When I was 11, I was having a rough time.
It was my first year of middle school. I got beaten up so badly on one occasion that the cops had to be called. I transferred schools between grades since the school admitted it couldn't do anything to protect me from the people who harassed me.
It was also the time I discovered Stephen King. More specifically, Stephen King's IT. A story where a child-murdering shapeshifter stalks his victims via magic and mortal agents, including other children. He promised vengeance on the protagonists if the bullies in the story killed for him.
Starting to sound familiar?
Yet I didn't poison a kid to try and impress Pennywise. I didn't go into the sewers seeking his approval. If a bullied victim like me didn't go bad from reading this story after abuse heaped on abuse, why?
It's not because I couldn't tell the difference between fantasy and reality (as children of that age can. Especially when the history of the myth is easy to find). Its because I'm not a sociopath or a psychopath. "It's weird that I didn't feel remorse." Said one of the attackers. This is classic sociopath mentality. It is terrifying. Far more terrifying than Slenderman and his associated mythos.
Sometimes upbringing has little to do with it. Perfectly normal families produce people with no conscious. We have no indicators of the girl's home life yet, so I can't assume this was the case. But something was clearly wrong in their hardware. Normal kids, even kids who read gruesome horror stories, do NOT attempt to murder other kids. If they did, I would not be here. I would be in jail or dead.
What can we do? Where can we turn? Who can we blame?
The attackers. They knew the difference between right and wrong. They chose to kill for an icon. They are not the first to claim this. If they hadn't found Slenderman, it would have been for Charles Manson, or Freddy Krueger, or God.
Funny, I can't find any examples of people trying to kill for Freddy or Jason or the boogieman. Just real people and God.
Take from that what you will.
It was my first year of middle school. I got beaten up so badly on one occasion that the cops had to be called. I transferred schools between grades since the school admitted it couldn't do anything to protect me from the people who harassed me.
It was also the time I discovered Stephen King. More specifically, Stephen King's IT. A story where a child-murdering shapeshifter stalks his victims via magic and mortal agents, including other children. He promised vengeance on the protagonists if the bullies in the story killed for him.
Starting to sound familiar?
Yet I didn't poison a kid to try and impress Pennywise. I didn't go into the sewers seeking his approval. If a bullied victim like me didn't go bad from reading this story after abuse heaped on abuse, why?
It's not because I couldn't tell the difference between fantasy and reality (as children of that age can. Especially when the history of the myth is easy to find). Its because I'm not a sociopath or a psychopath. "It's weird that I didn't feel remorse." Said one of the attackers. This is classic sociopath mentality. It is terrifying. Far more terrifying than Slenderman and his associated mythos.
Sometimes upbringing has little to do with it. Perfectly normal families produce people with no conscious. We have no indicators of the girl's home life yet, so I can't assume this was the case. But something was clearly wrong in their hardware. Normal kids, even kids who read gruesome horror stories, do NOT attempt to murder other kids. If they did, I would not be here. I would be in jail or dead.
What can we do? Where can we turn? Who can we blame?
The attackers. They knew the difference between right and wrong. They chose to kill for an icon. They are not the first to claim this. If they hadn't found Slenderman, it would have been for Charles Manson, or Freddy Krueger, or God.
Funny, I can't find any examples of people trying to kill for Freddy or Jason or the boogieman. Just real people and God.
Take from that what you will.
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