The Monstrously Inexplicable
There are many signal and horrific events occurring throughout the world which could rightfully claim ownership of that title. Some are the fallout of natural disasters, others disasters visited upon groups of people as a fallout of other groups’ deadly intent to destroy them whatever the reason, be it for territorial advantage or to wage holy war in the name of their religion.There are other events which occur in civil society, just as they may occur in more primitive societies which, wherever they occur can only be labelled as monstrous in their execution and inexplicable in their avowed intent. These events leave bystanders, onlookers, family members or the extended community gasping in disbelief, struggling to find answers for these events’ occurrences among us.
Suicide is one such dreadful and dreaded event. Spousal murder is another. Infanticide, or the murder of one’s own children is yet another. How about the combination of all three for sheer deadliness, for a true conundrum presented to society? Do parents know their children sufficiently to understand why a beloved child would end his own life, let alone that of his spouse, and his children? Can society sufficiently apprehend that such potential for violence exists in our communities, that such a final solution to a seemingly insoluble personal dilemma can thus be solved?
In my community, in the greater Ottawa area, such an event occurred. In the wake of yet another where a woman stabbed her husband to death. Only several days later a man deliberately and with aforethought planned to kill his wife of 17 years, his 12-year-old daughter, his 9-year-old and his 6-year-old sons. And himself. Leaving an explanatory note in his vehicle to be discovered post-murder. His wife attempted repeatedly to leave him, along with their children, all of whom feared him, husband and father.
This was, obviously, a life-shattering event for this man. There had been previously-identified problems in this relationship, as there are in so many. Police were involved, and eventually a family court judge issued an order that he stay away from his wife. Nothing seemed to work, however. The man’s sense of rage and injustice at the turn his life took, deprived of his family, grew, and although he reputedly sought professional help in an attempt to ameliorate his controlling personality, it failed. The result being the death of five people.
Why is it that some men have characters whose temperament is tinder-box incendiary when events, however life-shattering conspire against their comfort and control? How is it that women abide by the will of such men until some time when they feel they can no longer exist in such stifling circumstances? How is it that such women often identify the potential danger their liaison has placed them and their children in, yet they are unable to convince others of the imminent danger?
Why is society and our institutions, let alone extended family, so powerless to avoid such disasters?
posted by Pieface @ Wednesday, April 05, 2006
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