Category Archives: Psychology

Psychology of some mass shooters

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I found this very interesting:

An evolutionary psychology explanation for mass shootings

Psychologists Joseph Vandello and Jennifer Bosson have coined the term “precarious manhood” to describe a dilemma that only men seem to face.

In a nutshell, they argue that “manhood” – however an individual male’s culture might define it – is a status that must be continually earned. And one’s self-worth is tied to being perceived as a “real man.”

It’s precarious because it can be easily lost – especially if the man fails to measure up to the relentless challenges that life throws at him, be they tests of physical bravery, or competition with other men for respect and status.

…

Nicolas Henin was a Frenchman who was held hostage by ISIS for ten months. Here’s how he described his young, murderous, Jihadi captors:

They present themselves to the public as superheroes, but away from the camera are a bit pathetic in many ways: street kids drunk on ideology and power. In France we have a saying – stupid and evil. I found them more stupid than evil. That is not to understate the murderous potential of stupidity.

Apparently, a lack of attention from others results in a lack of status, resulting in a lack of access to women. Combined with a young man’s testosterone, it creates a toxic, combustible mix.

Islamic law allows for men to have multiple wives. This contributes to a lack of female access for lower status males and (if you believe this study) a greater inclination for violence.

Of course this doesn’t explain the San Bernardino shooters. But it may explain others and provide another indicator for predicting future violence.

Sympathy in this case is difficult

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The French have been working hard for years to show the Muslims that they mean them no harm. THAT, we are told, is how you get along in peace with people of other cultures, and if other people hate you then there must be a good reason; you need to look at yourself and see what you can do to make them stop hating you.

The French have also adopted the idea of massive violations of the right of honest citizens to keep and bear arms. Criminals will have whatever they want, but the honest must be disarmed.

Predictably then, we get this quote after last night’s coordinated jihad attacks in and around Paris. This was from someone at a rock concert;

“We lied down on the floor not to get hurt. It was a huge panic. The terrorists shot at us for 10 to 15 minutes. It was a bloodbath.” (That’s from CNN if you want to look. I’m not linking to them)

If all you can do is lie down and hope, while people around you are being shot, for 10 to 15 minutes, then your tactics suck. Dozens of people died on that scene, like the helpless sheep they worked so hard to become.

They’ve brought this upon themselves, I’m very sorry to say, and it’s difficult to have much sympathy for them. We’ve tried for years to warn them.

The left in the U.S. sees all this and says to themselves; “We totally need more multiculturalism and more gun control.” That attitude, that insanity, is the enemy as much as any jihadist, for it is that attitude that has emboldened the jihadists. They must be laughing their asses off at our stupidity.

Quote of the day—Venkatesh Rao

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What do you fear most? An evil group or an evil person? Read Shirley Jackson’s thoroughly scary story of group insanity, The Lottery. Watch Children of the Corn. Would you rather live in a town where there is a sole vampire terrorizing the population, or be the sole non-zombie in a town that has gone all-zombie? Ask yourself, who scares you more — Hitler or the mindless army he inspired? Would you prefer the tyranny of a dictator or the tyranny of an illiberal democracy, where a mob tramples over individuals? Dictators can be overthrown. Can an evil group culture be as easily displaced?

Venkatesh Rao
November 21, 2009
Morality, Compassion and the Sociopath
[H/T to M.E. via her post The morality of sociopaths, clueless, and losers.

I’ve dealt with sociopaths before and was amazed at how effortlessly they would “win” when you got in their way. The most fundamental assumptions I had about human behavior were completely destroyed as they crushed me. I “follow the rules” and it is difficult for me to imagine other people not doing the same. Sociopaths know the rules far better than you. The rules that you acquired as a small child and “just follow” without thought or even awareness they have thoroughly examined under a light of hyper rationality. They may follow them most of the time but it is with the knowledge that it is to their benefit to do so at that time and place. When it is to their benefit to not follow them they effortlessly break them.

I began following M.E., a diagnosed sociopath, a year or more ago and my burning hate for sociopaths diminished some as read more. After a time I was able to develop a model for their behavior that allowed me see them in a different light. They lack empathy for other people. In a sense you can think of them as totally selfish but to do that would be to continue misunderstanding them in a way that is detrimental to both yourself and them. The short version of my model for them is hyper-rational beings who only care about themselves. They will act to the benefit of others but only if it furthers their own interests.

They examine the rules of society and understand them and use them to their advantage. They have and frequently need and want friends and family. They can be good friends, family, neighbors, and citizens when they want to be. But what you consider fundamental principles of behavior to them is nothing more than a suggested script to be read at the appropriate time. They examine, evaluate, and act with full awareness and no guilt for “going off script” when they need to achieve their goals.

This, perhaps surprisingly, was reassuring to me. It explained to me why there might be a genetic component to sociopathetic behavior. Having a small number of sociopaths in society is almost certainly an advantage to the group. Let me explain.

In The Walking Dead there are many people who avoid doing things that are clearly the rational thing to do and put themselves and a great many other people at extreme risk. You watch the show and you understand the dilemma of the character but you also understand they really need to put a bullet in the head of the zombie that was their child.

The show is make-believe but you have to be extremely well insulated from reality to not realize we have similar situations all around us.

We euthanize our pets when they are in pain and have no hope of recovery. We, in the gun community, think about and train for the use of deadly force to protect innocent life. Yet most, if ever in the position of taking the life of a human, even when clearly saving innocent life, will suffer for a significant period of time, if not their entire life, for doing the right thing. We send our young adults to war to kill and be killed when the alternative is even greater loss to our society.

These are tough choices and we agonize over them before and after making them when “the proper choice of action” is frequently crystal clear and obvious to the sociopath. Having people with this clarity of vision, ability to make these decisions quickly, and implement them without guilt or hesitation, is an advantage to a society.

One of the things that M.E. said in a previous post has almost haunted me. She said, IIRC, she fears mob behavior because it is so unpredictable. She understands individuals because after observing and interacting with them for a very short period of time she knows, with a high degree of certainty, how they will behave. Their behavior probably isn’t rational, but it is predictable. A mob is unpredictable and powerful.

This observation of mobs extrapolates well to a mindless or evil group culture which is destroying the good and the innocent. The sociopaths among us may be able to make tough choices, in direct violation of deeply held principles, and save a good society from the indecision which would result in the total destruction of that which is good.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Winston Churchill

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Here was another trading centre, to which high civic rank had been accorded. A like total slaughter and obliteration was inflicted. “No less”, according to Tacitus, “than seventy thousand citizens and allies were slain” in these three cities. “For the barbarians would have no capturing, no selling, nor any kind of traffic usual in war; they would have nothing but killing, by sword, cross, gibbet, or fire.” These grim words show us an inexpiable war like that waged between Carthage and her revolted mercenaries two centuries before. Some high modern authorities think these numbers are exaggerated; but there is no reason why London should not have contained thirty or forty thousand inhabitants, and Cochester and St Albans between them about an equal number. If the butcheries in the countryside are added the estimate of Tacitus may well stand. This is probably the most horrible episode which our Island has known. We see the crude and corrupt beginnings of a higher civilisation blotted out by the ferocious uprising of the native tribes. Still, it is the primary right of men to die and kill for the land the live in, and to punish with exceptional severity all members of their own race who have warmed their hands at the invaders’ hearth.

Winston Churchill
1956
A History of the English-Speaking Peoples: The Birth of Britain
[People like to believe the human race has been “civilized” for some time and mass killings and incredible cruelty are an aberration or an artifact of a particular race or religion. I don’t see it that way. I see “civilization” as a thin veneer which barely contains the true nature of people. I’ve heard people claim the atrocities of the 20th century with many tens of millions of murdered by their government will not happen again because “we have learned better”. I call B.S. on that.

Here we have Winston Churchill claiming, “It is the primary right of men to die and kill for the land they live in, and to punish with exceptional severity all members of their own race who have warmed their hands at the invaders’ hearth.”

This should serve as a stern warning to those who would invade a land and the natives who would aid the invaders. I’m not sure where I read it, it might have been The Good Earth, but it went something to the effect of “If you kill a man’s father he will hate you. If you take his land he will kill you.”

Invaders from whatever distant land, be it another continent or the out of touch politicians in Washington D.C. who view the property of others as plunder should study history. They should not count upon the permanence of the good nature of a society when they plunder their property. There is a threshold beyond which the thin veneer of “civilization” is removed and a terrible, bloodthirsty, barbarian emerges.—Joe]

I’ll blame public education

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People sign petition to ban discussion of politics and religion in public.

And, not as an aside but as the central issue, notice how readily some people are led to do something that, if they thought about it and had control of themselves they would know is wrong. Some of them sign reluctantly, but they sign. You’re seeing the standard American’s hypnotic state being briefly co-opted. You can see the hesitation and the resistance, but they go along as a way of avoiding the more uncomfortable of options.

If the guy with the petition understood just a little bit more about how this works, he could have some of those people explaining in detail, specifically why the first amendment is a terrible idea, and ultimately why America should be reduced to ashes.

If we don’t get it at home, we are programmed to be pliable and moldable to other people’s will, to avoid confrontation, when we enter public education as small children.

Thank you for signing my petition to repeal the first amendment, now go back to your regular programming.

More on tightening threads

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This is a deep, serious discussion of mechanical esoterica, with implications to life in general, so if you’re not interested in mechanics or in life lessons, go back to doing your nails, watching TV or stressing over your made-up relationship drama.

If you get the clamp screws tight enough, you probably don’t need the Locktite. If you don’t get the screws tight enough, the Locktite won’t help.

Thank you for sticking it out all the way to the end of this post, though if you needed to read it, you probably didn’t, and if you didn’t need to read it, you most likely did. I’m preaching to the choir then. Still it must be said.

Why women should panic?

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I don’t think women have any reason to panic. The article was written by a homosexual man. He seems more than a little bitter toward women at times. He makes some interesting and entertaining points, but I disagree with most of them for the most part.

I can only speak for sure for myself, but I’m pretty sure that the drive among men to solve problems is not a result of wanting to impress women. Sure, for a young buck, that may be a big part of it, but he’ll rarely get very far in his problem solving if he’s distracted by an over-active sex drive. Once you’ve been married for decades and your children have gone on to lead their own lives, and you realize that happiness and sex have virtually nothing do to with one another, the desire to “impress women” (which is idiotic in the first place) goes by the wayside.
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QOTD – from the guy that coined the word “menticide” in 1933

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“One important result of this procedure [use psychological torture and mental manipulation while pushing for a “confession” and public show trial] is the great confusion it creates in the mind of every observer, friend or foe. In the end no one knows how to distinguish truth from falsehood. The totalitarian potentate, in order to break down the mind of men, first needs widespread mental chaos and verbal confusion, because both paralyze his opposition and cause the morale of the enemy to deteriorate – unless his adversaries are aware of the dictator’s real aim.”

From “The Rape of the Mind: The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing” by Joost A. M. Meerloo, first published in 1933

This explains the true damage “PC” speak and the language police really pose. It’s a fascinating book in many ways, and I’m not that far into it yet. It really hammers home the idea of “if you are accused of being [non-PC], never apologize, never back down, never quit (force them to fire you).”

I’m reading this book at the time – one of several I’m slowing slogging through, along with the Gulag Archipelago. Combine with “SJWs Always Lie” by Vox Day, and two recent articles on victim culture, microaggression, and “trigger warning,” ( http://righteousmind.com/where-microaggressions-really-come-from/  http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/09/the-coddling-of-the-american-mind/399356/ ) it’s awful easy to get depressed at just how messed up, and how mentally fragile, humans are. On one hand, these ideas explain so much of human history and current political events that it is scary, and understanding opens all sorts of doors; the fact that such ideas are all now known to me is potentially very useful. On the other hand, the fact that the people that need to know what’s being done to them are the ones that need to know this the most, and are going to be the most resistant to hearing it, and will tend to make the problems worse, is terrifying. Continue reading →

Quote of the day—KBRC

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If you need brute force and violence, get a man. If you need pure evil, get a woman.

KBRC
September 2, 2015
Comment to The Female Psychopath
[There may be more than a little truth to this.

Perhaps also related is this blog post.—Joe]

Quote – dustydog

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“One definition of a liberal, is someone who doesn’t understand the problem, or the history behind it, or the concept of consequences, but is arrogant enough to think that his off-the-cuff solution should be enforced with as much violence and as much of other peoples’ money as might be required.” — dustydog on August 30, 2015

Many years ago I heard that the definition of a “liberal” is “someone who’ll give you the shirt off of someone else’s back”, but this one is much better. It sums up all the horror and mass death of the 20th century in one, concise sentence. Collectivists (Progressives, Fascists, communists, et al) are either extremely evil or blind, or both. In any case they must be kept as far away from government positions as possible.

It’s a symbol of responsibility

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That’s why they’re afraid of it.

A fire extinguisher is made as a tool to be used by someone who can cope, to protect his property and protect those who cannot cope.

The university educated, the entertainers, and media personalities, leftists in general, tend to wear their inability to cope as a badge of honor.

We’ve all see it; the guy well into adulthood who cannot drive a car, for example, and is clearly proud of the fact. Driving is what servants do, for me– It is not something I do. He has his nose in the air when he informs you he doesn’t drive.

If you gave him the gift of jumper cables and a nice floor jack, he’d be offended and maybe even a little scared. If you required him to demonstrate a fire extinguisher on a network TV show? Same thing.

Only icky people can build things, fix things, cope with unexpected dangers, and use guns or fire extinguishers. Eeew!

The Special Little Snowflake, or as I call him, “Fragile Little Flower” gains his identity through his weaknesses. He has learned that his weakness is his power over other people.

Those of us who can cope are to blame for this situation, through our failure to correct and through our capitulation. The FLFs are in charge of much of society and culture as a result.

Someone recently brought up The Lord of the Flies to describe the world, and it fits quite nicely. When the adults fail in their responsibilities to encourage and guide the “children” into becoming capable and responsible adults themselves, then all hell will break loose. That describes world politics for the last 100 years quite well.

Quote of the day—Jonathan Hutson

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Through simple, common-sense solutions, supported by nearly all US Americans, including the vast majority of gun owners, the Brady Campaign plans to realize the audacious but achievable goal of cutting gun deaths in half in the United States by 2025.

Jonathan Hutson
Chief communications officer for the Brady Campaign and Center to Prevent Gun Violence
June 30, 2015
Is Strict Gun Control the Best Way to Prevent Shootings?
Another Massacre Begs What Can Be Done
[It’s fascinating to read his entire answer to the question. He writes entirely about how great and wonderful background checks are. But not once does he say they would have prevented the Charleston massacre. Not once does he even hint at any evidence that “simple, common-sense solutions” will cut “gun deaths” by any amount let alone half in the next 10 year.

His entire response is an exercise in avoiding the question asked. There are two possibilities here:

  1. He knows gun control, of any type, will not prevent the shootings that make headlines and he is deliberately avoiding the question.
  2. He has mental problems similar to Peterson Syndrome. He literally sees and hears something very different from what others write and say. He brain is malfunctioning and he is incapable of rational thought.

In either case Hutson is making it clear to everyone that he and his organization are either malicious or have crap for brains and are to be ignored in the political debate.

Because of the evidence supplied by Brady Campaign board member Joan Peterson, for which Peterson Syndrome is named, and the actions of their lawyers, I’m inclined to believe crap for brains is a requirement for everyone aligned with them.—Joe]

Quote of the day – Roy Masters

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“Liberty lives in the hearts of men and women. If it dies there, no constitution, no law and no court can save it.” — Roy Masters, June 29, 2015

To that I would add “no military and no armed citizenry” can save it.

I heard him say it while listening to his radio program on internet re-feed on the way to work. He may have been quoting someone else for all I know, so don’t hold me to the attribution. It’s the kind of thing he’d blurt out spontaneously anyway, so I figured it was his.

Mental problems

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Having more than a casual interest in the mental problems of people I recognize a trait described by Senior District Judge Richard P. Matsch regarding The Brady Campaign lawsuit against Lucky Gunner, THE SPORTSMAN’S GUIDE, et al.:

plaintiffs try to have it both ways by complaining that the injury was foreseeable to the defendants on the one hand, and complaining that defendants knew nothing about their customer on the other.

One of the traits present in people with Borderline Personality Disorder and some other personality disorders is they create or complain about situations of which you cannot win. For example, “You must be home in time for dinner” and simultaneously imposing the condition, “You must complete your work before you come home regardless of how long it takes.” Or “You must bring home more money.” and “You must work fewer hours.”

Read my post Crazy talk for numerous anti-gun examples.

When you point out the impossible situation they have created they will probably attack you (verbally and/or physically). It is always your fault they are angry with you because you violated some “rule” they imposed or you “should have known” about. They insist upon a myriad of rules which are conflicting, nonsensical, and impossible to meet. They then insist you are the problem when you fail to abide by the rules. This is the Brady Campaign, and anti-gun people in general, mindset. This is conclusive proof they have mental problems.

The exact diagnosis of their mental problems is not particularly important. What is important is how to deal with them. In still another anti-gun crazy talk example Stacy, my counselor on such matters, has some advice on how to deal with these people.

Quote of the day—A Reader

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I think genocides were/are actually useful to the planet’s preservation. Imagine if all these ppl would have not died how much more pollution there would be? I did follow this statement by ” yes genocide is horrific…but” I honestly know that genocides are terrible things however I actually don’t feel bad for these humans that were killed.  I don’t care  at all….. I know it’s wrong as society thinks it’s wrong but I actually think it’s not entirely a bad thing….it has its positives?

A Reader
June 21, 2015
Sociopath?
[Yes. These people exist.

And the interesting thing is that it doesn’t take very many of them to implement a genocide. I think it was in Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust that I found it was something like only 2% of the population were directly involved in the genocide. That can explain why gun control is an essential component of every genocide. If that 2% is attempting to exterminate 20% of the population and half of the intended victims are armed then that means the intended victims outnumber the bad guys by about five to one. Even with an equipment advantage it’s going to be “challenging” to put those “reluctant” victims in the boxcars without losing a lot of bad guys. Which tends to make them “reluctant” to proceed.—Joe]

It is axiomatic…

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…among a certain personality type, that when faced with some problem serious enough to cause anxiety or other symptoms…how do I say this? The last place that person will go for help or advice is to those who are dealing with the same exact situation successfully and without stress.

Progressives, for example, behave that way all the time. They will not look to the more successful cities and states, to their policies and culture, seeking the path to the same success. Instead they’ll group up with other problem cities or states and impugn, malign and attack the successful ones.

This happens on a personal level, exactly the same way, because it is the same phenomenon.

I have two such people very close to me in my life, and it is getting to the point that something major (majorly bad, and expensive, and possibly worse) is going to happen. Things simply cannot continue as they are. It’s come to a head, as the personality type is always pushing for it. There is no talking to them about it either, because it causes a Ferguson/Baltimore type response. The resemblances are uncanny, actually.

It’s to the point where I’ll very likely be facing having my business (which I started) and my house (which I bought) taken away from me, or completely hijacked, which amounts to the same thing.

Beyond giving up the capital assets as the ransom my precious freedom I’m at a loss (and again, just like dealing with Progressives – such people are VERY dangerous). Maybe an answer will come along which, at the moment, I cannot see.

Units and measures; the milliHelen

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Fred;
“That amount of beauty necessary to launch one ship”

Check your privilege

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Translation; Check (stop or reduce) your objectivity

The more objective person has great advantages over the less objective person, and those advantages will be seen by the less objective person as threatening, unfair and oppressive. The less objective person thus sees the more objective as aggressors, imposing all manner of suffering upon the less objective.

It has two great benefits to the ego of the less objective. It reduces the comparative advantage of being objective (thus providing “Social Justice”), and it absolves the less objective of responsibility for their foolishness.

Since it requires a great deal more objectivity (which the less objective hate with a burning passion, much as a vampire would hate the sunlight) to convince the less objective to become more objective, the situation is a sort of Catch-22.

The classic definition of such is paranoia, but I see it more as a convenient method of control, by the less objective, of the more objective. A form of bullying from below, if you will.

So long as we entertain the foolishness of the less objective in any way whatsoever, we are being controlled by, and we are thus encouraging and empowering, the foolish. Our entertaining the foolish comes from our unwillingness to become the targets of their naked outrage. It is cowardice. When we know better, and do it anyway, we deserve everything that results (which will of course be horrible).

Quote of the day—Alan Korwin

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Hoplophobia continues to take a huge toll on the nation, distorts the political climate, and costs lives as innocent people are disarmed or subarmed (inadequately armed due to infringing laws) to help salve the irrational fears of its sufferers. The White House had no comment.

Alan Korwin
May 31, 2015
Medical Hope for Hoplophobia Sufferers
[Of course they had no comment. As with all people with personality disorders they don’t think there is anything wrong with them. And if something goes wrong they cannot see that they made any contribution to the problem.

In addition to consideration of a test for voters I think consideration should be giving to tests for public servants. Hoplophobia sufferers would be immediately disqualified.—Joe]

Pressure signs

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It seems to me that the process of reading pressure signs in your brass and primers, as they tell us in the loading manuals, can be a bit ambiguous. In this instance however it was rather obvious.

Pressure signs

Too much pressure?

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