Posted on 04/21/2007 10:11:41 AM PDT by Cinnamon
Though it's unclear if he told anyone about his plans to stage a shooting rampage at Virginia Tech, from childhood, Seung-Hui Cho showed an appetite for brutality, according to a new report.
The Washington Post reports that while Cho was unusually quiet as a child — according to relatives, he refused to respond to greetings and didn't want to be hugged — when he fought with his older sister, Sun-Kyung Cho, his actions spoke volumes. Relatives say he punched her with shocking force.
Despite signs of trouble, Cho's mother didn't seek treatment for him because he did well in school, the Washington Post reports.
But in their first public statement since the massacre, on Friday, Cho's family said that their son "has made the world weep" and that they are now "living a nightmare."
The statement, released to the Associated Press by Sun-Kyung Cho, says the family feels "hopeless, helpless and lost," after the 23-year old Va. Tech senior took the lives of 32 people.
"We are humbled by this darkness," wrote 25-year old Sun Kyung Cho. "This is someone that I grew up with and loved. Now I feel like I didn't know this person … My brother was quiet and reserved, yet struggled to fit in. We never could have envisioned that he was capable of so much violence."
anyone here not like being hugged as a kid, or fight with their siblings? yep you sir.gal are a potential mass murderer.
Cut 'em a little slack, eh ? They aren't making excuses for him and are mortified at being related to the scumbag.
They were supposed to predict he'd be a mass murderer ?
I feel first for the victims' friends and relatives, then for the victims, but also for this family. You'd want to crawl into a hole and die.
Please. This kid spent his childhood in near total silence. He clearly wasn’t wired right from day one. The only strange thing is that it took him this long to blow.
If one of my sons punched their sister, or any girl for that matter, with “shocking force” they know they would be punished, lovingly, with shocking rapidity. Consequently, they have grown into fine young gentlemen.
While I believe that early diagnosis and treatment would have done a lot of good, I have to agree with your assessment.
Most of them do as kids.
Leni
mildly autistic?
aspergers's syndrome?
One common thread in many violent killers is that they were violent to animals growing up. I’m not talking about going hunting and shooting Bambi. I’m talking about finding stray cats, dogs, etc. and killing them in painful, torturous ways to watch them suffer and die. The boy gets pleasure out of watching the animal’s obvious fear and pain. They also get a sense of power knowing they can look the animal in the eye and decide whether and how much it will suffer.
It isn’t long before they decide to try that with people instead of animals.
Most of those, however, wind up being serial killers (multiple victims killed individually spread out over weeks, months or years) as opposed to “spree” killers (multiple victims killed in a relatively short time span, often concluding with the killer’s own murder/suicide).
My point is that childhood incidents *can* help identify potential mass killers.
That’s what he sounds like to me.
Sounds a little like something out of the autism spectrum.
I know boys like this.
Let’s not pop a diagnosis on this. Far too many cases of “Lack of parental attention” are given a diagnosis and a pill.
I really expected to read something in regards to how he brutalized animals when he was a kid. Move on, nothing here.
They should have made his college education conditional on his getting treatment. Going to college is a privilege, not a right. School is expensive, what with dormitory and meals (which they were paying for, I'm assuming). They could have said, if you don't get treatment, you don't go to college. Why didn't they do that? You can't let good grades excuse bad behavior.
Cho seems to possibly have had an autistic disorder - but it had to have been combined with something else.
My son has Asperger’s and I am getting really concerned that people are going to think he’s a threat, especially when he goes off to college and people don’t know him.
I have met many people with autistic disorders and Cho was NOT typical. He would have stood way out from any young autistic men I have seen.
It’s not the Koreans that have to worry about a backlash; it’s the autistic.
Mrs VS
I’m sorry I read this thread.
What? Even little old Auntie knew the kid was nutso years ago before they immigrated. And the excuses start...
_______________________
David Gearheart, who also attended middle school with Cho, said he talked to Cho once or twice, but that talking to him was just that -– talking to somebody rather than with somebody.
"He had a lot of crazy writings in his notebook and stuff, how he hated Americans," Gearheart said.
Linton said Cho was once reported to the principal for writing down the names of people he was supposedly planning to kill.
"It was like a hit list," Linton said. "They found one in his locker."
Linton said people "constantly" talked about how Cho might be the type of person that would one day attempt to kill someone. http://www.cavalierdaily.com/CVArticle.asp?ID=30192&pid=1583
Very well said.
I know two kids with asperger’s syndrome, and they are not violent at all. Very nice kids, not withdrawn.
I agree VS. I don't think that the group-think, blame mentality is ever helpful. It is an individual case with its own specific facts. Analyzing what went wrong in this case may be helpful to some, but extrapolating it to other Koreans or other autism sufferers is obviously not wise or fair.
I feel first for the victims' friends and relatives, then for the victims, but also for this family. You'd want to crawl into a hole and die.
So true. Can you imagine how awful they feel about this? And the law wouldn't even permit the university to notify them that their son was succumbing to mental illness.
Imagine if some member of your family went off the deep end and murdered dozens of people like this. This family's members are victims as well.
This is true, too. Most autistic folks don’t act nearly like that...His condition certainly had paranoid overtones.
Once a person turns 18, the law doesn’t let the family help, if a person doesn’t want it. Pretty much privacy rules have put a wall between any adult child and his family if the adult child wants it to be that way.
I was thinking the same thing. I’m not thrilled about anyone besides my husband or kids hugging me. What is shocking? My sisters and I got into some really bad fights when we were younger. I’m not excusing this killer but just pointing out that the media is throwing out stuff that is normal.
Well that’s not normal.
“Despite signs of trouble, Cho’s mother didn’t seek treatment for him because he did well in school, the Washington Post reports.”
I think some of this is a cultural problem, as far as I know with Chinese and Koreans (in a general and stereotypical sense, but from experience as well) but maybe with some other Asian groups too.
Psychology, psychiatry and “mental health” psychological analysis and treatment, in the general sense (as opposed to the sense they are applied by the totalitarians in China) are still a predominately “western” feature of family life in the personal opinions of many Asians.
For many, most such “attitude” problems of children and young adults are handled in the family or not at all, and no one wants to bring “outsiders”, even western “professionals”, into it. Many Asian families do not “reach out” with these problems, particularly the more “traditional” and “conservative” (culturally) they are.
That is not to say that many westerners do not feel the same way. Many do.
I just think there is a larger level of aversion to “reaching out” with “mental health” issues among more Asians than among westerners.
Like some on this thread, nothing can diminish my anguish for the victims and their families, nor my belief that they will be foremost in our prayers, and they should be.
But, I too, today, must pray for Cho’s family, because in the end everything was a choice that he and he alone made, not them.
And yet the public focus on them, as Cho’s family is unavoidable and it must be nearly as heart wrenching for them as it is for the families of the victims, for there is not a thing they can say or do to alter their son’s guilt, a guilt that it is now being emotionally absorbed by them.
I think that should be “may have shown.”
100% correct.
It sounds like Cho had schizophrenia. His video rant reveals the psychosis - the delusions of persecution. The withdrawn nature and odd behavior is as much a part of schizophrenia as is the psychosis. The withdrawal, lack of emotion, etc. are called negative symptoms and often show up in early childhood.
Exactly. People with autistic disorders tend to be quite indifferent towards society at large. I can't imagine a child with autism or Asperger's holding the hatred for society that Cho did. Cho was anything but indifferent.
Yeah that is typical. Male or introverted behavior is being defined as aberrant when most introverts are the nicest people you could meet till they get bullied and made fun of without end. All they want is to be left alone and go out of their way not to bring attention to themselves but that doesn’t work. More aggressive males who have never been taught any manners target them. So the shy kid who was probably the most nonviolent stores the anger the hate and feels even more isolated from the world until something sets him off.
What I believe set Cho off was probably the deal with the girls. He was trying to get a girlfriend and didn’t know how to approach it and then he writes plays and is sent away to be mentally evaluated when he wrote nothing different than a Tarantino. I don’t excuse anything he did. He made a choice to be a murderer. I don’t however feel comfortable automatically classifying someone as “crazy” when I’m sure he knew and made a clear decision to do what he did. He was “getting even”.
Hey, hotshot . . . knee jerk responses can be hazardous to your charitable personna . . . if you had/have one.
As Dr Murray Banks used to say . . .
“What is it that the insane do that you don’t do?”
“Not a blessed thing! It’s only a question of degree.”
Well put.
You are correct!
More to the point, what kind of headline is “may have”? Either he did, or he didn’t!
ne common thread in many violent killers is that they were violent to animals growing up. I’m not talking about going hunting and shooting Bambi. I’m talking about finding stray cats, dogs, etc. and killing them in painful, torturous ways to watch them suffer and die. The boy gets pleasure out of watching the animal’s obvious fear and pain. They also get a sense of power knowing they can look the animal in the eye and decide whether and how much it will suffer.
= = =
INDEED. Right you are.
That is what I think too. People say he was too organized to be schizophrenic, in the way he planned the killing, but in his video and plays there is very little organization at all - new elements are introduced at random; there’s some repetition and parallel sentences, and an escalation of violence, and a disjointed end.
His plan didn’t involve all that much organization. Buy guns, make video, chain doors, kill people.
I do recognize elements of autism in Cho, and I’m sure there are a lot of families of schizophrenics recognizing his schizophrenia and thinking rightly, my child is not full of hate and rage like that; the only one he hurts is himself.
Mrs VS
True.
Many schizophrenics do not have badly disorganized thinking. Paranoid schizophrenics often do not have hallucinations or difficulty organizing thoughts. Their main problem is delusional thinking; in Cho's case, delusions of persecution. And it can be tough to get them to admit to it, because the smart ones learn very quickly that expressing your opinion about things can get you sent to the psych hospital.
There is some overlap between the symptoms of autism and the negative symptoms of schizophrenia, but I don't see that he had any of the three cardinal symptoms of autism.
Then again, I also think there ought to be a DSM entry that reads, "Just F*$%ing Nuts."
What do you call the three cardinal signs of autism? For a small child, I’d say, not taking a social interest in other people, delayed or strange speech, lack of pretend play. Also perseveration.
For an older individual, impaired social abilities and perceptions, and a good deal of perserverative behavior or interests.
Mrs VS
Australians being known for plain speaking, you might check their edition of DSM, in the vicinity of “Crazier than a s**t-house rat.”
With his personality complex, his prospects of finding a job would have been slim and none.
In hindsight, age 23 is perfectly understandable.
He was too ashamed...having an older sister graduate from Princeton.
He just created CHO SYNDROME.
Textbook case.
The three cardinal signs of autism are limited language development, lack of understanding of socialization, and limited, repetitive behavior. For Asperger’s, the language skills are normal.
Cho’s lack of social skills is clearly what makes people think that he may have had autism. But he expressed hatred for societal behavior, implying some understanding of it, and an acknowledgement that he had poor social skills. And there was nothing at all to suggest that he had repetitive motor behavior or obsessive habits.
Asian kids who immigrate and don’t end up as engineers are weird.
Spot on Jimt. They were so abusive to him that they were sending him to one of the top universities in the country. This is right up there with the MSM wringing their hands about a possible backlash to the Korean community in the US. Always ready to believe in the small mindedness of their fellow countrymen.
sounds like he may have had some type of autism or aspergers.
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