I sat down a few moments ago to write a post about some of my thoughts in relation to the South Carolina mother who killed her two young boys Monday morning. However, upon further reflection, I am not going to go down the road I had first intended. While I may write on that theme later today, I wanted instead to focus on an aspect of heinous crimes that I've discussed before in this venue.
After crimes of this nature are committed and beyond the calls of condemnation, the thing that most civilized people do is to ask questions. How could someone do such a thing? What were they thinking? Why didn't they reach out for help?
In answer to questions of this type, most of us self-righteously proclaim that, if we were in a similar situation or faced likewise circumstances, there is no way in the world WE could even imagine following this horrible course of action. We are different from THOSE kind of people.
I happen to believe that such sentiments are not true, not true at all. In my estimation, what frightens us the most is that we can AND have envisioned acts just as horrible and gruesome as those we read about or see in the news. Deep down, we understand there is a very thin line between thinking about revenge and retaliation...and actually carrying it out.
What do I base such a bold assertion on? Exhibit A is myself. Exhibits B - Z come from the many clients I worked with as a social worker. I could offer just as many examples from family members and friends. In this venue, however, I will concentrate on the one person I know better than most -- yours truly.
I don't mean to put any of you off. If this is the sort of topic you simply do not wish to think about, then you need to STOP reading this post right now. The rest of it is bound to make you very uncomfortable.
Have I ever been so angry with an individual that I have envisioned committing vile acts of violence against their person and, possibly, others associated with them? You bet your ass I have! It hasn't happened for many years and it hasn't happened very often, but I would be lying through my teeth if I wrote it wasn't so.
There have been a few times in my life I have been so filled with fury over a perceived wrong that I have imagined what it would be like literally to kill someone. And I don't mean simply putting a gun to their head and getting it over with swiftly. In the dark recesses of my ego, torture and abject humiliation were part of the plan!
Fortunately, for all involved, it never went beyond the stage of fleeting imagination. I never went so far as to purchase a weapon or plot out the crime. Once I calmed down from my initial reaction of wrath and fury, I beat myself up for thinking such horrible thoughts in the first place. What kind of evil reprobate would even fantasize about this kind of stuff, I'd ask myself over and over again.
I KNOW I'm not alone in this regard. Over the years, many people have shared with me their own fleeting thoughts of this nature. In my estimation, every person who has ever walked this earth possesses a dark abyss inside them somewhere. As Lao Tzu writes in the Tao Te Ching, the ONLY way any of us truly can understand the concepts of love and goodness is if concurrently we understand the concepts of hate and evil.
The difference between those who commit heinous crimes and the rest of us is the thin line between imagination and actualization. It's a good thing that our innermost thoughts are not on display for the rest of the world to see. If they were, we would all be branded bloodthirsty killers!
If you've made it to the end of this post, I warned you that it would make you very uncomfortable!!!
After crimes of this nature are committed and beyond the calls of condemnation, the thing that most civilized people do is to ask questions. How could someone do such a thing? What were they thinking? Why didn't they reach out for help?
In answer to questions of this type, most of us self-righteously proclaim that, if we were in a similar situation or faced likewise circumstances, there is no way in the world WE could even imagine following this horrible course of action. We are different from THOSE kind of people.
I happen to believe that such sentiments are not true, not true at all. In my estimation, what frightens us the most is that we can AND have envisioned acts just as horrible and gruesome as those we read about or see in the news. Deep down, we understand there is a very thin line between thinking about revenge and retaliation...and actually carrying it out.
What do I base such a bold assertion on? Exhibit A is myself. Exhibits B - Z come from the many clients I worked with as a social worker. I could offer just as many examples from family members and friends. In this venue, however, I will concentrate on the one person I know better than most -- yours truly.
I don't mean to put any of you off. If this is the sort of topic you simply do not wish to think about, then you need to STOP reading this post right now. The rest of it is bound to make you very uncomfortable.
Have I ever been so angry with an individual that I have envisioned committing vile acts of violence against their person and, possibly, others associated with them? You bet your ass I have! It hasn't happened for many years and it hasn't happened very often, but I would be lying through my teeth if I wrote it wasn't so.
There have been a few times in my life I have been so filled with fury over a perceived wrong that I have imagined what it would be like literally to kill someone. And I don't mean simply putting a gun to their head and getting it over with swiftly. In the dark recesses of my ego, torture and abject humiliation were part of the plan!
Fortunately, for all involved, it never went beyond the stage of fleeting imagination. I never went so far as to purchase a weapon or plot out the crime. Once I calmed down from my initial reaction of wrath and fury, I beat myself up for thinking such horrible thoughts in the first place. What kind of evil reprobate would even fantasize about this kind of stuff, I'd ask myself over and over again.
I KNOW I'm not alone in this regard. Over the years, many people have shared with me their own fleeting thoughts of this nature. In my estimation, every person who has ever walked this earth possesses a dark abyss inside them somewhere. As Lao Tzu writes in the Tao Te Ching, the ONLY way any of us truly can understand the concepts of love and goodness is if concurrently we understand the concepts of hate and evil.
The difference between those who commit heinous crimes and the rest of us is the thin line between imagination and actualization. It's a good thing that our innermost thoughts are not on display for the rest of the world to see. If they were, we would all be branded bloodthirsty killers!
If you've made it to the end of this post, I warned you that it would make you very uncomfortable!!!
What a great post. I don't think I've ever admitted this before, but I've had those thoughts as well on rare occasions.
ReplyDeleteI wonder, too, if at least some of the difference between people who do horrific things and the rest of us who just think about them has to do with impulsivity.
Lydia,
ReplyDeleteI'm sure that in some cases that has a lot to do with it. In other cases, another chief factor has to do with a person's support system. Those of us with people who love and care about us USUALLY don't cross the line. The people who feel they must carry their burdens alone and that no one is willing to help them (this may or may not be true) are more apt to cross the line. Some even may not recognize the line at all!