So I’m Not the most loving guy when it comes to Black people. I do try but its Not easy in here. However It seems to me that White American Law enforcement officers are literaly getting away with mindless Violence from racial profiling to capitol murder…
There has to be a criminals quit your bullshit. And for those who get stopped get pissed off after you’ve gotten thru the stop, Comply with the cops. There has to be some trust both ways. And for Shit Sake stop covering for fucked up cops people.
-Brent Brents 10-9-14
Tag Archives: violence
fucked up cops
Filed under Brents' writings
without doing violence
So in the 2 1/2 years i have been on my meds i have realy done well and haven’t had any Serious breakdowns that i couldn’t deal with. Any manic times i couldn’t get through without doing violence.
-Brent Brents 8-25-14
Filed under Brents' writings
many sexual offenders abuse animals
Oh before i forget…Animalabusers.org. Animal legal defense fund. Ok I encluded this one because many sexual offenders Abuse animals in their youth and on into adulthood. I didn’t know for sure if you would see this as relavent. I can tell you in most of the sexual offender groups i have been about half the men and kids admitted to violently abusing animals. Myself encluded.
There has also been a great deal of research into Animal Violence and criminal behavior. I had a rage even back then, that cruel and saddistic. It scared the hell out of me. Poor cat paid one hell of a price for my rage.
-Brent Brents 10-11-13
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how the healing happened
Note from Amy:
The following comment was sent to this Diary of a Predator website in June, and inadvertently missed until recently. So here it is, better late than never:
Diary of a Predator Contact
Hello Amy, and anyone else listening. I just finished this book and am writing to thank you. Accepting that there is always more to who we are than what has happened TO us, and what we have DONE … is an essential piece of true connection – and you have lived this process and then shared the story, you and Brent both. Thank you Amy and Brent.
While it is true that many who live through horrendous trauma from very early life end up repeating destructive patterns, living as though it would be easier to die, or “becoming” the perpetrator, these are not the only possible answers. There is always more possibility, coupled with the original innocent child, hurt, but able to heal. I commend any effort to paint the reality of those truths, rather than only explore or sensationalize the more obvious destruction and pain.
Your process and work are about connection, and what true connection is all about. THAT — is the inherent drive of the innocent child, to know we are connected. there are many survivors of horrific childhoods who know this — how hard it can be to heal from early childhood trauma and ongoing violence, secrecy and varying levels of “dissociation” (it wasn’t me, it didn’t happen to me)… rampant in such households. But survive we do, and heal we do. I like the emphasis on how the healing happened, and purposeful focus on seeing beyond what was broken. Too many books and articles dwell only on that side…. and while offering suggestions about healing, do not paint that capacity as a real story, as a long and hard process — and based in reality.
As a person who lived through the worst kinds of very very early and ongoing abuse and neglect, with 20 plus years of healing work now, I was again – on finishing this book — nudged into the position of knowing that many of my “perpetrators” if not all, were victims in their own childhood as well. It is easier to let them go, and let go the binding energy that keeps us all down. Today I let more go. thank you amy and brent (feel free to share with brent). AR
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Why Some Politicians Are More Dangerous Than Others
Note from Amy:
If you’ve spent much time on this Diary of a Predator website, you’ll know I am a big fan of James Gilligan‘s work, especially his book Violence: Reflections on a National Epidemic, where he presents case studies from his 25 years of working in prisons in an attempt to understand the causes and motivation of violent behavior.
We share that same goal, which is the entire reason I wrote the book Diary of a Predator: A Memoir, and why I have this website. If we don’t understand the complex causes of violence, how can we prevent it? We need to focus on prevention at its source–the perpetrator–instead of simply telling young women they need to walk in pairs after dark.
Now Gilligan has released a new edition of his latest book, Why Some Politicians are More Dangerous Than Others, and if you truly care about the prevention of violence in the U.S., it’s worth reading with an open mind.
From the Back Cover:
Politicians and the political process, even in ostensibly democratic countries, can be deadly. James Gilligan has discovered a devastating truth that has been “hiding in plain sight” for the past century – namely, that when America’s conservative party, the Republicans, have gained the presidency, the country has repeatedly suffered from epidemics of violent death. Rates of both suicide and homicide have sky-rocketed. The reasons are all too obvious: rates of every form of social and economic distress, inequality and loss – unemployment, recessions, poverty, bankruptcy, homelessness also ballooned to epidemic proportions. When that has happened, those in the population who were most vulnerable have “snapped”, with tragic consequences for everyone.
These epidemics of lethal violence have then remained at epidemic levels until the more liberal party, the Democrats, regained the White House and dramatically reduced the amount of deadly violence by diminishing the magnitude of the economic distress that had been causing it.
This pattern has been documented since 1900, when the US government first began compiling vital statistics on a yearly basis, and yet it has not been noticed by anyone until now except with regard to suicide in the UK and Australia, where a similar pattern has been described.
This book is a path-breaking account of a phenomenon that has implications for every country that presumes to call itself democratic, civilized and humane, and for all those citizens, voters and political thinkers who would like to help their country move in that direction.
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More Reader Response: if a kid is being abused…something needs to be done
Note from Amy: The following comment was sent by someone other than the first two readers regarding this thread started by the woman in Amsterdam:
This may be a more comprehensible translation:
” One always has a choice between good or evil, regardless of being a victim or not. If people didn’t have that choice half the world would be in jail. So this is complete nonsense.
To people like Brent Brents: begone, all you are is a financial burden to society.”
It could be turned around as well. It’s easy to say you always have a choice, if you yourself have not been growing up in a household where violence and rape is a daily routine.
I myself have been blessed with a very happy childhood. Being loved and being cared about was a normal every day situation for me. I was raised by parents who had certain values and standards. And as a result I turned out pretty normal (I think). I work hard and I try and be a good person. I’ve never committed a crime in my life nor am I planning to do so in the future.
I am not saying I would be a horrible serial killer if I had been raised by abusive parents. I’m saying the chances of me being a good person would be slimmer. I strongly believe an adult’s personality is the result of nature and nurture. You are born with certain personality traits and the development during your child and teen years shape the rest of your personality.
Two people might be born with an addictive personality. One grows up in a loving family, the other by an abusive one. One of those becomes a smoker, the other gets hooked on the thrill of committing crimes.
Then again, your parents being shipped off to jail and then having to live in foster homes and such might also be fairly traumatic.
We will never know if Brents actions could have been prevented by actively doing something about his home situation. But hell, if a kid is being abused by his parents I think we can all at least agree, something needs to be done about that.
Do not get me wrong: Brents SHOULD be in jail for the horrible things he has done. But it’s good that there’s a discussion on this website. It means people are actively thinking about the issue. Which means they might act when they see a child in need and perhaps even prevent that child from becoming abusive in their adulthood.
Filed under The story
like a train roaring through my head
“Violence ‘speaks’ of an intolerable condition of human shame and rage, a blinding rage that speaks through the body.” –James Gilligan, author of Violence: Reflections On A National Epidemic
When Margaret fought back I became almost overjoyed. I
literally could feel my Blood rushing into my head it sound
like a train roaring through my head . . . it was hitting her
in the back of the head that was getting me off . . . remember
seeing a meat cleaver on the counter and thought it would
realy feel good to smash her skull. Then I like woke up and
was totally different . . . how fucked up is that.
—From Brent Brent’s journal, as featured in Diary of a Predator: A Memoir
Filed under Brents' writings
Three Words That Triggered a Final Spree of Violence: “You Little Punk”
Brent Brents often told me his greatest fear was not of being killed, or tortured, or injured in any way–but of being shamed.
“Please don’t make me look stupid,” he would repeatedly say to me regarding publishing his writings, and when I asked him why the fear of humiliation held so much power over him, he didn’t have an answer.
The very first time I interviewed him, Brents told me his final crime spree-where he raped three women and two children over the course of a weekend–was triggered by a police detective talking smack to him on the phone in an effort to get Brents, who had a warrant out for his arrest, to turn himself in. I write about it in Diary of a Predator: A Memoir.
“He called me a little punk. ‘Tell me where you’re at. I’ll come get you, you little punk,’” Brents told me. “I said, ‘Fuck you. Come get me.’”
Then, he said, “I worked myself into this rage, walked out of the coffee shop . . . [thinking] ‘You wanna play games? I can play games, too.’”
At the time, I thought it was a ridiculous excuse, and merely a way for Brents to avoid taking responsibility for his actions. And while he is indeed responsible for his actions, today I now understand the deep motivation that shame and humiliation play in inciting violence.
“I have yet to see a serious act of violence that was not provoked by the experience of feeling shamed and humiliated, disrespected and ridiculed, and that did not represent the attempt to prevent or undo this ‘loss of face’–no matter how severe the punishment, even if it includes death,” writes James Gilligan in his excellent book, Violence: Reflections On a National Epidemic.
“The purpose of violence is to diminish the intensity of shame and replace it as far as possible with its opposite, pride…”
The more trivial the matter, Gilligan says, the deeper the humiliation: “…their very triviality makes it even more shameful to feel ashamed about them.”
Men who feel this way and act on it become violent because they feel they have no nonviolent alternative to boost their self esteem, Gilligan says. Also, with their sense of self threatened to be overwhelmed by shame, they lack the emotions of love and guilt that would normally prevent someone from becoming violent.
Again, it doesn’t excuse Brent Brent’s behavior–but it does help explain it.
Filed under The story
little tortured boys don’t just disappear
Note from Amy: I got a very thoughtful email last year from a woman who is working on her master’s in counseling psychology. She had seen me on the Paula Zahn show on Investigation Discovery about the Brent Brents’ case, and wrote to offer her support of my work.
Now she’s doing some work of her own, through an excellent blog called The Feminist Rag–and I offer praise of it not just because she recently wrote a very nice blog about my work on Brents, but because she has insightful and interesting things to say. I began reading James Gilligan’s book Violence on her recommendation, and have learned so much from it. That book articulates so well the underlying causes of violence in our culture and why conventional solutions have failed to stem its tide.
Since the author of The Feminist Rag doesn’t give her name on her website, I won’t reveal it here. Below is an excerpt of what she wrote about her reactions to Diary of a Predator: A Memoir, in addition to some very kind things about my ongoing work which were gratifying to hear.
From The Feminist Rag:
Reading Amy’s book is not for the light-hearted; it took me on an INTENSE emotional roller coaster that had me wrestling with all kinds of conflicting feelings like disgust, terror, empathy and despair as I learned of Brent’s childhood, which was filled with unspeakable child abuse which, unsurprisingly and all too commonly, resulted in a full blown sadistic, out of control, violent, sociopathic man.
Alongside my disgust, despair, and terror, I also found myself feeling empathy for Brent because little tortured boys don’t just disappear, they slowly morph into violent adult men. This is not to say that ALL abused boys turn into sadistic men, but some do, it’s simply how life works — everyone copes differently with the inner hell such a childhood creates. Read more
Filed under The story
the violence of everyday life
A reader suggested I read the book Violence: Reflections On A National Epidemic, by James Gilligan, M.D., and I am so glad she did.
Gilligan directed the Center for the Study of Violence at Harvard Medical School, is the former medical director of the Bridgewater State Hospital for the criminally insane and was director of mental health for the Massachusetts prison system.
His book is brilliant and thoughtful. I haven’t gotten very far yet, but there are parts of it already worth quoting, such as this:
“…even the most apparently ‘insane’ violence has a rational meaning to the person who commits it, and to prevent this violence, we need to learn to understand what that meaning is…The psychological understanding of violence requires recognizing how much method there is in violent madness, and how much psychopathology there is in the violence of everyday life.”
It articulates better than I ever could why it’s important for us to learn from someone like Brent Brents.
Filed under The story
Diary of a Predator 