Do you think that virginia Tech killer Cho Seu was an Aspie?

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Not sure if there is an undertone that seeks to control people who are/were bullied, but there is something very cruel about where the discussion is veering off to. By laying the blame at the feet of Cho’s life experiences, the media is inadvertently victimizing the victims of bullying. Even if Cho had been bullied, it does not justify what he did nor does it even come close to explaining why he did it.

As Aspergians, we have all had more than our fair share of injustice and humiliation, but we do not respond by buying handguns and killing people indiscriminately. Cho made a conscious decision to do something that all of us who are here talking about this tragedy would not have chosen to do. Just because one gets bullied does not mean that one becomes evil. That takes the babble of psychological-determinism to the extreme. We have a choice and it is that choosing which makes our humanity. How we choose to respond to the harm that others inflict on us is perhaps the most important question that all men face. And it is a grave insult to suggest that Aspergians or any victim of bullying will naturally seek to injure those who hurt them. Such assertions diminish all human beings.

We will never really know why Cho did what he did. That is a secret he took to his grave. Lots of Asian American men will tell you that they went through pretty much what Cho went through in school and continue on through their lives as sort of marginalized high performers. With very few exceptions, they do not end up becoming killers. Whatever it was that set him off, it was particular to Cho.

Zeno,

I agree with you. Many people have felt on the margins of society, have been bullied and felt they didn't belong most of their lives, and they didn't kill anyone. In fact, it became a motive for them to achieve. Roger Bannister was one of these. He is an example of someone who overcame the odds against him to live a full, well-rounded life.

I was also bullied and felt I didn't fit in. I realized it was partly my own fault. I never thought of killing people. Everyone wants to talk about diagnoses of these people, but one word they won't use to describe these individuals who kill and shoot up people is EVIL! Which, in my opinion, they are.

I think he was bullied but it is easy to take that literally and say that he did it because of bullying. Not necessarily schizophrenia takes bit of life and mixes it with fantasy, if it is the paranoid type it is the more provocative bits. It is far removed from reality.

I heard an interesting theory from a shrink last night where she opined he was a "withdrawn psychopath." She feels that the psychopath personality is formed by 8 years of age and that they either become extraverted and manipulative or introverted and withdrawn.

I did think along the lines of a sociopath. But I've not heard evidence such as cruelty to animals, etc.

Actually, as an NT, I would argue that the reverse is true. The society in general just pretends it doesn't understand how having been bullied in one of the most common threads linking mass murderers. I think it is hypocritical to say bullies do not matter in causing killings.

“In virtually every regard, Cho is prototypical of mass killers that I’ve studied in the past 25 years,” said Northeastern University criminal justice professor James Alan Fox, co-author of 16 books on crime. “That doesn’t mean, however, that one could have predicted his rampage.”

No one is saying what Cho did is right, but I would like to say that on this forum, we can at least discuss how harmful school bullies are without resorting to being PC.

True... But take a look at the logic you're using. It may be true that most mass murderes were bullied, but it doesn't mean that all kids that are bullied will become mass murderes.

No one is saying that. What people (here and in real life, not the Media) are saying is that bullying compounds psychological problems. If severe, bullying can cause PTSD, phobias and those can create serious, lifelong problems. I think people reflect on what they believe is bullying and then project how someone like Cho should have responded. That's just not how it works.
Any of the possible neurological or psychological conditions that we are discussing can contribute to a mental breakdown, if compounded by other difficulties. If he were autistic, it's possible that he had inadequate education or assesment which led to massive communication and socialization barriers. If he had PTSD, then he may have fallen into a deep paranoid psychosis over it, not having received or accepted the proper help. If he were schizophrenic, he may have lost all reason to even understand who he was and why he was being referred to mental wards.
No, most people that are diagnosed for the above are not killers, but to use that statistic to conclude "bullying doesn't create murderers/abusers" is very dismissive of the very real pain and damage done to victims of bullies. It drives me nuts when people use a relative who has PTSD as an example like this. He was severely abused and almost died as a toddler, this was done by quite a few people. He underwent years of depression, foster homes, failed relationships until he went to therapy and is now, relatively healthy. And people will point to him and say, "he was abused and he's okay". Bullkrap, he's not just "okay". In many regards, he's simply lucky he made it through.

Honestly, I think the university did all it could to try and help this guy. In that regard, without really knowing what his "diagnosis" was and what his family did to help him, I don't think the first two murders could have been prevented.

Was there evidence to suggest he would go on a shooting rampage at the time he was in college? Sure, he had disturbing writing, and he was obsessive with two women, but that doesn't mean he's guaranteed to commit a crime. There's an extremely fine line between intervening in the name of public safety, and stomping on somebody's personal freedom and rights.

I don't think the average Aspie is a propagandist, but I do think the average Aspie is stubborn and dogmatic. We aren't the "little professors" for nothing. It's one of our defining traits, the fact that when we encounter a topic that is one of our interests, we will go on and on and on about it. This, taken to its extreme, is the "propagandist who wants to be famous," I suppose, but that in itself is just another label.

With respect to copying, what you said about wanting your own stuff makes sense, yet there's no contradiction between that and what I said. Every Aspie (myself included) I've seen wants to be fiercely independent and hates being dependent on anybody else, but we're essentially composites of every idea and notion and experience that gets thrown our way. Even my Aspie friend about whom I rail so much, he has copied my behaviors and social skills extensively, but won't acknowledge that he got it from me. He believes he came up with it himself, and doesn't realize that on a subconscious level he was learning and absorbing from what he saw. Yes, many people copy and borrow, not just Aspies. We (Aspies and these people) absorb and cut up ideas and methods, and paste them back together in oftentimes different arrangements to come up with our worldview, or our repertoire for "creative" thought. But in the end we aren't really creative. We work with stuff that is pre-existing. It's the really creative subgroup of non-Aspies that have the imagination, the ability to come up with something new out of nothing.

Note that I never said that because Cho did xyz thing, that he must be AS. I only said that I wouldn't be surprised if he had AS, but my implication is that there's no guarantee he had it (hence my statement about posthumous diagnosis as being a guessing game). Many Aspies do display similar, though perhaps not as extreme traits.

As long as you didn't eat cat food last week you should be fine.

YEP, there WAS evidence! A JUDGE even said so! What about others rights?



OH YEAH, I said here several times I used to REALLY be stubborn and dogmatic. I wish I kept that all. Obviously, it still shows up a bit. But propagandist?!?!?



Your WRONG there. I may not be artistic, but I DO have original ideas, etc... (BTW read my post again. I DID say I have copied. I even did it HERE! I admit that. At other times, the stuff is original.) Some aspies DO seem to be artistic. Frankly, I bet they can all come up with original and novel things. Anyway, I wouldn't do anything like what CHO did without editing and understanding. CHO sounded like an IDIOT, even when you forget about his acts, attitude, and the subject matter! I never thought of how close artistic and autistic are.

BTW There have been things others have accused me of learning from them that I learned first, etc... SOMETIMES, I even taught the person THEY learned from.



Similar to the ones specified, yes! I'm just saying that is FAR from conclusive, and maybe we shouldn't even discuss the possibility until there is more stuff.

So, and where are the evidences for this stupid, uncreative idea?

The AQ-test contains several questions about imagination, and Simon Baron-Cohen decided these should be scored as NT-questions. However, since I've now analysed the results of these questions, along with all the other questions in the AQ-test, it is pretty obvious this scoring is inccorect. Aspies score higher on questions about imagination that doesn't relate to social situations than NTs.

Besides, as an Aspie, I must protest about not having creative ideas. I've presented lots of creative ideas in the areas of my special interests, mostly operating systems and autism. My operating system has many novel ideas, and some of them have been borrowed. The Neanderthal theory clearly is a very original and creative idea. Aspie-quiz has tested over 600 different ideas that nobody in the establishment thought would be related to autism. The scoring method is innovative, creative and original.

Quite right! I'm also a creative aspie.

I think Cho was a psychopath and the psychiatrist who suggested so was correct. I saw the interview with his former high school classmate and Cho's behavior was far and away beyond AS and indicated a contempt towards everyone. He even made up a "hit list" when he was in the 8th grade and was suspended from school for a month. It was also obvious from the interview that Cho didn't want any friends. He wasn't so much bullied as he was mocked and the other kids were AFRAID of him. Yes, he was withdrawn, but was he autistic? I don't think so.

I'm not sure that his being diagnosed with any particular mental illness at this point serves a purpose. I think the fact that he needed help , and the fact that had been noticed by those around him , but that not enough was done to help him and to protect him and others from the tragic resulting behaviour that led to him doing what he did is a tragedy as much as the death of all those people . He was alientated by his behaviour and yet it seems likely that the behaviour of others toward him caused his alienation as well . His problems and the behaviour of others toward him that caused his increasingly bizzare behaviour was evident when he was just a small child . There was plenty of oppurtunity for those around him to help him , maybe they did maybe they didn't i dont know but the resulting tragedy leads me to conclude that whatever help he did recieve , if any was clearly not enough. The only possible good that can come out of this is that the mental health and well being of children at school , college and university is given a much greater priority and that systems are in place to protect vulnerable individuals from the damaging behaviour of others and in so doing to protect the public from the behaviours of people who have been pushed to the edge and over.

bb natty

I don't buy that the behavior of others caused his problems. The school system made a mistake in tolerating his bizzare behavior instead of referring him to a residential psychiatric school where perhaps he would be untwisted, or restrained from harming others. We make choices about our behavior unless we are too warped to see reality.

Serious girl

you dont belive that bullying and being alienated for many years from being small would cause in some cases a person to develop mental health issues ? I think it would .