deranged killers?

[Amorphos]

deranged killers?

please read all before answering...

i watch a lot of discovery programs on TV and it is interesting to compare peoples thinking on different levels of killing. as i flicked form a show where pilots spoke about combat, to a show about deranged killers, i wondered what the difference is between one kind of killer and another. sometimes that difference is most apparent, however in some cases there are similar reasonings and motives, the difference is only in that the enemy is not endorsed by the state.

i don’t think there is a lot of difference between state or sub-state sanctioned murder. a subculture [sub-state] is little different to a state in that it is a group of people who think of themselves within a generalised identity. this is of course a fallacy as there is no such thing as a country, it is an imagined entity.

terrorists too are simply a group similar to revolutionaries, deranged murderers a step down from that to the individual rather than a group.

so what is the difference? how can we define the ethic here; i personally think that all killing should be considered the same, it is all madness ~ a misuse of the same mental traits we all have.

...or are we all ‘insane’ and killing is part of what we are? indeed to turn the whole thing around on itself, can we say that there is no such thing as this kind of insanity [that it isnt actually insane but 'normal'], it is natural for us to be like that. considering humans to be anything other than natural is a fallacy! anything else seams to presume that there is some kind of perfect brain that doesn’t think about killing etc, even though everything we are is born of nature. the workings of the brain should then not be changed into some imagines perfection, where we live lives based on falseness and pretension!

[Gwendylyn]

Saying psychosis is normal and natural is the same as saying mental retardation is natural.

Neither are things that we want to have in our society. In a more animalistic system, both types would be weeded out through natural selection. It's not "falseness and pretension" to eliminate elements of our society that hurt the society as a whole. It's a natural progression.

[Amorphos]

gwendylyn, hi

i don’t think we should have a more animalistic system in any sense, but that we should have a good look at what a perfect person and brain is. psychosis is perhaps just a label, when we break it down it is normal aspects of the brain acting how they are built to act in nature.

on the other hand maybe the soldiery of the world are all insane! its all about lines we draw and labels we stick on people. i don’t see why one killer is different to another generally speaking, obviously some killers are completely insane just as some soldiers throughout history must have been. i am not talking about the extreme examples here but the general ethics.

[rathelios]

It's all about intent.
Killing in self-defence is not immoral.
Soldiers killing people in defence of other people is generally not considered bad.
Terrorists, gangs and serial killers don't kill in self-defence.

Psychopaths exist but they are not normal. They are insane. Just as there are very tall and very short people, there are psychopaths and people with 'dependent personality disorder'.

[Amorphos]

Killing in self-defence is not immoral.

true, yet used the brain in the same or similar way. some killers do so because e.g. their spouse has had an affair, so they think they are defending their way of life and family unit. although it is messed up, i don’t think there is a lot of difference.

what is a normal mind, if we had a society where no-one committed acts of violence we would have an ineffectual army and police. we would also become incapable of defending ourselves. why also do we think that the brain is even designed to be like that?

i am just wondering what the end result would be, and if a lot of things we consider normal maybe are not.

i have given two views in the op, and may i state that i am not saying it is ok to be a serial killer - obviously! i am using extremes to try to highlight the ethics and mental aspects.

[rathelios]

Normal is not a choice. Normal is the average.
Most people are not either 7ft or 4ft tall. Most people are of medium height.
Most people do not kill most of the time. Therefore killing is not normal.

[Amorphos]

soldiers are normal, hence killing is a normal thing under given conditions.

most people are normal until they are put in a situation where they have to act in a manner other than that.