Immunity to Violence: A New Pandemic
We ought to train better for our social responses – like developing a workout regimen for empathy.
By Elaine Cox, M.D., Contributor |March 30, 2018, at 6:00 a.m.
The Associated Press
The human body has an amazing capacity to adapt to maximize survival. For example, over time, exposure to certain germs will result in immunity. In general, this is a very good thing and has resulted in eradication of certain illnesses that caused epidemics in not so distant history. The human mind has the same capacity to resist negative stimuli. But is that really a good evolutionary result?
When the mass school shooting occurred in Columbine in 1999, it dominated everything: the news cycle, headlines and everyone's minds and emotions. And not just for one day, but for weeks on end. The reasons for two teens to attack their classmates were debated, as surely there must have been some rationale for this behavior. In the end, there was never a satisfactory explanation, except that the perpetrators were smart, not unlike our neighbors, and they planned the massacre for the fame they thought would certainly follow.
https://health.usnews.com/health-care/for-better/articles/2018-03-30/immunity-to-violence-a-new-pandemic
