A Note on "Copycat" Violent Crimes
It has long been asserted that watching crime on television or enacting crimes in videogames contributes to violent behavior. In other words, it is what a person watches that allegedly desensitizes him and corrupts him. Thus he becomes violent. Consider the absurdity of such a thesis!
1. People who are fascinated by violence and other crimes gravitate to such programs and games and immerse themselves in great amounts of it.
2. Millions of people view violence in television programming.. It is entertainment or news. That's it. The viewers do not consider for a moment enacting what they see.
3. There is such a thing as a "copycat" crime. In fact, that is one reason given for maintaining recent higher security procedures at airports in the wake of the foiled airline bombing plot -- i.e., others may be tempted to copy it. For every person who might have such fantasies or even attempt to copy such behavior, hundreds of millions of people reject it, are repulsed by it, and never in their wildest imaginations would be tempted to copy this reprehenisible crime.
Critical is not what is on the screen or in the game but the mind of the viewer, reader, game player, or listener. A "not guilty by reason of television" defense failed many years ago in a Florida courtroom. That is to say the violent tendencies reside within the viewer. The television program, the movie, or the videogame do not turn him into something alien to his basic personality.
Past Concepts of the Month
2006
July: How "Errors in Thinking" Apply to Pedophiles
June: Suggestibility and the Juvenile Offender
May: Part I: Anger and the Criminal
April: An Expanded Concept of "Criminality"
March: Neurotic Features in the Individual with an Antisocial Personality Disorder
February: Sporadic Remorse Elevates the Criminal's View of Himself as a Good Person
December05/January: Can A Criminal Learn to be Empathic? -- Parts I and II
2005
November: "Compulsive" Gambling: Mental Disorder or Irresponsibile Choices?
September/October: Opportunistic Looting as in the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina
August: "Kleptomania": A Reality or a Psychiatric Invention?
July: "Love" -- The Criminal's Experience is Extremely Limited
June: The Problem with "Anger Management"
May: Religion in the Criminal's Good Opinion of Himself/Herself
April: From Maudlin Sentiment to Savage Brutality
March: The Use of the Offender's Language is Counterproductive in Interviewing and Counseling
February: The Concept of "Confrontation" in Helping Offenders Change
January: "I think, therefore it is so": A Costly Error of Thinking
December 2004 - A Clarification about the Alleged Causal Connection between the Larger Social Environment and Criminal Behavior
November 2004 - Does the Criminal Experience Remorse?
October 2004 - Thinking in Extremes
September 2004 - Peer Pressure
August 2004--Reading and Poetry Do Not a Reformed Criminal Make
July 2004 -- What the Drug-Using Criminal Really Means by a "High"
June 2004 -- The Criminal's Anger Results from Fear
May 2004 --
Typing Offenders by the Crime for Which They Are
Arrested -- Concealing More than Revealed?
April 2004 -- The Criminal Does Learn from Experience
March 2004 -- The Criminal's Shutting off Conscience
February 2004 -- The Criminal's Lack of a Concept of Interdependence
January 2004 -- The Criminal and "Low Self-Esteem"
January 2003 -- Control: For a worthy aim or for its own sake?
March 2003 -- Bipolar Disease or the Ups and Downs of the Antisocial Person's Unrealistic Expectations?
April 2003 -- "Out of Character Crime" is Not Out of Character
May 2003 -- The Armed Bank Robber and the Corporate Crook are One and the Same
June 2003 -- Drug Addiction: A Caution about the Disease Concept
July 2003 -- Dependence versus Exploitation
August 2003 -- Drugs as Escape or as Facilitators?
September 2003 -- Criminality and Suggestibility
October 2003 -- The Futility of Focusing on Causes of Criminal Behavior When Evaluating and Counseling Adult or Juvenile Offenders
November 2003 -- The Criminal Knows Right From Wrong
December 2003 -- Can A Criminal Learn From Experience?
May 2002 -- Working to Eliminate Anger
June 2002 -- Self Esteem: What is it?
July 2002 -- Can An Agent of Change be Both a Counselor and a "Cop"?
August 2002 -- Chronic Drug Abuse -- For "Escape" or Excitement?
September 2002 -- "Respect" in the Street Sense versus Respect in the Responsible World
October 2002 -- Power and Control -- Legitimate or Not?
November 2002 -- "Addiction" -- the disease concept in treating criminals
December 2002 -- Does the Criminal Have a Conscience?