Similarly, as bilekas suggests, the fact that "'trolls' are seen as cool in the online world" gave this man an active feedback loop for reinforcing this behavior.
Well, even from that perspective, "society" is giving him some strong feedback that this is not acceptable.
> Well, even from that perspective, "society" is giving him some strong feedback that this is not acceptable.
With the same reasoning, you can argue that people in this kind of internet forums gave him a strong feedback that the "society" is wrong here.
Most assassins are psychopaths in one way or another. It might be interesting to study them but it doesn't mean they get a free pass for their actions.
Autism can be an experience of having all your senses, empathy and emotions turned up to 11 while everyone around you is behaving in seemingly irrational ways you have no way of understanding except through the vicious pain other people steadily inflict on you.
Imagine growing up like that. Not just occasionally but every day for decades. It dulls something.
People with autism are not psychopath and it's honestly insane to bring psychopathy into a conversation about autism as some kind of comparison
Your lack of empathy and understanding for people on the autism spectrum is honestly scary
They do understand that they hurt people, but the fascination of finding something adhering to rules, is stronger.
I don't think it's insane to bring the comparison into this conversation, because the behavior of this autistic person is clearly a psychopathic one, regardless of the intention.
Psychopaths understand emotions but don't feel them.
They might seem similar but really are polar opposites.
Excluding intention as a part of judgement is also excluding a desire to rehabilitate the offender, which makes the goal of punishment revenge
What ends up happening is that people with autism are sent to prison, where they will be the victim of psychical and mental violence almost every day, in an environment that's torturous to them, with no ability to understand why they are there or how to change their situation. All this simply because of a desire to hurt someone who's perceived as "bad".
I'm not sure we agree who's displaying psychopathic traits in that situation
I'm aware that the concept of a disabled person also being 'bad' in some way is not an intersection box that modern world has the tools to discuss at the moment. Outside the Overton window so to speak.
I think that's a number so low, that it's not worth discussing, given that a psychopath with full mental capacity would undoubtedly be more dangerous
And psychopaths are not autistic.
Yet it does not make the two things mutually exclusive. They can be both present and exhibit in individuals at the same time.
You'd be surprised:
Defending the word can be misconstrued as defending the act. It’s not a fight worth having.
Well, similar defense could be used for psychopaths as well, they too have a condition that prevents them from seeing or understanding the context and the emotional impact of their actions - but some lines have to be drawn somewhere. Society has to protect itself and innocent people who get hurt by these antisocial actions.
In case of Brandon here no one got physically hurt, and the court should certainly see his condition as a mitigating factor - but you can't just completely dismiss the damage that was done and seriousness of his actions. Emotional traumas are serious deal too, and he, knowingly or not, psychologically tortured those families, causing them a great deal of pain. And he probably got some pleasure from it too, whether from the feeling of power or from the peer support and cheering, as he wouldn't be inclined to repeat it so many times otherwise...
I could be wrong though, but in case I'm not - these are entirely different situations.
As it was kind of explained that, 'trolls' are seen as cool in the online world and so he emulated that behavior. In fact one could say he went to the extreme. But his understanding of the context and emotional impact is nothing compared to us on the outside.
This isn't a case of him falsifying a condition to get off, this guy has his whole life documented with diagnoses. It's not a 'pass' but it's simply not the same situation and so it doesn't seem sincear to charge him as such.