quote:

SOMEONE is going to film these and get a LOT of attention.

Someone already has.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMsWzlFF5_E

And there will be hundreds of videos just like this one before monday morning.

quote:

Originally posted by Winterreverie:
BTW my screen writing application for Chapman was about o woman who was systematically killing off members of her family so she could see a certain relative at the funerals. What do you suppose that says about me?

That actually does say you're a killer, at least according to something I read once (on the internet, mind you, so take that for what's it worth.) Anyway, it was a psych test that gave a hypothetical series of loosely related murders and asked how they were related. Depending on your answer on how they were linked, you could be profiled as a murderer. The wrong (or right, if you were a psychopath) answer was that murders were committed so that the killer could see the same person at a funeral. You know, basically your script. I **** you not.

Now, I don't know if that's possibly something you've read before and are making a very wry joke, or if it's completely coincidence, but it's hilarious nonetheless.

I'll post a link if I ever find that article again.

elliott (otiose)...

See, we think like psychopaths. It's our job as screenwriters, directors, actors, whatever, to understand how these characters work.

didn't see this thread before...

but Winterreverie has a point. People get hungry for blame. They were hungry for blame from the 1st hour after this horrible tragedy. The way the media went after the cops was just tasteless and... vulture-like. Eventually they went after the essays.

Of course you can't take someone's essays as a sign of mental disturbance. I thought his were badly written, badly developed. And the anger and twisted logic inherent in his characters could be deliberate. But if they're not deliberate, would that, then, be a sign of a mentally disturbed and potentially dangerous person? I don't know.

From day one I tried to understand how a person can do such horrible acts. I mean, our human race has it's dark side, where people hurt others for personal gain. But here, there was no gain. This goes way beyond our 'dark side'.

I wrote an article on my blog where I theorized on what makes such a mass murderer... but I won't ask you to go and read it (You're welcome to, but I'm not here to plug my blog )

So the long and the short of it is that imho, it is not just anger and a penchant for solitude that makes a mass murderer.
Some people need support, and find it in life. They find it in religion, in fantasy, or in any other form of support-system available in our culture. Some people don't need it at all...
And maybe there are those who do need it but can't find it. They end up feeling cut-off from the society around them. Resentfull of it, cause they don't understand it. You add to that anger and solitude, you got trouble.