Just a Rotten Kid

Okay, Dick, You can give him the Father of the Year award and I will reserve my award for a different recipient.

We can agree to disagree.

It gives thought to what would have been different if this boy had grown into a man. Would he have been another Hitler? Would he have murdered both his parents?

I don't think parents can do it all. Today on CNN there was a report on trying to be a perfect parent. There were lots of good things said I wish I had written down, but they were similar to what we have said here many times.

There were times when I thought I had gotten the wrong children, asking myself and sometimes God why in the world I had these strangers in my care. I am sure my children had the same thoughts. No one was evil, but any resemblance to their parents sometimes seemed purely coincidental.

Carol

It befuddles me as to why in recent years parents get blamed for everything and as a result so many have a guilt complex. It may be the reason so many try to be a buddy rather than a parent. It seemed to begin in the 1960s.
That was the time when someone came up with the idea that self esteem should be instilled in every child even if they had done nothing to deserve it. The result was a generation of kids who believed they were truly special and nothing bad should ever happen to them. If it did, someone else was to blame.
Now those kids are the one who can't take disappointment. Some, when faced with it, kill. A few days ago a man that age in nearby Canton wanted the woman who had just divorced him to feel pain. He did so by killing her mother and then cutting the throats of their two kids. In court he was smiling, happy because he had indeed inflicted pain.
You hear about it happening every week. Phony self esteem gone wild.

Dick is right on this one, folks. Some people are beyond help. It's not their parents fault or the fault of the system, it's probably not even their own fault. For some reason they have no feeling at all for others, no compassion, no love, most of the time not even any hate. They just don't care what happens to any other human being, and many of them will inflict as much pain and suffering on others as they can.

For some, and I think it is a minority, help can be found. For most, nothing will ever help. Years of treatment do most of them no good at all. It's like trying to turn a hawk into a sparrow. You can try all you want, talk about it all you want to, think you're seeing changes for the better, but the fact is that all it will ever be is a hawk. Same goes for many people. You can't reverse the process that made them what they are, because for everyone of them it was something different. There is something that gets sideways inside some people, and can never be straightend out.

Personally, I think some people are born that way, and it makes no difference how they are raised, how they are treated, or how much help society gives them, they are not capable of being anything other than what they are.

There is an excellent chance that Ronnie's father prevented something terrible from happening, and who knows how many families might have eventually suffered had Ronnie lived.

Dick,

I, 100% agree with you on this one.

When I go to paint ceramics I hear the mothers with their children--mindlessly praising them.

I think the mothers feel guilty for not being with their kids and this is how they compensate.

It is nauseus to listen to.

Parents are pretty restricted in what they can do , nowadays--even sending a child to their room can be grounds for a false imprisonment charge.

Child-rearing is not easy anymore--if it ever was!

"Bad Seeds". I believe they do occur in nature. Long ago, there was a movie titled 'The Bad Seed', and it was a daughter, I believe.

There is one of those in my family, and he delights in other people's pain. He was not abused as a child, he was the abuser. From day one, almost. I have distanced myself from him over the years, lest I take maqtters into my own hands and do something drastic. I do not take his calls, answer his emails, or acknowledge his existence. I have come to the conclusion that as an adult I am responsible for what I allow to touch my life.

I keep waiting for someone to beat him into a coma or end his life in some way. But it won't be me--I would not last long in prison!

Good reaction, Zada!

Good points.

I agree.

In the last few years there have been a few deaths of young men in our town. One mother has nothing but praise for her son. Another said to me, "You know I loved him, but he did not live a healthy life." Ah, honesty. I would love to hear the first woman say that. It is the truth, but she never will.

We are all imperfect. All we can strive for is excellence. Sad stuff happens. I liked the comment about "sideways" stuff happening. I believe that. One word, a phrase misunderstood, can make a big difference.

We all have tasks to achieve in life. Some choose easy ways. Some choose to avoid them altogether. But they are dealing with disappointment, unhappiness, frustration, and keeping going.

And it all comes down to each of us being the best we can be.

There once was a boy required to come to counseling. He did, but nothing changed. When the therapist came and said she had to write a letter to the authorities, she asked what she should write. I told her the truth, that nothing changed. Sometimes it just doesn't happen.

Love, Carol

I agree totally that there are bad, bad seeds.

I hold the minority opinion that murder is not the answer.

Just because some kids do not improve with counseling does not prove that this one would not have.

My children were very frustrating to me as teen-agers--what if I had given up on them and murdered them?

I'd be in jail and have no grandchildren.

My husband never lets anyone win. If you win, you win. But then if you win too often he quits playing.

I love board games and yes you have do be defensive.

I don't believe in praising for nothing, but I also think each of us was given an equal space here and have a right to be here. Others have to figure out how to deal with us, and I agree with Alice that tragic story could have had a better ending.

Love, Carol

Let's suppose for a moment that Ronnie had lived and had become a killer. Suppose that over the years he had killed 30 people, men, women, and children. Suppose that some he had tortured, some he had raped, and some he had buried alive. Suppose that each of them had a normal family so that approximately 90 people had suffered intensely from what Ronnie had done. As had society as a whole.

Was it better that Ronnie's father killed him, or would it have been better to have let him live and for him to have carried out his destiny? Can the uncertainty of not knowing how he might have turned out be enough to let him live, even though all of the signs pointed to him becoming what I've described?

Would those of you who think Ronnie could have been helped be willing to let him live if you knew that he was going to kill those 30 people? Knowing that even if he were locked away he might still escape and fulfill all of the things his father thought him capable of?

How about if some of you could go back in time and kill some of histories worst people, before they committed their atrocities. Would you, could you, kill Hitler? How about Charles Manson? Lee Harvey Oswald? James Earl Ray? Jeffery Dahmer? Hell, for that matter, the two Harpe Brothers?

I think I could. With the possible exception of the Harpes, for without them I might not be here. If I were never here, I could never go back in time. Now there is something for me to think about.

What IF? What IF?

Murder is illegal!

That is a fact--not a WHAT IF.

Fact #2 --I am a mother. If the father of my child tries to kill my awful child I will kill him first.

Yesterday, I went out to lunch with the mother of a gay man. She said the same thing as you, Alice. If her son murdered someone, she would still stand by him. That's how far she was prepared to go.

Has nothing to do with what is legal or not. Or with a mother standing by her child. (By the way Shelagh, I can honestly say that the circumstances under which my child killed someone would dictate whether or not I stood by them.)

The question was not whether or not murder is legal or illegal. The question was whether or not you could kill Hitler, or another serial killer, if you could do it before they committed the acts that history says they did.

It's all up to you. Kill Hitler, let millions of Jews survive. Let Hitler live, and everything he does is on your shoulders.

And no, Alice, this is not just for you. This is a question that many have pondered over the years, and I was just wondering how our good folk here feel about it.

Opposed to child killing.

If one of my children killed another person in an act of self defense, or as the result of a car accident, or even when they were acting out of what they thought was a very good reason, I'd stand by them.

If any of my children kidnapped, raped, tortured, and buried a young child alive, as the man here in Florida did a couple of years ago, they would have to suffer the consequences. I would not be on their side.

Alice, I'm not talking about having them aborted. I'm talking about going back in time, putting a pistol to their head, and pulling the trigger. Or drawing the knife across their throats. Of beating them with a bat until they stopped living.

It's not that hard to stand by and watch someone else carry out the dirty work, because then we can always say they did it. It's something else when it is up to us.

Could I kill Hitler? Yep, hand me a pistol, a knife or a bat, and get on with sending me back in time.

Not within my power.
God only knows for certain what one will do.

Reconsidered

Stand by her. If she had done that, she would have had a good reason.

True story:

Hitler fell in a river in Germany. A man heard his screams and jumped in and saved his life. He was a hero.

It is like watching the movie, Valkyrie, a true story about an attempt on the life of Hitler. All through the movie, we cheered for the guys trying to assassinate him, but knew the results. And the only reason Hitler wasn't killed was the table between him and the bomb protected him. Hitler was also in World War I. What if he had been killed then?

Another what if:

How many potentially evil people have actually been killed or died? I think there have been a few. How many good people have miraculously lived? I also think there have been a few. Perhaps destiny saved a few and lost a few.

It boggles one's mind.

Carol

Marie,

There is a difference between support for a person, and support for their actions.

I've always supported my kids, but they know I haven't supported all their actions, and sometimes they knew they got into the mess they were in and needed to figure out how to get out.

They knew I wouldn't rescue, but I was there.

Carol

There has been numerous references to Hitler as a tyrant and an evil man. I was wondering what would happen if someone came up with a title to a book that made Hitler look good. It would certainly get attention.
"Hitler was not as bad as people think." (Huh?)
"The good that Hitler did." (one can almost see the dander rising)
"Hitler had a good heart." (well, it did beat)
Can you think of other absurd title that would grab attention?

Abe, you can't make the Hitler of the war years look good. it just won't work.

I do think, however, that the arugment that he did in fact do some good for Germany prior to the war might be made.

I think Don had it right as to why the father killed Ronnie. He knew what the kid would eventually do. There just was no doubt about it. He performed a public service.

Abe, there was a book a few years back called "Fatherland" in which Germany won WWII and Hitler was considered a god. Len Deighton wrote another "SS-GB." Nothing about Hitler because it centered on trying to rescue Churchill from the Tower of London. Both very interesting books.