He qualifies most as "disturbed" in one way or another, with a number of them seeking vengeance for some perceived alienation from society.Can we do a better job of noticing future killers? Mass murderers make a spectacle of themselves. There's no hiding, no evasion of responsibility. These are young men who choose to flame out. There's nothing complicated about dealing with them. We brand as evil monsters, and if they haven't already killed themselves, we suppress them forever, executing or imprisoning them for life.
"Predicting future activity and future dangerousness is inherently difficult, but nonetheless, we can identify people who are in some form of mental crisis and try to intervene early on," Scott explained....
Scott said part of the solution is paying more attention to mental health and helping these individuals before their actions turn deadly....
What is difficult is finding those who will act in the future, but here, not only are we uncertain who will end up where in the future, but there's a limit to how much you can intervene with someone who has not yet committed a crime.
And yet, there must be many things that we as a community can do for kids who become alienated and vengeful. At any school, the majority of children form circles of popularity, identifying normality in each other, and defining some as outsiders. This is a natural dynamic, but maybe, for our own protection, we should become more conscious and wary of it.
It's also natural for the weird kid to withdraw, to have his mother as an ally as he retreats into home-schooling, video games, and solitude. The "normal" kids are relieved to have him removed from their presence, and they don't know if he's off somewhere, hating them and plotting their murder.
I realize there's a risk of overreacting anyone who is introverted or awkward, but there must be ways to become more generous and inclusive toward the young outsider — ways that don't display fear or demand conformity.
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76 comments:
It seems like not making a spectacle of it would be the simple first step.
"[T]here must be ways to become more generous and inclusive toward the young outsider that don't display fear or demand conformity."
The best way has already been invented.
It's called "kindness."
So there have been 75 mass shootings since the 1960s and I bet at least 10% of the high school population is composed of introverted, awkward people. "Weird" is a subjective judgment and the "popular" kids make a great effort to be exclusionary and judgmental, otherwise they wouldn't be the "popular group". I don't think that most of the introverted, awkward kids want to be part of the "popular group" anyway, they just want to be respected for who they are, not shunned and ridiculed. If there is vengenance involved, I bet it is due to the lack respect, bullying and ridicule that they endure, and not from being excluded from the "in" group.
Not really. Jane Goodall's bonobos or Harvard Law School; it's all about the same.
Kids have social aggression. I think throwing them together in a big public school invites it. Lord of the Flies. the adults can go on as much as they want about civility and kindness, but this will still happen right under their noses. A lot of good kids who don't like it still stand by silent, afraid to become a target. Their silence is their complicity because they are buying a higher place in the pecking order.
Small is beautiful. Home schools or small schools.
Has anyone called into question mainstreaming?
@ Ann,
The reference to "homeschooling" doesn't make sense. Maybe I just missed your point.
Colombine killers weren't homeschooled - they shot up "their" schoolmates. As far as I know, Sandy Hook shooter shot up kids attending the school he'd attended years before.
@carrie I'm referring to the way all children, not merely the most popular group, form circles of popularity that shut other children out.
And I'm saying that however popular they are, children who are anything but the least popular, are part of a dynamic that has a risk to it. These children should become aware of the risk they are part of creating, If they are "exclusionary and judgmental," maybe they should be more insightful. It would be good for their development too.
Chimps in the wild used to have to spend sll day gathering enough calories and surviving. Human societies crept close, preserves are set up, and they are fed. Now they meet their caloric and nutritional needs quickly...and they spend their free time in social aggression and making each other's life hell.
So, maybe it's a sign of prosperity as measured by caloric abundance.
I read somewhere recently about the concept of "deinstitutionalization." Use your search engine to learn more.
It seems to me that these are what people in the old days called "bad seeds." Whether there are more of them now then in the past is a question. But society today surely treats these people differently, with much more latitude.
These horrible mass murderers don't just wake up one morning and decide to kill a bunch of people. Their anger and enmity has built up over years, and SOMEONE surely must have observed it. By letting it go, by turning their heads, they share some of the blame.
People with clear behavioral problems must be dealt with; they cannot be ignored or else Newtown or Aurora or Columbine will happen again and again.
I know I'll be accused of "blaming the victim." But who is the victim? I'm trying to head off victimhood. At some stage the "mean kids" are perpetrators, perpetrators of non-crimes, of course, and if later they are murdered, we see them as the beautiful, golden children we have lost. Their goodness and the outsider's evil are sharp and clear at that point and that is all we see. I'm saying: look at an earlier point.
Ann, it has been awhile since you had kids in junior high, hasn't it? Insightful? This seems beyond the range of possibility for the average 7th or 8th grader.
I don't have any answers, other than that evil always exists.
Some kids are just nasty little shits, as we all know, and I can 100% see them adapting nice well meaning guidance counselor lessons on inclusiveness into menacing whispers to the weird kid that "we had to invite you or they said you'd pull a Sandy Hook," which seems counterproductive at best.
I do like what Liz mentions about smaller social circles for kids. More intimacy. Might not be bad. Although it only takes three kids for one to be the unchosen, uncool one.
Hmmm. As a white male who as a teen played video games, I feel like I'm being profiled here like the flying Imams were.
Part of this is the change in society. Instead of the young white males all being off in the armed forces, farm fields or factories working off some of that energy in physical pursuits, most today sit around for hours on end "shooting people" in video games.
And in doing so create neural pathways to the activity of aiming and pulling a trigger while at the same time desensitizing themselves to the concept.
Also, how many of these kids are products of a divorced household or one without a father?
There have always been the nutcases like the guy in Bath, Michigan who blew up the school back in the 1920's, but I think we've created a lot more of these type of people than existed 30 years ago.
"Ann, it has been awhile since you had kids in junior high, hasn't it? Insightful? This seems beyond the range of possibility for the average 7th or 8th grader."
Children are very intelligent, especially emotionally. You'd be surprised. Talk to them. Your disparagement of the young is very ugly, and I'm ashamed of you.
"Hmmm. As a white male who as a teen played video games, I feel like I'm being profiled here like the flying Imams were."
Well, I think there is a big problem of schools treating young masculinity as abnormal and in need of correction. They should do a much better job of understanding young males. Making them more like stereotypical girls is not the way.
@Ann but there's a limit to how much you can intervene with someone who has not yet committed a crime.
You intervene not because they may commit crime. You intervene because they need help and they are sick.
There's a danger here, of reviving the old anonymous denunciation. Those in charge of verifying same may take it on themselves to 'err on the side of safety', making life hell for introverts. Who wants that?
"The reference to "homeschooling" doesn't make sense. Maybe I just missed your point."
Adam Lanza was -- if the last report I read is correct -- homeschooled by a mother who removed him from a school that she didn't think was serving his needs.
There are many reasons to homeschool, and it can be done well or badly.
My point -- which also applies to videogames -- is that we've set things up to facilitate retreat, and the outsiders (with mother's help) can take that option. It's an easy option and it serves the interests of those made uncomfortable by the presence of the outsider type.
It's a dynamic.
Just pointing it out.
If kids like this are isolated at home, there's less chance of adults other than the parents seeing that help is needed.
The parent may want to protect this child and may fall into some outre ideation.
Adam Lanza was pronounced "brilliant" -- a "brilliant, brilliant" child.
That's an idea mother can treasure as she cocoons at home.
I'm not saying this is what is happening with all homeschoolers, of course.
There is a certain irony with so much attention lately on bullying and yet none of these shooters would have qualified as a "bully"
What a bunch of rot, Ann.
We don't owe them anything. We are not obliged to make friends with creepy people.
There is no way to stop murderers that plot surprise and ambush. We cannot live in a way that keeps all evil away.
The best we can do is defend ourselves when someone tries to murder.
Wow, "awkward loner" could have described both me and my son. I think carrie's comment is spot on.
I went to a small parochial elementary school, with the same kids in the class through eighth grade. There was no bullying, if one doesn't count the nuns. Mostly kidding.
Then I went to a large public High School where my classes were all with the smart kids. No bullying, I didn't know most of my class of 502 students, no surprise.
My son went through the public school system here, and there was a fair amount of bullying. Karate lessons kept him from being a popular victim once we saw what was going on. One can't stop being part Asian, nor can one stop being intelligent. It wasn't until he went to college that he blossomed socially.
So, I'm going to be careful about the labelling.
I think the Japanese have it right. They taught morals in elementary school. There isn't much talk about responsibilities anymore, it's all rights. You have to have both.
The other thing the Japanese are big on is group activities. It's a lot tougher to be left out unless it's your choice.
I have no easy answers.
I agree that we aren't allowing young males to be masculine so to speak. That's where I go back to the point of physical labor.
I did a job in my teens and college years that at times required a lot of physical labor with other guys (warehouse and delivery). It was a good way to get all that energy out and common for most of us back then. You could have done yard work, factory work, farm work, etc.
The exact type of work didn't matter. But the fact you were on your feet a lot and lifting things or sweeping and the like was good activity that tired you out and took the testosterone edge off. And again you did it with other males, which created a socialization pattern that was beneficial.
That outlet does not exist anymore for a number of reasons. And it needs to come back.
Some people have inborn quirks that there is nothing you can do about. They were just born that way.
Others may be all right, or even exceptionally good people, and then something happens, perhaps a physical injury like a blow to the head, perhaps something mental like a bad divorce or getting fired, and their personality totally changes, and again, there is nothing you, or anyone else, can do about it.
It just is what it is.
Wow, "awkward loner" could have described both me and my son. I think carrie's comment is spot on.
I went to a small parochial elementary school, with the same kids in the class through eighth grade. There was no bullying, if one doesn't count the nuns. Mostly kidding.
Then I went to a large public High School where my classes were all with the smart kids. No bullying, I didn't know most of my class of 502 students, no surprise.
My son went through the public school system here, and there was a fair amount of bullying. Karate lessons kept him from being a popular victim once we saw what was going on. One can't stop being part Asian, nor can one stop being intelligent. It wasn't until he went to college that he blossomed socially.
So, I'm going to be careful about the labelling.
I think the Japanese have it right. They taught morals in elementary school. There isn't much talk about responsibilities anymore, it's all rights. You have to have both.
The other thing the Japanese are big on is group activities. It's a lot tougher to be left out unless it's your choice.
I have no easy answers.
The schizophrenic break from reality happens in a clear and easy to spot way in the early 20s
why we allow it to go on is the question. an acceptance of goths, tattoo and piercing freaks, and druggies is our excuse for the maniacs among us being seen as acceptable.
we need some adults in authority.
"There is a certain irony with so much attention lately on bullying and yet none of these shooters would have qualified as a "bully"
More likely these shooters are often the victims of bullies, or the lesser form of bullying, social ostracism.
I'm also concerned, Ann, that you act as though society, whatever that is, has a right to tell parents how to raise their children.
The government creates their own schools, which by almost any measurement are terrible, and makes the cost of private school prohibitive for most people.
Those who don't like having their children in a gun-free murder zone, or being indoctrinated in government approved learning programs are forced to choose homeschooling as the only viable alternative.
The schizophrenic break from reality happens in a clear and easy to spot way in the early 20s
why we allow it to go on is the question. an acceptance of goths, tattoo and piercing freaks, and druggies is our excuse for the maniacs among us being seen as acceptable.
we need some adults in authority.
Professor Scott poses the core of our problem with outliers. His extensive experience with law enforcement lets him know that "enforcement" per se will not stop a mass killer. We need to do more to ameliorate the problem, such as devise "safety nets" for the factors that allow the incidents to occur. In the main I agree with him. I certainly am not sure how we do that, however.
Therefore I am puzzled/disappointed by his comment that weapons and ammunition are easier to acquire today. This is simply not true. He is younger than I am, I presume, so he might not know it...but in the time frame he cites from 1960 to today, "gun control" laws have multiplied since the 40's and 50's of my youth. It is puzzling why his police experience didn't inform him on the acquisition factor.
In my view, the problem is lack of respect for existing laws, by citizens and by the federal government. When you set up a "sting" that requires your non-police participants to break multiple laws, then the government itself is committing crime. Yet, we expect Joe Sixpack to respect the same laws?
If I buy a case or two of some given ammunition, (for target shooting, I no longer hunt)I have to document why I am doing so, with a legitimate reasons, and that record goes to a state and federal database. Even with a CPL if I deign to purchase two or more pistols in a single transaction, I have more forms to fill out and sign, both of which go to state and federal authorities.
Back in the 50's and early 60's at 18 I could buy multiple cases of ammo and shotguns of my choice with zero paperwork. In the mid-60's once 21 I could buy 20mm semi-automatic anti-tank rifle or a working mortar kit with virtually no hassle. That changed in 1968.
Today? I can purchase several hundred pounds of Ammonium Nitrate and several gallons of diesel with less hassle than any sidearm or long gun. I don't object to the current gun laws on the books, so long as most people respect them. I'm very unlikely to support more of the same.
Finally, some 700 or so persons being killed in mass attacks since 1960 or there abouts amounts annually to less persons killed than on a hot summer afternoon or night in Detroit or Chicago.
My question: why isn't the literally daily carnage in urban areas covered by TV and sundry media as feverishly as the incidents of tragic mass killings? Why is no one in media asking why the KIA rate for US servicemen and women in Afghanistan has doubled in the past 3 years out of the 10 total years? Back in the day when I enlisted (1968) TV had body counts of dead Yanks on the nightly news at 6:00 PM...every fricking day.
Some one mentioned that the coverage of these mass murders might be "entertainment"...and you know what, given what the media doesn't cover as feverishly, I think they might be right.
Are we now a nation of sick puppies?
I say they want notariety, not revenge.
Which is what is offered every time.
I realize there's a risk of overreacting anyone who is introverted or awkward, but there must be ways to become more generous and inclusive toward the young outsider — ways that don't display fear or demand conformity.
How about recycling plastic bags?
This sure sounds like a recipe for superficial band-aid measures, probably expensive, which might help people like Ann feel better but will do almost no good for the young people involved and, if I had to bet, will probably make their troubled lives more difficult.
Any intervention from the outside upsets the family balance. I caught hell from my mother when my third-grade teacher took an interest in whether I was being abused or neglected at home.
99.99% of the young people like Adam Lanza do not go on murderous killing sprees. Unless psychologists develop some remarkably accurate tests for picking out those who will, this seems hopelessly naive.
Otherwise, we are left with the general problem of dealing with the oceans of suffering experienced by children growing into potentially troubled adults. I would love to help them all, but I don't know where we start.
Imagine no religion. It isn't hard to do.
Imagine no sin, no ultimate punishment.
Imagine no teaching of virtue, and instead rewarding self-love ("esteem").
Imagine two awkward geeks marrying each other, and raising him to believe he is superior to all those assholes.
There is absolutely no way for this to be prevented from happening again. But I guess it gives pointy heads a sense that if they analyze it every whichaway they're doing something useful. They're not.
Instead imagine no mention of the shooter, other than calling him "the asshole who did this".
Teenage suicides have the same effect.
The TV applause for teenage candlelight vigils soothes the soap opera demand and then, like clockwork, more local suicides come on its heels.
Rhhardin is right. Shun the TV shows that do this, boycott them, and it'll help.
"You intervene not because they may commit crime. You intervene because they need help and they are sick."
Who is the "you" here? The govt can't intervene simply on the basis of someone "needing help" or being perceived as "sick."
There's this vague notion that "helping" is good, but we are not empowered to intrude on people because we're motivated by "helping."
There's a such thing as individual autonomy, and that must be respect as we think about what could be done in the case of persons who have not committed crimes.
Mom was prepping for Armageddon, it appears, hence the weapons were in fact hers.
And Armageddon she got.
I can only guess as to the dinner conversations this young man engaged in. Paranoid already, her interpretation of current events -although not rare- certainly fueled his fever.
Maybe he imagined himself Holden Caulfield, catching the kids in the rye, saving them from having to live through Armageddon, like a psychotic Mom who kills her own children to take them to heaven.
I wonder whether we'll ever know how many of those 75 shooters were being "treated" with psychotropic medications?
"I say they want notariety, not revenge..
They want to confirm their documents are official?
I keed, I keed.
Some years ago I wanted to do something for young kids who might be able to use a sympathetic adult.
I called the local Big Brother chapter and offered to help. I was told that the waiting list was full, but if I wanted to send them money I could do that.
Talk of "teaching morals" and needing "adults in authority" completely misses the point: these mass killers are mentally ill, emotionally disturbed, or otherwise cognitively damaged individuals who are frustrated, angry, and in pain from loneliness, isolation, failure to assimilate with their peers or to achieve desired success in academics, work, or in relationships with others. Their failure to connect successfully with the world around them is a torment to them, and they come to hate themselves and the world they see as the source of their misery. They determine to end their own pain and punish the world in the process.
This combination of anger and pain with mental illness or cognitive damage is not an absolute predictor of potentially criminal violence--heck, this combination can also be a spur to creativity or other worldly successes, even if not happiness--but these persons are scarcely apt to be amenable to notions of "morality" or authority, or to fear punishment.
If they can be detected before they act out, perhaps psychiatric intervention may help them to greater or lesser degree, but nothing else will ameliorate that torment within them that will drive them to obliterate the existence that is torture to them.
"but these persons are scarcely apt to be amenable to notions of "morality" or authority, or to fear punishment"
In this you are completely and utterly wrong.
The amoral environment these young men inhabit shapes their worldview, as solipsism is encouraged rather than rejected. Think 200 million dead under the atheists of communism, and the continued corruption in post-communist Russia and China.
And for their inner lives, to suggest that the depressed and tormented cannot benefit from religion is just stupid. Christianity is based in part on bringing such people back to God's love.
I know I shouldn't respond to Mary...
Medicine may stabilize a child's emotions, but a good foster family/family member willing to open their arms is everything to the answer. Every person needs people to rely on as an adult in a time need/emergency. Children/teens must have a social support they can trust and be there for them.
When people grow up in living situations where they can trust no one, well... financial affluence and all the survival skills in the world are no substitute to it.
"He qualifies most as 'disturbed' in one way or another, with a number of them seeking vengeance for some perceived alienation from society."
Maybe we could stop fetishizing alienation in our popular culture. People give the real thing a try and discover it doesn't make them cool -- it just makes them alieanated.
leslyn said...
One thing he might have taken into account is the assault weapons ban, which expired after 10 years. Also, "cop killer" ammunition wasn't available in earlier years.
One way to signal to the world that you know nothing about guns or gun laws is to mention "cop killer" ammunition. Thanks for playing, though.
I think we forget the old trusim about the child being father to the man.
A lot of mean kids (maybe not all) grow into mean people. A lot of the quiet kids stay that way. This is the way society is and it's going to be this side of impossible to change it.
Problem is, most of these murderers were spotted by most of their acquaintances long before the incident. They stand out because they're more than just quiet or withdrawn. Look at the pictures of our latest cutthroat. He had the same look as the psycho who led the Heaven's Gate fanatics.
carrie said...
So there have been 75 mass shootings since the 1960s and I bet at least 10% of the high school population is composed of introverted, awkward people.
It's a lot more than 10, I'm betting.
The Colorado shooter had been identified as a threat by the school psychiatrist yet no one was able to prevent the shooting at the Aurora Movie theater.
In a free society it seems to be impossible to prevent these tragedies.
There's a huge disparity between the hatefulness of this crime and the hatefulness of the perpetrator. The kid who did this looks frail and lost and ineffectual. You want to hate him, but there's not enough there to hate.....Well, I know how the dynamics of this works. All the torrents of hate that this god awful crime has generated will be redirected towards the NRA and the Republican Party......Just as a matter of conjecture, I wonder why Aridog feels that a 20mm antitank rifle would be protective, fun, or useful.
Leslyn...It is possible Prof Scott was thinking of the Assault Weapon Ban. If so, he should know that the weapon ban served virtually no good purpose...it "banned" symptoms only....no true assault weapon operates the same way the civilian Rambo specials do.
I will confess, humbly, that I don't really know what "cop killer" ammunition is today...never had any interest in it. In my days toting assault weapons around we figured full metal jacket and/or armor piercing rounds were good enough for whatever needed killing.
Today, mostly I shoot wad cutters or hardball (FMJ .45 caliber pistol rounds) at paper targets....or 12 Ga AA target loads for trap shooting. I'm even okay with the "green" lead free issues...it makes the competition hit the targets solidly, no points for one pellet dingers :-)).
When I was in seventh grade I moved to a new school where I had the misfortune of resembling the previous victim of middle school cruelty. I immediately took his place. I was daily tormented by a a band of "cool" kids, and after two years of it, I was nearly suicidal. I finally told my dad, an elementary school principal, about my pain. My dad told me to fight back physically. I had eschewed this for years, sincerely believing that fighting wasn't the answer. After that, if somebody pushed me, they got punched. One kid threw a basketball in my face and I chased him down and beat him up. Things improved steadily after that. By the time I was a senior, I was "cool", and my tormentors were fading into obscurity.
I go into autobiography to make a point. If a kid fights today he is suspended, and there is no "self defense" plea. A repeat merits expulsion. The world of school children has been feminized to the point that kids like I was are submerged in victimhood, never to surface again. My father, God bless him, understood human nature, something today's educators have no place for.
leslyn said...
Aridog said,
I am puzzled/disappointed by [Professor Scott's] comment that weapons and ammunition are easier to acquire today.
One thing he might have taken into account is the assault weapons ban, which expired after 10 years. Also, "cop killer" ammunition wasn't available in earlier years.
"Assault" weapons are full automatic by definition. What the shooter used was a semiautomatic rifle with a high capacity magazine.
"cop killer" bullets. all ammunition has the potential to be a cop killer.
Banning any of those real things-not buzzwords- wouldn't have changed a thing.
Now it turns out the mother of the nutjob BOUGHT THE GUNS he used to kill her and the others. And she also took him to the gun range! He had known mental illnesses and she did that.
He was rejected when he tried to buy his own guns. So how is 'gun control' gonna stop that?
We need nut control, not gun control.
"My father, God bless him, understood human nature, something today's educators have no place for."
More likely, your father worked in a time preceding the bureaucratization of the school systems and the litigiousness of the parents, and he was more concerned with your being able to overcome your problem and not at all concerned with the potential for lawsuits.
"Now it turns out the mother of the nutjob BOUGHT THE GUNS he used to kill her and the others. And she also took him to the gun range! He had known mental illnesses and she did that."
1.) She was apparently a gun enthusiast and she bought those guns for her own use.
2.) The reporting that he practiced with these (or other) guns at the local gun range are being withdrawn as erroneous.
3.) He had Asperger's Syndrome, which is not "mental illness," as such, but is a cognitive or learning disability, on the high end of the autism spectrum.
Aridog,
"Cop killer" ammunition is out of fashion any more or may even havee been outlawed.
Back when, it referred to some sort of teflon coated bullets that was supposed to be able to pierce the early armored vests in use then, however, I believe this was proved to be entirely advertising hype; the rounds were not any deadlier than any other FMJ on the market.
(However, one could reasonably wonder a little about the state of mind of people who would buy ammo with such advertising.)
AriDog,
"If I buy a case or two of some given ammunition ... I have to document why I am doing so, with a legitimate reasons"
Wow. That must be a MI thing, we don't have to do that here in WA. (Nor Federal, I buy from places like CTD and all they want to know is am I over 21.)
"and that record goes to a state and federal database"
No to the federal part.
leslyn,
The AWB had absolutely no impact on crime, nor did its sunsetting. Perhaps you're unaware of what the AWB actually banned?
My question: why isn't the literally daily carnage in urban areas covered by TV and sundry media as feverishly as the incidents of tragic mass killings? Why is no one in media asking why the KIA rate for US servicemen and women in Afghanistan has doubled in the past 3 years out of the 10 total years? Back in the day when I enlisted (1968) TV had body counts of dead Yanks on the nightly news at 6:00 PM...every fricking day.
because we've gotten used to nightly crimes... to paraphrase "Dirty Laundry" it's interesting when (masses of) people die
Skyler...
What a bunch of rot, Ann.
We don't owe them anything. We are not obliged to make friends with creepy people.
People like you that generate mass murderers.
Sabinal: Yes.
Crunching the numbers, 75 mass shootings over 50 years averages out to, say, 20 people per year. Meanwhile, approximately 13,000 Americans are being murdered every year.
Do we only care if people are killed a dozen or two at a time, as opposed to one or two at a time?
Unless there is some diagnostic magic bullet for singling out these mass shooters before they act, mass shootings are not the low hanging fruit for society to focus on to save lives.
creely - can a society tolerate a mass shooting of little kids even once a decade? There is a reason certain types of incidents make us recoil in horror while others make us yawn.
Some Famous Introverts
Albert Einstein
Warren Buffet
Fredric Chopin
Charles Darwin
Mahatma Gandhi
Al Gore
Isaac Newton
Larry Page
Rosa Parks
Eleanor Roosevelt
J.K. Rowling
Steven Spielberg
Steve Wozniak
Clint Eastwood
David Letterman
Carl Jung
From Wikipedia (Extraverion and Introversion)
“Rather than focusing on interpersonal behavior, however, Jung defined introversion as an "attitude-type characterised by orientation in life through subjective psychic contents" (focus on one's inner psychic activity); and extraversion as "an attitude type characterised by concentration of interest on the external object", (the outside world).”
“The common modern perception is that introverts tend to be more reserved and less outspoken in groups. They often take pleasure in solitary activities such as reading, writing, using computers, hiking and fishing. The archetypal artist, writer, sculptor, engineer, composer and inventor are all highly introverted.”
“Introversion is not seen as being identical to shy or to being a social outcast. Introverts prefer solitary activities over social ones, whereas shy people (who may be extroverts at heart) avoid social encounters out of fear, and the social outcast has little choice in the matter of his or her solitude.”
We don't owe them anything. We are not obliged to make friends with creepy people.
Well, I think Ann was making a suggestion, not creating an obligation.
I myself favor being more generous and inclusive if possible, but damn that's not easy, and if you've ever dealt with seriously screwed up people, you know how hard it is to make a positive difference.
You also know that you've put yourself on their radar and if these people go wonky, you could be a target.
creely - can a society tolerate a mass shooting of little kids even once a decade? There is a reason certain types of incidents make us recoil in horror while others make us yawn.
Alex: Assuming you're sincere, and you're such double moby most of the time that it's pointless to read you, much less respond, sure.
It's obvious that this is just another senseless horror served up in the news and we'll be quaffing egg nog and opening Christmas present per usual next week.
creely - you're wrong. unless you're a total sociopath, you carry with you the baggage of your own life's traumas and the horrors you've heard about on the news. I know I do. I don't magically have a compassion switch that I can turn on and off during the holidays.
Alex said...
There is a reason certain types of incidents make us recoil in horror while others make us yawn.
I agree and that is part of the problem. If we can mentally or physically "stand off" far enough, then it's not our problem...and yes, "yawn."
Example: Does anyone (I may be forgetting?) recall US national revulsion over the Halabja massacre in 1988 Iraq...5000+ people (Kurds) gassed to death, by Iraqis, with a mix of gases: mustard gas and the nerve agents sarin and tabun, possibly combined with hydrogen cyanide?
I don't recall any uproar...in fact I think our officials tried to blame it on the Iranians IIRC.
I think you have a point about murders en'mass at a singular location versus high numbers spread over time and space. Actually, we kill off more monthly in most urban areas but it gets far less attention. If in a far away place, nearly no attention. I think it is more like we are the gawkers at bloody accidents than morally concerned...after all, it wasn't "our people" who did this, right?
We even celebrate movies illustrating hate based murders, as a recent Tarantino piece of fiction as feces film. It amuses me that Jamie Foxx is asserting his ultimate blackman authenticity, all the while playing an Oreo guy in "Django Unchained"....most mass murderers have been white, right?
People will pay good money to see ole Django get righteous...and Foxx will explain his blackness some more just in case the majority white population that has made him right don't get it. I mean does he think 12% of the population has paid his way all this time?
No, we are fucked up nation of people who can't resist bloody messes and just have to gawk or make up some for theater.
Always has perplexed me that these guys who just wanna go out and kill just don't enlist in infantry and feel it...you know, when the other guys can shoot back. Fortunately, our military would generally not enlist these psychopaths.
@ Ann,
Thanks for the clarification about the referenced to homeschooling. You've read deeper into it than I have, which is why I didn't pick up the connection.
You're talking about a homeschooling scenario I've seen first hand - the mother who insists upon homeschooling because she wants to protect her child(ren) from the influences of the world. Though in those scenarios, the issues were more with the moms than the kids.
Alex: I can tolerate a bee sting. I don't like it and it ruins a slice of my day. Others, however, can't tolerate a bee sting. They go into shock and some may even die.
That's what I mean when I say society can tolerate the CT mass killing. We will not go into shock; we will not die.
We won't do much about it after the palaver dies down except maybe pass some law that will make it harder to get guns or require people to do more paperwork of some sort.
And my bet is that you will celebrate Christmas pretty much the same way you did last year.
"Back in the day when I enlisted (1968) TV had body counts of dead Yanks on the nightly news at 6:00 PM...every fricking day."
The purpose of that at the time was purely propagandistic: announce the day's (or the week's) American deaths as contrasted with the (usually or always) greater number of deaths of the enemy as a means of scorekeeping. 40 American dead this week vs. 230 VC dead: we're winning! Of course, it was mostly BS, as any Vietnames killed was counted as "VC" casualties.
The non-reporting of body counts today also serves a purpose: it's to keep our wars and their consequences out of public consciousness so we don't get exercised enough about them to demand a halt to them.
Cookie, I believe your heart is pure, and that you believe what you say.
Maybe because you've been saying it to yourself for way too many years?
Not unlike those of us who repeat the ten commandments or the golden rule?
Not unlike those who pray for better outcomes.
It's become part of our "ritual".
Here's the thing, Cook. Can you "contemplate" that Americans no longer have a conscience that extends beyond "How's this working out for ME"?
The non-reporting of body counts today also serves a purpose: it's to keep our wars and their consequences out of public consciousness so we don't get exercised enough about them to demand a halt to them.*
* Now that a Democrat is in the White House.
There were plenty of body counts, some wildly exaggerated, in the news when Bush was President.
About the only good thing to come out of Obama's presidency is the indisputable proof that almost all Democrats and liberals are utter hypocrites.
Another 'fed up with the NRA' liberal
How soon before an angry liberal "pops off" and starts shooting?
Alex accused, "People like you that generate mass murderers."
Wrong. It's people like me who are more likely to stop them.
Mass murderers are exceedingly rare. They are free citizens and free to go about their daily business just like the rest of us until they become a mass murderer. It is only at this point they anyone can do anything about them.
Since we can't identify them and can't stop them, I will choose to associate with my own friends. Creepy people are free to be creepy and I am free to stay away from them. The idea that anyone can or should be coerced to associate with people they do not choose to associate with is slavery and totalitarianism.
The enemy has been identified and it's the NRA. We must destroy them and then we will pick the next target and the next and the next.
NRA is the left's Emmanuel Goldstein.
"There were plenty of body counts, some wildly exaggerated, in the news when Bush was President."
Not recited daily on the evening news as was true in Viet Nam. The placement of our wars out of sight and at a distance from the American public has been continued by the Obama administration but began under Bush's presidency.
"About the only good thing to come out of Obama's presidency is the indisputable proof that almost all Democrats and liberals are utter hypocrites."
Ha! A sophistry. While no doubt true, it is easily as true of Republicans and conservatives. (It's called partisanship.) However, you, as (presumably) a Republican and/or conservative, already assumed it to be so, and Democrats/liberals don't see it that way at all.
So, there has been no change in the public's views regarding Dems/liberals. Those who like 'em (or are them) still think them to be peachy keen, and your like continues to deplore them.
Alex said...
Another 'fed up with the NRA' liberal
Never let a crisis, or tragedy, go to waste...that is the mantra of the left.
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