Timothy McVeigh’s Legacy of Revenge - Evil is Evil is EvilWritten by Dr. Dorree Lynn
A Psychologist Speaks“Are we like sheep? ” Isaiah If we give an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, we shall all be blind and gumming. Overtly we are dealing with issue of crime and punishment. Covertly we are dealing with evil, revenge, and passion. As soon as we get caught in confused web of revenge masked as justice, as soon as we re blinded by our own evil intentions, good people get lost. Revenge evolved into justice because individuals needed to give over personal retribution for good of society. The desire for revenge probably exists for all of us in most primordial parts of our brain, as do other feelings that we chose not to act upon. We chose not to act upon them because as humans we are only species that can foresee consequences of our actions. Premeditated execution is premeditated murder. If we kill McVeigh on TV-closed circuit or not---and who is naive enough to believe film won’t be hacked?--- We only perpetuate most base and heinous of crimes---premeditated murder. An avenger acts to preserve his kin group. Primitive men and women have always acted this way. As we became less overtly animalistic, we saw ourselves as better than beasts. If we use justice as our excuse for retaliation and revenge, we hide behind our own evil and become less than animals we claim not to be. Mourning is a natural process that goes through a series of stages in order to reach closure. One TV host asked me: “How does one avoid pain of loss of a loved one?” The answer is simple, but not easy. “You don’t.” One must not bypass pain, but instead go through it and come out other side. Those who try to sidestep agony often wind up living it forever. The only prerequisite to loving deeply is ability to sustain intense pain. Therefore, mourning a tragedy requires walking through fires of hell until one reaches healing shores and possibly even ability to forgive. This process requires more courage than many possess and it is easy to understand if one chooses to stop midway. The death of a child goes against natural order of life and thus is rarely fully mourned and certainly never forgotten. As religion and history attest, closure comes in many forms, unveiling, visits to cemetery, perhaps birth of a new child or through religious rituals. One does not have to watch victims' death throes to have closure. Why not call upcoming June 11th event circus it really is? Call movie by its rightful name and have participants pay for play? Make it pay per view, pay to play, sell popcorn and soda, exalt tailgate parties, and let us live with our own denied evil. Someone will make millions from this event. It may as well be government. Only then, they too would have to acknowledge their participation in “show.” We may as well be viewing a film like Gladiator. Watching an execution or ritual murder on closed circuit TV is not so different from going to latest blood and gore flick, except that some adults and most children can’t distinguish between reality and fantasy of event. Studies of children's reactions to cartoons indicate that when a cartoon character dies and then pops up again, kids expect that if they shoot someone in real life same thing will occur.—They don’t understand why dead person doesn’t bounce back to life.
| | September TearsWritten by Dr. Dorree Lynn
September is that ritualized time of year when children of all ages leave home for school. This week, our twenty-two year old daughter left home for what seemed like zillionth time. This time it was to return to college, and this time she left total chaos in her wake. She had transferred to a new school and her hitherto well-understood leaving and packing process seemed forgotten. It was as if she had never been away before. She experienced periods of anxiety followed by times of elation. According to her, she needed everything new and there were several significant altercations as her stepfather and I pointed out that what she already possessed was perfectly fine. She took an extra job to earn money for what she wanted and she vacillated between pride in her accomplishments and anger that we weren’t giving her all that she asked for.At times, I burst with pride at many wonderful things she did. Other times, I wondered where this “bratty” young woman came from. She refused help with packing and for a week entire house looked like a college dorm, although historically, her college room unlike her room at home, was in fact military neat. As parents who had been through school starting with several children before her, as well as many with her, we found ourselves surprisingly torn about how much help to give her. Should we impose much-needed structure that we thought she would benefit from, or should we respect her growing edge and let her do things as she saw fit? We wanted to maintain our feelings of good will and send her off with our support and blessings, but could we? Would she let us? Some days were easier than others. Sometimes she snapped at us. Other days we snapped at her, and still other times, my husband and I snapped at each other. It was clear that her new adventure was both exciting and scary for her. Since decision to transfer to a new school was all hers, she tried to hold her anxiety inward and present a brave face to all.
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