# Do mentally healthy people commit mass murder? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 29, 2015, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612 "2015-12-29T02:50:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 10:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/21 "2015-12-29T10:56:21Z")
[Yes.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reserve_Police_Battalion_101) ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/22 "2015-12-29T11:34:19Z")
A little later in the thread I specified that I was referring to people acting on their own, outside institutions… ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/23 "2015-12-29T13:56:44Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > Ookay, here’s the video. I think it sucks…shitty logic, too busy being snarky. > > [2M views · 18K reactions | This is how badly the NRA has endangered America | This is frighteningly accurate -- and hilarious. Thanks to Mark Fiore. Shared by Occupy Democrats. | By Occupy Democrats | Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/OccupyDemocrats/videos/1014045058688548/) If your friend considers that video to be a rational argument then he’s mentally ill. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/24 "2015-12-29T15:25:25Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > All killing is not murder. It’s an important distinction, because we recognize the right to self defense. If you’re put into a war situation, it’s kill or be killed. One might argue that it would take an insane person to NOT kill in that instance, since we’re talking about self preservation. > > Mass murderers are not operating under a condition of self preservation. Comparing them to soldiers on the battlefield is ignoring the fundamental difference between murder and self-defense. Not all military killing is in self defense. Indeed, I doubt that most of it is. ---
**Author:** ![FloatyGimpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/floatygimpy/32/7750_2.png) [@FloatyGimpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FloatyGimpy)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/25 "2015-12-29T16:34:35Z")
This is something I’ve thought about, too. If you think about the Rwandan genocide, it was just regular people running around and hacking their neighbours to death. Were they all insane? Maybe a couple were but I have to believe that most of them were just regular, normal people who decided to hack to death (men, women and children) the people they hated. I think Anders Breivik is a good example, too. I don’t think he’s insane. I think he just really believes in his cause. So yes, I think that completely sane people can become mass murderers. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/26 "2015-12-29T16:49:03Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > Not all military killing is in self defense. Indeed, I doubt that most of it is. When 2 countries are at war, every active duty serviceman in every branch of the military is a target for the opposite side. That is not to say there cannot be murder in war, but it’s simply not true that “all war includes mass murder”. ---
**Author:** ![UberArchetype](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/2bfe46/32.png) [@UberArchetype](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UberArchetype)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/27 "2015-12-29T18:21:09Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > Today’s good guys get angry, get disillusioned, get drunk; or get poor and sell their guys illegally; a few of them go insane. Today’s good guys _become_ tomorrow’s bad guys. Time and space - what on earth would we do without them? :rolleyes: The problem this argument ignores is the present. You know, the moment the shooting starts? As to the OP, the answer is “yes,” of course. Emotions, morality, laws and motivation aside, from a purely logical standpoint, at the 40,000-foot level, mass murder is a “good thing” simply for reducing the planet’s population - right along with war, plague, famine, pestilence, accidents and anything else that arbitrarily kills people. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/28 "2015-12-29T18:28:19Z")
> [@Stoid](#): > > And I _ **also** _ think that _ **no one** _ who could reasonably be described as mentally stable or mentally healthy goes out and blows away a bunch of people. To me, that is a crystal clear symptom of mental instability. Really? Consider someone rescuing their child from a gang. Were you armed, would you even hesitate to kill someone threatening your child? That’s not the generic you, BTW, that’s the YOU you. The NRA are right when they say, “When seconds count, the police are minutes away.” At least one of your mistakes is to not realise that part of the point of owning a gun is not to kill people but _to not be killed_ (or hurt, or robbed, etc). Try reading up on defensive gun usage. It’s not sexy so doesn’t get a lot of news coverage, but it’s there. And don’t limit yourself to America. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/29 "2015-12-29T18:39:21Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > Today’s good guys get angry, get disillusioned, get drunk; or get poor and sell their guys illegally; a few of them go insane. Today’s good guys _become_ tomorrow’s bad guys. > [@UberArchetype](#): > > The problem this argument ignores is the present. You know, the moment the shooting starts? That’s an incomprehensible counterargument to me. What does it mean? You could perfectly well have good reasons to disagree with my view on guns, but are you really claiming that an analysis that considers only a static snapshot in time is superior to one that the considers also the dynamics _through_ time? ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/30 "2015-12-29T20:24:39Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > At least one of your mistakes is to not realise that part of the point of owning a gun is not to kill people but _to not be killed_ (or hurt, or robbed, etc). Try reading up on defensive gun usage. It’s not sexy so doesn’t get a lot of news coverage, but it’s there. And don’t limit yourself to America. Since gun ownership is probably the single easiest and most effective way to vastly increase the likelihood of being a victim of gun violence, I believe I shall continue to decline participation. (The stats are readily available, start with the FBI) ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/31 "2015-12-29T21:08:07Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > … > > You have to define mass murderer also. … Pilots who drop bombs in war zones? People who order those bombings?.. This? Is the pilot a mass murderer for dropping the bomb? If he is, is he mentally ill for doing it? Or how about a sniper, who is told, “Kill this person.” and does it without any personal reason for doing so? It’s also a question in my mind that the very willingness to kill at the orders of some authority figure, without making some personal moral assessment every single time such an order comes along, may be a sign of mental illness, regardless of whether the actual killing takes place. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/32 "2015-12-29T21:28:27Z")
The Milgram experiment suggested that many people are ready to go along with the concept of inflicting pain for no obvious gain, as long as they had the sanction of authority figures for doing it. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/33 "2015-12-29T21:32:49Z")
Milgram has been largely debunked. Gavin the Becker explains the how and who, and when, of mass shootings very well in his book, The Gift of Fear. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/34 "2015-12-29T21:33:53Z")
> [@Mk\_VII](#): > > The Milgram experiment suggested that many people are ready to go along with the concept of inflicting pain for no obvious gain, as long as they had the sanction of authority figures for doing it. Ok, I’ve heard of that study. Has anyone made claims that this willingness is some form of mental disease or defect? ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/35 "2015-12-29T21:36:24Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > When 2 countries are at war, every active duty serviceman in every branch of the military is a target for the opposite side. That is not to say there cannot be murder in war, but it’s simply not true that “all war includes mass murder”. I disagree. War _is_ mass murder\*. In order for a killing to be in self defense, you have to have been threatened by someone who was not doing it for self defense. Somebody started the damn war. Somebody said “we’re going to go kill a bunch of people from country X”. On purpose, and premeditated. It is not possible for both sides to be acting in self defense. When I was in the Army, I was a technician. I fixed shit. I didn’t kill anyone in Iraq, but if I did, it would have been in self defense. But the infantry guys weren’t acting in self defense. They had specific missions, some of which were “go kill these guys over here”. When you specifically set out to kill other people, that’s not self-defense. We can argue about whether or not killing in war is “murder”\*. But I don’t think there is anything wildly different going on in the mind of a soldier who kills 20 people or a civilian “whackjob” who kills 20 people. They’ve both justified it in their minds in some way that doesn’t involve immediate self defense. They might be wrong, and in the case of mass murderers who kill civilians I think they’re certainly wrong, but the justification is essentially the same – “I need to go kill these guys even if they’re currently not _actively_ threatening my life or the lives of others. Because if I don’t, bad things are going to happen to me and mine”. \*If these statements seem at odds to you, let me explain. War _is_ mass murder. But the soldiers who participate are usually not mass murderers, in my opinion. They’re more like the murder weapon. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/36 "2015-12-29T22:18:47Z")
Suppose a radical environmentalist tries to invent a way to murder 1 billion people in an efficient and eco-friendly way because he thinks the Earth is overpopulated. Sane or insane? Rational or irrational? ---
**Author:** ![Claverhouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/13edae/32.png) [@Claverhouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claverhouse)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/37 "2015-12-29T22:36:04Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > This? Is the pilot a mass murderer for dropping the bomb? If he is, is he mentally ill for doing it? Or how about a sniper, who is told, “Kill this person.” and does it without any personal reason for doing so? > > It’s also a question in my mind that the very willingness to kill at the orders of some authority figure, without making some personal moral assessment every single time such an order comes along, may be a sign of mental illness, regardless of whether the actual killing takes place. I absolutely hesitate to refer to a libertarian source, them being the Bane of the Internet an’ all, but there’s an essay on Rockwell, [**Sniper Theology**](https://www.lewrockwell.com/2015/02/laurence-m-vance/thou-shalt-murder/) _aka_ **Thou Shalt Murder,** by Laurence M. Vance where he kicks the slats of those he first calls: _…Christian armchair warriors, Christian Coalition moralists, evangelical warvangelicals, Catholic just war theorists, reich-wing Christian nationalists, theocon Values Voters, imperial Christians, Red-State Christian fascists, bloodthirsty Christian conservatives, nuclear Christians, and God and country Christian bumpkins._ … Still, and _sigh_ necessary disclaimer: I am pro-gun, certainly for Americans: the question posed by the OP might be a primo method for _ **determining** _ mental well-being. Since nutters who are undiagnosed are free there to buy what weapons (\* just as there are many killers and criminals who are necessarily never discovered\* ) they may, with little harm so far; a good test of mental stability — only in Amerika — would be to issue the allegedly cured with an AR-15 or such, with plenty of ammo in an open-carry state, and send him out for the day in the malls and plazas. If he comes back with no killings to his name, he can be pronounced as sane as his neighbours. ---
**Author:** ![Surreal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eada6e/32.png) [@Surreal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Surreal)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2015, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/38 "2015-12-29T22:56:33Z")
> [@Maastricht](#): > > Milgram has been largely debunked. Wrong. > **[amp-64-1-1.pdf](https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/amp-64-1-1.pdf)** > > 1015 B > [@](#): > > But my partial replication of Milgram’s procedure suggests that average Americans react to this laboratory situation today much the way they did 45 years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2015, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/39 "2015-12-30T09:04:35Z")
Surreal, the replication study you are linking to has tested only up until the first verbal protests of the " subject" . Not beyond. And even then the number of people obeying was slightly lower then with the original experiment. I was referring to studies like [http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2013/10/02/the-shocking-truth-of-the-notorious-milgram-obedience-experiments/#.VoOekq\_tSrU](http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2013/10/02/the-shocking-truth-of-the-notorious-milgram-obedience-experiments/#.VoOekq_tSrU) [http://www.psmag.com/business-economics/rethinking-obedience-stanford-prison-experiment-49677](http://www.psmag.com/business-economics/rethinking-obedience-stanford-prison-experiment-49677) > **[What Milgram’s Shock Experiments Really Mean](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-milgrams-shock-experiments-really-mean/)** > > Replicating Milgram's shock experiments reveals not blind obedience but deep moral conflict ---
**Author:** ![Surreal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eada6e/32.png) [@Surreal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Surreal)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2015, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612/40 "2015-12-30T15:13:58Z")
> [@Maastricht](#): > > [http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2013/10/02/the-shocking-truth-of-the-notorious-milgram-obedience-experiments/#.VoOekq\_tSrU](http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/crux/2013/10/02/the-shocking-truth-of-the-notorious-milgram-obedience-experiments/#.VoOekq_tSrU) > > [Rethinking the Classic ‘Obedience’ Studies - Pacific Standard](http://www.psmag.com/business-economics/rethinking-obedience-stanford-prison-experiment-49677) > > [What Milgram’s Shock Experiments Really Mean | Scientific American](http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-milgrams-shock-experiments-really-mean/) Since these aren’t replication attempts that failed I don’t see how they “debunk” Milgram’s findings. Lots of comparable experiments have produced similar results to Milgram’s: > **[Milgram experiment](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment#Replications)** > > Beginning on August 7, 1961, a series of social psychology experiments were conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram, who intended to measure the willingness of study participants to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts conflicting with their personal conscience. Participants were led to believe that they were assisting an unrelated experiment, in which they had to administer electric shocks to a "learner". These fake electric shocks gradually increased ... [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-mentally-healthy-people-commit-mass-murder/741612.md?page=3)