dear Mashood Sheik, I am unsure whether this is directed at my remarks.
For the sake of clarity I consider neither Wahabi religion, nor the
movements of Talibs to be composed by psychopath, and I suggest to avoid
making our disagreement in politcs a matter of medical intervention.
Best to you, may peace reign in pakistan and elsehwere
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
palma, a paolo shaul םֹשׁ ְרֵגּ
Er selbst bevorzugte undurchdringlich Klarheit
On Sun, Apr 7, 2019 at 12:44 PM Mashhood Sheikh <senor_massao@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
This is an interesting discussion. I’ve seen some posts on the topic, and
I think this discussion is more related to political sociology, criminal
psychology, and discourses on extremist ideas than social/psychiatric
epidemiology.
Having said that, I do not think that Anders Breivik’s actions could be
blamed on his psychopathology. Just like Talibaan’s actions cannot be
blamed on their (members) psychopathology. Both are terrorists and
cold-blooded murderers! One can argue and discuss the reasons behind their
terrorism, but that doesn’t change the fact that they are terrorists.
I have read Anders Breivik’s manifesto, and he killed young members of a
far-left party because he considered them traitors. He chose to kill the
(younger generation of) people who are responsible for immigration, as that
would be more productive than killing a bunch of immigrants (according to
Anders Breivik). Yes, such an extreme ideology is more likely to flourish
in certain personalities more than others, and yes, some people are more
prone to “indoctrination” than others, but that is not a justification for
his actions. Many other humans with exactly same personality traits as
Anders Breivik are amongst our friends and family members, and yet they
will never commit the crimes he committed. Understanding Anders Breivik is
useful for preventing such incidents, but to label everyone with similar
personality traits as “mentally sick” is simply counter-productive.
Regarding the connection between recent New Zealand shooter and Anders
Breivik; yes, like-minded people may discuss similar things, and can
encourage each other for certain acts, but that is simply because they are
“like-minded”. New Zealand shooter may have been encouraged by Anders
Breivik’s actions, but this is not a causal affect. The hatred in New
Zealand shooter’s head was not filled by Anders Breivik’s manifesto alone;
many websites, discussion forums, politicians’ speeches, etc., could have
contributed.
I can understand the desire to believe that Talibaan or Anders Breivik are
simply “mental patients”, and if they were “cured”, so many lives could had
been saved; unfortunately, this desire is just wishful thinking. Either
this, or we are unwilling to accept that such extreme ideas can flourish
anywhere, even in a relatively egalitarian society like Norway. The work of
famous social psychologist Stanley Milgram has shown the power of
“obedience”, and many others have assessed this phenomena (and
“indoctrination”) in varying settings. Having my origins from Pakistan, I
am well-aware of this phenomenon, and would not hesitate to call a spade, a
spade!
One interesting argument was the attempt to blame “islamists” for their
“warfare” that contributed towards Anders Breivik actions. In general:
violence begets violence, but we all have seen the terrorism by Anders
Breivik and Talibaan; if we are not affected, then Anders Breivik had a
choice as well!
Importantly, what’s with the use of term “islamists”? shouldn’t it be
Talibaan? Or we should refer to Anders Breivik’s religion in this
discussion? To me, they are all fairy tales, but one should not generalize
1.8 billion people, especially discussing Anders Breivik who was a member
of only ca 5.1 million people.
Lastly, what exactly is a non-integrating immigrant? Please explain
Kind regards,
Mashhood Sheikh
*From:* lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> *On
Behalf Of *Lawrence Helm
*Sent:* 6. april 2019 20:30
*To:* lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
*Subject:* [lit-ideas] Anders Breivik and Social epidemiology
I belong to a forum on Pentax DSLR cameras and one of its members asked a
series of questions hoping to discover a membership profile. The largest
number are old and retired, for example. One of his questions asked what
sort of work Pentax photographers had done. It seems that a
high-percentage are retired engineers. A relatively new member said he is
a retired Social Epidemiologist.
Never having heard of that specialty and knowing nothing more about it
than his title, I asked him if he worked on the Anders Breivik phenomenon.
The Moderator (whose forum name is the name of a shark) deleted my question
and some messages that followed it. Apparently my question resulted in an
argument which occurred after I had signed off and gone to sleep.
I invited the Social Epidemiologist to log onto Lit-Ideas for whatever
happens with this subject, but I don’t know if he will.
Subsequent to my asking my inflammatory question, I looked up “Psychiatric
Epidemiology” in Wikipedia. This specialty apparently explores “the
mechanisms behind how exposures to risk factors may impact psychological
problem and explore neuroanatomical substrate underlying psychiatric
disorders.”
“As an example, in an attempt to measure the prevalence of mental illness
in the United States, Lee Robins
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Robins> and Darrel A. Regier conducted
a study called the Epidemiological Catchment Area Project which surveyed
samples of the general population at five sites across America. In the
study, it was found that about a third of all Americans suffer from mental
illness at some point in their lives. This statistic is often referred to
as lifetime prevalence.” [from Wikipedia]
Apparently specialists work from statistics, that is the identification
and quantification of causes underlying psychiatric problems, but they are
not permitted to introduce stressors that might cause a psychiatric
disorder, but that is what I find most interesting. Goethe’s *The
Sorrows of Young Werther*, for example, was a stressor in the rash of
suicides that occurred after the book’s publication in 1774.
And so, while I haven’t read anything that describes Anders Breivik’s
exploits as a symptom of a psychiatric epidemic, I did read of an
Australian who killed some people in Christchurch New Zealand. Journalists
were attempting to see Breivik as this fellow’s stressor: “Ranstorp told
Swedish radio Friday that the New Zealand shooter, who killed at least 49
people in two mosques in Christchurch on Friday, claims to "have been in
contact with Breivik's sympathizers.” [From
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-15/nz-manifesto-resembles-norway-mass-murderer-s-text]
But whether or not Brenton Tarrant contacted Breivik’s followers isn’t
necessary in order to speculate that Breivik may have been the stressor to
Tarrant’s actions.
And then also, we might see a stressor, perhaps one that inspired Breivik
in the asymmetrical approach to warfare devised by the Islamists.
Does anyone have a better description of Social or psychiatric
epidemiology? Or a better explanation for the social pathology epitomized
by Anders Breivik?
Lawrence
