Interesting. Makes a lot of sense. Re women: they also are adept at talking among themselves and getting a sort of emotional therapy from their female friends better than a lot of cases, IMO. Maybe that's why they are able to their grievance collecting away?[user not found] wrote: ↑Thu Mar 01, 2018 8:25 amFirst, a couple of level setting points. All the below is based on several decades of research funded by ASIS (the security management professional organization), the Society of Human Resource Management, and the .gov. Most of the research has been conducted at PhD level psychology and criminal justice programs, MD level Psychiatry programs, JD level law programs, and by the FBI/CDC.
This stuff is not my opinion EXCEPT where I specifically state that it is my opinion. As such, I won't debate the stuff that is well researched science, I am happy to debate my opinions and recommendations based on the science.
I am using a very specific definition of active attacker as we understand them in the security industry. The person has to be committing their attack for the explicit and sole purpose of killing. If it is an attack in the commission of another felony it is NOT an active attacker though the media likes to tell you it is.
I will typically use the term active attacker throughout this post as that is more accurate than active shooter. Guns are the second most common means of commission of one of these attacks, behind knives, so active attacker is the term we use in the industry.
So... Ready?
First we need to establish the types of attacks that occur. They can fit into four large buckets:
Attacker connected to the target - this is the guy that goes back to an office or business after being fired and shoots up the place
School Shootings - these are a sub category if attacker connected to the target but are separated out as the physical environment of attack is extremely different than an office.
Attacker unconnected to the target - the media likes to call these random. They aren't random. We might not understand the reasoning but it isn't random.
Terrorism - y'all understand this one implicitly.
Let's talk about the attackers. You can't profile these folks based on their mental health, their socio economic status, their race, etc. Etc. They are extremely average in comparison to their victims. They look a lot lIke their victims in every way. That said, men are more likely to commit attacks than women (I'll explain this in a bit).
So what do they almost all have in common? Well a huge majority of attackers (somewhere around 90%) are what we call Grievance Collectors.
Grievance Collecting is not a mental illness. It's a personality trait. (Side note: psychology/psychiatry are not predictive sciences, security is). So what is grievance collecting? Think of it this way. If you get cut off on the way to work in the morning, are you going to be thinking about it all day? Probably not. All night? Almost certainly not. Three days from now? Definitely not. A Grievance Collector is a bit different. They don't let that go. Every little slight they face in life they hold onto. So while you forgot about that guy that cut you off on your way in this morning, a Grievance Collector will say something like "hey that's the guy that cut us off!" You'll have no idea what they are talking about so you'll ask him what he means and he will say "I can't believe you don't remember that guy! It was just like... Right before Christmas! And he cut us off!"
Now, are all Grievance Collectors attackers? Of course not. We have several on this board. Are most attackers Grievance Collectors? Absolutely.
So what causes Grievance Collecting? Well most people aren't born doing it. Usually it's prompted by a significant life event: death of a parent, spouse, or child; job loss; financial crisis; failure to achieve a goal that they had mentally decided was their only path to success. As such, we can help them! Easily. Most grievance collectors simply need someone to listen, to be a friend, and over time they will move beyond it. Some may need more help than that, but simply being a friend greatly reduces the likelihood of an attack.
There are a whole slew of indicators that tell me how close someone actually is to committing an attack, but thats way too much to write here via my phone. Ultimately, regardless of those indicators. They need a hug, a friend, and some conversation. Unfortunately though, people don't pay attention to the signals early, so by the time they do they just see the grievance collector as a "weirdo."
I noted men are more likely to commit attacks than women, that is because women in or society typically turn violence inwards while men exhibit it outwards. I don't have science as to why, but that leads us to the opinion section of the post...
The above was science following is all opinion:
I have a theory why men are more likely to commit attacks.
We are all the hero of our own movie. Think about your life, you're the good guy. Well, not every good guy is always good. I can think of times in my life, specifically with women, where something I was doing made me prince charming in one woman's "movie of life" and the evil king in another's, the exact same action. But we are all the hero of our own.
So look at media these days (and by these days I mean since the mid 1930s, and as far back as Shakespeare for some of these story lines)... The hero has to take action to fight back against an injustice. Why is it such a stretch to imagine that this has is viewed by some as the societally encouraged way of acting? It's not that movies or videogames have made us more violent or desensitized us to violence (the world is at it's least violent state, ever) but rather we have created self narratives of conquering evil (self defined evil) via violence.
The male hero often 'eliminates' all his enemies, and the female tragic hero often takes her own life only for her beloved to discover he loved her the whole time.
We all think we are John Conor, no one recognizes that they have become t-1000.
To be clear, I don't think media is the problem, it's us shutting people out from a productive emotional life.
I hope that answers some questions.
So, you mentioned that you know how to recognize a whole slew of indicators to you how close someone is to committing an act. How does society/LE learn to read the warning signs so we can keep dangerous weapons out of the hands of grievance collectors?