something to go away, tax it. Cigarettes are already heavily taxed & smoking rates have gone down significantly, so why not tax it more? 
3. Drunk driving, distracted driving and overall vehicle safety: Up to 1/3 of car accidents are caused by drunk driving, killing and injuring millions. 17% of car accidents involve distracted driving. Car accidents are the leading cause of death for teens. They drive faster than adults, are less likely to use seat belts, and are more likely to be under the influence of alcohol. Technology is definitely contributing to accidents (e.g. texting and web surfing while driving), but it's also a big contributor to the decrease in car accidents and there's reason to expect huge improvements in the future. Features like blindspot detection systems, lane departure warning, adaptive cruise control and collision prevention systems like the autopilot feature on the Tesla model S promise to make driving safer for everyone. 
4. Drugs: The war on drugs is much derided and rightfully so. Marijuana is a relatively safe drug (safer than cigarettes and alcohol), drug dealers are not safe. People say that it's a gateway drug and it's true that many people move to heavier drugs, but that likely has more to do with the people than the drugs. Legalizing marijuana and having it sold by licensed stores, takes away the interaction with the drug dealers who push harder drugs. It can also provide quite a bit of tax revenue. T
5. Suicide: More people die in the US annually (41,149 in 2013, plus nearly 500 non-fatal injuries) from suicide than car accidents and the numbers are increasing. Clearly we need to get more serious about helping those with mental health issues. This could also help avoid future violent attacks and mass shootings. 

Gun violence is horrible, but it would seem that the attention it receives is disproportionate to the actual severity of the problem. It's extremely unlikely that you'll be shot and even less likely that you'll be shot randomly. Still, guns are powerful devices that can be deadly, not unlike cars. Before you can drive a car, you have to pass tests to show that you know the laws, why shouldn't that be the case for guns. A simple background check that can weed out violent ex-cons and people who have suspended drivers licenses for driving drunk and the like makes sense. I don't see why we force gun shops to do similar background checks and don't hold gun shows or private owners to the same standard. It also makes sense to have a short waiting period before one can buy their first gun. Why not have a simple test to show that the potential gun owner knows how to be responsible and safe? 

Some states already have laws like this and if I understand correctly getting a permit to carry a concealed weapon is significantly more difficult and holders of these permits are far less likely to commit violent crimes. Hopefully I'll link to sources for that later. I can make the case that there's no need for further restrictions. Why should buying a gun be more difficult than buying a car, they can both be used as weapons and it's probably easier to cause mass casualties with a car? The reason I don't take a hardline position like that (even though it has merit) is that we all gain by having reasonable safety requirements. Responsible gun owners have the most to lose by allowing irresponsible people to own guns. 

Guns are not inherently dangerous. They don't up and kill people on their own. Ignorant people and those with agendas want to ban guns and many gun owners see any new restrictions as a step towards the government taking away their guns.  

The good news is we have an excellent crop of politicians running for president in the 2016 election, so we have nothing to worry about. Oh wait, what? I wish I could run for president this election (I was planning on it, before I realized the minimum age was 35, not 32), the other candidates are so ridiculous that it's not inconceivable for a no-name random person to come in and win the election. Ok, maybe I'm not the most stable or responsible person, but I'd still take my chances against the circus candidates. 

Seeing that I won't be running for president, maybe I'll have time to write some new posts that actually have something to do with living in Israel.