“Who’ll stop the rain”

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“Who’ll stop the rain”

“Long as I remember rains be fallen’ down.

Clouds of mystery pourin’ confusion on the ground.

Good men through the ages searchin’

for the sun and I wonder, still I wonder

who’ll stop the rain.”

Credence Clearwater Revival

Now years ago someone posted a comment on Facebook as a call to protest the release of one Michael Woodmansee.

Mr. Woodmansee is a convicted murderer. He murdered a fellow child at the age of 16. The details are of the sort that arise passions.

This piqued my interest and lead me to post the flowing comment.

If you are of the persuasion of these thoughts, then it is “preaching to the choir.” If not they will probably be quite unsettling if not enraging.

There is usually little “in-between” in these matters. The core thought that is expressed later is “The truth is we harm ourselves the more we hurt others. And that is what punishment does, it hurts others and therefore through it we harm ourselves.”

I started my original comment on Facebook  thus: “I am glad to see an open discussion on this matter.” I have been involved in these matters for a very long time. I am not in the legal profession. I am a physician so think about the human condition for a living. Long before that, I thought about what we “should” do with ourselves, which was in college. We give various names to this “Ethics” etc.

It has surprised me how my career has never quite veered from staying close to commenting on and trying to improve the understanding of what we call the “criminal mind” and the criminal justice system. My first attempt was my college thesis “Let Us Help Him Who Did So Human A Thing.” Therapists long ago took on Terence’s aphorism “Nothing that is human is foreign.” Jeffrey Dahmer, Hitler, et al, who committed unspeakable atrocities are in the end human and it falls to someone to understand them because without understanding we do not progress as humans and given the right circumstance we are all quite capable of atrocities.

Nietzsche said to understand the state of a society look to how they treat their prisoners. I have tried to come at these issues, not from a right or left or religious viewpoint. So how? From what we call science. That said, and so, it always bothered me when many a religious will supposedly promote the gospel of “vengeance be mine saith the lord” and that redemption is a personal matter and yet are on the front lines of executions.

I do not believe, at this point in history, that “punishment” has any place in the armament of human interactions. The only reason to incarcerate is to protect society from the harm others might do and in an ideal world to rehabilitate. Of course, there are all kinds of details to be worked out. How long do we incarcerate if we do not base it on a sense of “justice.”

Is this “radical?” I believe all psychological research tells us I am not, I am not radical. 

Otherwise, I believe in a “Restorative Justice” approach and reparations. Punishment cannot be used for retribution or vengeance. It is and of course, will continue to be used. It certainly will be but I see no religious moral or philosophical grounding for it.

The way I see it. Now why? It is because criminality starts and stops in the human mind. Crimes are discreet acts no matter how horrible. The truth is we harm ourselves the more we hurt others. And that is what punishment does, it hurts others, and therefore through it we harm ourselves. 

All we can do is try and heal ourselves. I have never understood what business I had yelling for the harm of another who did me no harm. Certainly, I am part of society and there is violence done to society, but again, in the end, they are discreet acts. As we know the execution of one will not bring back the deceased. I do not believe in “evil.”

Whatever took place in the mind of this 16-year-old took place due to some combination of genetics and the complex interaction of biochemistry and environment. 

I have briefly looked for some biographical data but have found nothing but that his father was retired police. This is a red flag. 

I have great respect for the police. We tell them to “take care” of the business that we want no part of. They absorb all the trauma then go home and often get addicted to prescription drugs and alcohol and beat their kids and wives and honest citizenry that they stop. I know, I hear the tales. Certainly not all, nor even the majority, but maybe it was true in the household of the accused. And it does not take much.

If the idea of murder, in any individual, seems to come out of left field like it did with Leapold and Lobe then it does. I for one ask why is it so hard to understand. Why is it so hard to understand that? People might be broken, simply broken? It is then for us to understand.

A tornado comes out of left field and destroys 300 lives and that is simple to understand and yet we are flabbergasted when billions of neurons in the brain take a momentary left turn. Natural disasters have not always been simple to understand. For most of our existence, we have explained such disasters in terms of divine intervention. And to be sure many people still do. It is the same when we desire punishment. We want some moral or divine intervention.

Do I believe in excuses? I do. I believe in explanations. I believe the mind to be fragile. To explain is to understand. So should he be released? It is a done deal is it not? I think we have a system. I think the system is going in the right direction. But there is no guarantee that it will continue in that direction or even reverse. I think it cannot be perfect. 

For sure we cannot know for sure that “good behavior” proves anything. We do know that even at 18 people are much different than at 16 and then again at 22 and even at 25. The brain is not fully integrated until 25. Almost all murders are committed before 25 years of age. I don’t think it is for me to have an opinion.

I am happy Pat Quinn signed the death penalty out of existence. 

Thanks Brian Lynch, M.D., Chicago