A brief overview of research on “Mass Shooter” demographics

I was intrigued by the different narratives going around about “who” the majority of mass shooters in the US are.  Essentially there are two camps; the “most mass shooters are middle aged white men” camp, and the “no they’re not”, for lack of a better name, camp. The main source for this is an analytic three part series by Benjamin Radford of the Center for Inquiry, an online journal that “strives to foster a secular society based on reason, science, freedom of inquiry, and humanist values.”  Radford also includes links to other data sources within the body of the article. Below is my interpretation and analysis* of the info, and source info links (many of which can be found in Radford’s article as well).

The table below is sourced from an original research study by Emma Fridel and includes a lot of unvarnished and non-contextualized data.  But in the chart (and the portions of the article by Radford), there is general takeaway, which are that mass shooting data varies based on the type of shooting event. There are three categories; “Family” (family annihilators), “Felony” (this is usually referencing drive-by and gang or drug related type shootings), and “Public” (which is what people generally think of when they think of a “mass shooting.) The other takeaway, noted in the body of the article, seems to suggest that, for those arguing whether or not mass shooting is a “white male” problem, that this largely depends on the definition one is using for “mass shooting”. If Felony or Family mass killings are included in the data, white men are not overly represented. However, if we are only discussing PUBLIC mass shootings, then, yes, non-hispanic white men technically are the majority of mass shooters.)
Typically, although Family and Felony killings fit the technical description of mass killings that I learned in my criminology courses (3 or more fatalities in a single event/episode of killing), they are not in fact what most people think of when the words “mass shooting” are used.  

The New York Times noted (also quoted in the above referenced article, and worth mentioning,) noted that “As convenient as it would be, there is no one-size-fits-all profile of who carries out mass shootings in the United States. About the only thing almost all of them have in common is that they are men. But those men come from varying backgrounds, with different mental health diagnoses and criminal histories.”

And of course the media plays a big role in which events garner coverage, and the narrative that plays out around the events.(IV)  (VII) And “the media” is of course, not one big conspiratorial entity.  Which version of events you are served depends on the source, and all bets for “truth in reporting” are off since the revocation of the FCC Fairness Doctrine. (VI)  We are told mass shootings are not as common as we are lead to believe, and whether or not a given shooting garners attention often has to do with the “pitiability” and perceived “innocence” of the victims. Victims of a gang-related mass killings, for example, are generally viewed as less deserving of sympathy and less “marketable” by some news outlets (even if they are innocent victims caught in cross-fire), than, say, a bunch of hapless church or movie goers, or children in a school.

So to sum up, the who of mass shootings may depend on the definition one is using of “mass shooting”, and what’s more, the usefulness of any analysis of what leads a person to become a mass killer or the “causes” of mass shooting events may be limited unless we can all agree on context.

(SOURCE) (I)

I) Fridel, Emma E. 2017. A multivariate comparison of family, felony, and public mass murders in the United States. Journal of Interpersonal Violence (November 1).
II) https://www.politifact.com/punditfact/statements/2017/oct/06/newsweek/are-white-males-responsible-more-mass-shootings-an/
III) https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/aug/04/mass-shootings-white-nationalism-linked-attacks-worldwide
IV)https://centerforinquiry.org/blog/how-common-are-mass-shootings-the-nature-and-frequency-of-mass-shootings/

V) https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/05/11/us/school-shootings-united-states.html

VI) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCC_fairness_doctrine

VII) https://centerforinquiry.org/blog/why-isnt-the-media-covering-this-story-or-are-they/

*Note: I did my best to offer a brief and unbiased interpretation of data,  based on the information I reviewed.  I hope you find it useful and that I didn’t botch too badly.

 

Related articles by ARQ:
https://alienredqueen.wordpress.com/2018/02/20/can-we-fix-whats-broken-here/

https://alienredqueen.wordpress.com/2018/02/19/conspiracy-theory-monday-or-how-the-govt-really-controls-us/

https://alienredqueen.wordpress.com/2015/10/03/umpqua-the-mental-illness-panacea-as-it-relates-to-gun-violence/

Can We Fix What’s Broken Here?

This is about more than just mass shootings.  This is about how sick our society has become, and it’s not because of violent video games or music, or “lack of prayer in school,” or even “broken families” or “millennial entitlement (lawd knows there is plenty of entitlement on all sides.)

For those of you who may think I am talking out of my ass (so I have been told recently, and by someone who was actually talking out their ass), I actually did study some of this stuff in school and hold a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology as well as Sociology, with a concentration on Criminal Justice.  My point is, I am simply asking for a little faith, or at least forbearance, that my opinion is somewhat informed.

So…

So let’s start by addressing this meme… or rather what this meme doesn’t say.

“Throughout Canadian history, the social policy framework has been composed of efforts to address the sociopolitical rights of marginalized segments of the population (such as laborers, Aboriginal people and other visible minority populations, women, disabled people, and sexual minorities), along with addressing the negative conditions in which people live through the creation of national and provincial programs of social support (such as community programs of support directed toward new immigrants or disabled people) and economic support (such as unemployment insurance or family allowance payments)” (source) Oxford research encyclopedias

Basically, it seems their government has always tried to lift people up instead of keeping people separate. I really feel like we need a multi-part solution to this mass shooting issue. Studies show that if guns are available, they will be more likely to be used. So, first, we don’t want angry, frustrated, or violent mentally ill people to be able to access them as readily as they can, while we fix the other issues.  It’s common sense, really.  You don’t hand pissed off people large mag weapons.

But more importantly, we need a political and social system built on lifting our whole society up and unifying them, instead of dividing them for the benefit of the oligarch.  People will always compete for resources; it’s human nature.  But it is not intractable! And the social structure of a society makes a difference.

 For this reason, there is a tendency to attribute wars to “primordial” ethnic passions, which makes them seem intractable. This view is not correct, however, and diverts attention from important underlying economic and political factors.

Although a person’s culture is partly inherited it is also constructed and chosen, and many people have multiple identities.²(source) NIH

With a small percentage of the population controlling most of the wealth  (namely big business and politicians), they then toss their scraps into the ring and the rest of us fight over them.  Maybe if we weren’t fighting for scraps, we would feel a little more generous and have a little more room for compassion and consideration for those less fortunate.  Maybe we’d be less frustrated, less likely to look to one another for someone to blame or resent.

Group motivation hypothesis—Since intra-state wars mainly consist of fighting between groups, group motives, resentments, and ambitions provide motivation for war. Groups may be divided along cultural or religious lines, by geography, or by class. Group differences only become worth fighting for, however, if there are other important differences between groups, particularly in the distribution and exercise of political and economic power. (source) NIH

It has long been acknowledged in social sciences that it is poverty, not race or other facts, have a significant effect on crime, and many, many books have been written on the subject.  It’s the reason “ghettos” exist in most cities and states regardless of the demographics.

So in summation, if we want to tackle the issues of violence and social injustice in our country, first we need to loosen the financial stranglehold on our people, and contrary to what the current administration suggests, this is not done by giving corporations tax breaks, cutting welfare for poor people, or denying affordable healthcare (especially mental healthcare) to millions of Americans.  It is not done by controlling who prays where or what bathrooms people use.  It is not done by ignoring social injustices or calling people “snowflakes.”  I think we’ll only be able to do it if we all accept that it’s going to get worse before it gets better, and take steps to fundamentally change how our government works, from the kleptocracy it has become, to once again being by the people, for the people. 

Please, if you have any hope for our nation to heal, think about it.

Umpqua: The Mental Illness Panacea as it Relates to Gun Violence

In the wake of another school shooting, people are choosing their bandwagons of blame and as usual, the top two contenders are “gun control” and “mental illness.”

To add some spice, this time, there is the added element of the possibility that the shooter targeted Christians that has the small but vocal segment of the Christian population already on the “persecution” train, practically frothing at the mouth.  But as much as they bug me, today I want to (once again) address the idea of mental illness as the “cause” of this scourge of school violence. Initially, I was going to let my last article speak for my feelings about this subject.  After all, it is very emotionally exhausting thinking about this kind of heavy stuff.  I’m sure you know what I mean.  Being inundated with awful news all the time takes its toll on a person.  But in the comments and discussion (hee hee…”discussion”) section of an article this morning, I came across some comments I felt needed engaging. (Sadly, this happens to me way too much and sometimes I should “engage” less with some of the more cretinous on the internet.)  But these comments weren’t too awful.

To begin with, I really recommend the article  to which I refer to…well, anyone.  It is a well thought out and informative view on the buzz word of “mental illness” in regards to gun violence.

One comment on the above article was actually valid and the others were typical ignorant (as in, underinformed) opinions from people who likely have never experienced real mental illness.

One commenter, claiming to be a retired mental health director, takes issue with the semantics of the article’s claim that “the mentally ill are 60 to 120 percent more likely than the average person to be the victims of violent crime rather than the perpetrators.”

His main point: There is not “The Mentally Ill.”  He states:

We are a diverse demographic, no broad statements can be
made about us.

We earn to the millions, hold every university degree, and
every professional, white, and blue collar job.

I agree. There is no “the” mentally ill, because speaking strictly using the DSM criteria, people with eating disorders would be categorized as “mentally ill” along with a host of other people suffering from afflictions that would have NO causative connection with violence. I myself am “mentally ill,” having suffered with OCD since I was a young child. There seems to be some misconception that because someone shoots up a place or kills someone else, they “MUST be mentally ill.” While I understand the desire to believe there is some answer or some easy way to detect and thus avert crimes like the Oregon school shooting or Newtown, it is a disservice to mentally ill people everywhere.

In a study of crimes committed by people with serious mental disorders, only 7.5 percent were directly related to symptoms of mental illness, according to new research published by the American Psychological Association.

Furthermore the idea that it’s a simple correlation of mental illness ——> gun violence ignores the very big social component to these crimes and the reality that it doesn’t always take much for a “responsible gun owner” to become a criminal. It’s not black and white. The fact that an abused woman is five times more likely to be killed by her abuser if he owns a gun seems to support the idea that you can’t always tell by screening who would or would not become a murderer.  (To stave off the argument that domestic abusers already are criminals, do you think a psych exam or questionnaire could suss that out with enough accuracy to prevent murders or family annihilation?)
As I mentioned to the commenter, I do find the statement in the original article, “gun-owning, angry, paranoid white men,” to be very telling, because these “type” of people seem to be the ones screaming most loudly, to media and anyone else who will listen, for their “gun rights.”  So either facts don’t work in their favor here or the idea that you can predict who will be a mass shooter by a “type” is flawed.  You decide.

Moving on…

Next come the typical comments from ignorant people about medication for mental illness.  They run the gamut from suggesting that people who are mentally ill don’t really “need” medicine to the idea that maybe some kids just need a stern talking to from Daddy or the church pastor.

Well, yes…but that has nothing to do with mental illness.  We’re not talking about under-disciplined little shits who need a whooping or time out.  Although those type of self-indulgent, spoiled, and understimulated kids could conceiveably grow up to be disgruntled or angry adults.

Then there is the more ridiculous idea that drugs typically prescribed for many types of mental illness can actual cause a change in personality sufficient to cause a mass murder spree…

I’ll wait here until you stop laughing…

It’s ridiculous.  For one thing, refer to the above APA findings-  7.5 percent.

Secondly, while I am sure that overmedication has become an issue in our society, and many people think they suffer from any number of physical or mental maladies  (gluten free Prozac for everyone!) there are REAL people out there with these conditions, who are helped by medicines. I myself have suffered with OCD since childhood. Real OCD, not the , “ohh, I like things super clean at my house” self-diagnosed type.

One commenter mentioned that too much in psychiatric treatment with medication is trial and error.  To an extent, I’d give him that.  For instance, after years of trying different meds for efficacy, reduction of side effects, or safety during pregnancy, I have finally come upon one that works for me. When I speak to others with anxiety issues (because OCD is classified as an anxiety disorder) they often tell me they tried the med I am on and didn’t like it or it didn’t work.

Okay, but to address his idea of people as guinea pigs for psychotrophic drugs, let’s put this in perspective.  All people can’t tolerate all anti-biotics or all pain relievers.  People have different chemistries and sensitivities and doctors can’t always say why.  But you’d still likely take meds your family doctor gives you for a physical issue.  Is he using you as a guinea pig? The same idea goes for people needing psychotrophic drugs; different drugs affect people differently.
A commenter questioned the validity of the “theory” of chemical imbalance.  That actually has been proven, but even before there was quantifiable data to support the idea of the chemical imbalance, the theory was essentially proved, ipso facto that SSRIs work for depression and anxiety. SSRI’s are not your gran-mammas little helpers of yesteryear. They aren’t opiods, benzodiazapines, or anti-manics, so they don’t just “blunt” peoples’ moods or make their feelings tolerable; SSRI’s modify the re-uptake of neurotransmitters.

You would not tell a diabetic to go get a good stern talk from their Daddy because it wouldn’t help. Likewise, I never could “pray away” my anxiety and obsessions.  But these common misconceptions add to the stigma of mental illness in today’s society.

To conclude, aside from media coverage turning a killer into a celebrity and giving any disgruntled jerk with a gun a platform, there is no consistent answer for shootings like Columbine, Aurora, Virginia Tech, Fort Hood, Newtown, the SC church shooter.  The details of the shooters all vary in age, agenda, mental state, social ties.  There is no single diagnosis to be shared between them, so to point a finger at mental illness as the “reason” for these tragedies is, well, a bit irresponsible, in my opinion.  Thanks for bearing with me.

AS always, feel free to comment, but especially given the sensitive nature of this topic, please be courteous.

Peace.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/10/03/us/how-mass-shooters-got-their-guns.html

Riot this

Most of you are aware of the riots going on in Baltimore right now. Supposedly it is because of that poor fellow who died in police custody.  That shouldn’t have gone down the way it did. But what is going on now- this is not about that man who died in custody. It shouldn’t have happened… But this is nothing more than cruddy people taking advantage of a situation to try to get away with shit behavior and get free shit. They figure if everyone is doing it, they have safety in numbers.  Really, how are your free Slim Jims and stolen pharmacy drugs going to get “justice for Freddie Gray?”  The basis of this riot in supposedly seated in race inequality, the media and the deliberately ignorant happily perpetuating the hate by shamelessly race baiting with inflammatory headlines and ignorant memes.  I’m not saying race inequality does not exist, but that’s not what all this chaos is about.

Not that long ago, there was a big riot in KY (mostly white people, guys), after of all things, a fucking (sports) game! Obviously, in regards to the Baltimore riot and the death of Mr. Gray, race is being thrown around (again) a lot by all sides.  But to me, the Kentucky riot is just further support for the fact that when it comes to behavior like this, race is not the issue.  Watch some of the videos circulating.  There were  peaceful protesters initially, but what you see in common in both the KY and MD incidents has nothing to do with race.  It’s nothing but a mob of opportunistic scavengers.

And to those people I say:

U MAD, BRO?

You either get it or you don’t.  That’s it.  I’m out.

The Cycle (IV): Kintsukuroi

I’m going make this week’s prompt another short story in the same series.  You may find all the previous installments under the title “The Cycle,” with a theme and number, in the Hive Index.   I’ve been lazy about my fiction, and lately a reader has asked me about this story series, so…here goes. 

Angela had spent the whole weekend with her husband’s journal.  That journal and not much else.  She took the phone off the hook.  She didn’t eat.  Her path through house consisted of a truncated and zagging path between the armchair by the cold fireplace, the refrigerator where she kept multiple bottles of Evian, and the bathroom on the first floor.  It had been hard enough to sleep in the bed her and her husband had shared, ever since his crimes were laid bare…literally.  After she found the journal and read the first few entries, Angela gave over the idea of sleep completely.  Every time she closed her eyes, a fusillade of gruesome images kept her from achieving anywhere near the peace of mind required to relax into sleep.  Most of the images were montages conjured by her own mind– the few details the detective had shared with her from the crime reports , and the faces of the women as they had been before her husband had “fixed” them.  With these details, and the sickly ambiguous writing in her husband’s journal, prose that were somehow equal parts self-important, saccharin, and terrifying, Angela tortured herself with vivid scenarios of what had happened to each of the women.  In these scenarios, she recognized her husband’s face, his handsome face, but his eyes burned with the light of insanity, practically glowing, like the eyes of a comic book demon.

That he thought of these women, his victims, as finished products– as his art– was sickening.  That he thought he was “fixing” them, making them better somehow, like a craftsman repairing a piece of broken pottery with powdered gold, was untenable.   But his vanity and the truth of his hedonistic pursuits were revealed by the fact that all of the women had similar characteristics.  Petite, pale blonde hair, tiny aristocratic nose…   Fragile looking, yet with an undefinable verve.  Like a flower.

Like her sister.

Jill.  It was impossible to tell if the obsession had started with her, or ended with her.  Were all his victims merely substitutes, or were they practice for his endgame?

Or had Jill’s disappearance merely been a result of her conveniently fitting his ideal victim type?  No.  There she was, fooling herself again.  At the very least, he knew who Jill was when she had taken her.  She figured in to all of this somehow.

All of these horrid images and ideas chased one another through her mind, keeping her restless and nauseous, and wearing at her sanity like an angry dog wearing a groove in the ground at the end of its leash.

G*ddammit, just STOP it already!

The above title could refer either to my need to check comments and notifications on Huffington Post, (where some moron has inevitably said something too dumb to ignore, or purposely picked a fight with me) OR it could, and DOES, refer to how very fucking tired I am of seeing all the race (and sex) hate online.  I sometimes wish I could go back in time to when I did not have constant internet access, and hence, was not nearly as aware of all the horrible things going on in the world, and subsequently, the horribly misguided and moronic responses of scared and ignorant people.  I’ll admit, I’m scared too.  I have a child, and my fear for her safety and happiness is all encompassing; no matter how vigilant you are, you can not protect against the senseless and amoral.

So, I’m scared.  But I’m also pissed!  I need to get off Facebook and the internet news for a while, because if I see one more person blame Obama for all the woes in this country and then support it with inaccurate “factoids” they picked up somewhere I might just explode.  If I see one more forwarded article posted by one of my Facebook friends whining about “why does Trayvon get all this attention but black on white crime goes unobserved?” I might just throat punch someone.

I have noticed an increase in my own political posts and replies in an attempt to combat all the rampant ignorance going around, and frankly, to some people, I am probably becoming one of those political posters that annoy me!!!  I don’t want to be that person… because it doesn’t do any good anyway.  It seems like most people either agree with your views or disagree.  If they agree, you haven’t really “enlightened” anyone.  And it feels like most people that disagree are loath to make room in their personal philosophies to consider any new info on the topic.

But back to the race thing, which is what today’s post is about… I ask you… I BEG you…

[Some**] black people… please stop threatening to riot when shit doesn’t go your way.  It doesn’t do anything to help your cause.  It’s basically like trying to bully people into action by threatening violence.

[Some**] white people… please stop playing the whole “reverse” racism card.  You are not helping “spread awareness” about the perceived plight of white people.  You just sound like a toddler whining, “it’s not faaaair…”

It’s bad enough there are still people who are comfortable being openly racist, basically acting like a bunch of uneducated hillbillies, but the rest of us, who think we’re “fighting for the underdog” or standing up for our rights are not helping.  Some people claim Obama is trying to divide the races.  Let me tell you, he doesn’t need to.  We do it all on our own.  And to me, the barely veiled racism of today is in some ways just as bad as the racism of yesteryear.  Passive aggressive, misguided…

Yes, both sides (and believe it or not, there are more races in America now besides black and white) are still seeing instances of inequality.  Both sides have victims.  Both sides have perpetrators.  The problem is not black and white.  When the race of a perpetrator is mentioned in the title of an article, unless there is specific evidence the crime was racially motivated, to me that’s a red flag.  That’s propagating hate.  And then if you go to the comments section of just about any news outlet online, someone will inevitably find a way to dredge up and grandstand on their particular beliefs, whether said beliefs have anything to do with the article or not.

So if you want to be part of the solution instead of part of the problem, for the love of God, or whoever, just stop with the “righteous indignation” and forwarded crap about race crimes…on both sides!!!  Isn’t people killing people bad enough???

okay…end rant…have to go mop up my brains…

(ps…and a note to myself…  JUST STOP ALREADY! Stop letting morons you don’t even know piss you off.  Stop posting political stuff on Facebook or being bated by others’ political posts. Slactivism is not activism, so.  Just.  Stop.)

**If it’s not already obvious, I qualify these statements with the word “some,” because I would never dream of impugning a whole group of people based on the actions of only some.  However, it’s apparent to me that the number of people spouting the nonsense have enough of a voice that they are still causing trouble.

Hairy Pits and Stinky Breath: A Love Story

I love fiction.  Love to be immersed in a good book…or book series.  Love movies, especially horror films. I’m one of those people that will suspend disbelief over things like dinosaurs jumping through rifts in time, and massive pandemics killing off entire populations…

And yet I can’t quite seem to get through a show without nitpicking the little things.  I think about things that a lot of people either don’t consider, or choose not to consider.

Like, I love a good period piece just like most other people.  I totally got sucked into Game of Thrones, along with everyone else…

And yet those steamy and/or romantic sex scenes…

Yeah, those…  All I can think of is how not only did hardly anyone have perfect, white teeth like they do in these shows, without modern dental care, most people were likely missing teeth, and what teeth they had were probably half rotten, and all bucked and twisted.  And can you imagine what their breath would be like?  I guess they had to ignore such things if they wanted to, you know, propagate the species.  But I’m betting there weren’t nearly so many passionate kisses or face-to-face close embraces as the writers of this type of story like to imagine.

And if I’m lyin’, I’m cryin’!

I mean, I don’t know specifically what era Game of Thrones is set in, however if one were to infer anything from the clothing styles, type of ruling party, and customs, it could likely be anywhere between the 14th and 18th centuries.  Personal hygiene likely left a lot to be desired back then.  Apparently, people in medieval times actually did bathe quite often, and it wasn’t until the renaissance that people began to fear that frequent bathing might be “unhealthy.”  Often, only visible body parts were washed, and the remaining “odors” from infrequently bathed people were covered by perfumes and the like.  Now…without being too vulgar, you can just imagine which parts went unwashed.  And then we’re supposed to believe in hot, steamy, romantic sex???

But let’s set that aside for a moment.  Let’s focus on the visual aspect of hygiene.  We are always being told that “men are visual” creatures when it comes to sex, but I’d wager both women and men take for granted some of the anachronistic hygiene practices seen in most period pieces.  Like shaving.

Aside from dictates written by the Prophet Muhammad regarding  hygiene and codes of conduct for those of Muslim faith, historically speaking, cosmetic shaving/hair removal was not a widespread practice, and made its way to the West around 1915. (source)

Take these hot chicks for example;  I’m not picking on GOT specifically (hey, even I would probably bang Daenerys Targaryen); it just happens to suit my purposes as far as examples go.  I mean, people seem to be naked a lot in this particular period piece.

“I’ve got this unidentifiable lump right…here.  DO you think it’s an ingrown hair?”

They’d likely have looked more like…

this :

(wikipedia)

TO be fair, this isn’t the only type of stuff I nitpick.  Having at least a small knowledge of criminal justice, I love  to pick apart police procedural dramas.  One of the biggest pieces of crap almost all of them try to sell is the idea that one small team personally goes through every step of crime solving, from collecting their own evidence, processing said evidence in their own lab, conducting often aggressive interviews with suspects and witnesses, and finally solving the crime and (in some cases) participating in the prosecution.

Likely I don’t have to tell most of you that not only is this not the case, it’s not really even feasible, let alone in the unusually short time span which these TV detectives clear their cases (a few days.)  Oh well.  I suppose if they portrayed it at the snail’s pace which some murder cases plod along, they’d lose viewers to comatose boredom.  Also, if they included the real number of people it likely takes to solve most crimes, viewers would not be able to keep track with, or more importantly, “bond” with the characters.  And that would never do since a lot of TV shows are successful, I would wager, because of the viewers’ attachments to certain characters.  So I just have to suspend my disbelief.  And it’s really not that big of a deal for me.  As I may have mentioned before. I really don’t ask for much when it comes to “entertainment” TV or films.  I just want to be immersed in a different kind of place for a short period of time and be…well, entertained.

So, what are some of your pet peeves when it comes to TV inaccuracies?

Related articles

• http://goodwomenproject.com/sex/debunking-the-only-men-are-visual-myth

“She must have been beautiful…”

She must have been beautiful…  At the beginning of the first episode of the French cop drama, Engrenages (it means gears or cogs, but the title is translated to Spiral for US viewing,) a nude young woman is found in a dumpster, her face savagely beaten and mutilated.   Within the first few minutes of the show, when told by one of the investigators that the victim’s face was smashed, the Prosecutor replies, “She must have been beautiful.”

The first time I read this (the show is subtitled,) it gave me pause.  What?  Was something lost in translation, or was this ham-fisted remark somehow considered a normal observation in the context of a foreign investigation?

A few mere minutes later he offers, “She was killed because she was beautiful.  Hence the ferocity.”

I thought…Oooo-kaaay.  That makes a little more sense.  Maybe this is a serial killer and the Prosecutor is familiar with his MO.

But this turns out not to be the case either… and yet people throughout the show continue to remark on the victim’s beauty.  One cop goes to his prostitute informant (who he apparently also likely beds and occasionally scores coke from) to see if she has heard anything that might help identify the victim.

Prostitute: Are you sure she was a prostitute?

Cop: No, she was a nun.

Prostitute:*laughs* You’re right.  If she wasn’t in the game it’s odd.  Especially the mutilation stuff.

So now it has been inferred not only that her beauty somehow precipitated her murder, but that being the victim of a horrific mutilation makes much more sense if you happen to be a working girl.  Having studied violent crime, I will allow that being a prostitute is considered to be a high risk factor in terms of one’s chances of becoming the victim of a violent crime.  There is a real correlation there.

However, in the general public’s view, (and regrettably, sometimes in law enforcement) there is also an implied and sometimes spoken assertion that a sex worker killed because of or during the course of her work somehow deserves her fate.  The fact that the prostitute/informant in this particular show would consider the mutilation of the victim “odd” if she wasn’t a sex worker seems downright inappropriate.  Again, is it simply that something has been lost in the translation from the original French dialogue?  Or maybe it is a calculated tactic by the script writers to infer how many women in “the game” feel, how they view their own self-worth?  Or maybe it’s exactly what it sounds like; an ignorant and flawed assumption that may be indicative a a larger problem, the way people view female victims of violent crimes?

I seem to remember the coroner in the autopsy scene similarly remarking on the savagery of the victim’s injuries and also linking it to her beauty.  He claims the attack to her face was postmortem and methodical.  He also posits that it was done not to hinder identification of the victim (as her hands and fingertips were left undamaged,) but rather out of some sort of spite for alleged beauty.

Again with the beauty?   

And then again, almost exactly halfway through this first episode, the coke snorting cop tells his colleagues that the neighbor claimed a certain person of interest was a “real beauty”, and that he would “let them know” when he saw her.

What?!  Why does this keep coming up?  I’d understand if they had some specific reason to believe in this situation that the victim’s beauty was an emotional catalyst for suspect, IF they had any information that backed up that theory– previous crimes possibly committed by the same offender, evidence collected from crimes scenes, a criminal profile… A person can be driven to fatal violence by many things.  Their victim may be the actual focus of their rage or they may be no more than a convenient surrogate, chosen for reasons that have nothing to do with aesthetics.  Furthermore, the mutilation of the face, especially done postmortem, could also be indicative of the perpetrator’s desire to “erase” the victim’s identity, not from a literal standpoint, but from an emotional perspective.  A person’s face, specifically their eyes, are often considered to be symbolic of their essence, representative of what makes them a real person in the eyes of the perpetrator.

Alas, the episode ends on a sort of cliff hanger, with the crime not yet solved.  I guess I’ll have to watch a few more episodes to determine whether the attitudes expressed towards the female victim in this episode are indicative of the overall flavor of the show.  I hope not. I found the frequent references to the victim’s appearance distracting and irrelevant.  Not to mention completely inappropriate.  Unless it turns out to be relevant to this particular plot line, I think I’d find those sort of repeated remarks too irritatingly misogynistic to continue to watch the show.

cast of Spiral

Related articles

• They Still Have Rights: The Search for Humanity and Justice for Sex Workers (jezebel.com)

The Cycle

“I asked you a question.”

He’s trying to control the conversation.  Don’t let him.  You have the power now.  He’ll never control you again.

“Say something…say something!” His lapse in composure is brief, but she sees the rage that she now knows must have always been there.

“What do you want me to say?”

“I want you to answer the question.”

A pause.  “How could you do what you did?  Those women…”

“Have you never been taught not to answer a question with a question?”  She’s never heard that note of condescension in his voice before.  Not in 8 years of marriage or the two years they dated before that.

I never knew him at all…who is this man?

“You still love me…”  His eyes pin her to the spot, like a butterfly mounted in a display case.  “You miss me.  You need me.  Don’t you?”

I don’t need him.  And I don’t love him, not anymore.  But, God help me, I do miss him.  At least, I miss the person I thought he was.

“Answer me.”  Somehow this quiet command is more frightening than all of his rage.

I’m not scared of him.  He can’t hurt me anymore.  I’m not scared, I’m…  Defiant,”Why should I?”

“Because I have something you want.”

“You don’t have anything I want anymore!”  No!  Don’t let him see your anger!  If you’re angry, he wins.

He smiles.  “We both know that’s not true.  I know where your sister is.”

Bah! Humbug! Homesick for the Holidays

Ah, the smell of BBQ, like a campfire in the fall.  My Peppermint Patty coffee creamer.  The joys of experiencing the holiday through my toddler’s eyes…

The ridiculous crowds at Walmart, the rude drivers, the stress of not having enough money to buy groceries, let alone presents…

Oh, and it’s currently 69 degrees outside.  Bah! Humbug!

But all of this I could handle if I didn’t feel so down and out.  The holidays are drawing inexorably nigh and it’s looking less and less like I’m going to make it home to see my family.  I was going to hitch a ride with my uncle in his motor home (he generously offered last year,) but he told me they had planned on taking the car this year.  This was a few weeks ago, and he said if they changed their minds, of course we could ride with them…  But it’s hard enough for my husband to get time off for the holidays ahead of time, so the closer the holidays approach before we ask, the less likely he is to be allowed off of work.  Last year, as we were the only one’s whose family is almost exclusively (with the exception of my uncle) out of state, he was the only one of his coworkers who did not get to spend Christmas with his family…any of them, because the baby and I flew home by ourselves (oh, holy night…mare that I will never repeat!)  He had off Christmas of course, but as we live 800 miles away from family, one day just isn’t sufficient travel time.

If my uncle were able to take the motor home to MD this year, I’d tell Hubby to tell his boss that he was takin’ off, and tough titty said the kitty if they didn’t like it.  It’s not right.  Seems to me they could spare him for a few days, as everyone else at his job generally stays instate.

“Tough Titty…” (Tough Kitty)

It’s bad enough I only see my parents like 3 times a year now (and consequently, they only see their granddaughter 3 times a year.)  It’s killing me, and I know it’s killing my mom.

I miss my family and I want to move back home… but I also don’t want to.  Simply put, I’d only move back to MD because most of the family is there.  Frankly, I don’t like what the place has become.  I feel safer out here with the good ol’ redneck, racist, ignorant, fat hillbillies than I would back home where I’d fear getting mugged going to the freakin’ Wawa.  I realize part of this is perception, and that there is crime everywhere…  but according to my perception, it seems like the people out here are more ignorant than actually malicious.  Prime example; last year, in my home state, a guy I went to school with was stabbed to death in his own apartment when a seventeen year old hood broke in to steal the gun my classmate had for home protection.  Did I mention he knew the kid from around the neighborhood?  Did I also mention this guy was legally blind?  Who the fuck stabs a blind guy?

But back to the point, suffice it to say this conflict of feeling is causing me some distress…

Were we to magically discover hubby had the time off of work, thus allowing us the opportunity to drive ourselves home, then there’s the question of the $300 dollars in gas we’d likely need to get there– one way.  Would our POS Explorer even make it that far?

Assuming we’re grounded and we just have to accept it, how now am I going to afford to get everyone I want to gifts?  Our parents usually understand if we can’t afford to get them anything, but I like to buy for my sisters, and then their are my nieces and nephews, and my best friend’s kids, and my cousin’s kid…

Obviously I am not the first person to observe with no small trace of irony that this holiday is not supposed to be this stressful.

Yet I feel blue, and despite what I intellectually know and what I would tell others in my position, I feel like I deserve a big lump of coal in my stocking for not being able to give my family, and most importantly, my child, the things I want to be able to give them this holiday season.

Yeah, yeah, I know.  That’s not what the holiday is about, if they really care about us, they’ll understand, and all the baby needs is love…

So why do I still feel like a giant, disappointing piece of crap?

Bah! Humbug!