Violence

When Hell Comes to Visit

To those people who are not instinctively violent, there is a curiosity to what causes a person to step over the line and become the perpetrator of violence. The spawn of evil that is like a wild seed blowing in the wind, spreading dangerously throughout our communities. Unfortunately there is not one cause, and so to annihilate the problem, is complicated. As I have looked into the eyes of violence from early childhood on, I saw that evil was not choosy as to whom it chose to carry out the dark side of humanity.

It could simply be a genetic weakness, drug and alcohol related, or the even more complicated to decipher, mental illness. I have witnessed extreme violence several times through out my life, each came with a very distinctive set of circumstances. The first time it fell under domestic abuse, and I believe alcohol and drugs played a large part in edging on the violent behavior. You never become numb to scenes of violence, I believe you become more aware. The repeated behavior taught children how to live under the control of fear. It also teaches a person how to read others attempted actions through the eyes.
Inner city living came with its own set of rules, fear, lessons, pains and confusion. As violence in the city escalated, I witnessed another type of violence. Stranger upon stranger. Here I was in a city gift shop as I looked into the gunmen's eyes. All I can say is that I knew, he knew, I knew, no humor in that. Our eyes locked and I saw his desperation, I saw his fear, I didn’t necessarily see hatred in his eyes. He allowed me to walk out of that store, as he pulled the gun on the store clerk. I saw that hell walked many a path. It's not that evil goes through stages of morphing that we cannot not always identify it, it's that if effects so many people in so many ways.
Which brings me again to standing at the gates of hell. This time it fell to close to home. I could sense at this moment anger, here we had a situation with no drugs, no alcohol, no evidence of mental illness, yet the breakdown of one human who had inadequate sleep and food and was hell bent on expressing his anger and hatred by wailing a gun through the air, no particular reason, no particular day, just stepping on the edge of insanity.
There are so many ways that evil makes its way into peoples live, that it is impossible to identify them all, who will be the next perpetrator or the next victim? The motives are endless, we have greed, hatred, revenge, sickness, desperation and the list goes on. Can we isolate the gene that might promote violent behavior, the weak gene, or should we? This dark characteristic side of humanity.