[Saeko]

What's wrong with art therapy? A story goes that @Saeko went to an art therapist once, and look at her now!

Don't worry Bulaba, no one will ever look at that therapist again.

[Bulaba Khan Jones]

I picture a much younger Saeko calmly saying, "No, I will not scribble."

[Red_Army]

Where is there an indication for all the psychosis you're attributing to mom? This looks like naked projection unless you have something besides your wild leaps of logic based on the limited knowledge we have of a nasty divorce.

In any case he was 24 so all your protestations excusing his actions via the tyranny of moms is ridiculous. Trauma doesn't automatically make murderers and it certainly doesn't excuse them. Putting all the blame for this grisly murder on a mother you know next to nothing about is insane on your part. Maybe she was a terrible mother and maybe not, but this 24-year-old man is the sole person criminally responsible for his crimes. I don't see you jumping to the defense of other criminals who undoubtedly experienced trauma. This is just you projecting your bitterness about divorce on a mass murder that has a very flimsy connection.

[colliric]

Trauma doesn't automatically make murderers and it certainly doesn't excuse them. Maybe she was a terrible mother and maybe not, but this 24-year-old man is the sole person criminally responsible for his crimes

I never said he wasn't responsible. I am however trying to under his psychological makeup and why he turned out the way he did.

[Zagadka]

Because understanding and treatment of mental health issues, especially in America where treatment is expensive, are horrid, and it isn't helped by negative social stigma people put on it?

[colliric]

Because understanding and treatment of mental health issues, especially in America where treatment is expensive, are horrid, and it isn't helped by negative social stigma people put on it?

I agree it's stigmatized. The phenomenon of divorced traumatized parents projecting their own psychological issues onto their children especially in psychologically controlling "I'm forcing you to go to a psychologist I personally know as a friend and who will help me control you with drugs" ways doesn't help. Gaslighting is one of the worst forms of abuse.

Dude needed to socialise more at an earlier age, not be forced to do fucken "art therapy" which is absolutely a useless waste of money on teenage kids who just want to do what is now a normal bad habit(play too many video games!).

[Zagadka]

Dude needed to socialise more at an earlier age, not be forced to do fucken "art therapy" which is absolutely a useless waste of money on teenage kids who just want to do what is now a normal bad habit(play too many video games!).

Therapy works. Maybe not on everyone, and youths are different than adults, but it is important, and deriding it only undermines the process.

[colliric]

Therapy works. Maybe not on everyone, and youths are different than adults, but it is important, and deriding it only undermines the process.

For older men generally creative and interested in art maybe, for young teenagers interested mainly in movies, girls and video games... Probably not..... Definately not. And certainly not if it's sold to them with the word "compulsory".

[Zagadka]

I'm sure that your "probably not... definitely not" will be of keen interest to psychologists who have spent their lives developing techniques and the uncounted numbers who find such therapy useful.

But yea, keep up the general feels.


EDIT

As you are apparently not aware, therapy is never just one method. "Art therapy" may just be one session a week. And yea, it sucks for a lot of people, but then it starts being useful once you do it.

[colliric]

As you are apparently not aware, therapy is never just one method. "Art therapy" may just be one session a week. And yea, it sucks for a lot of people, but then it starts being useful once you do it.

I am aware, don't patronize. Personally I think CBT, which puts the onus on the patient to heal themselves at their own pace, is actually the most effective and useful. Maybe that's why I am admittedly prejudiced against "art therapy". I think it's a hands off approach and doesn't work at all, unless the person likes doing art already(and needs a social group).

[Zagadka]

I actually agree about cognitive therapy, but art therapy and other methods are also effective in their own realms. Cognitive doesn't work in every scenario.

[Prosthetic Conscience]

Dude needed to socialise more at an earlier age, not be forced to do fucken "art therapy" which is absolutely a useless waste of money on teenage kids who just want to do what is now a normal bad habit(play too many video games!).

The art therapist was mentioned in the 2006 divorce papers, when he was 12, so it was before he was a teenager.

I'm sorry the mention of an art therapist seems to have triggered you. I'll give you a warning, or self-censor, next time.

[colliric]

so it was before he was a teenager.

....only by a whisker. Thirteen is when it starts.

[Quercus Robur]

No to the question in the title.

Now what would the USA-related angle on this be...? Is it the winning culture or is it a ridiculous gun culture that sees guns not as part of gang, sporting nor military culture but as part of everday self-defence? It's just so hard to tell :P

[Prosthetic Conscience]

so it was before he was a teenager.

....only by a whisker. Thirteen is when it starts.

We don't know how much before it was. The lawyer wrote in 2006 that it had happened already. It could have been a couple of years earlier, for all we know.

[Political Interest]

You can read a book for hours and books are escapism too. Games allow blokes to play out their hunter-killer instincts in a way that doesn't involve actual bloodshed. People like games better than films or books because games are interactive, your input matters to what happens. With books and films you are just a passive inconsequential voyeur.

Books do not immerse you in the same way. You can sit in an open room with light coming in and read for two hours or so and then you will move on. There is still a feeling of being present in the actual world while you are reading a book. Games consume the player, they almost take you into the world which they depict because you are, as you say, interacting rather than simply observing or comprehending. It's an intesive and detaching experience which can produce depressions if continued for too long.

Also closing the curtains is just for removing screen glare. The reason for closing the curtains is exactly the same reason cinemas don't have windows in the viewing area.

The difference is that cinema and theatre do not go on for hour after hour. You are not sat there in the dark for four hour periods. And they are both communal experiences because you are sat with a lot of other people. There is a solitary aspect to gaming that can be depressing. But yes watching films in one's house for hour after hour would also be depressing. I think any solitary activity other than reading books will make people depressed.

In the 1990s I remember gaming used to be considered something for children and it was an indulgence that parents allowed. A lot of people at that time did not have a very positive view of games and did not let their children buy consoles or computer games. I think the idea was always that the games were a distraction to be played here and there like board games. Children would grow out of them when they entered adulthood. In the late 2000s I noticed that it became socially acceptable for normal adult men, not merely fanatics or hobbyists, to also play games regularly. There was always something rage inducing about games, I think. Why is it that on multiplayer online games you always encounter strange and horrible people at the other end? As far back as I can remember when I used to play these types of online games in the mid 2000s you would get weird people.

Now days young men get so worked up and excited about their online games. It's as if they take them seriously.

Is it really any surprise that gaming seems to produce mental instability or at least attract people with such tendencies?

[SolarCross]

Books do not immerse you in the same way. You can sit in an open room with light coming in and read for two hours or so and then you will move on. There is still a feeling of being present in the actual world while you are reading a book. Games consume the player, they almost take you into the world which they depict because you are, as you say, interacting rather than simply observing or comprehending. It's an intesive and detaching experience which can produce depressions if continued for too long.

You are just saying books are inferior as entertainment. I would agree that games generally are superiour entertainment over stories but I wouldn't put your morose spin on it. I think you are just projecting your own depression on others.

The difference is that cinema and theatre do not go on for hour after hour. You are not sat there in the dark for four hour periods. And they are both communal experiences because you are sat with a lot of other people. There is a solitary aspect to gaming that can be depressing. But yes watching films in one's house for hour after hour would also be depressing. I think any solitary activity other than reading books will make people depressed.

Stories are really solitary experiences even if you sit watching them with others. Games in general a far more social because at the very least you are actually interacting with a human opponent. Video games were something of an exception to this because many games are played against an AI opponent. However increasingly modern video games have sophisticated multiplayer options which allow the games to be played against human opponents. The epitome of this would be Massively Mulitplayer Online (MMO) games in which you can literally engage with hundreds of thousands of other human players. You simply have no clue at all what you are whining about.

In the 1990s I remember gaming used to be considered something for children and it was an indulgence that parents allowed. A lot of people at that time did not have a very positive view of games and did not let their children buy consoles or computer games. I think the idea was always that the games were a distraction to be played here and there like board games. Children would grow out of them when they entered adulthood. In the late 2000s I noticed that it became socially acceptable for normal adult men, not merely fanatics or hobbyists, to also play games regularly. There was always something rage inducing about games, I think. Why is it that on multiplayer online games you always encounter strange and horrible people at the other end? As far back as I can remember when I used to play these types of online games in the mid 2000s you would get weird people.

Now days young men get so worked up and excited about their online games. It's as if they take them seriously.

Is it really any surprise that gaming seems to produce mental instability or at least attract people with such tendencies?

Indoor sports that is all it is. Some ignorant people say sports are just for kids and nevermind all the adults doing it. Some ignorant people shake their heads sadly as sports fans get "worked up and excited" about their sports games and nevermind that is literally an admission that sports and games are really good entertainment.

I don't think you are in any position to judge others on "mental instability".