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YouTube creationist "Tony48219" kills young woman and then himself [Video]

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Permalink Reply by Dallas Gaytheist on April 13, 2009 at 6:50pm

What a fool!

Permalink Reply by Rev Hellbound Alleee on April 13, 2009 at 7:38pm

It's always easier if you have a scapegoat. In this case, it seems like his scapegoat was women.

Permalink Reply by Chris on April 14, 2009 at 3:48pm

Holy shit. What a mess.

Permalink Reply by Sentient Biped on April 14, 2009 at 10:37pm

He seems mentally ill. I feel sorry for him.

Permalink Reply by Medusa on April 15, 2009 at 8:29pm

What a shame. This story is a tragedy.

Permalink Reply by Фелч Гроган on April 15, 2009 at 10:29pm

This story is a tragedy.

It's only a tragedy if you're personally involved - otherwise it's entertainment.

Permalink Reply by Tedster on April 16, 2009 at 12:19am

We are involved. Even when you aren't involved. Depression, and what ever else that is going on which people deny its existence and starts tragedies of huge proportion. Religion itself could be a diagnosis if the shrinks felt comfortable with making it official.

Permalink Reply by Фелч Гроган on April 16, 2009 at 12:58am

That's what Sam Harris is working on.

Permalink Reply by Medusa on April 16, 2009 at 10:56am

Hardly. I do not have to know the people involved to feel sadness over it. I am not "entertined" by murder and suicide.

Permalink Reply by Фелч Гроган on April 16, 2009 at 8:35pm

I absolutely do not question your integrity - it goes without question you have never watched police reality teevee, or CSI and its gazillion spinoffs. You play absolutely no part in the misery-exploitation economy.

Permalink Reply by moJoe on April 17, 2009 at 2:47pm

It's a bit more complicated than that. Speaking for myself, I don't really watch TV. But, as may be fairly obvious to all, I do dig up a lot of depressing stories about people doing terrible shit to other people.

We could probably draw some conclusions about what a twisted individual I am from what I choose to do with my spare time, but that would be inaccurate (although that doesn't necessarily preclude me from being a twisted individual, mind you.) First, and not that it matters, I don't feel "entertained" so much as "enraged" or "righteously indignant." Righteous indignation is a lovely, pointless and totally self-serving feeling. I love it.

But yes, in that oh-shit-it's-a-train-wreck sort of way, I do get some entertainment value out of all of this, as I am sure most if not all healthy people do. I would venture that people that have been abused or people with low stress tolerances for violence are not likely to find this entertaining in the slightest.

Now we run into the question of why. Why do we feel "entertained" or "bemused" or "self satisfied?" And not just some of us; again most people feel this way. I would posit that we do this for the same reason that we laugh: we are pattern seeking and fault seeking beings. It's one of our greatest strengths as a species. We have a built in reward system for finding what is "wrong" with our environment which I think is probably very closely related to why our brains "reward" us with a flush of serotonin when we watch stupid people launch themselves off of bike ramps into houses, or when we watch someone get head-butted in the nuts by a little kid wearing a football helmet. And again, we are "rewarded" when we read stories about an "out group" doing terrible shit to innocent people. It is our brain confirming the pattern; confirming that our decision to not be a part of that "out group" was the correct one.

This only becomes unhealthy when ones need for such confirmations overwhelm ones reason and perspective, otherwise I'd say that it's perfectly healthy and normal.

(For the record, I am not in any way, shape or form an expert on this and am, in fact, a bartender. So this is pretty-much just my own bullshit opinion. Take it all with a grain of salt.)

Permalink Reply by Фелч Гроган on April 18, 2009 at 12:03am

For the record, to me it is entertainment. Its on the other side of the planet, people I know nothing about, there is no possibility that any action I could have taken would alter the events in question, and extra bonus goodness - they were religious nutjobs.

This automatic "I feel bad for this tragedy" response people feel obligated to give is to me sicker than simply admitting its entertaining. Come on, who here has NOT had a chuckle about Jeffrey Dahmer ? Those that haven't need to loosen up, or the world will end up crushing them.