I felt called to reposting this after all the mass killings in America. I am but a small voice in the wilderness who is saddened and disheartened not only by such heinous violence but by the awareness that these mass killings will continue.
Whenever I saw the ancient ruins of Roman arenas, I use to wonder what sickos
would fill the bleachers to cheer on a lion tearing into the flesh of a human being.
Nothing has changed in human behavior. The sickos are still very much living and breathing amongst us.
They now congregate in arenas behind screens using social media to spread their filthy hateful violent propaganda.
What thrilled them over 2000 years ago to pump their fists cheering on fleshing eating beasts are visible today in your Facebook feed, Twitter, Instagram, and all the other social platforms you look at.
Their searing words of hate and putrid verbiage propagate others to jump in adding their own vile opinions, be it facebook or twitter, each hoping to outdo the other with their cleverness of cruelty.
There is one thing that has changed though, from Roman times, the flesh-eating beasts are now our fellow humans. They may look normal on the outside but harbour pools of malignant anger and hatred inside their hearts.
When leaders of nations spew the same hate-filled diatribes it becomes an even more powerful and potent license to incite others to do the same. The oval office has become a pumping station of racist taunts and cruel demeaning verbal jabs.
If these leaders take the freedom to tear into and bully others with foul despicable speech and propagate them online they model what is obviously acceptable in current societal norms.
Normalizing violent hate driven speech is now taking place and has indeed given license to the populace to reproduce without much consequence.
Hatred begets hatred. Malignant anger metastasizes and stokes the flames in those who harbour and fling hatred around.
There are several factors in play as I see it as a therapist regarding human behaviour.
First is the inherent capacity of human beings to inflict cruel behaviour towards other living beings. This may happen under intense anger, duress or manipulation.
We are born with the freedom to do good versus bad. There has always been and will be saints and sociopaths amongst us.
Our behavior both good and bad can certainly be mitigated by situational factors.
For example, I have witnessed normal well meaning human beings lose total control towards their spouses in fitful rages of anger spewing the vilest of words, including physically combative acts.
As I write there are hundreds of children being cruelly abused by normal looking parents.
Not to mention the enraged parents who inflict severe physical and emotional punishment to misbehaving children that they will scar them forever.
Second is the fact that hatred can be contagious and can be elicited and propagated.
Thirdly, that authority figures can induce and manipulate others to carry out acts of violence by their own words.
I remember being shocked the first time I read about the Milgram experiment in undergraduate studies.
Yale University professor Stanley Milgram conducted studies to see how the cruelties of the Holocaust could be carried out so prolifically.
Basically, it demonstrated that ordinary human beings could easily be manipulated by authority figures to inflict pain on others.
You might ask why millions fell under the spell of Hitler and adopted his sociopathic prejudices as their own, despite that it went against all previously held morality.
Belief perseverance was at play and I see that today happening. Belief perseverance is maintaining beliefs about someone despite evidence of contradictory behaviour.
Fourthly is the sad fact that malignant anger and prejudices can draw marginals in need of belonging to a group, club or organization of like-minded others.
The need to feel validated by others is very strong amongst most of us. We have a tendency to cluster with others who share our own beliefs, be it religious, political, cultural or even philosophical.
Those feeling less than on the fringes of society, the ones socially ignored, left out, angry and even mentally unbalanced are drawn like flies to sugar in these violent tinged supremacy groups.
It ends up being a gang mentality, pitting one group against another. Add guns and weapons to the mix and volatility explodes with disastrous consequences.
Modern-day technology of the internet and social media can be used likewise for the betterment of human society or the worst, spewing hatred, malice, and hostility.
The prevalence of using social media platforms and violent video games also gives license to carry out acts of violence with rewards.
Not only adrenaline involved in the play, but gaining points or even recognition is part of the reward system.
Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram and others all offer the “rewards” of “likes”. So besides propagating hate and prejudices, one can be rewarded as well with validation!
Some sociopathic leaders have tremendous charismatic personalities that can easily and effectively draw well-meaning others towards them with lies and falsities.
When evidence starts to mount up contradicting their initial “perceived” benevolent intent, that belief can be challenged in those who possess cognitive flexibility.
Cognitive flexibility is essential in being rational and seeing through the hype or spin of things.
Those who are not able to decipher for themselves moral wrongs and inherent evil will continue to defend their sociopathic leader’s propaganda and even fortify it with more irrational thinking.
It happened in pre-war Nazi Germany scapegoating Jews and I see it happening now with Hispanic refugees in the United States and towards Americans of colour.
The embers of racism towards American blacks are still smouldering with flare ups stoked by blunt racist remarks emanating from the oval office.
I wrote an almost unbelievable true story on July 17, 2018, about a family of normal acting human beings in Monflanquin who fell under the spell of a sociopath and suffered immense financial losses and lost their centuries-old family chateau.
It is a stark example of psychological manipulation and loss of cognitive flexibility of discernment.
This very sad saga details the psychological aspects of a folie en famille, which can be extended to a folie en societé too.
This family lacked the cognitive flexibility as they were brainwashed to see beyond the obvious for over 10 years!
I am writing all of this because of the explosivity of malignant hatred, racism, white supremacy and violence quite evident in my birth country.
I had finished another post but once again felt compelled to address the recent tragic violence.
I am but one of you with my small voice who feels powerless at times in the mounting waves of malignant hatred and anger I see exploding and being carried out in the most repugnant vilest acts of killing innocent human beings.
So I am lighting my little candle of light, and crying out in the darkness, however insignificant, in hopes that you will voice your concerns too and do what you can do in your own way to propagate peace, tolerance and harmony, however improbable it seems.
Chère Cherry,
vous ne pouvez savoir comment votre texte a rencontré mes pensées. Si j’écris en Français c’est parceque mon Anglais n’est pas suffisament bon pour exprimer ce que je voudrais direet que je ferai très brièvement avec quatre ou cinq réflexions:
La première est de moi-même:
Il me semble que la principale différence entre les Romains (ou même d’autres civilisations anciennes) et la nôtre réside dans l`augmentation de la consommation d’énergie, toutes autre choses n*ayant pas ou seulemnt très peu changé.
La deuxième est un vers de Georges Brassens dans son poême “Le Pluriel”:
“Le pluriel ne vaut rien à l’homme et sitôt qu’on
Est plus de quatre on est une bande de cons”
La troisième est d’A. Einstein:
” La bêtise humaine et l*univers sont infinis… Pour l*univers j’ai un doute”
J’ajouterai une autre de mes réflexions: Il y a plus de détraqués mentaux en liberté que ne peuvent en contenir tous les asiles de la terre”.
Et pour finir et paraphraser Descartes: “La haine (et non le bon sens) est la chose au monde la mieux partagée”
Merci pour vos pensées toujours si généreuses. Cela redonne un peu d’espoir.
Georges
Un très grand Merci a toi Georges pour ton excellent commentaire plein de gentiesse et sagesse! Tes commentaires en francaise sont toujour beinvenue.
Il y a long temps que tu a commenter sur le blog, donc J’ai étais un peu inquiènte. Tu m’a manque!
J’adore les vers que tu à offrir, et que je ne connais pas. Einstein et Descartes a bien exprimé sur la mentality des êtres humains et toi aussi avec tes propres réflexions que rien a vraiment changé depuis le temps Roman.
Comme toi, j’ai souvent dit qu’il y a beaucoup plus des gens derangé entre nous que dans d’un hopital psychiatrique!
J’espère que toi et ta famille vont bien.
Hugs
Cherry
Cherry, this is a timely article. Based upon what I’ve read numerous times, approximately 4% of the population are sociopaths to varying degrees, Not to be too political, but I think that Donald Trump is a “classic type sociopath”. (And I was never a Hillary Supporter . . . so this isn’t “political”.) They say that sociopaths can initially seem to be quite convincing, persuasive and influential; and appear to be rather charismatic. However, that often fades away when people have more interactions with them. They seem to have a constant turnover in “friends” and supporters. As a sociopath, Donald Trump simply cannot resist doing the impulsive outrageous stuff that he does . . . the man simply cannot perceive the irrationality of his damaging irrational acts of attacking others personally; and has no sense of embarrassment about being caught in blatant lies or irrational acts.
Our local master HOA – Homeowners Association of 3,676 homeowners, has, and is still having problems with three sociopaths managing to be “elected” to the HOA Board. Sociopaths are everywhere in our daily lives. Many politicians, attorneys, doctors, policemen, corporate leaders, etc. are said to be sociopaths. There is just no escaping them. I have challenged some of their radical gross improprieties; and in turn I have been viciously verbally attacked, and even threatened with lawsuits . . . which never occurred because the claims were baseless. Now they are investigating hundreds of thousands of dollars in “misspent dollars” amounting to a million or more dollars over the last decade. Sociopaths are known to react viciously and even violently to anyone who opposes them or questions what they do . . . which is what Trump seems to do.
From what I’ve read, sociopaths are born with their brains being “hardwired” differently than “normal people”; and they cannot be changed. They are simply the way that they are. It is similar to LBGT people; they can’t be “changed” by discussing their sexuality.
Society seems to be digressing into more basic “tribal identities” with more intolerance with “outsiders”. Congress has become rather dysfunctional due to extreme partisanship between the political parties too. It just seems to me that a lot of rather “sociopathic Leadership” is the basis of the demise of society. Statistically, if 4% of the 320,000,000 people in the U.S. are sociopaths, the we have approximately 12,800,00 sociopaths amongst us. (How many of that 320,000,000 might be psychopaths too?) That is significant. I suspect that it has always be about the same throughout history; and the masses of people are easily led . . . just look at how the Nazis were able to take over Germany before WWII; and Germany was considered to be a relatively educated, enlightened, and advanced society for their time. Similar things have occurred in other countries. There seems to be a lot of sociopathic leaders in MANY countries throughout the world and in history; and yet masses of people seem to support them until it becomes too late.
The major problem is that while sociopaths are driven to seek power and control, most people apathetically do not want to become involved in these types of matters. Ergo the sociopaths often prevail by the default of non-action by “normal people’.
In ancient times the masses of people were basically uneducated and unsophisticated , therefore more easily led. In our modern world most people seem to have “devolved” in not being able, or willing, to handle anything more that 120 character “tweets”. And the radical media on both the left and right focus on the extremes of the issues, which promotes the extremists on both the left and right factions to take radical actions. The Internet which was once the potential “enlightenment” of society has become the tool of the extremists; and that is progressively worsening.
As for myself, I try to factually challenge the sociopathic extremists when they arise in my life. That is probably the best that one can do without become some type of activist. I know from experience that it doesn’t accomplish much by confronting sociopaths; they will refute or side step the issues. But hopefully the “confrontations” will encourage others to try to discern the truths for themselves.
As is said: “Evil exists and persists because good people do nothing to oppose it”. Being apathetic is, in essence, allowing the bad elements to achieve their misguided goals. I thank you for addressing these issues.
Thank you David for sharing your detailed knowledge about sociopaths. They are indeed very present in all levels of our society and unfortunately, one has achieved the highest level of office in America.
Many have fallen under his spell and will continue to defend him despite his propagation of violent thoughts and words that are extremely inflammatory. Your quote about allowing evil and those complicit with evil to persist is why I felt compelled this morning to write this post. I had already written another one on a lighter subject, but I knew that I needed to voice my own concerns.
I am a peacemaker at heart and strive for harmony and tolerance, but the face of evil is ever so prevalent and I no longer can sit back and passively hope for change.
Dear Cherry,
Many thanks for your kind reply. Now we are living in Apulia, exactly in Villa Castelli between Taranto and Brindisi. Rain, snow and cold weather are nothing for old men like me; with the years I’m becoming more and more a lizard (but with warm blood).
We have got an old house with swimming pool and are glad when we got the visit of family, friends and very often customers from France and Germany (because Italian people have problems with foreign languages). Next year we’ll welcome a customer of mine and her husband from Chicago who want to visit Italy…
Maybe you’ll come one of these days too. There are many beautiful historic sites and old stones here…
Je vous embrasse cordialement
Georges
P.S. Link for information: http://www.vip-cooking.de/produkte_details.php?ctl=73&ctm=_505&pr_id=2295