Monsters.
POSTED BY: Wulfenstar
UPDATED: Wednesday, August 26, 2026 20:52
VIEWED: 14016
PAGE 19 of 25
"Any way you slice it, this person made a choice not to evolve, and they make that choice every day: Other people don't matter. Well, hell, if other people don't matter to them, I'm sorry, they don't matter to me."
The statistics re those who are in jail are pretty indicative that abuse does tend to lead to abusers.
The very rich have concerns all their own - and tend to not see most people as human at all - and they then pass this on to their chidren.
I don't know how anyone can 'decide' at an early age (2, or 3 at the most) whether or not other people 'mean' anything to them. It's far too early for them to be thinking per se. And once past that point, I'm not sure that empathy v none is under their control.
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Silence is consent.
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Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
sig,
if you don't want stuff like this to happen, don't support the institution.
Magonsdaughter,
I've heard this argument all my life, and I don't buy it. Here's why: I've watched it happen, a lot, and it doesn't look anything like this. The serial rapists, serial killers, and criminals I have known that do the most damage are golden boys who could do no wrong, not abused children. The abused children who commit crimes are often people who see power, they're a minority of people, but they're just like other people, they identify the source of power as abuse, and violence. These people bully and even kill, but they don't form packs and attack. Still, regardless of what someone has been through, I have no sympathy for these people at all. A monster is a monster regardless of how they were made. They value only one thing: Themselves.
More complicated characters are more complex. Tormented souls. They can be insane, violent or criminal, but they're not of the same stripe. I knew a kid who was abused, and very violent. He stabbed a girl, abused a young boy, was generally a destructive force, but he was a mess inside, not a gang organizer. He was constantly looking for outside approval, and then lashing back against those who didn't give it. The boy he abused grew up to be a much more serious abuser, but completely unsympathetic. He would rape and steal and rat on everyone. He was a master manipulator who cared about himself, and no one else. If you gave him your approval or a sign that you cared, then you were a sucker that could be easily manipulated, and he's gladly take you for all he could get.
Yeah, I get the point, monsters are made, not born, but still, there's a difference. Some people decide that the world consists of them, and long before anything happens to them, they're going to be liabilities. One part here I think Freud was right on: This is an early stage, and some people never get out of it. If later, that person discovers violence as the answer to problems, they will be a violent destroyer, if they see money as the power, they'll be an economic destroyer. Any way you slice it, this person made a choice not to evolve, and they make that choice every day: Other people don't matter. Well, hell, if other people don't matter to them, I'm sorry, they don't matter to me.
And people know that I have tolerance for a lot of things and have dealt with a lot of people with vary serious mental problems. This is about assholes. Their mental illness is selfishness, and they didn't learn that anywhere: we were all born with it, and the rest of us just got over it.
*some people encourage it, and create new useless people.
Well I think the evidence is oretty clear that most people who commit acts of violence have had a background of childhood abuse and/or neglect. The jail statistics are well documented. Doesn't mean that you will automatically be violent, but the causality is pretty strongly linked.
That's not to say people shouldn't be held responsible for their actions, that being abused as a child should be used as a defense - that's not what the author is saying either. But if we want to break the cycle of violence and abuse we have to start thinking a bit differently about crime and punishment. One of the major problems is the lack of rehabiliation that takes place in jails - in fact, people are hardened and trained into expert criminals by the time they have done their time. They've learnt more about how to use violence and abuse to survive and then let loose on society once again. Crazy stuff.
I don't hold with dehumanising anyone, not even Hitler or Stalin or Pol Pot who were responsible for monstrous deeds because that's exactly WHAT THEY DID and how they justified their own heinous deeds. Humanity is not all good - we need to take on board our own capacity for doing terrible stuff before we can start to fix things.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
I'm not saying that this works for everybody. SOME sociopaths are born and not made. But for the most part, behavior is a combination of inborn personality and environment. We can see this by the extreme differences in crime rates from one nation to the next. Shouldn't we try to change our environment so as not to create so many violent people?
I guess the only way they could be born sociopaths is brain damage - alcohol fetal syndrome, some inutero trauma perhaps. I still think it's unlikely - the 'empathy' wiring takes place after birth - and even missing neural pathways can be formed at least into your thirties and possibly longer.
Sociopaths are created - again, child abuse, neglect, war, early institutionalisation, exposure to drugs,alcohol, violence in the home. The infant is not soothed, does not learn to self soothe, does not learn to depend on another to meet basic needs of comfort, feeding, safety and love.
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Sociopaths are created. Psychopaths are born with chemical imbalances, or possibly brain damage. Either way, they're people who need help, understanding, and outreach. Eventually they can develop a sense of empathy.
That doesn't absolve them of the damage they cause to other people. Rape is horrible, and if any of these gang members are psychopaths or sociopaths, they should not just be forgiven for what they've done.
But I think it's far more useful to try to give psychopaths/sociopaths therapeutic treatment, instead of the usual crime prison recidivism cycle. And then, if they are able to demonstrate control over their tendencies, they should be given chances to have a life, because otherwise they're just driven to repeat offend.
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"I still think it's unlikely - the 'empathy' wiring takes place after birth - and even missing neural pathways can be formed at least into your thirties and possibly longer."
This is an intersting topic to me, which I will continue to think on for years to come.
Sociopaths apparently don't learn anything from punishment/ pain (not even avoidance). Though there is some thought that sociopaths are missing mirror neurons, it seems to me they are observant enough to be able to easily manipulate others. Maybe what they are missing is making the connection with pain - their own or others. And that leads to abhorant behavior that disregards the pain of others.
I think many that we might call sociopaths are latent normals though. What they have going on the some other over-riding concern - survival or affiliation for example - that blocks out the normal response to another person's pain.
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Quote:
I think many that we might call sociopaths are latent normals though. What they have going on the some other over-riding concern - survival or affiliation for example - that blocks out the normal response to another person's pain.
I do think that over-riding concerns can block empathy. Although I think we ought to be careful about calling some of these people latent normals, that almost suggests, without intervention, that all children would turn out like them.
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Quote:
That's not to say people shouldn't be held responsible for their actions, that being abused as a child should be used as a defense - that's not what the author is saying either.
Quote:Funny thing is, I even find the language all wrong. Holding? Defending? Absolving? Forgiving?
That doesn't absolve them of the damage they cause to other people. Rape is horrible, and if any of these gang members are psychopaths or sociopaths, they should not just be forgiven for what they've done.
That's not the point.
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I once wrote a paper (under a surname) on learned sociopathy as a defense mechanism and how that devolves within the institution of public school and creates, as some say... "monsters".
They learn it by emulating the successful and powerful people in our society, and once that path is trained in so deeply, it becomes the path of least resistance for them, especially the earlier they learned it.
That's DIFFERENT from someone born with a misfire, it's something treatable, but the earlier you get to it, the better chance of fixing it - especially if you don't amplify it by chemical suppression, causing an isometric escalation of the behavior.
The real irony of that paper, which was recieved about as well as you'd expect by folks who'll look for ANY excuse that doesn't involve their own complicity in the mess...
Was that I wrote the damn thing when I was thirteen and seeing the exact things I was writing of from point blank range every single day.
-Frem
"Your grievance shall be avenged!"
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Kathy
Quote:
The statistics re those who are in jail are pretty indicative that abuse does tend to lead to abusers.
not really. 1) abuse is very common among the non-criminal, and 2) playing up sympathy is the defense attorney's job.
Sig,
School. Also, listen to your inner Wulf. He may be wrong, or at least overly intense, but he's not 100% wrong. You're suggestion, when you add Wulfoid skepticism, results in Frem's world view, which is not that far off. The problem is that
1) yes, you're correct, we should design such a society... but
2) History has proven 100,000 times that peace society is fine until it meets violent society which kills it.
Any society with a better design plan will need to be able to defend itself. I just disagree that this defense will be guns in school. I don't actually see guns in my vision of the future, but I definitely do see their point.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:Quote:
That's not to say people shouldn't be held responsible for their actions, that being abused as a child should be used as a defense - that's not what the author is saying either.Quote:Funny thing is, I even find the language all wrong. Holding? Defending? Absolving? Forgiving?
That doesn't absolve them of the damage they cause to other people. Rape is horrible, and if any of these gang members are psychopaths or sociopaths, they should not just be forgiven for what they've done.
That's not the point.
I'm not sure I follow you.
I made damn sure that I don't ever forgive the shit I've done, and I'm a better person for it.
...I think.
Anyway, I wasn't talking about all that in the sense of punishment, 'cause I don't think that works.
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