Cruelty and Sadism

Why be cruel? Why does there have to be a weak and a strong? Why must there be a winner and a loser in the power dynamic? 

Because they can? 

That really isn't satisfying enough. That doesn't get to the heart of the matter. Even with human psychology saying that in certain individuals, the pleasure center of the brain is more excited when they see others in pain, this still doesn't really get at why people act upon these impulses, for "the mere act of thinking compassionate thoughts caused significant activity and physical changes in the brain's empathic pathways" (622) as well. 

I mean, I'm sure the pleasure center of my brain is firing off five million times stronger/faster when I'm eating brownies, but it's not as if my delight in brownies means that I can't deny myself of them. There is a certain amount of self-awareness and autonomy and choice that has to be involved, as well. 

So let's look at some of the definitions of sadism (and schadenfreude) as defined in these works then, shall we? 

The "impulse to acquire unrestricted power over another person?" (606) "Need for power and control?" (619)

I'm still unsatisfied. "Power" is too ambiguous a word. I mean, in reality, there are as many expressions of power as there are individuals. For example, to say that I will exert my will on you [il.e. manhandle you into sitting in a chair] because I want to prove that I have power over you is physical, real, tangible. However, this idea of power is an idea and only exists in one's affirmation of it.

After all, it is not as if all of our definitions of power are the same. For one it may just mean feeling a semblance of physical security in which nobody would be able to hurt you. For another, power may mean that they are able to do whatever they want to do whenever they want to do it (without consequence). You see? Think about your own idea of power. Does it involve other people? Or just a feeling of autonomy, in which there is possibility? I mean, yes this is a very vague notion, but in my defense, the "irrational perception" of someone else taking something from me by their actions or existence is a rather vague notion, too (no matter how real it feels to the person).

Look at the reasons demonstrated here: 

1.  I have to lash out at this person because something about them is threatening to me physically or my perception of self, etc. In this case the ""victim is a personified representative of a variety of irrationally perceived threats." (606)
2. The perpetrator is simply not thinking or feeling at all. They have completely disconnected themself emotionally and mentally from what they are doing. If one"cant bear the pain caused by their own empathy," choosing rather to feel nothing at all," then exertion of self becomes an act against others, one in which good/bad/pain/pleasure don't really matter. Even beyond that, inflicting pain becomes a self-actualizing analysis of identity to test "the boundaries of their own desensitization." (620)
3. Somebody with authority told you to, and you're afraid for yourself, or if you've never been taught to question authority, you just don't question it at all. 
4. Somebody you love asked you to do it. "I am resolved to venture body and soul to do as you would have me" even as "my conscience flies in my face as often as I think of wronging her." (615) Such is the case with Ann Gill, the love of Tom Nero. 
5. Repetition and utility. You have been told that doing this sadistic thing will somehow benefit a select group of people. Consider the dissectors of Tom Nero, whose "hearts hardened after years of working with cadavers" (616) * Still, I would love to point out the irony that humans have this need to punish others that have done wrong, even if not to them. Consider how many people believe in the death penalty who have no tangible connection to any criminal or the penal system. I mean, where does that come from in us, when, after all, historically speaking, murderers and most thieves were being tried by the "state," not humans. The state is meant to be impartial and just, is it not? Why, then do we insert our desire to inflict pain on those who inflict pain? As someone who doesn't share that belief, I really don't know, other than that is what they've been taught is right. Feel free to talk to me about it anybody. I really am curious.  Perhaps we could add
6. Revenge to the list. "God's Revenge against the Murderer" (615) I mean, even entities that should in know way bear resemblance to our base human emotions we give violent tendencies like "revenge." 
7. "Abuse reactive" behaviors in which individuals "re-enact what has been done to them either with younger siblings or pets" in order to maintain a semblance of control in an environment in which they very often do not feel like they have control because they are very often being physically or emotionally imposed upon. (620)
8. The behavior is socially acceptable or legal, and we're willing to put aside whatever we think is right because it's socially acceptable. 
9. When our own needs are compromised, we become selfish, and are not willing to consider someone else's pain above our own. (Consider the Stanford experiment.) 

We're strange, convoluted creatures, aren't we, then? On one hand, we recognize that what we are doing made us feel bad, but then we inflict that upon others in order to understand the action, because before it just felt like something happening TO us. Think about it. That 1980's study in which "7-to-10-year-old children named on average two pets when listing the 10 most important individuals in their lives" (620) had to include children who would grow up to inflict pain knowingly on others, statistically speaking. Yet we are capable of such bad things. People who shut themselves off in the ultimate form of isolation (and sadism ceratinly does seem to be a way of protecting yourself from everyone else around you) often act that way because they know they can get away with it in their community (i.e. they're still acknowledging being a part of the group). 

I guess I'm just a big advocate of questioning why you do things to understand it, through thought, not action. For example, the "crush" videos really bother me, not because they're a fetish. In fact, all power to responsible practicers of BDSM who are aware that that form of expression will make them happy without infringing upon another. All power to you! But these "crush" videos, along with a few other various sexual preferences that I don't need to go into detail about now, don't seem to really question the where's or why's or outcomes of their preferences. They just know they like it, and that's a good enough reason for them--- no further thought as to what that says about them as a person, or better yet, how their expression of that interacts with the outside world.

Anyway, I've digressed. I suppose that I will leave you with this final thought:

"Prisoners suffered--- and accepted--- sadistic and humiliating treatment from the guards. The high level of stress led them from rebellion to inhibition." (608)

There's two parts to the violence, which equals acceptance and perpetuation. That is the problem. 

"Dismayed by official military and government efforts shifting the blame from the torture and abuses in the Abu Ghraib American military prison on to "a few bad apples" rather than acknowledging it as possibly systemic problems of a formally established military incarceration system." (609)

I'm with her. I seek to understand--- not judge. I will not be an  "idle onlookers" (618) like the people watching a dog burn in the middle of Baltimore. 

So, do we make laws to make people behave better or to represent people since clearly we want to think well of ourselves and ignore our "dark side"?