Zero Tolerance vs Sane Society.

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My father tells me that when he went to school, lots of high school kids drove pickups with shotgun racks on them onto school grounds, and they'd frequently go out after school and on weekends to target practice with rifles out in the Everglades.

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Yup. It was that way when I went to high school. Hell, damn near EVERY pickup had a gun rack, and usually a shotgun AND a deer rifle stowed in them. Never heard of a shooting in that school, and that was a school with over 1400 students.

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I'm not convinced by Ames arguments, but then I haven't read his book.

That being said - the incident described sounds utterly ridiculous - what a way to educate a 6 year old, who'd be probably be struggling to find his lunch utensil in a bag let alone use it for a heinous act. Stupid stuff.

I don't think you can blame workplace or school culture for the mass shootings that happen, unless you are intend to look deeper at the culture that might foster people developing sociopathic tendencies that lead them to kill indiscriminately.

My understanding is that people who murder others in such a manner (I'll leave aside the so called crimes of passion) or who kill for pleasure, are not just pissed off with society, or feeling lonely or trapped. Many, many people fee that way but don't conduct themselves in that manner. People who do such things have had some sort of childhood developmental experience that has means that their neurons don't fire properly. Basically, they lack empathy for others, have poor impulse control and experience some sort of ongoing inner rage that is not related to their current circumstances. Some of the childhood experiences might typically have caused this psychological damage might include sexual or physical abuse, neglect, not bonding with a primary carer because they live in foster homes or orphanages, or have been moved from one carer to another. It might also include brain trauma as a result of a difficult birth or accident. Not all people who experience these difficulties within the first few years of their life will go on to murder, because there are other factors - including genetic at play.

It can be true that some societies produce more sociopaths than others. Societies where there has been the massive disruption of war is one example - especially if casualties are large and there are lots of orphaned children. Other societal causes might include things like weak family and community structures, absence of some form of welfare net, limited access to pre and post natal care and other health services, both parents having to work long hours and children being in care long hours, especially substandard care.

Basically it's about how well parents parent -especially in the early years. Does society structures support parents in their good nurturing of children, or does it hinder them? In that way, workplaces can impact upon people's behaviour, but it's in an indirect rather than direct way.

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It can be true that some societies produce more sociopaths than others.

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And we happen to be one of them. All you have to do is look at our crime rate versus Europe to figure that out.

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It would be hard to determine percentage wise which places have more sociopaths that others. I don't know of any research on this. I'm not sure you could specifically separate North America from other Western nations, altoughI know you have a lot more gun murders and larger prison populations - but some of that latter is at least to do with your sentencing. I think in terms of

Sociopathy doesn't always result in crime, either. Stuff I've read suggests that sociopaths are very good at climbing to the top of corporate ladders.

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Originally posted by Kwicko:

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Even if the motive and outcome is exactly the same? He wanted to hurt people by hurting their children. He succeeded. I'm not sure how that lessens the impact of his deeds. That seems awfully close to dismissing McVeigh's act as unsuccessful because it was a "protest" of big government.

Does the motive lessen the tragedy?

Mike

The percentage you're paying is too high-priced
While you're living beyond all your means;
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car
From the profit he's made on your dreams

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Hello Mike,

I didn't mean to reject the comparison because it didn't match a scale of tragedy. Rather, it wasn't violence committed by youths, which is the focus of my discussion here. I would consider 9/11 to be equally irrelevant to child violence, and our society's distrust of children to the point where they can't bring eating utensils to school (or an asprin, for that matter.)

--Anthony



"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

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Originally posted by AnthonyT:
Hello Mike,

I didn't mean to reject the comparison because it didn't match a scale of tragedy. Rather, it wasn't violence committed by youths, which is the focus of my discussion here. I would consider 9/11 to be equally irrelevant to child violence, and our society's distrust of children to the point where they can't bring eating utensils to school (or an asprin, for that matter.)

--Anthony

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Ah - I see. I think I misunderstood where you were headed. Sorry 'bout that.

Carry on.

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It would be hard to determine percentage wise which places have more sociopaths that others. I don't know of any research on this.

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I got thirty some years of empirical stuff on it, and Andrew Vachss and Dr. Bruce Perry have far more legal and technical research on the matter.

Part of the problem is that by accident or design, our current structure is almost tailor made to produce at the very least partial or compensated sociopaths, and it churns them out at a rate that is appalling.

One factor to this is how the social structure we "teach" in schools is so counter to the basic nature of humans that have had ANY primary caregiver attachment at all, that the contrary messages from their own instincts and what they're being taught about how to function and achieve in our society impact each other and tend to cause psychological aberration - and often as not cause we don't wanna ADMIT that, we find other causes to blame, medicate them, punish them, and in extremis, till recently, sent them to the youth equivalent of concentration camps, therefore out-selecting and effectively weeding out the most humane amongst us.

Seriously, when you got a kid who's instincts say love and trust, and who's being taught hate and betray - it's GOING to cause some mental static.

There's also that our child-rearing practices on a black pedagogy or authoritarian model are a contributor to the problem.
(See Also: Alice Miller)

But mostly it is that a childs first social environment here in the US is very psychologically destructive in a way that tends to cause sociopathy as a direct result, whether it's intentional or not.

There's TONS of research and fieldwork out there related to this, it's just that no one seems to care because children have a lower social and legal status here than housepets - a lack of personal respect that also impacts them negatively from puberty to adulthood, and leaves a taste for vengance in many cases of individuals already suffering aberration, and thus, someone to "blame" for their troubles.

Like I said, I could go on for weeks - but Vachss, Perry and Miller do a far better job of explaining it than I would.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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