The Shadow in the Hallway
Who was it tapping? Momentarily we had a pang of doubt. What if the Elders were right after all and in addition to the locks on doors and the barred gates, human beings needed defenses of a different kind. We looked in vain for the walls that were once called taboos which marked off things deemed too dangerous to approach — at least not without long preparation and perhaps only in the company of the Wise. But we put the thought aside, as the new teachers said. T’was our imagination and nothing more. So it was back to listening to Madonna.
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
“Surely,” said I, “surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore -
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; -
‘Tis the wind and nothing more!”
If by now it was getting spooky, you could be forgiven for searching in a smartphone store for an application designed to to dispel such insistent tappings. There’s one I think which can be customized to countertap at a canceling frequency. But it’s still due out next spring. For the moment –
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
We have organic food to make our bodies stronger, video games to make our reflexes faster, and welfare to sustain us in our dotage. At great expense society has built an impregnable Maginot line against every physical threat. But for some reason it left the Ardennes forest of the mind completely undefended — but there’s no need to worry; we have long since declared culture and ideas impassable to any evil, which anyway doesn’t exist.
Evil is just a matter of taste.
Thanks .
Did you conflate the second and fourth stanzas of my favorite poem on purpose?
Yes I pushed the 2nd and 4th together. The Raven made me do it. I am not sure that any kind of preparation will wholly prevent people from doing irrational and murderous things. But it seems to me that we owe it to the children to warn them about the Boogeyman. Not the kind depicted by Jason but the sort of thing you can meet in a corridor of the mind.
Children may in the end choose to follow that shadow into the cave, therein to discover what delights he has to teach, but it seems to me only fair to mention the Boogeyman’s existence in passing, after putting the sandwich in the bag and tightening the cover on the thermos jug as we send them off to school.
As a society we’ve the developed the ability to track a physical clue down to its remotest location; we can root out anything with a tangible existence. But we seem wholly helpless against an enemy idea or value. Whenever there’s a tragedy in a school or home, we look to see what drawer was unsecured; what alarm went unactivated, what door was left unlocked. But even if we ourselves see the Thing in the garden, one leg over the fence on its way next door, we avert our gaze, ashamed to speak. Afraid of scorn. Maybe we are more disarmed than we know.
At the same time as moral relativism took the lead in our schools, the importance of the three Rs went to the dunce corner. The teachers’ unions in both the US and Australia are a firm plank of support for leftist political parties while abrogating real education and demanding ever incresing funding simultaneously with demands for less strict testing of things like literacy. A disturbing number of students now arrive at adult life with grossly inadequate education. Australia’s poor results have just been shown the other day; we’re sinking way down the lists relative to other countries.
These same vigilant teachers who fail to teach basics also scorn religion.. The scheme of rather tokenistic school chaplains was made a cause celebre recently. How dare those christians mention their teachings to students? It’s mental pollution in the moral relativist modernist wading pool.
Is falsity the natural human condition, with sanity only a learned aberration?
In a possibly related note, Hillary strikes her head and is compelled to cancel her Benghazi testimony. Would the concussion have driven her to clarity, like Stan Laurel when struck by a window, and induced her to tell the truth?
Is falsity the natural human condition, with sanity only a learned aberration?
Falsity may be the human condition, but sanity represents the only prospect of salvation. And even for the irreligious sanity can be defined as recognizing a t-rex when it stands in front of you.
Sanity is recognizing reality and its consequences and perforce that some actions and some modes of thinking are more likely to be survivable than others. We have not been condemned to falsity. Sanity offers a way out.
But we have to teach sanity, value it and preserve it. Once we have a tested result we should enshrine it, like a value in the periodic table. What will us in the end is lies. It floats upon the air like insubstantial smoke such that we scorn to fear it. And yet, sure as shootin’ it will get us unless we see how dangerous it can be.
The guy who shot Gifford, with his weird grotto to Satan, or the guy in Aurora who thought he was Batman or something, or this present killer who shows up all dressed in black after locking himself away, according to his friends — who have they been talking to?
I don’t mean who they were talking to on the phone, Skype or Gmail. But where have they been wandering? Not that you could have stopped it, for some people hear the call and are off like a shot. But it seems to me that we moderns have thrown away the user’s manual. We send people and especially children out into life with a prepaid handset and hope for the best. And then we wonder when they come back with an assault rifle and the desire to shoot everyone but no one in particular. Back in the day you shot someone in particular because you had a reason. Today we’re all out of reasons but not out of ammunition.
Darkness is nothing more than the absence of light.
It wasn’t until I was confronted with pure evil that my faith became whole. My hair stood on end, the room began to slowly spin, every movement was in slow motion, I became chilled, very cold…I was face-to-face with evil incarnate.
A few weeks earlier the man, a friend out on bond, had murdered his wife with a light cord. When one of his young children came to her aid with a pair of scissors, he used them to stab her multiple times. In front of the child. Without remorse.
Later, while sitting in my truck, I shook uncontrollably. For the first time in my life, I knew I was out of control. I understood for the first time that evil was real, it was not an opinion of old men wearing fancy hats and colorful robes.
But this realization brought an immediate calm. If there is evil, there must be goodness. After I realized that, I calmed down.
Just as darkness is the absence of light, evil is the absence of God.
W this, to me, was one of the best pieces you’ve produced and I’ve been lurking around here for some time. Yet it was incomplete. Teaching children and adults that evil does in fact exist is only one-half of the story…
If we teach them about darkness we surely should teach them about the light.
Wretchard, as always, you give voice to my thoughts, only yours are with clarity and acuity. I remember being 17 and seeing The Exorcist when it first came out. I was the first to scream – and I screamed when the music came on… that film shot past any poor defenses I had – a tough street-wise kid raised Catholic, but too disenchanted to go to church or believe in God. It opened the doors to my unconscious and it took years to come back from the fear that film engendered in me. My nephews watched it and laughed. They thought it stupid and outdated. Maybe, but not for me.
#7 – No Justice, No Peace: thank you. You called it out and named it right.
Regarding these “whisperings” and other noises…
I can only recommend this book. Not for the faint-of-heart, but possibly for the open-of-mind.
http://www.richardroseteachings.com/SexConn.html
The only immaterial thing they’ll teach in public schools are politically correct values. The leadership there can’t find consensus on any other take. The strange thing is that nobody really has any faith in political correctness. Political correct thinking never displays boldness, originality, and it never contains quality. Worse, it confines thought to its narrow realm. Any truth that lies outside its confines is a truth that’s disallowed. PC strictures make honest discourse problmeatic at best in a host of ways. So, there’s broad recognition that it’s a sham, and indeed a harmful sham, yet we’re incapable of moving beyond it. Those who try will be sued or shamed back to the fold.
It is not surprising in many ways that a plain looking 20 year old white man with social disorders lashed out at his mom and the heavily feminized, suffocating world that our elementary school system’s become. It is a horrific, evil tragedy, yes. Surprising, no. Those types in the bubble he attacked have one possible response they’ll choose: gun control. The only possible response they’ll allow themselves. As Satan laughs, mocking them.
Once I was hitchhiking across New England going to Maine to pick blueberries, shortly before checking into a VA psych ward. A guy picked me up in a sports car. He was a homosexual and he was a Nazi sympathizer and he was evil in a way I couldn’t comprehend. I was not a religious person but really an ant-religious person. Concepts of good and evil didn’t really exist in my world, but when I looked in that guy’s eyes and heard the faintly diabolical lilt to his laughter I knew I had seen darkness. He wanted me to keep traveling further with him, but I was able to fortunately extricate myself.I think he was a murderer. Two years later I came to Christ, but I’ve always remembered that encounter.
Adam Lanza was a devil. He was a young man who made choices like all of us but somewhere, somehow he opened his soul to something dark and diabolical. To even fathom shooting babies is incomprehensible. I was in Cambodia last year and saw the tree where the Khmer Rouge dashed out babies brains. They were devils too and Himmler and Jeffrey Dahmer and Jarod Loughner and now there are many of them who walk amongst us. Cry out to God for his mercy on our land.
We stopped locking the mentally ill away from the general public in 1969, that is until they kill, then we lock them up after the fact. Progressives are more than willing to sacrifice the children in Connecticut for their ideals, they are partially responsible for this tragedy. For all their self-declared intellect, they are not able to see beyond feel-good motives to the reality of human nature. Just consider the causes they champion and some of the consequences they are unable or unwilling to see. Lax parole standards and repeat offenders. Teacher’s Unions protecting feckless teachers and poor student performance. Outlawing guns for the law abiding citizen in Chicago and high rates of violent crimes by handgun.
As I walked into a Starbucks to read this blog I parked next to a car with these two bumper stickers next to each other: 1) Meat is Murder and 2) I am Pro-choice. I wish I was making that up but the reality is progressives are too stupid to see the conflict of these two ideas. Killing animals for food, bad; Killing babies out of convenience, good.
Lord please smite these idiots.
#4 blogstrop – I’ve been on the receiving end of “Christians” (some people would call them inarguably so, being monks) mentioning their teachings to students. I was 8 years old, and the mentioning was done with a cane, vigorously enough to draw blood. I have no recollection of what was deemed a heinous enough crime to merit such treatment. Perhaps I had failed to memorise enough of the Bible.
“When the first knave met the first fool, then was born the first priest.”
I hadn’t read “The Raven” since I was in high school — it’s much scarier now, after a lifetime of seeing things that are evil.
The news today: the autopsies are all done, and they found that each of those little ones was shot more than once.
I used to rebell against the concept of “original sin,” but I think we should seriously consider that all of us have the capacity to side with the Devil; he has no power over us but what we cede to him, but he does have that.
Jesus said, “This day I set before you life and death — therefore, choose life.” We must choose.
Richard, good insight into the substitution of the [ineffective] material safeguards for the spiritual. The Left is into substitutions of all kinds: their idea of earthly utopia for the real Paradise; the cheap and easy new agey nostrums for the hard demands of Christianity. “Make us your slaves; but feed us!” indeed.
Stabat Mater Dolorosa — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHfS4FwXTPw
the most beautiful, piercing setting of all. ["Stabat Mater" is the title of a thirteenth-century Latin hymn, and it means "the Mother was standing." In Latin, the hymn consists of twenty couplets which describe the Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin at the Cross.]
At the cross her station keeping,
Mary stood in sorrow weeping
When her Son was crucified.
While she waited in her anguish,
Seeing Christ in torment languish,
Bitter sorrow pierced her heart.
With what pain and desolation,
With what noble resignation,
Mary watched her dying Son.
Ever-patient in her yearning
Though her tear-filled eyes were burning,
Mary gazed upon her Son.
Who, that sorrow contemplating,
On that passion meditating,
Would not share the Virgin’s grief?
Christ she saw, for our salvation,
Scourged with cruel acclamation,
Bruised and beaten by the rod.
Christ she saw with life-blood failing,
All her anguish unavailing,
Saw him breathe his very last.
Mary, fount of love’s devotion,
Let me share with true emotion
All the sorrow you endured.
Virgin, ever interceding,
Hear me in my fervent pleading:
Fire me with your love of Christ.
Mother, may this prayer be granted:
That Christ’s love may be implanted
In the depths of my poor soul.
At the cross, your sorrow sharing,
All your grief and torment bearing,
Let me stand and mourn with you.
Fairest maid of all creation,
Queen of hope and consolation,
Let me feel your grief sublime.
Virgin, in your love befriend me,
At the Judgement Day defend me.
Help me by your constant prayer.
Savior, when my life shall leave me,
Through your mother’s prayers receive me
With the fruits of victory.
Virgin of all virgins blest!
Listen to my fond request:
Let me share your grief divine.
Let me, to my latest breath,
In my body bear the death
Of your dying Son divine.
Wounded with His every wound,
Steep my soul till it has swooned
In His very Blood away.
Be to me, O Virgin, nigh,
Lest in flames I burn and die,
In His awe-full judgement day.
Savior, when my life shall leave me,
Through your mother’s prayers receive me
With the fruits of victory.
While my body here decays
May my soul your goodness praise,
Safe in paradise eternally. Amen, Alleluia.
My nephews watched it and laughed. They thought it stupid and outdated. Maybe, but not for me.
Well, there could be one or more of several things going on with the laughter.
First – yes, movie FX have become incredibly sophisticated over the past 20-30 years, and what was once state of the art is now viewed as clumsy & laughable. It takes some sophistication as a viewer to get past the “clumsy” FX and appreciate and older movie for what it achieves in story, character, directing, acting, score, pacing, etc.; i.e., to evaluate the movie for things other than the FX. Generally speaking, almost no one under 20 has that sophistication or skill. If the FX are not up to the par of what they are used to seeing today, the entire movie gets dismissed as hokey.
THE BEST version of King Kong ever made is still the original 1933 flick. Hands down. As a complete package, that movie’s version of the King Kong story will probably never be equaled or surpassed. But again, try telling that to anyone under 20. (Tell the technology-spoiled brats to go out & do an old-fashioned stop-motion animation movie with actual cut-and-splice film editing, and see if they can learn any appreciation for the skills of Willis O’Brien, Verna Fields, et al. But no. Most {NOT ALL – I have had a handful of film students who would rise to exactly this type of challenge & love every minute of it!} would probably just stare at you glaze-eyed & reply, “Why would I do that? I’ve got Photoshop & FC Pro.”)
Second – The bravado thing. People, esp. younger people & esp. males, will laugh when nervous or scared, and will never, ever admit the nervous or scared part. This ain’t generational. It’s an ageless human trait.
Third – As a horror film, The Exorcist was exponentially darker & more “evil” than virtually anything that had been seen in a movie theater up to that time in 1973. Today? Meh. We’ve been grossly desensitized to portrayals of death & evil in our entertainment due to the ubiquity of it. Many American yoots today have seen the SAW series or have watched torture-p-rn films like HOSTEL. After fare such as this, which is like a moving-images-and-booming-audio version of crack, expect that no viewers today will be able to dial back on their burned-out entertainment receptors & be able to react to older fare the way older audiences did, unless & until today’s viewers undergo a significant entertainment “detox” program first.
Fourth – As mentioned above & as discussed in other BC threads, we have largely lost the ability to reckon (and reckon with) evil in our culture. Thanks to simultaneous trends of desensitization (see #3), secularization, and the affluence-safety bubble (for those not living in inner-city gang territory, at any rate), most Americans are oblivious to existential threats. Those kinds of thing exist only in movies & video games, and those things are for entertainment. Ergo, evil/death/Satan get laughed at cuz “they’re not real.”
Until, of course, they are.
We still have the Second Amendment … for now … but don’t think that Americans have not been disarmed in other, significant and dangerous, ways already. The politicians, the educrats & the media-smarties have successfully Hadleyville-ized half or more of the country. While convincing us that if only that damned warmongering Marshall Kane would just git out of town, everything would be peachy again.
5. Blast From the Past
Is falsity the natural human condition, with sanity only a learned aberration?
////////////
John 18 (English Standard Version)
33 So Pilate entered his headquarters again and called Jesus and said to him, “Are you the King of the Jews?” 34 Jesus answered, “Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you about me?” 35 Pilate answered, “Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered you over to me. What have you done?” 36 Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.” 37 Then Pilate said to him, “So you are a king?” Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world—to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.” 38 Pilate said to him, “What is truth?”
After he had said this, he went back outside to the Jews and told them, “I find no guilt in him. 39 But you have a custom that I should release one man for you at the Passover. So do you want me to release to you the King of the Jews?” 40 They cried out again, “Not this man, but Barabbas!” Now Barabbas was a robber.[g]
Thank you for this column.
Who is the odd man that we should ‘lock up’ that we might avoid tragedy? Which weapon need we bar from our arsenal? As they say in politics: ‘It isn’t who votes that counts, it’s who counts the votes.’
Just this Friday past, our grave uniter assured us that it is our politics that are the true source of evil. Certainly I didn’t imagine that? Did I?
7. No Justice, No Peace
If we teach them about darkness we surely should teach them about the light.
……………
John 1
New International Version (NIV)
The Word Became Flesh
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
6 There was a man sent from God whose name was John. 7 He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. 8 He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
9 The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. 10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. 11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. 12 Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— 13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+1&version=NIV
W: perhaps your best ever. How you do it, I don’t know. But thanks. As another commenter has said, this brings back an earlier reading of Poe with a whole lot more life packed around it now. I need to sit with him and think about our true nature. Which most of us spend our lives hiding from ourselves. It is troubling –but important and indeed liberating– to address the Evil that is constantly trying to enter our hearts, that has tinged each of us to some degree. If we know it and face it, we may yet overcome it. And because there is Evil, there must be Good also. With Good at your side, everything is possible.
Meanwhile, I pray for those children and the families they’ve left behind.
Brilliant and important piece. And, as usual, excellent comments.
I just subscribed. Should have done it long ago – finally overcame my lazy & cheap impulses.
Cute.
I guess just sayin’ … “Something is Rotten in the State of Denmark” would not have made the word count.
Military Escalation, Dangerous Crossroads: Russia-US Confrontation in Syria? By Prof Michel Chossudovsky Global Research, December 15, 2012
http://www.globalresearch.ca/military-escalation-dangerous-crossroads-russia-us-confrontation-in-syria/5315830
“Stan Laurel is Lord Paddington”
There may be hope for Hillary.
My belief is that the Truth is Out There, and teaching us to be more than erect apes with a sense of time limited to one hunting/agricultural season is the role of religion. People become civilized in the civitas as part of a community. Religion molds the troglodyte so that in a city they become not just urban but urbane. There is more than one way that this natural human need to become connected to something greater than ourselves, to see beyond the false signals of our limbic survival heritage, can be transmitted.
We can judge or dare to discriminate in our opinions about the relative merits of different religions in summoning the “Better angels of our nature.” Most religions, Christian, Buddhist, Jewish, Hindu, Jain, Zoroastrian, Greco-Roman, etc. have performed this function. In each life is considered something sacred that is only taken with regret and at some cost by special dispensation and for a proximate cause that cannot be deferred for divine judgment. Each religion considers that civilizing function even when they fail a central part of doctrine. Does Islam?
When I lived in Virginia one Monday morning in the office an item in the newspaper came to our attention. Over the weekend a multiply convicted felon in Maryland had announced his desire to “go kill some white kids.” And he did.
He stabbed to death two children on their way back home from buying Mother’s Day cards at the mall. Other children had noticed him lurking near the trail, “looking scary.” The killer died later that same weekend in a hail of police bullets, as they say in the newspapers.
If you do not think that true evil is at large in the land, that one story should convince you otherwise.
I pray for the souls of those lost, and for the comfort of those left here without them, who no doubt awoke the next morning with the terrible realization that even given a classic Heaven, it will be years and years before they see their loved ones again.
And I pray that next time, or even just one time, He will put me there, standing in the way of evil – preferably with my M1 Garand at hand. It was built in late July 1943, defeated evil before, and can help do so again.
I got my first glimpse of evil in the documentaries of WWII. Walter Cronkite in his narrated Victory at Sea series and others concerning all areas of conflict in the 40′s. I had a natural interest since both my Dad and my Mom’s brother had served. I believe most documentaries aired on Sundays and since my family eschewed church, I was around to be educated any time of the day or night.
But what my innocent mind saw back then was the real world – not some made up “reality” that was being foisted upon the nation because the powers that be wanted to forget the war. Many who came back from the war were silent and probably for two reasons: First the stuff they saw, they didn’t want to remember those bad memories or foist them upon those who didn’t have to go through it. The others, who guilty in some way that theydidn’t go through the bad stuff, or they did and showed cowardice, didn’t want to talk about it for obvious personal reasons. Nevertheless, through the use of documentaries and the parental teaching that always comes through with personal experience as a prime mover, we got the message of the truth of the consummate evil that ran unchecked in Europe, Africa, and Asia. Because that message was never attacked in the public schools back then, it was allowed to stand as a warning about the consequences of international threats and what they could to us at home.
Kids don’t get that today. As for 9-11, we didn’t want our children to realize that there truly is evil in the world and that the cause of 9-11 came from a very defined set of people. So we shut off the video of the attacks to “sheild” their innocent minds. I wanted to play them every day – to remind me who is capable of bringing the evil to our shores. We couldn’t allow that, however, instead we shielded every one from it so that the Progressives could bring it here in the form of Sharia Law.
Today, there is no such thing as evil. When someone goes “off the tracks” it is society’s fault or the stingy Republicans who refused to spend enough, or the conservatives who only want to spoil the “party.” Man is not an evil or fallen being as is preached in the Bible, he is a good being forced off the tracks because government wasn’t able to do enough to keep him in line. So, more government is needed to “help” him and next we take all the guns away so that “he can’t hurt himself” when left alone for a short minute.
The more the left teaches that no one can possibly be responsible for their own actions, the more excuses we give for bad behavior; the more we release people from their efforts to understand the truth that we can’t not know. And the worse things will get. Today, no matter what you do or how heinous an act it is, someone is going to come out of the woodwork to defend you against the people who actually believe in the rule of law.
We are now running Pell Mell into the Abyss, and when we get there, to use a cliché, all hell will break loose.
Here is what an atheist friend of mine wrote me from OZ:
“My fears are not of gulags, there are simply too many Real Americans with firearms and at that point there would be a civil war. My fear is that America will follow the path of Greece. Slowly drained of all its resources, crushed under debt, corruption sucking the life and wealth from everywhere… until the country is a shattered ruin. Working age men jobless, young women stop having children as they lose hope, young people condemned to face a life with no prospects. The objective of these Marxists is to crush the spirit of America and reduce its people to serfs who can be easily managed. Once a man’s spirit is broken and his hope gone, it no longer matters if he is armed. He will see nothing worth fighting for anymore.
I think that is the danger for you, the memories of freedom is the spark that will light a fire one day in millions of people. It is that spark “they” need to extinguish and they know it. I would expect, rather than camps, a crushing burden of petty regulations, each in themselves no real threat but collectively they suffocate the people and drive them into gentle submission, establishing a habit of waiting to be told what to do.
“They don’t need any elaborate conspiracies for that, they can just follow the model of Europe, where the people are led like sheep where ever the Sheppard’s want to take them. After 2 generations of socialism there is hardly anyone left there who remembers what freedom was and certainly few who would risk their life to get it back.
“Since you’ve doubled the number of wars, shouldn’t you be getting another Nobel Peace Prize?”
Perhaps my Aussie friend is hinting that if we keep going like we are, there will be no major cataclysmic events, but perhaps instead, hundreds of school attacks by people driven madly into hopelessness.
Dude, that wouldn’t be good now would it?
Here’s something for those that believe that guns kill people – people are simply powerless to control something as influential as a gun:
http://www.courant.com/sns-rt-us-china-stabbingsbre8bd065-20121213,0,5592318.story
Funny, that crazy person didn’t need a gun.
Funny thing – 265 pound linebackers don’t need guns to kill anyone; but guns are the only things that could stop a 265 pound linebacker from killing…”anyone he wishes.” Especially his 120 pound girlfriend.
One last part of this rant. One crazy person killed 20 children and 8 adults yesterday, but over the same time period of 24 hours, 2,740 babies were aborted by “eyes wide open,” sensible, thoughtful and coherent women and their boyfriends and husbands. That figure doesn’t include the murders and maiming that took place in the cities with the toughest gun laws in the country – New York and Chicago.
What is evil, my friends, is that this country can lay claim to the most incredible sense of hypocrisy that has ever existed before, at least in this country and perhaps in the world. We will wring our hands all weekend over this one tragedy and ignore a virtual cornucopia of evil acts all over this country and in areas of the word that we “could” if we weren’t “leading from behind”, have some influence in countering.
For a person of faith, that the hand of protection is being slowly removed from America is neither impossible, nor implausible – it is a certainty. There are two ways back; will we take either of them or just.give.up?
I served 25 years as a Pa. State Police Trooper.When I first started, an older trooper said every so often you will see true evil on this job. While I saw evil frequently, true evil was different. You can look into the perps eyes and nothing is staring back, snake eyes. Cold, remorseless evil. You may see it only 10 times in your career, but you know it when you see it. Every fiber of your being knows you are in the presence of satan.
I teach high school English. I have covered The Raven many times in class, but I have never thought of teaching it from this perspective. Excellent! Well done!
Good versus Evil? Perhaps, we should call it civilization versus savagery? Humans are basically savages, barely civilized, at best.
Christianity is about civilizing mankind. It teaches us to be hard when we would be soft and soft where we would be hard. It teaches us to be the opposite of human nature.
The first Commandment is, “I am the Lord, thy God. Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.” That means, you must not elevate some other beliefs above God. God must come first. God’s Commandments have penalties built in, based on human nature. When you make something other than God your dogma, your central value system, humanity suffers.
Less and less people now attend church in this country. They turn to other things as the most important things in their lives. Thus, do they turn away from God’s civilizing Commandments. They turn towards savagery.
They are encouraged to do so by those who would elevate their cause above God. They offer false teaching and false prophets. They would make gods of themselves. In reality, they are savages, themselves, and create savage followers. Evil people rarely think of themselves as evil. They rarely know they are savages.
One can call it Good/Evil, or God/Satan, but it is really civilization/savagery. It is not that Lanza was insane. It is that he was savage. Many insane people still will never hurt anyone. It is not their nature to do so. Lanza did evil, because he was a savage, not because he was insane.
It would have really helped, if some of the civilized teachers had been armed. Far less people would have been murdered. We civilized men must arm ourselves against the savages among us. Pardon me for saying, “It’s for the children.”
Just think – if the mass murderer had dressed up his atrocity with a political manifesto, he would be recognized as a “freedom fighter” by many of the same people who are presently pushing to eradicate guns.
@ 25 — thanks for posting that. Without linking to it, and speaking of the subject of horrific evil that many seem quick to pretend does not exist, has anyone seen the Syrian rebels’ snuff film where they forced a 13 year old boy to decapitate someone? It’s real, but I will not link to it nor the videos of them tossing Christians or Allawis off buildings…but don’t tell the rebels’ apologists that, they’re still insisting a Shi’a mosque was burned and the Al-Qaeda flag of Musab Abu Zarqawi foisted above it because that mosque was supporting Hezbollah. The Nazi apologists walk among us even if they pose as two legged drones on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/ReginaldQuill/status/279983286745448448
Very well put, Richard. I was previously composing a more ironic and political response, along the lines of:
After yet another massacre, it is time we seriously address the matter. To do so, we must first get rid of the atavistic and irrational impulse to deflect blame for these tragedies on inanimate objects, ie firearms. This is ridiculous and unhelpful for three reasons: 1. There are simply too many firearms, legal or illegal, for any realistic legislation to put even a dent into this problem. 2. Firearms are useful devices; we must continue allowing a large number of them, if only for law enforcement, politicians who are at risk from extremists, battered wives, homosexuals, etc 3. Even if every last firearm was confiscated, mentally unbalanced individuals would continue with these despicable mass murders, using improvised explosives, vehicles, or anything else their sick minds can come up with.
We must therefore turn to the root cause of this problem, which is our culture of violence. Our movies and video games are filled with graphic violence and our media devotes round-the-clock coverage to violent crimes. This assault on our society has the inevitable result of normalizing and even glorifying violence. In a society of over 300 million people, it is inevitable that some of them will be mentally imbalanced and susceptible to this assault, causing them to adopt this manufactured zeitgeist. If we want to prevent an ever-increasing number of these tragic massacres, we have no choice but to put severe restrictions on the corporate purveyors of mass culture.
I realize that this suggestion might strike some as not very liberal, but after all these massacres, I believe that all sensible and caring people will agree that it is high time we cease acting in a knee-jerk spoiled manner, stop clinging to antiquated foibles, and maturely adapt to changing circumstances. For the children!
(After implementing this, we should proceed with further steps, such as institutionalizing anyone showing signs of mental instability, and hermetically sealing off the border with Mexico, to prevent the entry of patently illegal weapons.)
We have not been condemned to falsity. Sanity offers a way out.–RF
It may be more difficult to achieve than we can reasonably hope.
I read “The Raven” as a young man–perhaps as early as the 6th grade but I never noticed the juxtaposition of the jet-black bird and the bust of Pallas.
“Pallas” was so common as a title for Athena that Edgar Allan Poe’s raven (of ‘The Raven’) sits forever on a pallid bust of “Pallas”, which, here, refers to Pallas Athena.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pallas_%28son_of_Crius%29
pallid adj. (Lat. “pallidus” to be pale) abnormally deficient in color as suggesting physical or emotional distress
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/pallid
I think Poe is intimating that black and white are not contrasts but compliments. Black is the color of death but so is white. Choose what you will, there is only one outcome: the grave.
We need an escape from this conundrum but naked sanity seems to be insufficient.
I agree with the other comments; this is one of your best columns.
29. AfghanVet
Your comment reminds me of the innocence and unquestioned safety of Pennsylvania schools when I was a kid growing up in Lancaster. The only police presence I ever saw in school was an annual visit from a state trooper who was there to talk to the kids about bicycle safety, traffic rules, fire safety, and what to do in case of a medical or weather emergency. Basic stuff; nothing about people going postal in a school– or anywhere else, for that matter.
28. Sgian Dubh
First encounter with evil? World War II documentaries, yes, but also my dad’s memories of his unit’s liberation of one of the smaller German concentration camps in April 1945. He didn’t go into graphic detail, but he wanted me to understand that there is such a thing as evil in the world and that anyone can encounter it when they least expect it. And that an M1 Garand in the hands of a sane and well-trained soldier has its legitimate uses.
Second encounter? Kennedy’s assassination. It was the first time I ever saw adults lose self-control in public; I can still remember our French teacher racing down the school corridor in tears after we had been told than the President had died; she was begging the headmaster to tell her that the news reports couldn’t be true. And later that weekend I was watching the news coverage on television with my slightly younger cousin when Lee Oswald was shot in the police station while the cameras were rolling. It was surreal; my cousin looked at me and said, “Did we just see another shooting?” When she spoke, I knew I had not been hallucinating.
—
Newtown has been associated with evil in my mind ever since the 1980s. The first time I was ever called for jury duty in Connecticut, I (like most of the prospective jurors standing in line at the courthouse door) was surprised by the metal detectors and x-ray equipment we had to pass through before signing in– this was years before 9/11. The officer on duty said the high level of security was necessary to protect the attorneys– not the defendants. Seems like someone had taken a shot at his wife’s lawyer in family court a few months earlier. The next stage in the process was being assigned to a smaller group from the jury pool for voir dire. There was a man in my small group who was from Newtown and talked about his experience as a juror on what was then a famous CT murder trial, the so-called woodchipper murder in 1986. He had had nightmares for weeks after the trial ended. I remember feeling suddenly cold in the little jury room– the man’s sense of being haunted by evil was both palpable and contagious.
The petition in the Lord’s Prayer that asks for deliverance from evil means more to me than ever these days; I’ve taken to saying it twice when I recite the prayer.
I went looking for a video you posted earlier, that featured the marksmanship get-togethers in Switzerland. I don’t know whether this was the one I was looking for:
http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2011/08/13/the-european-gun-debate/
but the second video slot displayed only this message:
‘”Switzerland is Crime Free, …”
The YouTube account associated with this account has
been terminated due to multiple third-party
notifications of copyright infringements.’
Do you have any links to the original video?
Found it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nf1OgV449g
The petition in the Lord’s Prayer that asks for deliverance from evil means more to me than ever these days; I’ve taken to saying it twice when I recite the prayer–PA Cat
Amen.
And I place the blame at the people who emptied mental institutions. With best intentions of course. The same people stopped DDT applications as well. Again with best intentions.
The rifle was found in the car. Media say that he was with two pistols – Sig Sauer and Glock in the school. All people were shot with a long-barrel rifle.
Was is going on with the story?
I am recalling St. Henry grade school choir in the late ’50s, early ’60s. One our our Lenten songs was “At the Cross her station keeping”. Though simple musically, the lyrics are very powerful.
I have a permanently disabled adult child and I cannot tell you how many times I have felt sorry about how this made my life difficult until I remember Mary “at the foot of the cross”. Thank you for the lyrics of the Sabat Mater.
A pipe organ rendition is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7QxzmYTEjU
Some people remember this happening back in May ’27. Making up news hadn’t been invented yet, in fact ignoring real problems was quite popular. (Wait. They could have forged the date, written everything in the 1970s… They wouldn’t, would they?) Unlike today, hopefully, the New York Times felt somebody’s aviation stunt was more important than 38 kids dying, hence the story ran on the bottom fold of the paper. The headline was tactful enough: “Maniac Blows Up School”.
All things considered, there’s at least a half chance that the Bath bombing really occurred. Partisans at the time blamed moral decay (as in flappers, loose bonnets, and communists) for the actions of a lone Tea Party conservative with easy access to dynamite.
Two wrongs don’t make a right, I say.
I don’t like the fact that “trutv” and “examiner” are the major sources on that. Both are known dissemination channels.
Looks like this guy Parker came out with a book in 1992. Other than that… very very fishy.
Evil is learned from within ones environment as is the desynthesization of evils consequences as it might relate to killing other human beings. Look at the thousands of digital games depicting human and human like objects in which it is ‘fun and challenging’ to kill as many as possible with all kinds of high tech automatic weaponry. Heck you even learn to be rewarded in those games for the amount of kills and are challenged by others to achieve more kills and a higher recognition of status among that social group.
Another social sickness perpetuated by and industry for nothing more than economic gain.
Like they said in the movie Halloween (in response to Laurie Strode’s “What’s the boogeyman?”): “As a matter of fact… it was.”
I’m struck, as I read the article and the comments, that no where else in media can I get this sort of thought. Great stuff.
Charles (#18) “Not this man, but Barabbas!” Yes, we are surely in the days where “Barabbas” is welcomed, the Truth turned away, chased from the public square. The days of Noah are not far now, evil will soon sit in the temple of every man!
W 6: “Sanity is recognizing reality and its consequences and perforce that some actions and some modes of thinking are more likely to be survivable than others. We have not been condemned to falsity. Sanity offers a way out.”
George Orwell understood that most people will not accept falsity outright. Since totalitarian governments require the great mass of people to accept falsity, it actually works out better if such a government dishes out lies on the same plate with the truth, with the expectation that most people will accept both the lie and the truth in a duet of controlled insanity – controlled in that totalitarian government initiates the process under a controlled mass media, entertainment industry and educational system – insanity being the mental state of “the little people” where reality (the truth) cannot or will not be separated from falsehood (the lie).
“Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously [the lie and the truth], and accepting both of them [Insanity]… with the lie always one leap ahead of the truth… Those who have the best knowledge of what is happening are also those who are furthest from seeing the world as it is; in general the greater the understanding the greater the delusion; the more intelligent the less sane… If one is to rule, and to continue ruling, one must be able to dislocate the sense of reality… If human equality is to be forever averted; if the “high,” as we have called them, are to keep their places permanently; then the prevailing mental condition must be controlled insanity.” George Orwell – 1984
Yes, as W said, sanity offers an escape from the controlled insanity of Orwellian Doublethink, because sanity is simply the ability to observe, comprehend and accept self-evident truth. Sanity (same as common sense) means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously (the truth and the lie), and accepting only the truth, with the truth always one leap ahead of the lie.
Winston Smith: “The belief that nothing exists outside your own mind; surely there must be some way of demonstrating that it was false… There was truth and there was untruth; and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world, you were not mad.” George Orwell – 1984
There are quite a few references here. Text mostly… not scans. I think I’ll hold off on judgement.
Hey Karl Menninger, could you remind us again, Whatever became of sin?
I would recommend reading the works of the late Malachi Martin SJ. Fr Martin was a lifelong practicing exorcist. I used to come home late and hear him
on the air with Art Bell on “Coast to Coast AM”.
Listening to said program, I found that I could not debunk him. I made it a point to try—-just like I do with conspiracy theories——-and got nowhere.
And that is unusual for me.
I then read his books and was suitably impressed.
Since that time I have learned that Southern Baptists have started following Fr Martin’s prescriptions, while reserving their God-given right to denounce all forms of Papist Idolatry. Even heard of a free-lance Jewess exorcist
who dutifully observed the Torah but was very careful not to disturb Roman Catholic precepts in her work. I am forced to conclude that there is something real to the concept of demonic possession.
And in Fr Martins last novel, “Windswept House” he described an “enthronement ceremony” which put “The Smoke of Satan” into the Vatican itself and presumably into other institutions as well.
While this is not the cause of all our troubles (widespread human misbehavior is) it does add something, something that (a) encourages or even compels such misbehavior while (b) damaging our behavior to minimize and control the damage.
‘Nuff said.
The most evil people I have met are those that would take away our free will and turn us into tele-operated robots living in a panopticon. That theme is frequently found in the fiction of Vernor Vinge. I try to imagine such a reality at times and always always return to our reality thanking God for free will. For while free will must entail evil, without it there would be nothing good, or beautiful, or of any value of all.
It always puzzles me: Why evil mind is always more sophisticated? Am I wrong?
w @ 54: It always puzzles me: Why evil mind is always more sophisticated? Am I wrong?
Lucifer thought himself very clever.
Has he learned better yet? Probably not, he never does.
Richard, Thank you. Amen.
Malthus and PA Cat, I’ve found the petition to St Michael to be of great help while battling evil:
St Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle.
Be our protection from the wickedness and snares of the devil.
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray,
And do thou O Prince of the heavenly host, by the power of God
Cast into Hell,
Satan and all the evil spirits who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls.
Donald Sensing made my point much more succinctly (and sincerely): “Funny how in the aftermath of tragic events such as Sandy Hook school Friday, when the Left starts once again to bewail and condemn the ‘American gun culture,’ they always zero in on guns and never the culture. … I will be much more sympathetic to calls for more gun control when those same people are just as adamant about culture control.”
Walt 54,
I think it is the other way around. Some intelligent minds turn to evil because they can – because they can do so more effectively, i.e.: more self-servingly, than the less intelligent mind, and can do so in stealth mode, and in grander style. The more sophisticated mind often turns to evil because it can see evil and its advantages first.
58. Storm_Rider,
Does it mean that the forces of good are doomed?
When I see how much effort is needed to prove that right is right and wrong is wrong I become desperate.
W: beautifully done. Great essay. Lots of outstanding comments, too. I too found the Good Son to be rather haunting and a bit confusing. I first saw it when I was a teenager, and as others have said, have experienced quite a bit of “life” since then. I haven’t seen it since, but I find what I remember of the movie a little less confusing now … but just as haunting.
What happened on Friday was evil. This needs to be said loudly and often, especially because of the people who will be uncomfortable at hearing it.
28. Sgian Dubh
Brilliant thoughts there. I had never considered that rather than the U.S. filling with concentration camps or similar, that the dystopia would come in the form of tiny but un-countably numerous pressures / threats / coercions such as would crush everyone’s spirit. The former is easier to firewall against and identify, whereas the latter … well, I see it’s already advancing itself successfully.
Evil is to Godliness as dark is to light – total darkness is total lack of light. And evil is simply the total absence of any Godliness. I’ve never known such a person but they most certainly do exist. Adam Lanza was obviously one of that type. One does not have to be religious to act in a Godly manner but one must be totally void of Godliness to act in an evil manner.
We are witnessing what happens in a society when God is forced to the sideline. I expect more of the same of what happened yesterday. Not less. I pray I’m wrong.
I commented yesterday about the possibility of this kid having a social disorder in another article. And the probability that he played violent video games. I’m two for two on that score. Unfortunately. Maybe its time for adults to monitor what our kids are playing on the computer. In almost every case these young killers are being desensitized by these violent and bloody video games – that is a matter of record. One we can ignore and cite the second amendment – or do something about. Or are we just going to go after the guns instead???
Best line that I’ve read today, “Makes home schooling look a lot better. If evil shows up with a gun it will be shot.”
Still waiting for all the facts to come out, lots of unchecked stuff flying around. It seems the perp had an altercation with the staff several days before the shooting. He tried to buy a gun and was turned down about a week before. His mother was a firearms enthusiast, took both of her sons shooting, and they were both good shots. Firearms used supposedly belonged to the mother. Perp reportedly had Asperger’s syndrome,but no source on who made the diagnosis and whether it was before or after the shooting.
Does it mean that the forces of good are doomed?
When I see how much effort is needed to prove that right is right and wrong is wrong I become desperate.
No, the forces of good are not doomed. It is evil which is doomed, and good which will ultimately triumph. The ending is not in question, only the timeline.
And, yes, in eras and cultures dedicated to worshipping simulacra, deception and prodigious amounts of bullsheet are the norm. Even to attempt to find the truth, let alone to stand up for it, live it and (perhaps most difficult of all) witness to it, is time-consuming and exhausting. Resistance to a depraved culture, while not futile, is most certainly brutal. This is a feature and not a bug BTW.
Make no mistake, accounts are being kept. In great detail. Who does what to whom, who stands for what, whose heart is self-deceiving and whose is humble and honest. N-O-T-H-I-N-G, not words nor thoughts nor deeds, of any moral consequence is going to be lost or forgotten.
43. Bobo
“Some people remember this happening back in May ’27… The headline was tactful enough: ‘Maniac Blows Up School..”
I’d heard of the incident but didn’t recall the town.
“…Partisans at the time blamed moral decay (as in flappers, loose bonnets, and communists) for the actions of a lone Tea Party conservative with easy access to dynamite.”
Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.
#17 and #63 Bogie Wheel – sorry to be late in thanking you for your posts. You are very right regarding the aspects of FX, the desensitization to violence – I remember driving down a major boulevard years later and seeing a billboard highlighting the newest horror movie. The ad was a woman kneeling and the bad guy had her hair gripped in one hand, pulling her head back to bare her throat, and in the other hand a butcher knife poised at her throat… well something to that effect (after the advent of GWOT sounds almost normal). I remember thinking, “Jesus! Do we have to train killers, too?! Why give them the ideas if they haven’t yet thought of it.”
I take great comfort in your last paragraph of #63.
The comments today have been just excellent. Thank you all.
The Church as long known that there is an allure to evil. This is made clear in the Rite of Baptism during the questioning of the parents prior to the baptism itself:
Celebrant: Do you reject sin, so as to live in the freedom of God’s children?
Parents and Godparents: I do.
Celebrant: Do you reject the glamor of evil, and refuse to be mastered by sin?
Parents and Godparents: I do.
Celebrant:Do you reject Satan, father of sin and prince of darkness?
Parents and Godparents: I do.
This section is followed by the three-fold profession of faith.
The rejection of evil and embrace of good is a perennial theme in the journey of faith, and the constant condition of the pilgrim Believer as he wends his way towards God and eternal life. Evil is seductive, promising some illusory benefit in exchange for surrender. Some there are who wholly surrender themselves to evil, burning all bridges to God and their fellow man. No matter how careful we as a society, even a pious and attentive society (which we are not), there are those who will succumb. The Soul naturally recoils from this surrender, which is why evil’s triumphs are fewer than they might otherwise be and less complete. They are nonetheless many in absolute terms, and largely unrecognized. Would that there were a way to easily recognize these formerly human shells so as to neutralize them by isolation or destruction. Alas, there is not.
The Hollywood crowd was quick to call for gun control after this terrible incident but I haven’t heard any condemnation of Jamie Foxx’s remarks from the week before.
This is brilliant, Wretchard. One of your best. We all knew what you were writing about, though you never mentioned it.
Deliver us from evil, indeed. Evan Sayet, neoconservative, had the insight that Leftism inevitably leads its followers to protect Evil (short video clip) and disparage Good.
http://evansayet.com/evan-sayet-explains-why-liberals-whitewash-evil-and-darken-good-video/
This General Confession (following) has been excised from my church’s Holy Communion service. It is the heart of the idea of “repent and be saved,” but we can’t expect Modern Humans to say anything this starkly uncompromising, can we?
“ALMIGHTY God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Maker of all things, Judge of all men;
We acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness,
Which we, from time to time, most grievously have committed,
By thought, word, and deed, against thy Divine Majesty,
Provoking most justly thy wrath and indignation against us.
We do earnestly repent, and are heartily sorry for these our misdoings;
The remembrance of them is grievous unto us;
The burden of them is intolerable.
Have mercy upon us,
Have mercy upon us, most merciful Father;
For thy Son our Lord Jesus Christ’s sake,
Forgive us all that is past;
And grant that we may ever hereafter serve and please thee in newness of life,
To the honour and glory of thy Name;
Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”
On a sweeter note, here is Humperdinck’s lovely “Evening Prayer,” from Hansel and Gretel, sung by two little boy sopranos and a boys’ choir.
When at night I go to sleep
Fourteen angels watch do keep
Two my head are guarding
Two my feet are guiding
Two are on my right hand
Two are on my left hand
Two who warmly cover
Two who o’er me hover
Two who show me when I rise
The way to heaven’s Paradise.
Sleeping softly, then it seems
Heaven enters in my dreams;
Angels hover round me,
Whisp’ring they have found me;
Two are sweetly singing,
Two are garlands bringing,
Strewing me with roses
As my soul reposes.
God will not forsake me
When dawn at last will wake me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U02DM4NM6GM
Walt #41:
My thoughts exactly. The rifle was found in the car we were told. Then the report comes in from the autopsies that the victims were all killed by multiple rifle rounds. It is understandable that initial reports were confused, but now? Can it all be continued media fumbling?
It is true that there is a version of the AR-15 that fires pistol rounds, 9MM. But if the rifle was found in the car that’s not an explanation either.
Why is evil so “sophisticated?” Maybe it’s not; maybe it just looks sophisticated because we are unable to truly understand it. Or perhaps it is simply that it is easier to destroy than to build. Creating a genius is impossible for us. Turning a genius into an imbecile can be done in so many ways. Evil can reach new heights of destruction so easily. Meanwhile, yesterday morning I was puzzling over how to repair my fence.
By the way, prayer has returned to the schools. Fox News reports that as the teachers huddled in fear with their students as the shots rang out some of them led their class in prayer.
I posted today (12-16) the sermon I will deliver later this morning at my church. It is, “An Advent Sermon After Sandy Hook.”
It’s not so much that people do not believe in evil today, because many apparently do, and believe that it is embodied in the OTHER political party, its values (and lack thereof) and its masters: the gun lobby vs the Godless communists. If bad things happen, you can be sure it is usually because of the evil, malice, and/or stupidity on the other side. We feel better if we can blame someone.
I don’t know who to blame here, so I don’t feel better.
One of the reasons Tolkien’s works are as great as they are is that he has an ongoing philosophical dialogue about the nature of evil: i.e., is it merely the absence of good, as in Boethius, or is it a real presence (to coin a phrase)? Tolkien ‘discusses’ this dialogue through story-telling. The Ring seems to have a will of its own, and it has the ability to bend the intentions of those who wear it (even those around it) to its will. If they are already evil (Smeagol murdered Deagol for it, for instance) it controls them all the quicker and more totally. But how can such a thing be? Just what is evil? How ‘real’ is it?
Wretchard truly is brilliant, as this column shows (and I don’t mean to be offensive with too lavish a praise). I wish he’d write more novels, because he has this basic question on the nature of evil so interwoven in his writings. Tolkien and Wretchard don’t talk or debate the question in an abstract, philosophical way, but deal with it in story (Wretchard’s “No Way In”; remember the French pair of killers-for-hire? The man of the pair kept shopping for housing bargains in elite places?) and we all notice today how Wretchard took Poe’s classic (the most famous, and now we realize, perhaps the greatest) poem in American literature, and reveals it here in this column to be a meditation on the nauseous evil that is attacking us everyday.
Brilliant column and most excellent comments from everyone, esp 17, 28, 29, 57 and Tamquam’s excellent 66. But equal thanks to everyone for making meaning out of the meaningless savage Berserker butchery of Friday.
An Préachán
PA Cat #36:
Since the Sandy Hook shootings, I keep thinking of that scene in movie, “The Big Red One” where Mark Hamel chases that German into the ovens at the concentration camp.
He opens the oven doors with the barrel of his M1. When he finds the one where the German is hiding, the German pulls the trigger on his MP40, but the gun is empty and the hammer falls on an empty chamber. Hamel shoots the German, emptying the clip. Then he reloads and empties that clip. Then he reloads again and empties the clip. Lee Marvin comes up and says “You got him.” Hamel reloads again…. Bang … Bang … Bang … Bang… Bang echoes through the camp.
If I ever come up against a Sandy Hook style shooter, I hope I have enough ammo with me to use up my supply of emotion.
RWE, Proves why there are no athiests in foxholes.
Donald Sensing, Good sermon.
Richard, Beautifully written.
Commenters, Excellent comments. I can not think of anything to add.
There is a Spirit here today. It has aways been here, ever since a good man, Richard Fernandez started The Belmont Club. It is what brings me here every chance I get.
Richard, You and my fellow commenters have done me a great service over the years. You have humbled me, taught me and inspired me.
Thank you.
P.S. One thing I could not accept from the book Atlas Shrugged was Rand’s rejection of Original Sin.
“Give us the power to decide what things you can own, what things you will call holy, and how you can live and we will make you safe.”
Can a culture that poisons, dismembers, and crushes the skulls of 50,000 x 20 innocents every year expect anything else?
“There but for the grace of God go I.” I suspect that most of us have lived with ourselves long enough to have seen that evil is never more than a moment away. It is sobering (because it is terrifying) to experience the completely irrational desire to do evil. To be sure our choices and our circumstances affect our ability to resist its allure, but the fact is that just as each of us is capable of small acts of evil (and not just capable — often willing!), so we are all capable of committing great atrocities.
At the same time, it is very important that we remember that even the worst of us can be redeemed, even in this life. The most wicked man can be restored to righteousness, even to heroic virtue. No, it doesn’t always happen. But even if it is our responsibilty to end their life for the protection of others, it should be done with regret that they could not be redeemed in this life, and with hope that they will find mercy in the life to come.
I wanted to jump in here with pithy comments of my own. Unfortunately (for me, fortunately for YOU) W and the first 78 commenters did the job, and well.
Wretchard #3:
Wonderfully done. Next time please integrate “Ulalume” into your essay.
I particularly liked “…we have disarmed ourselves against noxious ideologies…” as childhood boogeymen. This needs exposition.
Thanks.
Satan, Lucifer, Prince of Darkness has beguiled America as evil does to all earthly kingdoms, There was no violent overthrow of Americas soul, but a Frog slowly simmered and then boiled in a pot, the Cook will soon eat his frog. Freedom in America did not go out in a violent struggled but was slowly smothered with errant compassion for his fellow man, evils that would not have happened in the pass now happen with frequency and worse on grander scale all in the Name of love, fairness and justice (mans love, fairness and justice). Big Brothers grip is very close to being complete, the stage will be set for the worker of wonders and peace maker to step forth from the shadows and take his throne on earth.
My Raven Song
A system of morality that is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true.
~Socrates
Good and evil co-exist in all of us. There is always the tempation to commit evil, and the seduction is that evil does not always appear so to us without introspection. Deliver us from evil.
The purpose of religious faith (Judaism, Christianity) is to teach right behavior to guide us, even when our brains and emotions tell us to do something that is evil, that we would later regret. We are all tempted; some evils are small thngs, such as lies, deceit, petty theft and the casual cruelties in life. Modern society and pop culture, as Bogie Wheel describes, have de-sensitized us to the petty evils which try to seduce us constantly.
The truth sociopath cannot really determine the difference, or just doesn’t care. Their thoughts and emotions have no conscious check, and they will choose evil because there is no internal speed bump to slow them down. Are they sociopaths because they are evil, or because they choose evil, then that makes them sociopaths?
Cain murdered his brother Abel out of jealousy, in a fit of rage where his judgement failed him. When God asked Cain where was his brother, God alreay knew where Abel was. Yet again, Cain lied, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”
And the mark of Cain is on all of us.
Evil can appear more “clever” than good, because evil cloaks itself in lies, deception and the petty jealousies that fester in all of us. It is cyinical, shrewd and cunning, and harnesses the anger and hate we all hold in reserve from every petty slight and grievance which we carry. Evil is full of wrath.
Good appears quaint and stodgy, because it holds itself to the standards of truth and justice, which must be fair to all, the guilty and just the suspiciously guilty, as well as the innocent. Good cannot be too shrewd without appearing cynical. Good cannot be cunning without debasing itself. Good does not bear false witness against your neighbor.
And evil can be found everywhere that Man walks; in churches, synagogues, schools and in your own family. It’s struggling inside you now, trying to make you do something you shouldn’t. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
With no real knowledge of good, many people walk in the twilight, never really knowing good from evil, and believing in instrumentality and the physical world, rather than recognizing that the metaphysical (spiritual) side of Man is where the sickness and temptation to do evil lies. Gun control fixes nothing, as they are talking about instrumentality, and not the energizing force of evil that tempts men to do terrible things.
64- That’s what I said. There’s about a 90% chance that the story was fabricated just to smear Tories like you people. All this jumbo mumbo about the world going to pieces… bunch of winos under the bridge if you ask me.
Anyways it’s my 4th post. And don’t call me Bobo.
BoogieWheel @17: Many American yoots today have seen the SAW series or have watched torture-p-rn films like HOSTEL.
I have a personal experience with this. Five or six years ago I happened to see a scene from Hostel. Just a scene, about ten minutes. Someone else was watching (a young man) and I happened by.
I won’t describe the scene, but it was horrifying, so intensely violent and cruel that it has stayed with me ever since. I wish I could forget having seen it. And in fact, it will now and again just pop into my head, unbidden, out of nowhere, a disturbing image that I can’t clean from my memory.
That was one brief scene, so I can’t imagine what the cumulative effect of the entire film would be, to say nothing of viewing many such things over and over. Yet we have youth who soak in this stuff. To claim that it has “no effect” is absolutely ludicrous.
For those who haven’t seen such stuff, you really can’t imagine what it’s like. This isn’t a cheesy “Night of the Living Dead” or even “The Exorcist.” It is just gratuitously violent and cruel imagery, not there to tell a story, but to be indulged in for it’s own sake. Violence doesn’t inform the story, it IS the story.
The purveyors of this trash have much to answer for. As do we as a society for letting them get away with it. Incidentally, the film grossed (there’s a good word) nearly $50 million when it was released. God knows how many people have seen the filthy thing.
COURAGE
Winston Churchill said it well
Were you scared by
THE HELL FIRES OF KUWAIT
THE GULF OIL SPILL
FUKUSHIMA DAI-CHI???
All of those disasters were finally brought under control with human intervention. I played a part in all three of those interventions.
What I saw, and feel was most distasteful, was the feckless behavior of those putatively in a position to do the most to regain control, particularly among the politicians in the latter two cases. Obama failed America and the Japanese government failed the Japanese. The Emir of Kuwait merely pretended to be a heroic firefighter by extinguishing the “last” fire by throwing two switches, one to inject inert gas into my “venturi tube” to kill the flames, and the second the shut to blowout preventer to stop the flow of oil.
It’s a good thing those of us who did the work do not work for our respective governments.
FAITH
Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.
LIVE FREE OR DIE!
I’m wary of categories & pairs of opposites in general that we humans use to frame “reality”. I question the assumption that “good” is primarily integrated through religious belief and instruction.
I believe in in crappy brain wiring that spawns all kinds of anomalies, from dyslexia to sociopathy. (“nature”)
And that parents can really mess up children and engender psycopathy. (“nurture”)
The Daily Mail did an article on the morality gene in babies as young as 6 months. 60 Minutes did a segment.
Is there a “morality gene” ?
85 Peter Pike, These Hollywooders also funded the Obama campaign!
Just watched a bit of “news”, a gathering of Obamite anti 2nd Ammendment types has assembled at the White House protesting for gun control. It’s for the Children!
I think I was looking at evil right there. These types can not understands the logic that the 2nd Ammendment protects us against evil. It proteccts us from armed evil doers and tyranny. That is its purpose as designed by The Founders.
It is time to rejoin the NRA.
Richard (and comments)…Profound…amazing.
I’m not sure what the use of Poe’s poem is supposed to be about here.
The poem is one of rememberance and loss, but not evil except as being reminded of the loss is painful, not being allowed to forget. The Raven is a messenger, though one can wonder just from what and to what end.
“Nevermore”, is it? I just watched the dreadful ABC Stephanopouluza wallowing in the tragedy, broadcast from the school’s library. All that was missing was a bust of Pallas and a black bird (and really I should turn on ABC nevermore).
If ABC paid a tenth this much attention to the Obamanation, we might not be in the national and economic and global situations we’re in.
I will note we are STILL waiting for some word on the mental states and histories of the perp and his family, and friends if any. I guess we don’t expect much surprise. Like Poe’s protagonist, we know the answers before we ask the questions, then we ask them and get freshly enraged at what we already knew.
The Raven is, I suppose, a lark. It may teach us something about mourning, but little about ravens or much of anything else, besides alliteration and poetic meters. What is there to learn from Sandy Hook?
Well, of course, the usual suspects’ reaction to a helpless school being ravaged includes locking down the school (already done), and making the world outside less threatening. Really? The reaction is to fix the whole world?
… I’m going to let it go at that, for now, rather than get into the technical issues of gun control and the mental states, political assumptions, and social policies of the two sides, because about that I want to say some rude things and the moods clash.
Okay kids, say your prayers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHm9Ggdanyo
But for some reason [society's Maginot line] left the Ardennes forest of the mind completely undefended
Perhaps one reason is that, like the real Maginot line, the perception of the physical threats was incomplete and arbitrary. Little girls aren’t little girls any longer, but ‘pre-women’ with a full set of adult rights and, so it is said, needs. Who dares to disagree? Well, encouragingly, just about everyone by now, though they haven’t yet figured out what to do. The folks who drew the current maps weren’t and aren’t trustworthy, and often couldn’t tell a landmark from a hemorroid. The endless obsession with matters sexual was one tip-off, that and the statist need to kill-off childhood and neutralize the toxic threat presented by the happily married.
Back in the day you shot someone in particular because you had a reason. Today we’re all out of reasons but not out of ammunition.
Clever, but wrong, or at least incomplete. Plenty of reasons and plenty of ammo around. Somewhere down the road, there’s a catalyst; both sides will claim to identify and understand the Raven. The winner will decide the ‘correct’ way of thinking. Wasn’t it ever thus? Superior firepower remains the key to better living for (nearly) all. The outcome, as always, is uncertain.
FWIW, add two more cents to the pile (I’ve already contributed to the tip jar): What a wonderful and very disturbing article!
To paraphrase (and mangle) a favorite old saying; A people who will not freely live by Ten simple Commandments from on high will in short order be made to live under the lowest complexities that can be conceived by byzantines wielding ten-thousand pages of commandments…In all the ‘security’ and ‘comfort’ of Slaves.
Free Will is to free lunch as Liberty is to license.
90. Josh
I just watched the dreadful ABC Stephanopouluza wallowing in the tragedy, broadcast from the school’s library. All that was missing was a bust of Pallas and a black bird (and really I should turn on ABC nevermore).
I lost interest in TV fiction (comedies and dramas) a long time ago.
After Election Night 2008, I quit watching TV news as well. Including Fox.
A couple of weeks ago, I canceled my cable TV subscription and turned in my converter boxes. Ripped the damn thing out by the roots, I did.
I don’t miss it, not at all.
I’d take the Commandments more seriously, if the first (and therefore presumably most important) four weren’t so obviously designed to keep priests from having to work for a living.
“When the first knave met the first fool, then was born the first priest.”
The most frightening part of Dante’s Inferno to me was when he encountered a shade of a person he knew to be still alive. It was explained that yes, sometimes people’s souls just drop out of their bodies, but they go on “living”, inhabited by a demon.
peterike @ 85 (on the film “Hostel”)
I won’t describe the scene, but it was horrifying, so intensely violent and cruel that it has stayed with me ever since. I wish I could forget having seen it. And in fact, it will now and again just pop into my head, unbidden, out of nowhere, a disturbing image that I can’t clean from my memory.
That was one brief scene, so I can’t imagine what the cumulative effect of the entire film would be, to say nothing of viewing many such things over and over. Yet we have youth who soak in this stuff. To claim that it has “no effect” is absolutely ludicrous.
For those who haven’t seen such stuff, you really can’t imagine what it’s like. This isn’t a cheesy “Night of the Living Dead” or even “The Exorcist.” It is just gratuitously violent and cruel imagery, not there to tell a story, but to be indulged in for it’s own sake. Violence doesn’t inform the story, it IS the story.
I have experienced similar after-effects from “The Sopranos.” There is one particular image from one particular scene that will NOT leave my mind, even though I watched that episode just once, nearly 10 years ago.
I won’t go into great detail here b/c it is not the forum for this sort of thing, but I’ve read some pretty convincing evidence on the cumulative effects of certain types of imagery stimulation on the human brain. I’m speaking as a layperson & as neither a neurologist nor a psychiatrist, but the issue of addiction was of interest to me some years back & I did a lot of reading on that subject. I’ve become convinced that graphic and realistic sexual imagery and violent imagery do affect our brains, and repeated exposure to those kinds of images, *especially* by young people (whose brains are still “forming” until about age 25), will result in stimulus-response patterns that are not, shall we say, ahhhh, “normal.” (i.e. in keeping with the stimulus-response patterns in circumstances without repeated exposure to graphic sexual & violent imagery)
This is the cultural elephant in the room that NO ONE wants to seem to talk about. Pr0n and graphically violent entertainment (movies, TV, video games) are multi-, multi-billion-dollar industries. And they generate those multi-, multi-billions of dollars by satisfying some extremely dark (and quintessentially selfish) impulses of the human soul. The mere mention of self-control on the part of producers & consumers of this stuff will bring the wrath of both producers & consumers down on you like a ton of bricks.
But here’s the bottom line. None of this hard-core stuff is necessary. Not dramatically (artistically excellent entertainment can be and has been done without it), not consumer-wise (plenty of other, more constructive fare and pursuits to fill one’s leisure time), not for any reason whatsoever. It.Is.Not.Necessary. We produce and consume this stuff not because we need it, but because we want it. As individuals and as a culture, we are addicted to Darkness. This addiction is not only killing our culture; it results in the deaths of real, flesh-and-blood individual human beings.
NOT calling for government regulation. AM calling for self-regulation. Unfortunately this is preaching to the choir. Those who agree that the above-described addiction is a real problem producing real casualties are, generally speaking, not the ones driving the train. But any little bit that you, as an individual, can do, will help.
Back to “The Sopranos.” It’s interesting that the overarching theme of that series was the seductiveness of evil, and how all sorts of otherwise good and decent people get caught up in complicity with it. And therein is the conundrum. If you watch it, are you, as a viewer, then complicit in any ill-effects that that slice of entertainment then generates b/c you are supporting it with your $$ and viewership? This is not an easy question. And I’m not trying to be either a scold or a sophist about it.
I’ve gotten to the point where, before I watch or read some piece of entertainment, I find myself asking: Is it edifying in any way? Will it add to the light or to the darkness? At the very least, will it not *subtract* from the light (i.e. is it neutral, truly harmless fluff?) If my answer is no, it won’t edify, it won’t shed light on anything, it will add yet another brick to the wall of our culture’s nihilism prison — then I walk away. And I go one step further than that. If that movie or show won’t cause me, personally, to stumble, but I know that it might do that for others, if there is no “necessity” for watching (and, usually, there is not), then I also walk away.
I have not watched anything more explicit than “The Sopranos” since that came out. Much as I admire the artistic qualities of that show’s execution (bada bing, rim shot), I do think I probably should not have watched it, period. For me, it falls in that gray area of “not a personal stumbling block, but, yes, a stumbling block to others {insofar as it leads them to more graphic, less intelligent entertainment.}” Since it was not necessary for me to view it ….
Again, I realize how all this probably sounds (weird and Puritan), even on BC, which is decidedly way more conservative & mature than most discussion forums. (fora?) But the desensitization is real, folks. I have comparison on audience reaction to Sam Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch,” 25 years apart, as just one data point. Plop your average American yoot of 25 or under in front of any at-the-time, lurid-and-graphic 70s movie and watch them go glassy-eyed with boredom or laugh at the (perceived) cheesiness of it, if you want to add more data points. Read up on addiction neuroscience.
I’m not advocating a total unplugging from popular entertainment. What I am advocating is a radical rethinking of what we consume, how much we consume & why we consume it. A wary, severely discriminating approach, which takes into account long-term effects. Inform and sharpen your conscience. Be especially aware of the human tendency to self-justify unwholesome thoughts & behavior where some pleasure stimulus is involved.
And for God’s sake (for the non-religious: for the love of pete), DUMP THE NIHILISTIC CONTENT. You don’t *need* to be watching yet another show or movie that depicts human depravity in all its gory awfulness; the descent and downfall of Walter White (yes, I’m talking to the BB fans here); the immorality extravaganzas of who can out-betray and out-butcher whom. None of this stuff is necessary. If we want to know what s***s human beings can be, all we have to do is turn on the news. Can we, once again, make “entertainment” the place we go for the good, the true & the beautiful, and not the depraved, the deceptive & the ugly? Can we? Can you???
All this x100 for those who have kids.
Sorry for the rant. If you are still reading, thank you for your patience & indulgence. And thank you, W, for BC.
bw out
28. Sgian Dubh
Slowly drained of all its resources, crushed under debt, corruption sucking the life and wealth from everywhere… until the country is a shattered ruin.
……………..
That’s not going to happen not with 100 years supply & 100 trillion dollars worth of newly technology enabled oil and gas in the ground. Alas, Krugman will be right but not for reasons that he suggests. (Just as the Reagan years produced a strong economy–but not principally for the reasons that are fondly remembered by conservatives but rather because of dirt cheap oil prices.)
OT, Walid Phares on FBook:
Why would anyone conceive of an election in Egypt now being less corrupt than the Ballot Box Stuffapalooza we just showed the world in America? Know that they want you to feel shame. They feed off our grief and pain. Someone on another thread said they want to say to America, “You are our b*tch now.”
Also on FBook and closer to our topic, Bill Whittle:
That was a profound essay, Wrechard. Some protein for the mind.
Your writing prompted some memories and things I learned to protect myself and others. I was about 11 years old, when my Dad asked me to help our neighbor to go about a mile away and pick up some furniture that was hers and was taken by her ex-husband. The place we went to was his girlfriend’s house, where he finally went ballistic and killed her and then himself with a shotgun. Dad said that we first had to clean up the couches, as there was still a considerable amount of blood on them. He was gentle, and he asked me if I could do it. I said that I would. It was horrific to see the splattered blood and know that some great evil happened there a few days ago. However, I got the cloths, sponges, and cleaner and washed the blood stains away. We loaded the furniture in the pickup and took it to our neighbor, who was very appreciative. After we got home, I told Dad that I felt shook up doing the cleaning, but I kept at it, because someone had to do it, and I did not want to let him down. Dad said that at times there is great evil in the world, and someone has to take responsibility and deal with it. He said that he was proud of me. I learned a lot that day.
Later on, when I became a father, a fellow I knew who was a policeman, taught me things that kids could do (or even adults) that could protect themselves against the kind of crazy and evil people that would go into a school and kill a bunch of kids and adults. He told me about the patterns of behavior of these kinds of killers. Locked doors and lack of visibility inside help, but the main thing is the fact that 80% of a person’s sensory input is from the eyes. Deny the perp that input and that he will be temporarily neutralized long enough to deal with him. This means that kids, or at least some of them can throw change, pencils, sand, anything at the eyes in an intense barrage. I taught my son and his chums these principles. It was their responsibility to protect their fellow students or die trying. They do not have to cower under a desk. Imagine if students at Columbine High rushed the perps. There still may have been deaths, but the perps would have been overwhelmed. The point is that one must size up the evil and act in an appropriate way to confront the evil for the survival of the good.
This society does not teach the mindset to confront and defeat evil. That means that the parents, relatives, and friends must teach children survival skills. It does not necessarily involve firearms, though they are helpful tools in the kit. The first prerequisite is to be able to recognize evil. The next is to have the mindset to develop a plan when confronted by a threat, then to carry it out.
As the society we live in is stressed, there will be those that are stressed and will snap first. What will you do to protect yourself, your family, and others from them? Some of the boogeymen are real. That is just life. It starts with the right mindset to face evil, and not to cower from it.
14. Fletcher Christian
Perhaps I had failed to memorise enough of the Bible.
………….
I listened to a radio commentator remember a time in his early 40′s when his world was collapsing around his ears because of his drinking and drug abuse. He lost his job his home himself. He said that at the time the Lord’s prayer kept coming to him.. Why? Because he had been forced to memorize it and recite it daily when he was a boy. He says prayer helped turn him away from drugs and alcohol and helped restore his life to him.
95. Fletcher Christian
I’d take the Commandments more seriously, if the first (and therefore presumably most important) four weren’t so obviously designed to keep priests from having to work for a living.
……………….
Jesus was known as a rabbi’s rabbi or priest’s priest. Not least because he is the only one in history who has been able to obey perfectly the 10 commandments.
95. What do you mean, “Not have to work for a living?” There’s a lot more to being a priest than Sunday Mass. A priest must be on call 24/7 to rush to the bedside of people he may not even know. He must serve as both a teacher and a therapist. He must listen to people’s deepest, darkest secrets and swear never to divulge them to anyone, even if the penitent confesses to a murder for which someone else has been falsely convicted. And even if he lives blamelessly in his private life, he is still culpable if he fails in his duty to warn the people under his charge about the dangers of sin.
97. Swearing by St. Peter, just like swearing by Heaven or by Earth or by God’s altar is the same as swearing by God Himself, for it is God who sanctifies all these.
Happy Holidays Fletcher Christian. May the Bounty of Christ’s season visit upon you good cheer in charitable company.
97. bogie wheel
If we want to know what s***s human beings can be, all we have to do is turn on the news.
Or just read the Bible.
28. Sgian Dubh: “My fear is that America will follow the path of Greece. ”
My fear is that the future for America is not Greece, but South Africa, in which a civilized, Western, law-abiding culture (OK, absent apartheid) was forced by degrees to turn over power to relatively less-civilized, less-educated third worlders.
The progressives are doing their damnedest to Balkanize America at the expense of the Western culture that developed and nurtured so much good in the world. Pulling everything down to their level.
#97 bogie wheel – “But here’s the bottom line. None of this hard-core stuff is necessary. Not dramatically (artistically excellent entertainment can be and has been done without it), not consumer-wise (plenty of other, more constructive fare and pursuits to fill one’s leisure time), not for any reason whatsoever. It.Is.Not.Necessary. We produce and consume this stuff not because we need it, but because we want it. As individuals and as a culture, we are addicted to Darkness. This addiction is not only killing our culture; it results in the deaths of real, flesh-and-blood individual human beings.”
A prof once said to me, “As the Kingdom of God draws nigh it will draw out all manner of evil and corruption for all to see. As it does so, each person will also find that every decision made, both great and small, will be a decision either for or against the Kingdom of God.”
Your observations on addiction are spot on. I think the Apostle Paul’s antidote to evil addictions and evil ways, was voiced to the Philippians, and is perhaps what my prof was referencing about decision making, indeed essential for Godly mind formation and righteousness.
Christian brothers, keep your minds thinking about whatever is true, whatever is respected, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever can be loved, and whatever is well thought of. If there is anything good and worth giving thanks for, think about these things. Keep on doing all the things you learned and received and heard from me. Do the things you saw me do. Then the God Who gives peace will be with you. (Philippians 4:8-10)
“Why evil mind is always more sophisticated? Am I wrong?
You are wrong, you only hear about those because they are the ones who scare us the most and get the stories written about them. The evil, stupid ones (and there are very many) are the ones who fill up our jails and generally find ways to get there very quickly. (talk to a jailor or sherrif’s deputy about how stupid the average inmate is these days, you’ll get an earful)
One other thought on this thread, and this is a sad one that comes from personal knowledge of a relative who is mentally ill: the point was made that sanity is the best choice for survival. True, but then what attraction does that have for the soul who, because of either warped emotions or warped wiring, doesn’t want to survive? What do you do about those people who sincerely feel that death is better than life – why would they want sanity? In fact, for some of them insanity is the only way they can find to give themselves a reason to live.
I know that doesn’t make any sense, but once you start to understand a bit about how insane people think, it can’t help but make you a bit crazy too.
I never understood what Poe was up to, and still don’t, but this introduction to the Poe section of _The Stuffed Owl_ might be amusing.
97. bogie wheel
I thought of your comments about addiction to violence when I came across a blog post written by the mother of an obviously disturbed son (HT: Ace of Spades):
I live with a son who is mentally ill. I love my son. But he terrifies me.
A few weeks ago, Michael pulled a knife and threatened to kill me and then himself after I asked him to return his overdue library books. His 7 and 9 year old siblings knew the safety plan— they ran to the car and locked the doors before I even asked them to. I managed to get the knife from Michael, then methodically collected all the sharp objects in the house into a single Tupperware container that now travels with me. Through it all, he continued to scream insults at me and threaten to kill or hurt me.
That conflict ended with three burly police officers and a paramedic wrestling my son onto a gurney for an expensive ambulance ride to the local emergency room. The mental hospital didn’t have any beds that day, and Michael calmed down nicely in the ER, so they sent us home with a prescription for Zyprexa and a follow-up visit with a local pediatric psychiatrist.
We still don’t know what’s wrong with Michael. Autism spectrum, ADHD, Oppositional Defiant or Intermittent Explosive Disorder have all been tossed around at various meetings with probation officers and social workers and counselors and teachers and school administrators. He’s been on a slew of antipsychotic and mood altering pharmaceuticals, a Russian novel of behavioral plans. Nothing seems to work. . . . This problem is too big for me to handle on my own. Sometimes there are no good options. So you just pray for grace and trust that in hindsight, it will all make sense.
I am sharing this story because I am Adam Lanza’s mother. I am Dylan Klebold’s and Eric Harris’s mother. I am Jason Holmes’s mother. I am Jared Loughner’s mother. I am Seung-Hui Cho’s mother. And these boys— and their mothers— need help. In the wake of another horrific national tragedy, it’s easy to talk about guns. But it’s time to talk about mental illness.
. . . . since 1982, 61 mass murders involving firearms have occurred throughout the country. (http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/07/mass-shootings-map). Of these, 43 of the killers were white males, and only one was a woman. Mother Jones focused on whether the killers obtained their guns legally (most did). But this highly visible sign of mental illness should lead us to consider how many people in the U.S. live in fear, like I do.
When I asked my son’s social worker about my options, he said that the only thing I could do was to get Michael charged with a crime. “If he’s back in the system, they’ll create a paper trail,” he said. “That’s the only way you’re ever going to get anything done. No one will pay attention to you unless you’ve got charges.”
I don’t believe my son belongs in jail. The chaotic environment exacerbates Michael’s sensitivity to sensory stimuli and doesn’t deal with the underlying pathology. But it seems like the United States is using prison as the solution of choice for mentally ill people. According to Human Rights Watch, the number of mentally ill inmates in U.S. prisons quadrupled from 2000 to 2006, and it continues to rise—in fact, the rate of inmate mental illness is five times greater (56 percent) than in the non-incarcerated population. (http://www.hrw.org/news/2006/09/05/us-number-mentally-ill-prisons-quadrupled). . . .
No one wants to send a 13-year old genius who loves Harry Potter and his snuggle animal collection to jail. But our society, with its stigma on mental illness and its broken healthcare system, does not provide us with other options. Then another tortured soul shoots up a fast food restaurant. A mall. A kindergarten classroom. And we wring our hands and say, “Something must be done.”
The entire post is well worth reading: http://anarchistsoccermom.blogspot.com/2012/12/thinking-unthinkable.html?m=1
There are no quick fixes for this type of broken mind, and I have a hunch that the neurologists and psychopharmacologists would be the first to say so. Meanwhile your remarks about a possible link between the visual system of the human brain and desensitization to violent imagery make a good deal of sense. (Waiting for Dr. Irons and the other psychiatrists who post at BC to chime in).
Walt 59: “Does it mean that the forces of good are doomed? When I see how much effort is needed to prove that right is right and wrong is wrong I become desperate.”
No; the forces of good are not doomed because the greatest force for good, and the greatest enemy of evil, is truth. Truth must be searched out by good people and defended to the death. Courage is required, and so is persistence, cooperation and intelligence. The forces arrayed in today’s conspiracy of evil depend on lies, so we must strike them in their heart – strike them in their capital city of lies. Our conspiracy of truth and goodness will open up the jugular veins of evil men.
My father went all in after Pearl Harbor, left his dairy farm home, and met the enemy of freedom and truth on the Island of Saipan; there he engaged his enemy face-to-face and hand-to-hand combat, surviving by the power of his Thompson sub-machine gun and the grace of God. Now, if my father entered into harm’s way in the most brutal sense, not fearing death, why should I not go all in against the totalitarian evil which is forming up today under the allied banners of Marxist Socialism and Islamo-Fascism? We must first cast aside our fear of death, and then establish, like our Founding Fathers, an all-American conspiracy of truth and goodness. Although these times may eventually try our bodies and souls, this is no time to become desperate. Our children and grand-children need to see us enter the struggle against lies and evil – to lead the struggle – if necessary to die in the struggle. When our young ones see us go all in for truth and goodness, with some of us falling, there will be an outpouring of righteous indignation and steely resolve which will loose the fateful lightening of His terrible swift sword. The power of good men and women fully engaged against lies and evil will be thrilling – because the power of good men and women fighting for their God-given equal rights to life, liberty and creative pursuit of happiness, as it always has been, will be invincible.
“I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary but slinks out of the race, where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat.” John Milton
I pray that our State governments will grasp the enormity of the ideological struggle which is now upon our nation, that they will begin the process of nullifying all un-Constitutional Federal laws, regulations, executive orders and Supreme Court decisions within their respective borders, and that they will then enact an anti-Marxist / anti-Islamo-Fascist Constitutional Amendment – no Federal permission is required. Let us first use the power of the pen.
111 PA Cat
Having dealt with the psychiatric profession on a professional basis (no one in law enforcement can avoid it), my opinion is that the main problem is the profession itself.
Entirely too many psychiatrists view their jobs, and their patients, through a lens distorted by their politics and their social engineering aspirations. Since most psychiatrists are determinedly “liberal”, the result is essentially pre-ordained.
They become fascinated by, and enamored of, the “different worldview” of the mentally ill- a term, by the way, they regard as odious as “insane”, these days. They will go to any lengths to avoid institutionalizing a patient, no matter how disruptive or dangerous their behavior, because they equate the patient’s refusal (or simple inability) to conform to society’s mores with the “rebel” mentality they were taught to admire in college. As such, there is almost no chance of having a violent mental case placed in custodial care, even if a bed is available.
If the relatives of such a person appeal to the psychiatrist, they’re most likely to be sternly lectured on their failure to “value the insights” of the patient, who the psychiatrist will also insist “should not be punished for seeing the world differently”. At least three such experts I’ve encountered expressed admiration for such individuals’ ability to achieve “altered states of consciousness” without recourse to hallucinogens. I can only assume their own use of same had been extensive at some time in the past.
And of course, there are always the “political” ones, who view violent outbursts like this as “teachable moments” in the way we must change society to make it “more safe” and “more just”. By banning firearms, for instance, so that the “wisest among us” (i.e., themselves and their political cronies) can rule as they see fit. (As with religion, political belief systems are adopted by people on the basis of “will this belief sanctify my doing what I want to do anyway?”)
Some of the more extreme members of this subclass view violently deranged mental patients the same way they view violent criminals. That is, as the “front-line soldiers in our war against a repressive society”- namely, ours.
I am often amazed at the way people in the self-styled “enlightened elite’” get everything they want, yet somehow feel they’re being constantly “repressed” by everyone else. I then wonder what it would take for them to cease feeling this way.
And I am concerned that (1) I already know the answer, and (2) that answer might be “We want to build Utopia- but we need everyone else’s absolute obedience to do it. Dissent will be punished by death.”
In short, as long as psychiatrists as a group see themselves as crusaders for a “better culture”, rather than doctors seeking to heal the sick, we can expect no relief from outrages of this sort.
After all, if they do indeed succeed in disarming us “for our own good”, the homicidally-inclined can always slash us up, blow us up, or poison us. And that’s just a sample of the available methods. Timothy McVeigh didn’t destroy the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building with an “assault weapon”, and Theodore Kaczynski didn’t need one to kill people with, either. Not to mention the creative “person” who thought putting poison in Tylenol was just good, clean fun.
But the psychiatrists won’t care, anymore than the politicians will. They’ll have their power, their positions will be secure, and they can always blame that nebulous villain known as “Society” for all the ills of the world.
And demand even more power over everyone else. Not that it will stop any of it. But it will make them feel powerful, and important, and thus good about themselves.
Which ultimately is what all of this, psychiatry, politics, and all, is really all about.
clear ether
eon
When it comes to this incident, I refuse to talk about guns. The narrative should be the truth: We have welcomed, nay, encouraged, a culture of death. The unthinkable is thinkable and accepted when we have a president who is an advocate for infanticide, who sees babies as a problem he wouldn’t want to punish his daughters with.
Nominated at a convention that views abortion as a sacrament, that shouted out to deny God any recognition in their platform three times.
Voted in by a people who sell their children into slavery to the all powerful state for an Obama Phone and free birth control. People who refuse to even acknowledge truth, even if it is as direct and clear as the math behind our deficits.
PA CAT: In the case of Michael, two things should/must be done: one is to de-tox him. The drugs he has been given preclude any recovery. Nobody ever gets well by staying drunk. Those bozo shrinks eon mentioned refuse to admit this and keep swapping/adding to prescriptions thereby leading to perpetual intoxication.
If it goes on long enough it will duplicate the chronic alcoholic with the “Wet brain”. Body de-toxes brain does not.
And the other thing? Call the exorcist. Look for a good one, not one who goes through the motion because the Bishop designated him the fall guy for his Diocese. Michael exhibits classic symptons of the “severely harassed” to “imperfectly possessed” stages. If this is the case, the exorcist will be able to expose the presence of familar or demon. And then chase it off.
If harassment/possession is NOT the case, the exorcist by eliminating one possibility can often (I think much more often than not) identify what is causing all the trouble. So Michael’s Mother should definitely start calling.
Can you pass the word through Ace of Spades. I will try too. Thanks partner.
Alaska Paul: Thanks for the tip about concentrating on the perp’s eyeballs.
useful info that.
eon; My birth mother was a gentle person who by age 33 had been widowed twice,
once by war, the second time by alcoholism. She endured a variety of psychobabble
diagnosis and was subjected to innumerable electro-shock treatments, a goodly number of insulin comas as well, and God Only Knows how many varieties of pills.
As a consequence she was ruled to be violently unstable, declared permanently mentally incompetent and died a ward of the state. Poor woman was born with a bit target on her back for every misbegotten snakepit idea that came down the pike.
Only good news was that finally the state of Texas cleaned up its act a bit, stopped all that “therapy” and took her to AlAnon meetings. She then became a normal person and was able to live out her days in a halfway house, just a poor person’s Senior Center.
So like you, I tend to view “mental health professionals” with a jaundiced eye. Unca Krauthammer is a noticeable exception.
Was I the only one who thought of obama’s call for revenge in the last couple of days of the election? Maybe someone took him seriously.
@116. Dave—you’re welcome for the tip. Even in close-up fighting, you go for the eyes. It is nasty, but that is what you have to do to win and survive. Just think about going fast on your bike as a kid, then running into a bunch of gnats hitting your eyes. Becomes a crisis real quick, heh.
112. Storm_Rider
A. good points, suggestions noted
B. thanks for what you do
I sent the link to “The Shadow in the Hallway” to my email list. One of my sons (20-something and all a father could ask for) responded, “That one was a bit tricky to follow.”
I told him I was not a poetry person and would re-read it for more detailed analysis, but felt the main point was that real evil does exist and spiritual defenses are required. Evil will always find a way around our technical defenses.
Since I am a political and historical animal, let’s go with this example: Suppose we remove all guns from civilian hands. That may prevent school shootings, but evil will find other ways to kill innocents, perhaps via government power. In that case, the death toll would not be in the tens, but in in the tens of millions. (With apologies to Manager Lou Brown in “Major League”) It has happened before.
Alaska Paul @100: A tip I picked up from a SWAT member: use a compact 500-600 lumen flashlight to attack the eyes with painfully-bright light to gain an edge. Even in daylight it buys a second or two, and in darkness some multiple of that. Seconds that can be used to flee or strike. Legal and innocuous-looking no matter where you go. Schools. Commercial flights. Subways. Church. City streets. Great for adults and responsible kids alike.
Want to know why Obama is afeared of those bitter clingers?
They know who Donna Fargo is.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3hzKjiCN_o
Our country is insane.
Has been for several generations. You could blame it on the enormously successful infiltration of ComIntern recruits. But no-one in the U.S. believes any other country or organization than our own Sweet US of A has ever done anything mean or sneaky to any other culture or country.
So the same folks who believe that anyone who legally owns a gun is a violent beast deserving death, simultaneously believe that any criminal who commits an ACTUAL murder is innocent and morally pure because Society musta made him do it.
F***ing IDIOTS.
For 4 decades, the feminists have loudly objected that women who report that they have been raped MUST BE BELIEVED WITHOUT QUESTION, because otherwise we are further victimizing them; To question their allegation is to blame the victim.
At the same time our Progressivist Schoolmasters have taught schoolchildren AND their parents that for a child to defend against a violent attack with any sort of violence whatsoever makes them fully as guilty as the original attacker.
MADNESS.
Worse, it is AN EVIL LIE.
Finally, I have to conclude that the people who blithely posit these fetid contradictions are absolutely, fully aware what they present as logic is just a stinking pile of ordure. They do it to create a nation of mewling sheep who will piss themselves in fear rather than stand against tyranny.
Sure. SecState fell and had a brain concussion so she won’t be made to testify, but she didn’t need to go to hospital to have it checked out.
Just how effing stupid do they think we are?
You speak of the in-betweens, between the Good and the Evil. Those who have no name and are still enjoined by our Elders not to speak with or listen to.
In India, one of Tagore’s most famous songs speaks of this. First, the song sets out the two extremes of the human condition. One, those who are “gharey”, that is, at home, with family and hearth. And, two, those who are “paarey”, that is, on the shore, called to death, waiting to cross the river to the other side.
Then, the songwriter asks the bitter question – what of those who are in between, neither living nor yet dead? He speaks of the shrouded figure who comes in the twilight whispering things. Throughout the song, the singer wrestles with these whisperings. In the end, with the fatalism of Indians, he finds it intolerable to fight and succumbs to the solace of surrender.
The Elders may urge you all they like not to listen to these whisperings – not just those who are living and those who are dying, but in the Tagore analogy, between those who are content and those who are not. In the end, the discontent will open the window and let the Raven in.
Falsity is not the human condition. Insanity is. And sanity is not a learned aberration. Instead, learning is the brave attempt to appear sane.
Scott Fitzgerald called this “intelligence”. “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.” The philosopher might call this the ability of the insane to appear sane.
Recall the astrophysicist who said that to hold the idea of a bounded universe and an unbounded universe as scientific fact, both at the same time, is to invite insanity. He said, we maintain the ability to function by postulating string theory, worm holes, space time etc. To even entertain the thought that one or the other other is true is to let the Raven in at the window.
Who knows what window the Lanza kid opened on a dreary midnight? Maybe, he just gave up the fight. Maybe the human condition proved too much?
According to one tradition, the reason God did not want us to eat from the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil was that these categories were too amorphous for imperfect man. Previous to that, man thought in purely binary terms of Truth and Falsehood, with no room for confusion, willful or not. Once Good and Evil enter into it, then we started using our impressive God-given brainpower to rationalize anything and everything.
Bogie @ #97
the desensitization is real
Yes. Also, “the brain” has a life of its own, despite adages, despite rules and lectures, despite it being “yours” & allegedly subject to your control.
Pattern it one way, through continuous exposure to violence and mayhem, and guess which way it’s going ?
eon @ #113
…psychiatric profession …my opinion is that the main problem is the profession itself.
I’ve met a few of “the professionals” over the years and decided I’d try to stay out of their grips.
Some of the diagnosing seems insane in and of itself.
Psychotropic meds are prescribed like candy. Reportedly, the killer in Connecticut was on them & at least one of the killers at Columbine had abruptly stopped taking his in the days prior to the carnage.
You can’t stop taking these substances abruptly. Ideally, you’ll never start taking them, but they’re easily available.
The United States has (or had anyway when I read about this 10 years or so ago) something like 90% of the diagnoses of ADD and ADHD in the world.
The degree of supposed protection, cure & control available in modern American society seems directly proportional to that society spinning out of control.
123. Mad Fiddler
I’ve had the discussion too many times with ‘progressive’ friends who believe man is good but becomes perverted by corrupt social and political systems.
The question that stops them cold is: “Well, then, who is to blame for corrupt social and political arrangements?”
I am always surprised by how these people never think beyond Step One. I suppose if they did, they would not be liberals.
112 Storm Rider,
In helping to try to shut down a pervert-worshipping cult that’s been masquerading as a Catholic order for the past seventy years, I’ve come to realize a few things about fighting evil:
1. Your sins are your own. Before taking on someone else’s evil, you need to make very good examinations of conscience, very frequently, so that you know the difference between your sins and theirs. It’s very easy to make your opponent the embodiment of your own sins.
2. There is always a new evil to take the old one’s place; we aren’t going to solve anything once and for all. It doesn’t matter so much what we ourselves successfully accomplish, but how our own immortal souls come through the struggle.
3. If you don’t have powerful, evil enemies, you aren’t trying hard enough.
The question that stops them cold is: “Well, then, who is to blame for corrupt social and political arrangements?”
I am always surprised by how these people never think beyond Step One. I suppose if they did, they would not be liberals.
Ascribing special powers to inanimate concepts or objects is that remarkably stone-age logic that liberals possess. They do the same thing with guns, remember.
The Catholic church began to be corrupted by Protestant-like man-centered faith after Vatican II. Catholicism has devolved with gusto into the heresy of moral relativism. The so-called “Pedophile Priests” problem was / is a “Gay Priests” problem: it was all about the young boys and men–not the little girls. We cannot talk about that, however. Nor can we talk about the church averting its eyes from fifty million abortions.
Benedict and, to a lesser degree, American bishops are attempting a belated return to core church doctrine, but it will be a long time before the Catholics-in-name-only who voted for Barack Obama die out and leave the church to be re-constructed on their ashes.