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What makes a mass murderer?

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Charlie Manson is dead. Fetch me a bin liner. I could make that funeral quick and inexpensive I assure you.

In the wake of Manson’s long overdue demise there were a great many catastrophically bad opinions expressed.

Chuck Woolery, a former television host and Hollywood conservative does a podcast (doesn’t everyone these days?) with fellow weirdo, Mark Young. It sounds as many podcasts do, as if two drunk men are sitting in a garage with a cheap microphone trying to outdo each other with increasingly stupid takes.

Woolery thinks Manson was an early supporter of the antifa (anti-fascist movement) and further that had Charlie been allowed to vote, he would have scratched a swastika in the box alongside Bernie Saunders’ name. By Woolery’s logic Jeffrey Dahmer would be a Reaganite, preferring to opt out of the expensive food stamp welfare program and make his own sandwiches.

Sadly it got a lot worse. On the other side of the political aisle, there were some appalling attempts to evoke sympathy for the man who facilitated and urged his followers to commit the most appalling deeds known as the Tate-Labianca murders in Los Angeles in 1969.

Full column here.

516 Comments

  • Henry Blofeld says:

    My great State of Queensland heads to the Polls today as you know Mr Insider with the shrewd Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk going for a 2nd term, which I predict she will get. Democracy in action and how lucky are we in Australia to live here imho.
    https://tinyurl.com/y7an4mod

  • Uncle Quentin says:

    I tend to think that the brutalisation of Smith, Flannery et al was not entirely the reason for their callously murderous subsequent behavior. Look at the revelations from the Royal Commission as well as the experiences of child migrants from the UK. Some lived damaged lives as a result but subsequent criminality would have been only at the same rate that occurs in the general population. Smith and co were like the Port Arthur shooter miss-wired and were already down the path that they ended up taking.

    I was a court officer in New Zealand and you could see the path to professional criminality every day. The age of legal responsibility was 14. Up until then their parents would be charged with not having them under proper care and control. 14 – 18 they went to childrens court, although for serious crime they would be booted upstairs to the District Court and even to the High Court.
    After age 25 most of them lived blameless lives, only about 10% becoming career criminals. Over here when I worked in hospitality on of my colleagues had done time for armed robbery, as had two of the roofers who put our new roof on a few years back. They had managed to clean up their lives.

    • Jack The Insider says:

      Thanks UQ but there has to be more to it than the “born bad” quasi theory. The answer is complex, I think, and a mix of influences including the criminogenic effects of incerceration come into play. Once someone like Flannery spent time behind bars as an adult in his early 20s, including a notable stretch in the dreaded ‘H’ division where he railed about and succeded in reforming the place, he got out not only angry but full of self belief. Add a relationship with corrupt police and other personal relationships that enabled his criminality and he was good to go.

  • Wissendorf says:

    Blues have signed well with Bendigo hotpot Paddy Dow Jack. His two seasons with Bendigo show promise and he should partner well with Cripps in the midfield. He has strong talents at the breakdown and contests well, and at 185cm should be a great midfield fence. Delivers well into the 50. Great pick up. 200 cm forward Lochie O’Brien another good snatch also from Bendigo.

  • The Bow-Legged Swantoon says:

    There’s a CD album on my bookshelf of Charles Manson’s songs (‘Lie: The Love and Terror Cult’), recorded when he was still trying to get Dennis Wilson and others to take him seriously as a musician. There’s a theory that the Tate / Polanski residence had previously been occupied by a producer who had knocked Manson back for a record deal and the murders were aimed at him in retribution.

    Who knows? There’s been a lot of speculation about the motivation, including doomsday race-war scenarios and Beatles music. When people go out into the desert and get completely mangled on acid, wine and weed no doubt a lot of stuff looks like it makes sense.

    • Jack The Insider says:

      I like their third selection, too. The ruckman. Dow and the pick 10 look very good.

    • Milton says:

      That producer I think was Terry Melcher, Doris Day’s son.

    • Tracy says:

      It was Terry Melcher, the son of Doris Day.
      He wasn’t interested in Manson’s music, think he went on an extended trip overseas after the murders.
      The sad thing is the La Bianca’s are almost an afterthought, they weren’t the rich Hollywood set and were just a normal middle class couple.

  • BASSMAN says:

    I know people call for the death penalty and I know it costs a fortune to keep a killer in gaol. Why am I against the death penalty? Because I want to see the Mansons of this world wake up every single day just to be greeted by a brick wall. The death penalty is too quick and is in fact a reward.

    • Jean Baptiste says:

      I am against the death penalty for different reasons. You may be surprised to learn that some don’t have a problem with being in jail. Or at least make a purposeful life of it, in their own minds.

    • Milton says:

      I’ve previously mentioned my thoughts on the death penalty Bassman and my “enthusiasm” for it wavers. Except when it comes to the callous obscenity that killed Daniel Morecombe. That crime was horrific. What makes it even worse was the previous crimes, in particular the one committed up North, and even after that he was allowed to walk free. That turd gets (at taxpayers expense) the sort of protection that his victim and you and I will never get. I fail to see how his existence can be justified. Put him in mainstream and return him to the predator/prey game which he so enjoyed.

      • Razor says:

        I’m morally for it Milt but practically against. It’s hard enough to get a conviction in front of a jury as it is let alone when they think they’re going to send someone for the dirt nap.

  • smoke says:

    khawaja test career is toast….a #3 who can’t bat Ali doorknobs won’t last

  • Jean Baptiste says:

    Violent experiences in formative years can set the brain chemistry for life, toss in experiences and genetics and “good” “choices” are not afforded to some.
    If I had been born with Charles Manson’s genes and had his precise experiences I cant see how the outcomes would be different. And that applies to everyone else who has ever lived.
    That’s assuming there isn’t some mystical “betterness” in everlasting my soul. I believe I was just lucky in the great draw, there but for the grace of the fates go I.
    Getting right down to the molecular level, free will is unlikely, but it is a useful idea to instil for the purposes of controlling behavior and creating a more peaceful and effective civilisation. Well, maybe.

    https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/proceed-your-own-risk/201311/do-we-have-free-will

  • Henry Blofeld says:

    Many States of the USA still have the Death Penalty for heinous crimes, Mr Insider as you would know. Australia abolished this many years ago, I think Ronald Ryan was the last person to be executed in Australia in 1967. I wonder if bringing back the Death Penalty for the absolute worst crimes would in any way be a deterrent? Would that have ever stopped the Port Arthur gunman from doing what he did I do wonder?

    • Boadicea says:

      Don’t think so, HB
      Martin Bryant had a disturbed childhood and was protected by his father from getting into too much trouble.
      He fell through holes in the system after his father died.
      I don’t think the death penalty would have made the slightest difference to what happened.
      In fact the opinion was that it would be a greater punishment to keep him alive.
      Costs a fortune to keep him imprisoned in isolation too. It does seem futile really.

      • Boadicea says:

        I should have added that, of course, the death penalty wasn’t an option for Bryant. But suicide was. He wanted to die. Not sure if he is still on suicide watch. Probably is.

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