Bluring the line of that which is human
Picture a psychiatrist at her desk reviewing a case file. The report describes a young, teenaged male who, with several others his age, killed nearly a hundred victims. The case is astounding—not only because of the intensity and magnitude of the violence, but because nothing remotely like it has ever happened in the community before. Not even a single murder. As the psychiatrist turns the pages and reads on, the pieces of the puzzle start to come together. A few years before, the young killers had witnessed the massacre of their families and been orphaned. Afterwards, although still very young, they were relocated to another community with few adults to raise them; importantly, it was absent of older, mentoring males.
Resignedly, the psychiatrist writes her opinion: post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). She recommends intensive counselling and psychotherapy. Trauma and social breakdown—in this case, loss of a mother and community—compromise normal brain and behavior development, often resulting in hyper-aggression, violence and other asocial behaviors. Although treatment is called for, such developmental trauma, in the absence of family and friends who can psychologically, emotionally and physically support recovery, often leads to a pattern of psychobiological disorders. Trauma becomes neurobiologically etched and may be transmitted across generations. Unfortunately, the teenagers’ story echoes those of many others, each unpleasantly familiar in their association with a string of wars and genocide in Uganda, Rwanda, Iraq and Sudan. However, there is something different and perhaps more disturbing about this account.
These teenagers are young male African elephants.
read the whole article…
To me this article points to how little we know. Humanity is so smug in its knowledge, yet hasn’t even yet found a boundary in the reality of what can be known. Stand on the backs of giants, but do not fear to jump off and stand alone if you know something to be true. Too much of science nowadays is formulaic. There aren’t enough groundbreaking discoveries being made because the scientists are so immured in the social aspects of their class. If someone is instantly shouted down it only points to the ignorance of the noisemakers, not the validity of the person with the new idea.
Anyway, there’s my two bits…