Page 42 - January 2020 IIssue new year

Vigilance for Violence

ensure the promotion of a different worldview. As-

particular view. Notoriety, sessed in a more diverse Specious of otherwise hal- B
celebrity promotion, re- context, what might be low, false, baseless, etc. R
election, emotional dis- perceived by emotional due to the insufficiency of O

tress, etc., enter the fray reactivity of the moment corroborating evidence. W
quickly. Regardless of the is more than likely less of Given the mystique, lore A

facts in evidence, many problem when considered and legend around killers R
will easily conclude the in a more rational and in general, any speculation D
most simplistic assertions. broader schematic. is possible. Yet, what does

the evidence show? Lack- U
As a result, given the hu- The problem arises in any ing proof, in all probabil- N

man inclination toward discussion of a particular ity, the assertion is without I
deception, the contempo- aspect of violence is that merit and only services to V
rary perception of violent biased perceptions presup- promote the mythology of E

acts potentially assumes pose a certain outcome. the particular case. In ad- R
a disproportionate scale In that, an explanation as dition, when compared to S

with regard to the totality to the central nature of data derived from a num- I
of human malevolence. human violence hinges ber research sources, the T
One tragic multi-murder- precariously on the fragile proclivity to violence, and Y

ing event can easily be edge of rational analysis. particularly murder going
interpreted as a “virus” Of particular interest is back to ancient periods, is 2

spreading through the embellishment and enrich- very much a human incli- 0
country like some kind of ment of the issue in ques- nation. 2
human contagion. In actu- tion. All manner of infer- 0

ality, the scope of physi- ence becomes notoriously Nonetheless, a case for
cal harm could likely be distorted at any juncture homicidal rate decreases

an overestimation of the outside the absolute cer- can be made for certain
reality. The challenge of tainty of proof by authen- periods of time. By con-
assessing the degree of tication of the evidence. trast, that depends on the

violent behaviors among For example, especially definition applied to the
humans is analyzing the true in the study of “serial term “homicide”. Relevant

data within a larger con- killers”, is the specious to that point, the issue of
text. Historical references claim by a killer that one proportionality comes into
and modern proclivities thing or another happened question relative to a glob-

toward mental and physi- during his or her child- al analysis. By calculat-
cal harm might offer a hood development. ing a ratio of incidents to

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