The motive for the murder of innocents
This is absolutely heartbreaking – photos and short bios of the teachers and children who were killed in Uvalde.
People who kill random children are not just homicidally inclined, it’s a particular type of sadistic vengeance, and the target of the sadism is all of us as well as the parents and community directly involved. It’s a war against innocence and love and what people hold most dear – it’s the killer saying he cares nothing about their lives or about humanity itself, which he rejects.
This was the sort of impulse that motivated Eric Harris of Columbine fame, although he killed fellow teenagers and not children. For all that most people know about Columbine (or think they know about Columbine), many people know little about the reality of what happened and who the perpetrators were, and much of what they think they know is often incorrect.
I’ve written at length about that in this 2017 post in particular, but if you’re interested in more you should go to this site. I warn you, however, that it’s exceptionally disturbing.
I’ll mention only three very short quotes of so many that perpetrator Eric Harris wrote in his journals, but I think the quotes encapsulate the sort of impulses I’m referring to. The first is, “…before I leave this worthless place, I will kill whoever I deem unfit.” The “worthless place” is earth and life itself.
The second quote is this:
Eric writes that someone is bound to ask, “What were they thinking?” He answered, “I want to burn the world, I want to kill everyone except about 5 people…”
This is the third: “You know what I hate? …..MANKIND!!!!…kill everything…kill everything…”
Another thing to remember is that Eric Harris was adept at hiding these impulses and judgments from the world, including his parents. The same is true to a lesser extent of his partner in destruction, Dylan Klebold, who was more depressed (see this) and at least somewhat less psychopathic, but nevertheless full of rage at others.
I don’t know whether Salvador Ramos had this sort of hatred and impulse to destroy to the same extent, but my guess is – from things I’ve read about him – that he harbored something of the sort or at least a significant degree of it. I infer that he had a sadistic motive not just from his actions, which speak very loudly, but also from this report from a survivor who said that as Ramos entered the classroom he said to the students, “you’re going to die.” Seems to me that was a moment of savoring his own power and their terror, and trying to augment both the power and the terror.
This is why I don’t really buy into the things religious conservatives say after mass killings like “this is what happens when you have moral decline,” “this is because people aren’t taught the value of human life,” “this is what happens when you have fatherless homes,” “this is because we took Bibles out of schools,” etc. And contrary to what the liberals say, it’s not about patriarchy, “toxic masculinity,” white supremacy, or whatever buzzwords they want to use. The culture doesn’t cause psychopathy.
Culture doesn’t cause psychopathy, but in some cases it does encourage or enable it.
https://thefederalist.com/2022/05/25/guns-arent-radically-deadlier-than-they-were-50-years-ago-but-our-sick-culture-is/
Shadow… try reading the above.
We inculcate a disdain for the good beautiful and true, exalt the degrading destructive and self-glorifying all the while pretending evil is either imaginary or tameable. We perpetuate lies and mock the character traits of civilization. And we don’t punish wrong or reward right… even justice is inverted.
Don’t be so quick to disregard the loss of Christian fundamental truth as the underpinnings of liveable society.
Say what you want about the guy, but Chuck Schumer is ALWAYS reliable…
“Schumer blocks Senate GOP school safety bill, angering Republicans;
‘You’re a liar and a hack,’ Sen. Rick Scott tweeted to Schumer after he blocked Luke and Alex School Safety Act”—
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/schumer-blocks-senate-gop-school-safety-bill-angering-republicans
Salvador, not Salvatore, the latter being the Italian version.
Shadow;
‘The culture doesn’t cause psychopathy.’
Mother Teresa;
‘If a mother can kill her own child, what is left but for us to kill each other?’
The question is not whether the culture causes psychopathy but whether the culture causes evil. Does it? I don’t know. But I do think the concept of psychopathy is imprecise and. largely incoherent. The term is over-used. A person who commits mass murder may or may not be a psychopath — how can we ever know for sure? — but he is certainly evil. There is, to my way of thinking, something about labeling a person a psychopath that sort of lets him off the hook. Not so labeling him evil, which is also more accurate. IMO, of course.
Otter;
My point exactly. By labeling choices as a ‘sickness’ or a ‘condition’ we let people off the hook for consciously choosing evil.
Then there’s the whole issue of living in truth.
Funny. There’s been a number of listed school shootings, yet none of them seem to mention this one, which took place before Columbine:
https://criminalminds.fandom.com/wiki/Kipland_Kinkel