Gun Control: The Low-Hanging Fruit

With the recent high-profile spree killings in the news, more and more talk of gun control and another attempt to ban assault weapons is being thrown around.  The reason why it's almost useless is the fact—like people looking for a solution to this problem—guns are also the low-hanging fruit for most of these killers. 

Let's talk about killing…

Soldiers and police also deal with the possibility of having to kill as part of their profession.  However, like most people with a normal degree of empathy, they are inherently reluctant to do so.  The way they are trained to "overcome" this reluctance in the performance of duty illustrates the major difference between the spree killers and these professionals.

For soldiers, life as a soldier starts early through the creation of the idea of a shared cultural or social identity.  This lays the basis—psychologically—for the motivations to volunteer (in non-conscripts) and cooperation with conscription in other cultures.  During training, soldiers are typically exposed to a high degree of forced cooperation with other soldiers which usually results in a high degree of emotional bonding between both the soldier and other soldiers and the soldier and their organization.  This is long before any exposure to actual combat in most military institutions.

When faced by combat, most soldiers are then presented with an emotionally relevant situation where they can choose not to kill an enemy but the risk of not killing them is in terms of the lives and well-being of the soldiers around them.  In these situations, the enemy is often from a distinct "other" group and/or is presented as such by military and usually civilian authorities as well as—often—the enemy themselves.  This means the decision to kill is one of empathy for a stranger versus empathy for your comrades and—depending on the country—your people, country, etc.

This dilemma—although enabling most soldiers to kill—is also a likely root cause for some post traumatic stress disorders.

Police—while using similar methods of group-creation training initially—are presented with a different problem because the social group they are nominally protecting ("the Public") is also from where the potential "target" they may have to kill comes from.  In some cases, they will use the same sort of psychological distancing as soldiers when the enemy presents itself as a distinct social entity like a gang, but the primary decision maker for police use of lethal force is the concept of immediate threat.

For police, the dilemma they have to resolve is one of immediate threat to themselves and to bystanders from a particular person in a particular situation.  The "releaser" for the ability to kill is their emotional attachment to themselves and others in the somewhat nebulous concept of "the Public" and their natural reluctance to kill other people.  This dilemma may also result in post traumatic stress disorder when the officer is unsure of his or her actual assessment of the threat presented or has an unwillingness to accept it after the fact.

In both of these paradigms, the only legitimate targets for lethal force are directly or indirectly threats toward someone who they also have an emotional attachment to.  This is one reason why the crimes of spree killers seem so outrageous and horrible to us. 

Let me explain…

The commonality between all of the recent—and not so recent—spree killers is not necessarily the use of guns, it's the history of untreated or undertreated mental illness combined with an average or above average degree of intelligence and enough planning and preparation to make for a large body count.

The body counts in these incidents are because these men have by design selected target locations and times to maximize the number of non-threatening targets given the weapons they had at their disposal at the time.  All of these crimes had some degree of pre-planning involved.  In some cases—like the Aurora shooter and the shooter in Norway—there were months of preparation and the creation of complex plans.  All of these crimes had locations selected that took into account the availability of defensive measures for their victims. 

Again, for the Aurora and Norway killers, the secondary explosive devices made were intended to distract local law enforcement.  For the Columbine event, the explosive devices were intended to create a distraction and probably allow a greater concentration of targets for the shooters, but this didn't materialize.  The Virginia Tech shooter did not use explosive devices; however, he did prepare and bring chains and locks to manipulate his targets response by restricting their ability to escape.

In these cases, the spree killers show a high degree of analytical problem solving and understanding of both their victims' and law enforcements' responses.  This also reveals that these men intentionally selected targets for their inability to defend themselves and probably used laws regarding firearm restrictions to their advantage.

None of which is why I think gun control is a waste of time to stop these sorts of killers.

Why is gun control probably a waste of time against these killers?

Gun control is a waste of time against these killers because they are not stupid and are usually very aware of these restrictions.  The selection of firearms—even in the cases where bombs were also used—is more likely a compromise between ease of use and the degree of personal involvement in the actual killing.  Similar spree killings in places like Japan and China have so far relied on melee weapons including kitchen knives and cleavers with similar targets—school children—possibly as a response to increased difficulty acquiring guns. 

For the Norway killings, the killer maneuvered through the firearm laws of several European countries in order to acquire the weapons and explosives he used.  The Aurora shooter—likewise—maneuvered through the legal requirements of several jurisdictions to assemble his "arsenal" and explosive materials.  Others simply didn't have to go as far.

For the Sandy Hook shooter, he used weapons available at home and Columbine shooters used a combination of available weapons and weapons purchased for them by another person.  In all of these instances, cars or vans were also used to transport weapons to their targets of choice as well both in vehicles provided to them or acquired by other means.

While restricting access to firearms might on the surface seem to be a means to reduce the number of casualties, my issue is with the possibility it might work.  For all of the shooters mentioned so far, the firearms used appear to be the weapon with the lowest opportunity cost to use but with the highest degree of personal involvement in the actual killing.  Assuming we could somehow get an effective weapons ban—for these type of killers—you're simply increasing the opportunity cost for one type of tool.

This doesn't stop this sort of non-empathetic, intentioned killer.  It merely makes them find another tool for their tool box.  If—like in the Chinese and Japanese school massacres—it forces them into a less lethal but more personal weapon like a knife or cleaver, it might reduce the number of families dealing with dead children.  If—like in the Aurora , Norway, and Columbine incidents—explosive devices are already on the menu, it might simply make the killers forego the killing of many people one-at-a-time and go for a larger, single or multiple killing with more casualties.

My point is these men (and all have been men so far) have yet to allow a law to stop them from killing.  The only thing that appears to change is the amount of planning time and the higher number of casualties.  The focus on trying to "limit" the number of dead by banning weapons when you have already seen multiple killers using a potentially more lethal set of weapons is ludicrous and is a recipe toward creating even larger number of casualties as these men adapt to using different weapons to kill with.

The solution—the only solution, in my opinion—is to focus on making these situations result in only one—the perpetrator—or ideally zero casualties. 

"He was a quiet boy…"

Almost all of these spree killers operate in a social vacuum.  While they have acquaintances, most of them lack close, emotional attachments.  This may be both a symptom and a cause of this violence.  This is a symptom because it enables the degree of planning involved with a lack of outside interference.  For many of these killers, the first kill is usually their parents, whom they live with.  Outside of their family—and with their family out of the picture—most of the restrictions on these men's behavior vanish and it enables them to go out and kill.

The first step to preventing these killings is simply social involvement and mutual investment with the people around you.  If someone can't or won't emotionally engage, those people need to be identified and professionally assessed.  

If they lack the ability to demonstrate empathy toward other human beings, they need to be positively controlled, monitored, and kept out of situations where that lack of empathy can present itself in a violent manner.  This may mean medication, secure facilities, or something similar to prevent them access to the means of doing harm to others.  That's knives, guns, cars, bombs, information, etc..

If they have a history of violence as well, there should be an obligation to restrict them from interaction with the rest of society.  These are demonstrations—for those who look—of the lack of empathy that restrains everyone else in society from doing overt harm outside of extreme circumstances.  These actions should be documented and remain searchable in order to prevent access to locations, situations, and the means to allow large scale killing.

Most mentally ill people aren't this way, but most of the spree killers are mentally ill—in other words, someone noticed there was something wrong—and no one took definitive action to stop them.

Why?

Because it's not comfortable to make decisions about someone else when you're worried about people making decisions for you.  The problem is, until we are willing and able to, the killings will go on and—as the low-hanging fruit is disposed of—probably get worse as they adapt to the rules we set for ourselves.

Relationship Advice I Wish Everyone Understood: Sexual Compatibility

I’ve spent a little time sitting on the sidelines occupationally and some of that time has found me on various websites where people seek advice.  One of the more common families of issues seems to be:

I’m in a relationship/marriage and my partner doesn’t satisfy me.  I really love him/her and I want things to be better…

Which is typically followed by a long list of reasons they want to stay together—children, religious ideals, economic situation—which are usually very rational reasons to want to stay together.  This is usually not followed by a description of the partner’s qualities.  Generally, it’s the female partner who is actually seeking help.

The issue is—like my title suggests—sexual compatibility, but the problem is many people only consider it after the fact and a very long time after the social and economic commitments have been made.  In many cases, the person seeking advice admits up front their sex life with this partner was never particularly satisfying in the first place.

To be honest, because I’m a nice guy, my suggestions to them in the fora they ask usually are a combination of a medical work up (to catch any underlying health issues), mutual counseling with a professional counselor (ideally, to resolve communication issues), and to try something different sexually with their partners (to identify potential common sexual interests they haven't explored yet).

What I really want to do is ask them “What were you thinking when you committed to someone in a sexual relationship who can’t even provide you basic sexual satisfaction?”  Don’t get me wrong, I’m a realist and I know sexual satisfaction for both parties isn’t going to happen all the time, every time either party has an interest.  But regularly satisfying sex in a sexual relationship has got to be a requirement.

Why?

Oxytocin

Oxytocin is a neurohormone  which means it’s a chemical signal (hormone) released by nerve cells (neuro-), primarily in the part of the brain—the hypothalamus—that’s key to our sexual responses, many of our stress responses, and integral to the system in our brain that drives how we respond to friends, lovers, enemies, our children, and basically every other being in existence.  Oxytocin is released during sexual arousal and in higher doses (with another hormone called prolactin) with orgasm. 

What does this have to do with sexual compatibility? 

Simple, one of the effects of oxytocin is increased cooperation.

In the last few years, oxytocin has been available to researchers in a form allowing them to administer it nasally.  This has resulted in a lot of less-than-sexual research in the field of experimental economics.  To make a long story short, in controlled studies, people administered oxytocin make more cooperative economic decisions, are more likely to share, and increases empathy in males.  Also, it makes it harder for people to “remember the bad times”.

This means, if you are sexually compatible, you regularly dose each other with a chemical signal promoting sharing, forgiveness, and cooperation in a way most people will proactively seek out.  Add into it the fact prolactin—also released in high doses with partnered orgasm—produces sexual satiety so both partners tend to forgo looking for sex elsewhere, you have a reasonable starting place for a committed sexual relationship with added economic, social, and familial commitments.

However, as some people point out in advice forums:

I’ve been married (a large number of) years to my partner.  He/She was my first and we’re still going strong.  We just took the commitment seriously…

Desperation and the Learning Curve

As kids, we learn rules reasonably quickly so, by age five, we often end up arguing with little kids about rules they know well—like grammar and spelling rules—as we try to teach them the exceptions to these rules.  For example, the plurals of mouse/house and why “its” is a possessive and doesn’t have an apostrophe seem to confound many kindergartners and first graders.  After a while, we learn that most rules have exceptions and start picking up on how to make decisions including cost, benefits, and risks based less on rules and more on the underlying expectations.

Once we grasp the concept there are alternatives, but they might differ in these three qualities—cost, benefit, and risk—we often start making more responsible decisions when we have experience with each alternative.  Or, we simply emulate the people we know who’ve already made those decisions.  The reason this is important is the fact emulation is often of a lower cost and risk than gaining experience with an alternative in order to make an informed choice.  As far as a learning curve goes, it’s a strategy to “leap ahead” to a hopefully better choice. 

As a society, because many of these choices have consequences for all of us—consider the choice to follow traffic laws vs. driving 90mph through school zones—we often find ways to “incentivize” particular choices by either lowering the benefits—speed bumps—or increasing the costs—speeding tickets—in order to drive individual decision makers toward a socially beneficial ideal.

Sexual relationships are prime real estate for this.  The institution of marriage, for example, is a public announcement of an (assumed) sexually exclusive relationship that’s incentivized with social benefits in most cultures as well as increased costs for violating marriage vows and expectations.  The ideal result is a decrease of social and family disruption and the hope for a stable upbringing of socially compliant children.

Where does sexual compatibility apply to this?

Simple, when the perceived consequences (cost x risk) of a failed, socially accepted relationship is more than the level of perceived sexual frustration in the relationship, many people will take the easy way (change their perceptions) or find enough social pressure to apply to their partner to change.  

Even if this fails, the amount of emotional and social investment in their relationships creates an effect called cognitive dissonance.  With cognitive dissonance, the individual changes their own perception of their situation and often tries to “recruit” others into similar situations to validate their investment.

However, another factor may also be at work and that is developmental age. 

Humans have a very long development.  We have a delayed childhood compared to even our closest primate relatives including a long infancy providing more time for brain development and language-related ability acquisition.  We have a very long juvenile period before puberty.  We have an additional growth spurt of neurons in the part of the brain we use to learn how to (socially) solve problems and interact with others as an adult during puberty.  We have provided a long socially-mandated developmental period between biological adulthood and when they are considered—legally and socially—an adult (i.e. the “teenage years”).  We—at least the female half of the species—have a reproductive phase (pregnancy/motherhood) and post-reproductive phase (post-menopause) with the potential for yet more social roles.

In each of these stages, our “place” in society and even the same relationships changes because we change neurologically (the way we think), physiologically (the way our body functions), socially (the way we interact with each other).  In some stages—like early childhood and the period right after puberty—our behavior is much more plastic or changeable and we respond differently to our environments and partners.  During these stages, we can develop sexual traits that are much less flexible later on. 

Victims of child sexual abuse demonstrate this to an extreme in a negative manner.  Learning that sex is something done to you, against your will, and that you have to put up with it tends to change the way you deal with partners later on.  Sexually active teenagers kept blind about consequences of their sexual behaviors often become more irresponsible adults.  Sexual isolationism is probably a source for much fetishism as well when sexual learning becomes focused on what is available during this plastic period.

At the same time, if two people enter into an accepted, supportive relationship while still “pliable” and learn together, their sexual compatibility may develop as a consequence of their sexual plasticity.  With positive reinforcement and attention to their health, that can result in long term, successful, sexual relationships as well.  Probably the only way to tell the difference between the “desperation” and the “shared learning” crowds would be some measure of general health as desperation and frustration often results in health consequences related to stress.

So, what’s a guy or girl to do to avoid the problem completely?

Communication, Experience, and Honesty

Because sexual compatibility is important, sexual experience with a partner before becoming seriously committed—or a willingness to break a committed relationship after the sexual experience starts—is very important.  Obviously, reducing risk to both partners up front and avoiding situations that force some level of commitment—like pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections—are one key to this solution.

A second key aspect is avoiding “desperation decisions” based on economics or living situations.  Helping someone out of a bad situation is good.  Helping them by having them become your boyfriend/girlfriend and having them become financially dependent on you isn’t good.

Communication is also very important.  While learning isn’t as quick depending on age, communicating your desires, satisfaction, lack of satisfaction, and listening to their issues up front helps you both assess whether the relationship is working and helps you and a partner establish what works for each other.  Without direct communication, a partner is left open to assume, try to interpolate what you want, think, and feel off of less informative non-verbal cues.

Communicating clearly also keys into honesty, both with a partner and with yourself.  If you aren’t happy, you need to be honest.  If sexual satisfaction isn’t happening—and with some partners, it simply won’t—you have to be honest with yourself and not commit. 

Unless the partner is between 13 and 17 years old, don’t expect to be able to change them.  The odds are, it’s not going to happen in a way you want them to change.  This means—if you are an adult and you aren’t a criminal—don’t marry someone expecting to “fix them”.  Their flexible learning years are mostly over by the time you can legally date them.  They will change, but the trajectory is set by about 18.  If they aren’t “good enough” for you now, you need another partner.

(Note: I am not advocating sex with legally underage people.  Though a biological reality and a cultural reality in many cultures, exploiting this is illegal and considered immoral in the culture we live in and I accept that.)

Likewise, on the prospects of change, some physiological events are going to change people, but usually in ways beyond your ability to change them.  Pregnancy and menopause for women are key events.  Both of these will change how a woman sees herself, feels about herself, and what she needs emotionally.  This will change sexual compatibility.  Sometimes, in a good way, but usually just in a  different way. 

Also, trauma, illness, and even social changes can affect sexual compatibility by changing how a person—especially men in this case—see and feel about themselves.  If they are on medication or start taking medication—whether hormonal birth control, psychoactive drugs, or illegal drugs—sexual changes often follow.   Expect change, and try to adapt with a partner by focusing first on how they feel about themselves emotionally.  Don’t expect everything to always be the same.

At the end of the day, sexual compatibility can make or break relationships.  If it’s there, it’s a mutually desired activity replacing “you and me” with “we”.  If it’s not, it’s one more problem for “you and me”.  And that’s what I really wish people knew up front.