Born Evil?

[paradise lost]

I agree Bath that even for those very much predisposed in nature to become like this there STILL has to be something in their nurture which is the trigger. But i think that the trigger could be hard to find with some. I think a child without the predisposition could go through a lot of abuse, trauma and pain and not become like that, but for the predisposed child something as simple as a poorly handled birth of a new sibling, difficult first day (year/whatever) at school, off-the-cuff-remark by a choice adult, could be enough. I do not believe that every person who does evil can be found to have such terrible trauma we can understand the extremism of their actions.

I think what i'm basically asking is, if something either works well or does no harm to 99.9% of people, do we change it because it *might* cause some terrible reaction in 0.1%? If someone says "i was bullied, that's why i was driven to kill" do we start to use the citation of bullying in the past to mitigate crimes? To me mitigating circumstances must be immediate - if a battered wife (or husband) accidentally kills their spouse while trying to defend themself against a violent attack, that is mitigating circumstances. If a battered wife (or husband) waits until their spouse is asleep before putting a knife into their chest that is cold-blooded murder.

I mean, the sort of trauma we would consider terrible is normal for some. Imagine a child who is never fed properly, is in constant and real danger of starvation in fact, is not clothed properly and is cold and miserable often. Who has to work at hard, heavy labour and is not allowed to go to school or play. With many siblings and busy parents without the resources to look after each child well. There may be illness too, both in the community and in the family, so that the child is exposed to the sickness and death of close relatives, friends, neighbours. We would consider this a severely traumatic existence, yes? But many people in the countries of North Africa grow up this way and they do not all turn into serial killers.

The richest country, with the lowest levels of socioeconomic suffering (internationally-speaking), the US, has some of the highest murder rates in the world.

I know my attitude is hardlines and purist, but i cannot reconcile ANY amount of suffering with murder. Thou shalt not kill. There is no excuse. There is no amount of suffering one may stand behind and cite as the reasoning. When one crosses that line and kills another human being, for me (i know, i sound like a conservative lunatic! ) one has crossed the line which is the edge of society. Once outside society due to one's actions, one is no longer subject to its rules, but one no longer has its rights. So you don't have to pay tax but you can't go wandering out among the people either.

So for me, finding out what the killer thinks their reasons were is only relevant in prison, where rehabilitation is needed before they should be released into society again. But for court, for deciding their punishment, no, sorry, only the crime they commited is relevant.

Bec

ETA - for an example of a killer who came from a background without particular violence or abuse and killed without aggression or rage, and did not understand the enormity of his crimes, google Denis Nilsen.