https://www.yahoo.com/news/zealand-mosque-attack-suspect-charged-murder-012715781.html
If one tries hard enough, anything can be rationalized. Hitler wasn’t such a bad guy, after all he built the autobahn. Mussolini made the trains run on time. Mao established the basis for modern China. These virtues do nothing to offset the evil done by these individuals. These statements say nothing about the individuals but serve to illustrate the delusions of their supporters.
I guess it is human to want to want to understand or label the actions of a madman. Popular culture says there has to be a reason and blame must be apportioned. It depends on how one defines reason. There is reason, as a call to action. There is also reason as rational thought leading to a justifiable and logical course used to obtain a goal.
The problem arises when people take the time to read and understand just what beliefs these damaged individuals hold dear. The MSM assures us that the New Zealand idiot is motivated by right wing hatred. Here is a quote from his manifesto:
New Zealand Shooter
“For once, the person that will be called a fascist, is an actual fascist, I am sure the journalists will love that,” he wrote. “I mostly agree with Sir Oswald Mosley’s views and consider myself an eco-fascist. The nation with the closest political and social values to my own is the People’s Republic of China.”
Huh?
Here is a brief survey of the reason advanced by some serial and mass murders.
My experience as a cop say that all crooks regard themselves as the hero of their own story. Sometimes they are cast down and meet their end due to forces unanticipated and outside their control. Alternately they meet their end fighting the good fight against superior forces. It doesn’t matter whether they are a child molester seduced by a three year old or a coward taken out by a SWAT team.
This means that they are all self serving and will assemble a variety of reasons to explain their actions. A close look at those reasons may show that some are mutually exclusive. Warren Jeffs had a whole congregation convinced that plain and fancy trick fucking of underage girls was sanctioned by God. Blow Job Bill the serial rapist former President convinced an entire political party that blow jobs weren’t sex.
The New Zealand shooter left behind a 74 page manifesto. This is the twitter generation. Who has time to read and understand 74 pages? Hit the high points, no more than can fit on a bumper sticker. Context and conflict doesn’t matter.
This idiot’s actions to not define or illustrate a movement. They only serve to show the workings of a disturbed individual.
Kemper has been the subject of several books and articles. You can find interviews of Kemper on line. He doesn’t duck and dodge and rationalize. He is pretty straight forward about himself and the system at the time. He comes across as a likable guy. He also points out that if he was ever released, he would go back to his murderous ways. Contrary to popular fiction, evil takes many forms and isn’t always easily identified.
It is possible to describe the course of evil, the high and low points. I think understanding is beyond reach. Experts can offer opinions but that in the end that is it, an approximation.