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I keep meaning to tell you, I was asked to attend a disaster preparedness
conference at Hopkins about 15 years or so 9-11. It was really in the wake of Hugo that took out South Carolina. It was a strange conference for a lot of reasons.The police captain I worked with set it up. He was a quiet guy from a part of town not known for forward thinkers, yet he was always on the edge, doing really, really good things. He turned out to be one of those really good people who, like you said, doesn't take shit off of anyone at the end of the day. I so admire the guy, and try to sort of follow his lead.
Ruben Greenberg (spelling may be off) was the chief of police during Hugo, and he was the keynote speaker at this conference. What struck me so funnyt, particularly now in all the PC talk, is how he told his people to deal with it. SC hadn't seen the likes of something like this. I don't think the country had seen much of it then. All of the power was gone, roads were gone, sailboats were sitting in driveways in the middle of Charleston. If people were lucky they got to the shelters, but many wouldn't leave because they just didn't believe anything was gong to happen.
The typical insanity started breaking out, and the rank and file cops were going in saying that this person or that one was out committing mayhem...what should we do with him? Well, elecricity in the jail wasn't going well either. In front of this huge conference at Hopkins, he said, "I just told them to let them know we'd have to let them go, but we'd also have to beat the hell out of them." Basically, just put the fear into them since they couldn't do much else. He was credited with really controlling the situation in a way I not many could. He ended up writing a book, not about the disaster, but about the same sort of philosophy, called, "Take Back Our Streets."
I asked about the compartmentalization because I don't know many people who see these sorts of thing, then lead normal lives being able to say...overall shit happens, but you keep moving about your business. I know so many cops who are major drinkers. I always keep my guard up, but I think I still have an optimism that people who don't deal with crap don't seem to have. I've never figured it out entirely, but I think you explained it pretty good there. You can't really prepare to box with a crazy person, especially when you don't know for sure if the person is crazy. So you go about your life in a good way but keep sharp objects put away during dinner parties. What else can you do? Still, not many people get that philosophy, at least that's been my experience.
posted by
terpgirl30
on October 6, 2006 at 2:20 AM
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PS: Speaking of psychopaths...
The psychologist speaking at the national disaster preparedeness and response meeting a couple weeks ago said that he could always tell wqhen he had been speaking to psychopaths because he always had the feeling it would be fun to take them home to supper.
I knew patients who, through their disease process, thought they had killed a parent or a sibling, when it had been a fantasy or the voices told them that.
posted by
majroj
on October 5, 2006 at 10:45 PM
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What's to compartmentalize?
I don't try to "make sense of it all" or follow a strict code. While I don't think anyone is, overall, controlling my destiny, I don't have complete control, either. I'm responsible, but shit happens.
Sometimes one can get depressed, sometimes for quite a while...get help. Sometimes things are going along just ducky...enjoy, but don't do anything too rash. I do have faith in Murphy's Laws, subscribe to the creedo from "The Shootist (see below) although I am flexible, and I have studied and prepared for shit you have no concept of for so long, while working with liars and sociopaths and also inmates, that I can look up at the sky and enjoy just being there.
Quote from John Wayne's chracter in "The Shootist":
John Bernard Books: I won't be wronged. I won't be insulted. I won't be laid a-hand on. I don't do these things to other people, and I require the same from them.
My version:
At the end of the day (literally and figuratively) can you say you did your best and didn't hurt anyone unnecessarily? Then you had a good day.
So sez I. I might just steal this comment for my own blog!
posted by
majroj
on October 5, 2006 at 10:40 PM
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Maj
The schizophrennics I've come in contact with have all told me they could have prented harm and crime. This is the first I've ever heard of it manifesting itself in thinking they've done harm. Can you imagine being that tormented in your mind? I have enough guilt from lying to a (count ONE) nun in Catholic school around 8th grade. The other part makes sense---thinking it's okay for them to hurt someone. That goes with the sort of rationalization I've seen.
I have never heard about the suicide group you are talking about. You get to a point where you think nothing will surprise you. Well, I'm surprised. I can't even fathom that. Dues paying? I guess you've seen enough of this kind of thing that you're beynd shaking your head on it. I still haven't quite crossed over that bridge, I guess. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
Now you tell me, for all this kind of talk, I still think of myself as being highy optimistic and master of my own destiny and all of that. Can you compartmentalize what is "out there" from our life? I've sort of gotten that from you in the past, but I thought I'd ask. I don't think I've ever crossed over that cynic line, which I'm really grateful for. I think because I've also seen so much unexpected good from mankind, in family and in strangers that it has evened it out. Then again, it could be that I just choose to look at it that way. I always wondered on that chicken/egg thing in regard to this in regard to how we think about things.
posted by
terpgirl30
on October 5, 2006 at 8:06 PM
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Terpgirl, in answer...
I've known more than a couple of people who thought they had committed heinous acts but were paranoid schiz instead. I've know people who couldn't wrap their head around why it isn't ok to hurt and kill people, because they wanted to, so that was OK. One couple killed their new neighbors because they liked their furniture, and the police wondered why they had two sofas and two TV's when their dead neighbor's apt had been stripped.
I was not thinking about suicide pacts as they are commonly thought about. The suicide clubs in Germany would pay dues, draw lots and the money was used to buy Nobel's newfangled "dynamite". What I was thinking about was unconnected individuals who are spurred to action when seeing/hearing about a Columbine etc.
posted by
majroj
on October 5, 2006 at 7:42 PM
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Strat
That's very kind of you to say. I've been criticized for writing responses that are longer than the original poster's work. I can't (and don't want to) get used to doing the "hi," "me, too" sort of comments and posts. That's just a waste of my time.
The most exciting thing in the world to me is an educated person who will sit down and discuss things with you. I belong to a political board online, and I've seen these people come to blows every so often. You don't get more opposite than these people. One guy's grandfather was a card-carrying communist in Russia, and another man, a veteran, I swear has a foot in the Civil War still. We always say that when the air clears, these are people we could hang with. I don't think more than a few have met, but over this time, we've all had major life events. It's amazing to me that these people have looked out for me as much as anyone a few miles from me. That's the respect thing. I really, really don't agree with some of them, but I really, really like them, and I think they are good people. I think that knowledge only comes from really opening yourself up to dialogue that is sometimes uncomfortable. It's boring to have to listen to opinions that are just like your own all the time.
I've had to interview people who, going in, I truly, truly just wanted to take a swing at. If I let my face show what is going on inside, however, they won't talk. Almost invariably I come out feeling differently. I may sitll dislike the person or the acts, but you'll find some sort of common ground. As you said, the results are amazing, even to me, even still. You always learn something if you aren't afraid of discourse.
posted by
terpgirl30
on October 5, 2006 at 2:49 PM
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I just want to say,
I hope everyone on this site reads this comments exchange. This is EXACTLY the way discussion and debate should be, here and anywhere else.
Kudos to you both, and by the way, both of your treatises and conclusions were delivered not only with Jesuit-like logic and civilized, rational discourse, but both of you have damned interesting and readable styles.
Thank you both. I mean that.
posted by
strat
on October 5, 2006 at 9:21 AM
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Maj
I still really disagree agree with aspects of what you're saying, but found the other parts really interesting. You know, my son and I had a discussion last night about how people disagree on things, in terms of the manner in which they disagree. Dennis Miller was on Jon Stewart. You couldn't get two more opposing opinions, yet, it was very convivial, polite, and it was obvious they had a lot of respect for one another. I've known lots of people over the years whom I've disagreed with vehemently, yet I knew they came to their line of thinking through a serious thought process. It wasn't just one of those goofy opinions some people seem to pull out of the air or because all of their friends think the same way. The ex I've talked about who came from the extremist right wing fundamentalist background couldn't have ended up more opposite to many of my own opinions, and yet we got along great. He's a good person, and he spent a lot of time thinking things through. I can never fault a person who comes to a decision that way. You obviously have enough background to come to the decision you have, even if I don't agree with aspects.
I hope the behavioral people really work this case because there are some strange aspects that I've never seen, and I've worked with a lot of cops who deal with crazies. This man supposedly told his relatives that he had to take these kids hostage because he had already molested a few of them years earlier. The children and their families are baffled by that and say it never happened. The guy told his family that he was having nightmares about having done it and about doing it again. Now it makes me wonder if the guy was, as I said, just a purely delusional person in every sense of the word.
From our experiences and study, have you EVER seen a person convinced he had committed crimes like this...when he didn't. I know there is that group that confesses to every crime under the sun, but that's a different breed. This guy sounds tormented in the mind...which obviously, he would have to be to do this, but aside from this act, he seemed like he had a war going on in his mind.
And yet, he was the guy next door, as most people report these kinds of people in the end. I always wonder if we'll ever get to a point that we spot the signs/triggers beforehand.
(BTW, I remember the suicide pact stuff as well. I didn't have it at my high school, but I remember that being a sort of fraternity/sorority mentality back when I was in high school and early college. That was a strange phenomenon. Is it peer pressure, hormones or outside forces fueled by seeing violence? I'd like to hear more about your study/work with that at some point, if you get the urge to post it.)
posted by
terpgirl30
on October 5, 2006 at 7:46 AM
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Terpgirl, I worked on a hotline and studied "suicidology".
Here's a reference:
http://wonder.cdc.gov/wonder/prevguid/m0031539/m0031539.asp
Schneidman and Farberow's seminal work from the Fifties also made refence to "suicide clubs" in Germany between world wars, and trees that had to be cut down because one after another teens used to hang themselves on them. My own highschool went through a paroxysm in 1970.
A "copycat" doesn't have to have the same background as the earlier perps, it just seems that in some violent people a sudden ratcheting-up of violence seems to be sparked by reports of violence that resonate with them for some reason.
I'll bet a shiney quarter that if I searched this guy's house I'd find kiddy porn of some sort, certainly weapons. If I went back along his path I'd find local cops, counselors and schoolmates who knew about him being violent or cruel towards animals and maybe smaller kids. If I was really slick I'd find emergency room visits by his wife, girlfriends, maybe his kids. They may find he was a subject of abuse, they may find a tumor in his head, they may find he recently was doing speed so he could work a string of overtime night shifts to bnuy his kids braces; he still premeditated a horrendous act against helpless kids, carried it out and avoided capture by committing suicide. No cure, no excuse, and damn little in the way of information to pracmatically use to prevent it happening again.
It isn't coincidental that these sort of deals happen in bunches, and the only way they can become known to susceptible subjects (assuming it isn't due to planetary alignments or pheromones or something) is mass media.
I know the reason the media keeps reporting and reporting about this incident is readership/ratings (or "eyes" as they are called nowadays). It serves no possible informational need of the nation to watch long lingering helicopter shots and, increasingly, ground telephoto and even across-the-road photos and footage, or hear the debate as to whether a dead predator did or did not "molest" these girls before he shot them.
I don't even raise the point of media accuracy. I raise the points of their motivation versus their public service; and of their disingenuity when on the one hand they say they need to report things because the nation needs to know and they are the ones to tell us, but when called to be accountable for this strength they twitter their eyelashes and say "Little ole me? I'm just sayin' it like it is!".
A report that a school had an incident, one telling of the particulars without the sensationalism and repetition, and get on with the rest of the day's news. No lingering and feeding the public's purient interest, gun fantasies, etc.
NO offense taken, you obviously have strong feelings here. Bottom line is that it doesn't excuse the perp, he's better dead, but the media has a role, albeit indirect, of triggering spates of this sort of mayhem.
posted by
majroj
on October 4, 2006 at 10:35 PM
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Maj, you know I'm crazy about you, right?
That said, I'm going to tell you that what I'm about to say I've said less than a handful of times in my life. You are totally wrong. You you have no idea what you are talking about. (It's a comment that makes for good reading, however, which would put it in the category of sensationalism, wouldn't it?) To say that the news media is "triggering" this stuff in Amish country is just plain crazy and irresponsible. It is being covered as a news story (not flogged to death) because it is something that has never happened before. There was a ZERO percent murder rate in the area. Amish or not, that's news BY DEFINITION. To say that the media caused this to happen is like saying James Cagney played a role in Attica way back when. It's a big leap thath sounds really good but isn't real.
I've said this a bunch of times in different places around here. In my mind, there's a one-nut theory often. The guy who did this does not fit a copycat mold as say, the post Columbine murderers did. This guy was a psycho waiting to do something. No reporter begged this guy to drop his kids off, park the milk truck and then target little girls in the school. Something else drove that. The guy who took all the nurses hostage back in the '50s, then offed them one by one was fueled by his own insanity, not by anything he saw on a black and white TV in a storefront window. The Green River Killer, ditto. He just liked little boys. Charlie Manson...a nut. The media hasn't created more Charlie's. There's just that one, and even the other inmates hate him.
If the guy in Lancaster had been a copycat of any sort, he wouldn't have let groups go, then lined the girls up and gotten them execution style. Copycats go out in a blaze of glory. They just shoot at whatever is breathing. In Columbine, they targeted jocks, which given the demographic of the shooters, makes sense. They were teenagers who were picked on. Jocks are a natural target, as would be any of the popular kids to a misfit who has hit his limit. This guy lined up the little girls. That doesn't follow a single thing other than this guy had some serious deep-seeded psychological problem we will probably only guess at.
Moreover, as with lawyers and cops, people hurl boulders at the media, but they sure as hell know where to find us when they want to use our services. Over the years, I've rarely had to track someone down to talk to me. I agree TV news can be intrusive. They also do things print can't do in terms of getting the word out fast. At least one parent in the country has gotten his child back because of Amber alerts going out or the media broadcasting details of a subject. America's Most Wanted is the case in point. You write stuff about Disaster Preparedness. How EXACTLY would you be expecting to get this information out to the masses? The whole Paul Revere thing wouldn't work these days.
You say you've had one day's contact with the Amish around where you are...well the're a fact of life around here. You're reading it wrong. First, Amish men always look a little on the sour side. They don't look for outsiders to stay out, as it would first look, even if that's what they say. And for blaming the media image, you were quick to grab the Harrison Ford reference. That wasn't real. That was a movie. If the Amish truly wanted others to leave them alone so they could live their lives in another century, they wouldn't have opened up three major stores down the street from my house, again, an hour from Amish country. A group just like the Amish is involved with one of the major auction sites in the country in Maryland. They make their wares, then run a restaurant at the place. That's not exactly separating oneself. You can't have it both ways.
People are always criticizing the media for getting a story partially right. Nonetheless, they have no problem grabbing a germ of a story that maybe, just might have happened, inflating it and sticking the blame on ANYONE but the crazy guy with the gun. Before you blame someone for stepping out of line and jumping in when they didn't know all the facts, seriously, look in the mirror.
posted by
terpgirl30
on October 4, 2006 at 4:20 AM
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There is a recognized "contagion"/copycat factor for suicides and homocides
So why are the newsies flogging this one to death? They expect Kelly McGillis and Harrison Ford to appear? (Vigo Mortenson wasin "Witness" too!).
I've had one day's contact with the Amish folks of Rockome IL. and they were patient but firm. The news people need to back off, notr only because they are possibly triggering these events, but because they KNOW the Amish don't want or need this.
posted by
majroj
on October 3, 2006 at 9:25 PM
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This was the first thing I heard on the news this morning.
Terrible stuff...
posted by
littlemspickles
on October 3, 2006 at 12:27 AM
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What an odd story!
And so tragic.
posted by
Passionflower
on October 2, 2006 at 6:15 PM
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Terpgirl, I don't listen to news in the daytime, so I missed this. Crap.
An Amish schoolhouse, these sick f*cking asses. Pardon my French, but that is sick, sick, sick.
posted by
Blanche.
on October 2, 2006 at 5:22 PM
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I keep finding myself must muttering
I can't believe it. It is sickening. I think because it is in such a peaceful spot as well takes one more inch of security away from us. We used to think we were safe with "x," then "x" turned into a crime area. We moved the boundary a little, but bad things crept in. Will there come a time when there is no safe place?
I've always thought the Guardian Angels have the right idea. The crime rate went so far down. In general, New York had the worst major crime reputation. Now my town, Baltimore, far outdoes New York. When I was a teen, New York seemed like a cold, big city---but we're worse statistically now. I feel safe walking downtown, however. I can't explain it.
posted by
terpgirl30
on October 2, 2006 at 5:16 PM
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It is sickening! When I hear aobut things like this,
I turn to prayer for all involved! It is just so sad, you send your child to school expecting to see her in a few hours and then she is dead! I can't imagine the pain of those families! God help them!
faholo
posted by
faholo
on October 2, 2006 at 4:57 PM
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It is a matter of great concern .
posted by
afzal50
on October 2, 2006 at 11:10 AM
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