It's rare for anyone to engage me in debate for more than one or two comments. Paula Reed is an exception. The back and forth commentary can be boiled down a bit:
I believe that most criminal behavior is the result of the criminal's personal experiences. I also believe that most of the behavior we now attribute to personality disorders, syndromes, and various forms of mental illness are caused by the people you are forced to interact with during your first two decades of life.
Paula Reed places a much greater emphasis on the role of mental illness in extreme crimes such as mass murder than I do.
I wasn't disheartened by my inability to win her over. I was pleasantly surprised by her willingness to actually maintain a debate instead of simply ignoring me or asking to be paid as Izzy Kalman did. You can find Kalman's commentary by Googling "Kalman" and Chicken Soup." I found him to be a bit arrogant, but many would say the same about me. Decide for yourself.
Read through the commentary between Paula Reed and myself and make up your own mind.
Kudos to her for not being a wishy-washy coward!
ReplyDeleteThough, it sounds like she's too drunk on the Frank DeAngelis Kool-Aid to even acknowledge the full extent of how toxic an environment Columbine is. Far easier to label E/D as two crazy McCrazyingtons, put away your copy of Cullenbine and then call it a day.
I respect her for sticking around long enough to engage in a genuine debate but like most Americans she avoids the difficulties of addressing society's problems by blaming the behavior of criminals on insanity. I'm naively hoping that this will change before someone does some real damage to our economy.
ReplyDeleteAre you still planning to submit to the NYADP journal?
ReplyDeleteSorry...lost track of time. Yes I'm planning on submitting something. I just haven't gotten to it yet. Am I pushing the deadline?
DeleteNot really - it's not until Oct. 1.
ReplyDeleteI'm not done with mine yet, either. :-) So n'orries.
Poke!!! :-) Do you plan to send it to David or me? I can give you my email.
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