One more domestic tragedy

[gurdonark]

Yesterday our news was alive with the latest Dallas "family member goes on a shooting rampage" story. Yet another angry man killing relatives, including children. In our part of the world, the crime of passion still is the most ubiquitous crime. Usually, it's committed by a man, although once in a while it's committed by a woman. When it's not a crime of passion, it seems to be a crime of simple abuse. We've had the fellow who killed his children while his ex was on the telephone, so she could listen. We've had the couple who kept their 8 year old in a closet. We've had every permutation of relationships gone wrong and all deadly. Our domestic abuse shelters fill, particularly as harder economic times set in. Meanwhile, the platitudes about solutions from every quarter, left to right, stream in. Some posit that a return to a fundamentalist God will fix everything, but religiosity does not seem to be a defining difference among the perpetrators. Some claim that a turn away from traditional relationships and beliefs will do the trick, but non-traditional relationships are also anything but immune. I get so frustrated when I think of life cut short by folks in fits of rage. I also get frustrated when we don't put a higher premium on life, and a higher priority on preventing this. I have no magic solutions to suggest, but I wish we could all figure out something to do to minimize this problem.

Comments

[ex-sinnie785.livejournal.com]

It seems to me that in recent years the incidence of cases like these you spoke of have increased steadily and things have almost gotten to the point where even those with their heads burried deepest in the sand have to really acknowledge that there is a major problem that does not look like it's going to get better on its own.

I wonder if there is a panacea to be found? Maybe it is God, more emphasis on traditional relationships -- maybe embrace all that George W. stands for and recommends for us. Then again, perhaps we just need to find the magic wand to make people realize that life is truly precious, an individual gift, and not to be taken lightly.

Here in Bakersfield we have one of the very top rates in the state in teen pregnancy. We are the top meth producer in the country. We also have the highest child abuse rates here. Is there a correlation? I'd bet my last quarter on it. Yet we, as a community, don't attack the obvious problems, we try and handle the results as they take place then scratch our head and wonder why, why, why.

I personally think it's Armageddon -- and this time I mean it.

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

I am not ready to call this an Armageddon yet.
But I do think that we've frayed our social safety net, church, society, home, schools, infrastructure, so far that it's going to take some real efforts to rebuild it.

[mockinggreylock.livejournal.com]

Hrm...I can't attribute the insanity to any one thing, or limit it to a list, but I'd guess that the problem is at least in part related to:

protracted childhood

limited applicability of currently adhered-to mythos (that means the popular religions aren't addressing the issue or helping provide a solution)

dissolution of the extended family or circle-of-neighborhood friends (we're such individuals
People are like dogs insofar as we need to be taught how to behave in society, what is appropriate, and what is not.

My thoughts this morning are centered around the notion of suffering and its role in our lives. I think a lot of suffering is self-created and self-perpetuated; focus on the pain and make it the center of your existence. Most of us are not given the proper tools to deal with life's little ups and downs...but I don't know where to begin to assemble that toolbox, and I'm sure it's different for everyone.

Some of it is there in Christian myth, but methinks the preachers and priests hyperfocus on the abstract notion of "Jesus died for your sins!" instead of something like "Jesus embraced his suffering to teach you something!" I've encountered a few (progressive methodists, unitarians, etc) who're making headway in finding the modern meaning of the Christian myth...but the rest have a long way to catch up. Going back to the fundamentalist god will only make everything worse. Case in point: the Taliban.

Most important, I presume, is good parenting, which I think comes from more than just the one or two actual parents. The role of extended family and neighborhood is vastly underconsidered, methinks, or otherwise I do not find it outside of Sesame Street ("Who are the people in your neighborhood?").

I think most people are still psychologically children: driven by urges and unaware that these urges are controllable. When and how are we taught personal responsibility? How many of us figure out just how far that personal responsibility goes?

Ahh, I ramble, and must now commute to work :)

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

So many times I get bored of all "political" or "philosophical" views on this issue, because it all really comes to what you are saying. We need to teach people the right thing, and we need systems in place to effectively protect people when the wrong thing is done. Personal responsibility is such tough choice; often all ideologies agree on what needs to be done, but how to do it?

[reneesarah.livejournal.com]

What partial answers there are complex. A recent study focused on men who were abused as children, and their likelihood to abuse as adults. They found a genetic link- so people who had this genetic variation AND had been abused as children were x-times more likely to be abusers. Outside of looking at the interaction of the genetic code with life events, research tells us that people who are part of a community that is important to them are less likely to act this way, as are people who spiritual beliefs and practices. But that does not mean inculcating children with spiritual beliefs will absolutely prevent this. And as we know, some communities people decide to belong to, that provide some of the comfort and structure people might have hoped to have gotten from a nurturing and supportive family life, such as the People's Temple Cult, can be suicidal and murderous themselves.

I am thinking of the mother who murdered her five (?) children, which, as I recall, happened in Texas. The woman had a history of mental illness and post-partum depression. Maybe if the people around her had given more thought to the idea that she was too mentally unstable to be in charge of children, tragedy could have been averted. Yet there were psychiatrits involved who believed things were fine with her. In California, they are debating in court whether or not to let a rapist go- he has served his time, and the question is whether or not he is a danger to society at this point. The first two psychologists involved came up with opposite answers-one said yes and one said no. So the judge is appointing two more psychologists- and if they both assert he is no danger, the judge will release him.

I took a year of psychological assessment in college from a psychologist who did this kind of work. He got paid big money for his "professional" opinion. He said that he basically looked at what the person had done in the past, and predicted he or she would do it again in the future. He was not able to peer into the mind of person with any better tools than the blunt instrument of looking at past behavior. He had no magic knowledge, he was not a psychic.

I also more recently knew a forensic psychiatrist who practiced in the same way.

So I am not so sure that psychology/psychiatry can be totally trusted to be the source of answers in this arena. There may be some value in doing, however, what is called a "psychological autopsy". In suicide prevention work, this is sometimes done in situations where someone has chosen suicide. The person doing the "autopsy" goes back and looks at the person's life to see what factors may have led to the decision to commit suicide, what clues or behaviors the person engaged in that could have served as warning notification, and what could have been done to preclude it.

Certainly there have been enough of these murderous disasters that we should have some ideas what the precursors and warnings are at this point. The problem of course is the range of variability in human behavior and experience is so wide. A stressor that will edge one person towards suicide or homicide will not function the same way for someone else under the same or a higher level of stress.

I wish we had better answers, and better ways of predicting and preventing. Of course the whole question of predicting and preventing brings us into the realm of problems like those explored in the movie "Minority Report". What happens when you feel you can predict something that hasn't happened yet? What about the rights of someone who, as of yet, has committed no crime- and may not do so due to unknown intervening variables? What about the civl rights questions? Looking at these issues as they echo into larger arenas, the question of whether or not the United States should make a pre-emptive strike against Iraq, given what the government thinks the country will likely do in the future, is a reasonable course of action for a nation to take?

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

The woman in Houston was a poster child for system failure, as the system had in essence picked up that she was seriously disturbed long before the murders, but woefully inadequate corrective action was taken.

You state the dilemma very well. On some level, though, we've got to reduce the stressors from the system.

[reneesarah.livejournal.com]

Absolutely agreed.

[voodoukween.livejournal.com]

tragedies abound

here we most recently looked at hate crimes and shootings enacted by teenagers...the children of and precursors to those adults who turn to violence as a means to an end

i find many ideas in the above comments and believe too it is evidence of the breakdown and inadequacy of social support systems

here it was determined as evidence too of a lack of connectedness and belonging to any nurturing community

poeple have no where to go for real help and as wrensch so aptly put it above, the organized religions are not addressing the issues

according to the classic storytellers this is because they have not evolved as humans (though in these cases i give pause) have....they are relying upon the repetition of words of some ancient mythos and unless the language of that myth is allowed to move and change with time and passage, it's potency and relevancy dies

that and get rid of the guns

granted all crimes are not committed with guns but their accessibility makes the option more available to those in despair

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

I believe that the problem is part a religious problem, though I agree with you that merely repeating old myths is not really a "religious" solution. I'm sure not in a position to teach my own belief system, simplistic as it can be, as a universal.

I think that the rest of the solution is just simple societal values. Fair play, equity, graceful acceptance of hardship, the ability to move on, release from feelings of the need to control.
They are so hard to overcome, those feelings, but that way lies paradise.

Re:

[voodoukween.livejournal.com]

breath in

breath out

fear less

love more

[gurdonark.livejournal.com]

yes, and if you can't quite manage love, try basic decency, and just because you don't get exactly what you want doesn't mean you "lost".

Re:

[voodoukween.livejournal.com]

most definitely

just because the package doesn't look like you thought it would, does not mean the universe has not heard you