i get what you're saying MW but at the same time supposing he rots in the antiseptic nightmare of a scandinavian prison i still won't necessarily feel like "justice has been served".
OTOH the more i think about the more i think "justice" is a fleeting concept anyway.
― the late great, Monday, 23 April 2012 21:35 (1 year ago) Permalink
justice will never be served is the thing
― THE KITTEN TYPE (contenderizer), Monday, 23 April 2012 21:41 (1 year ago) Permalink
None of those kids he killed is coming back. None of the trauma visited upon his country can be undone. Rertribution is fleetingly fun but it degrades a person and they either want more retribution or they spend delusional lives defending the righteous ways in which they've debased themself.
Whether sane or not, this guy doesn't deserve the attention. He's not all that bright and he has some major flaw in his works, where I don't know, but I don't particulalry care to see him 'martyred' when he can be quietly sequestered surrounded by all the condescension of a hospital and not the big-boy honor of a prison. Venality, wrath, anti-social behaviors - those are all at least typically human. His narcissism is so immense it's like he's a two-year old. That emotional immaturity allied to crank theories about race or ethnicity or saving your country or whatever daft little fantasies glimmer in his dank little psyche make me literally think him a kind of subhuman - not inalterably so, who knows? - but I also don't believe in killing animals w/o a reason so what's the point in a re-instating the death penalty and going through a trial which will invariably lead to his conviction and then leading him out to whatever the most civilized slaughter the Norse can think of?
― L'ennui, cette maladie de tous les (Michael White), Monday, 23 April 2012 21:53 (1 year ago) Permalink
Conversely, they used to be pretty good at disuassive punishment as I recall.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_eagle
― L'ennui, cette maladie de tous les (Michael White), Monday, 23 April 2012 21:59 (1 year ago) Permalink
if he was killed and eaten would you feel better?
― diafiyhm (darraghmac), Monday, 23 April 2012 22:05 (1 year ago) Permalink
eaten by what...
― heavy is the head that eats the crayons (Shakey Mo Collier), Monday, 23 April 2012 22:06 (1 year ago) Permalink
i dunno, pigs or victim's dogs or w/e, it was a throwaway line tbh- tho we have a (p. good iirc) death penalty thread somewhere and i agree that this guy is v close to the perfect strawman for the argument
― diafiyhm (darraghmac), Monday, 23 April 2012 22:08 (1 year ago) Permalink
Thrown into a snake pit, perhaps
― L'ennui, cette maladie de tous les (Michael White), Monday, 23 April 2012 22:16 (1 year ago) Permalink
TBH i probably would feel better if he was killed and eaten by pigs
but i think the martyrdom argument - don't let him become a symbol for other right-wing nuts - is a very compelling argument against execution, and is basically why i *don't* think he should be executed.
and who knows, maybe someday he'll recant
― the late great, Monday, 23 April 2012 22:23 (1 year ago) Permalink
what if he just has to sit quietly for the rest of his life and think about what he's done.
― j., Monday, 23 April 2012 22:24 (1 year ago) Permalink
re: his possible maryrdom, the worry is that the 'success' of his attack will serve well enough as inspiration to other nuts, what happens to breivik after the fact isn't going to lessen the havoc they've seen one guy cause.
― diafiyhm (darraghmac), Monday, 23 April 2012 22:28 (1 year ago) Permalink
Fantasies of horrible tortures inflicted upon those who have inflicted much pain in real life can be very satisfying as long as they stay at the level of fantasy and are recognized as nothing that you shall ever attempt to realize.
Shakey Mo, go ahead and dream up all the degrading, horrific scenarios for disposing of this guy that you want. Whenever one becomes boring, move on to another. Just don't tell us all about them, ok? I really don't want to know what depths are lurking in your psyche. I just assume they are there, as they are in us all.
― Aimless, Monday, 23 April 2012 23:55 (1 year ago) Permalink
sanctimonious much?
― the late great, Tuesday, 24 April 2012 00:03 (1 year ago) Permalink
I think the right way to understand the urge for retributive justice is in the context of justice being impossible. it doesn't matter what you do. you might as well let him walk free, except for the risk of him hurting more people: absolutely nothing you do will do a lick of good. those people are all dead. nobody's going to feel any better or be any less dead no matter what you do. that's really frustrating, that the person who acts to harm really gets the last word in preemptively: you kind of can't touch him; he's already touched you. so you want to kill him, to make him go away. I get that. I also think it doesn't make any sense in terms of policy, much less when you place it in the hands of the state, but I don't think many here are actually arguing for that, just parsing the rage we feel in the face of how truly helpless we are & are proven to have been in the face of something like this.
― cosi fan whitford (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 00:19 (1 year ago) Permalink
lol at the exculpatory 'as they are in us all' at the end of aimless' post
― The term “hipster racism” from Carmen Van Kerckhove at Racialicious (nakhchivan), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 00:35 (1 year ago) Permalink
there's probably an argument that breivik deserves no attention at all, that no good will come from reprinting and scrutinizing his tedious aberrant drivel
― The term “hipster racism” from Carmen Van Kerckhove at Racialicious (nakhchivan), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 00:38 (1 year ago) Permalink
He's right, tho (Aimless that is). We all fantasise horrible things, but no one needs to know.
― fix it with like some music glue (Trayce), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 00:38 (1 year ago) Permalink
just think if 'fantasia' consisted of walt disney's actual fantasies
― The term “hipster racism” from Carmen Van Kerckhove at Racialicious (nakhchivan), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 00:39 (1 year ago) Permalink
(shrugs) I've never yet met anyone who wasn't capable of dark fantasies of violent retribution, so I figured I was just saying what I knew to be true. But pardon me if I really don't need to see the scars from your last operation to establish you had one. I'll take your word for it. Really. Same thing with retributive fantasies.
― Aimless, Tuesday, 24 April 2012 00:40 (1 year ago) Permalink
yeah it's more at how it read as one long tirade against shakey until the final clause
― The term “hipster racism” from Carmen Van Kerckhove at Racialicious (nakhchivan), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 00:42 (1 year ago) Permalink
I would completely make this argument - there is imo literally nothing to be gained from attempting to sift through the thoughts & expressions of a narcissistic murderer
― cosi fan whitford (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 01:27 (1 year ago) Permalink
Yup, also agree. Stuff him in a hole, let him bore himself to death, basta.
― fix it with like some music glue (Trayce), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 01:37 (1 year ago) Permalink
i agree. and don't ever give him access to pen and paper. nothing he ever says or thinks should ever make it to the outside world. he's a poisoner. no books either. or anything. just a nice little hospital room with nothing in it except a bed and a toilet. forever.
― scott seward, Tuesday, 24 April 2012 02:46 (1 year ago) Permalink
i'm mean when it comes to guys who murder a zillion people.
― scott seward, Tuesday, 24 April 2012 02:52 (1 year ago) Permalink
give him a quran and a norwegian-arabic dictionary, and nothing else.
― one dis leads to another (ian), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 02:52 (1 year ago) Permalink
He should probably be treated no worse than Rudolph Hess.
― Aimless, Tuesday, 24 April 2012 03:35 (1 year ago) Permalink
imo he should pretty much be treated exactly how it seems he has been and will be treated by the norwegian justice system - like the human being he is, with a chance to spout any sort of drivel he pleases, and the right (likely in his case) to live the rest of his life in relative dignity behind bars (instead of locked in a cell deprived of all outside contact for years on end, as we do here in america). it's difficult to see someone who does something so truly evil as a person, which makes it easier to want to mistreat him - that's completely understandable and difficult to overcome, but imo it's important to try. and if everyone here shares my dislike for the way we treat prisoners here in the US, it should be seen as a test of our principles when someone like a breivik, or a mcveigh, or a steven hayes comes along. they all deserve the respect and compassion they couldn't show their victims.
getting into lol-excatholic hippie shit now but on some level i always feel terrible for these people - i mean they put out this great front like they're completely remorseless but - assuming they're playing with a full deck, which may be a stretch in some cases - what kind of human being can really feel nothing after doing something like this? i like to at least imagine that deep down they're being torn apart by regret and completely hate themselves - the misery any human being must feel in that situation must be terribly difficult to bear
― dharunravir (k3vin k.), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 04:00 (1 year ago) Permalink
You assume he feels what he has done is wrong, though - and he has made it very clear that he truly believes he did what he did because it was the neccesary and correct and moral thing to do. There is no way he has any remorse over this, because he wasnt mad or unthinking: he truly believed in what he did.
― fix it with like some music glue (Trayce), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 04:02 (1 year ago) Permalink
Not that I'm saying that means he deserves death or extreme mistreatment, but I do honestly believe he is not only remorseless, but unrepentant, and will remain so, in much the same way anyone with strong beliefs (cf Fred Phelps for eg)
― fix it with like some music glue (Trayce), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 04:04 (1 year ago) Permalink
well i tried to imply that part of that might be wishful thinking on my part - not a bad attitude to have tho imo. but whether he feels remorse wouldn't have any bearing on how i'd want him to be treated now that he's in custody and a threat to no one
― dharunravir (k3vin k.), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 04:06 (1 year ago) Permalink
Nothing wrong with hoping everyoine has a redeemable core somewhere in 'em, no matter who they are :)
― fix it with like some music glue (Trayce), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 04:08 (1 year ago) Permalink
Shakey Mo, go ahead and dream up all the degrading, horrific scenarios for disposing of this guy that you wan
wait waht? I have expressed no wish to do so, and have detailed no such scenarios. I am against torture. I am against the death penalty. end of story.
― heavy is the head that eats the crayons (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 04:16 (1 year ago) Permalink
but keep on strawmanning word up
― heavy is the head that eats the crayons (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 24 April 2012 04:19 (1 year ago) Permalink
How about hooking him up to a device that tortures him a little bit every time his WoW character takes a hit.
― badg, Thursday, 26 April 2012 05:27 (1 year ago) Permalink
one of the best things i've read on this http://www.newstatesman.com/uk-politics/2012/04/who-are-breivik’s-fellow-travellers
― liberté, égalité, beyoncé (lex pretend), Thursday, 26 April 2012 09:00 (1 year ago) Permalink
that is a decent article, tho i think people shd be careful about asserting a direct lineage of poisonous ideas in that Adam Curtis style. closer to the truth to think in terms of a permanent sea of poisonous ideas that individuals will adopt and adapt to their own ends and their own personal motivations.
that's why i think, on balance, that it's okay for somebody like Breivik to be allowed to express his ideas publically. Because he will never "convert" anybody to his cause, and he has nothing to say that hasn't been said by a thousand poisoned misanthropes before him. better to acknowledge that those people and ideas exist than to justify their paranoia and conspiracy delusions by using state power to repress them.
― seapunk run. run punk run! (Noodle Vague), Thursday, 26 April 2012 09:26 (1 year ago) Permalink
he should be made to inhale helium before being allowed to speak, like the IRA in the 80s.
― good luck in your pyramid (Neil S), Thursday, 26 April 2012 10:16 (1 year ago) Permalink
what kind of human being can really feel nothing after doing something like this?
I can conceive of many. In an odd way I feel that their hell is just being such inhuman freaks.
― L'ennui, cette maladie de tous les (Michael White), Thursday, 26 April 2012 14:43 (1 year ago) Permalink
the absence of grace iirc
― dharunravir (k3vin k.), Thursday, 26 April 2012 17:02 (1 year ago) Permalink
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-04-27/norwegians-sing-song-breivik-hates/3975198
Norwegians in being excellent trolls awesomeness :D
― fix it with like some music glue (Trayce), Friday, 27 April 2012 02:02 (1 year ago) Permalink
sweet
― heavy is the head that eats the crayons (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, 27 April 2012 02:09 (1 year ago) Permalink
Quoting of the final sentence from Trayce's very nice article:
If he is found criminally insane, however, he will be sent to a closed psychiatric care unit for treatment, a fate he has described as "worse than death".
Not sure if he will be so found, but the thought that he may cheers me up, given this quote.
― Aimless, Friday, 27 April 2012 03:13 (1 year ago) Permalink
Re: Norwegians sing...
That the whole world is against him plays to his narcisism, better to not show him any attention.
― nickn, Friday, 27 April 2012 03:28 (1 year ago) Permalink
think its more for the norwegian people than it is for him
― the late great, Friday, 27 April 2012 03:31 (1 year ago) Permalink
But he's aware of it, surely.
― nickn, Friday, 27 April 2012 03:47 (1 year ago) Permalink
who cares what he thinks
― the late great, Friday, 27 April 2012 04:34 (1 year ago) Permalink
don't throw me in the padded briar patch
― diafiyhm (darraghmac), Friday, 27 April 2012 08:30 (1 year ago) Permalink
It's painted in a very utopian light but not everyone here are happy about all the various public responses towards Breivik. Some people like to pretend we're much different from others, but the overly nationalistic celebration of our nation and our flag is present here as it was in other countries after terrorist attacks: Otherwise sympathetic demonstrations like that sing-a-long moment or rose marches always include, to me, slightly tiresome "this kind of response shows off how great Norway is, responding to hatred with love" statements or variations on "this is the Norwegian spirit!". Just focus on the respect for each other, why do we need to wrap it up in a Norwegian cross? I think some people lap up praise from foreign media, and nationalism feels even less rational to flaunt in the aftermath of this particular terrorist attack than many others.
― abcfsk, Friday, 27 April 2012 09:14 (1 year ago) Permalink
totally recognise that :(
― liberté, égalité, beyoncé (lex pretend), Friday, 27 April 2012 09:34 (1 year ago) Permalink
not really directly analogous but cf a lot of the "clean-up" response post-riots in the UK, and the "keep calm and carry on!" rhetoric that accompanied it
that thing of nice middle-class (liberal) society wanting to put total distance between them and the nasty man, as though breivik/the rioters/[insert menace to quotidian society here] was a monstrous aberration rather than an extreme, macabre manifestation of sentiments that are more widespread than most care to admit
― liberté, égalité, beyoncé (lex pretend), Friday, 27 April 2012 09:39 (1 year ago) Permalink