Forensic Thoughts

  T here are classes of offences that are quite different to others and that difference is problematic for thinkers and doers alike. A recent report from the BBC tells us that a girl, under 16, was engaging in a VR game (or based on other reports I have heard, was engaging in a VR environment*) when her avatar was either “attacked” or “gang raped” online. Police are apparently investigating this. Legally she can’t have been raped due to the nature of what rape currently is. The reports suggest that she “suffered the same psychological trauma as someone who has been raped in the real world”. So far, I have not seen anything that suggests that we have any evidence for this, other than opinion, but if she has been assessed by people who work with people who have been raped then this might very well be true. The problem with using media reports as jumping off points for thinking is that there is infrequently the necessary detail. I think this raises some interesting issues for re...

L ess directly linked to forensic psychology but with a little mental gymnastics we will eventually get there too. People gossip and we can't escape that. Sometimes we don't know, sometimes we do and when we do, it is perhaps something that we might decide to manage in some way, although it is not easy when the speed of rumour is the only thing faster than the speed of light. Celerity is not the mother of good fortune. Why do people gossip? If you wanted to take a harsh route to understand it, it might be that you conclude that their own lives are so dull and empty that they have to experience something by talking about, surmising about, others' lives. You might decide that it is an attempt to lower your status as you are considered some kind of threat to some people and you are such a threat and they want your power (although research suggests that people who gossip are regarded as less powerful - the irony is delightful) and that you have a special place in those people...

Lucy Letby has been found guilty of killing seven children and at her sentencing today she might, understandably, receive a full life order (she did). It has been suggested that she has stated that she won't come to court for the sentencing (she did, but opted to stay in a holding cell in the court) and, as often happens when the country's pecker is up, there have been demands for a new law to force convicted people to attend court. When convicted people attend court they get to listen to the judge's decision and often the judge's view of them as a person. They also, in some cases, get to hear impact statements from victims' families. I wonder why that is considered important and who it is important for. If it was important in that it aided some kind of change in the convicted person then that would make sense, i.e., it made them more reflective, repentant, less likely to offend again, to be less disruptive in prison. Awesome. I am sure that someone could do a study...

B y most measures of nice Levi Bellfield (originally Levi Rabbetts) does not score very highly so we might feel few concerns for Mr Bellfield's wellbeing. By that I don't mean that he should be tortured or beaten up, but if his cup of tea in the morning is a little low on sugar it wouldn't prevent my sleep. As is often the case with people who have committed serious offences, Mr Bellfield is rather popular with the ladies (he was popular with the ladies previously, having allegedly 11 children from 5 relationships, and yes, I am assuming that these were all consensual events that resulted in children as I have no evidence to suggest otherwise), which is always a little surprising when the serious offences involve violence against ladies. The reason why this might be true we'll save for another time. They are known as hybristophiliacs, but strictly speaking this is when it is a paraphilia, so probably would mean that they couldn't be attracted by anyone else or that ...

One for the birds It might be useful to make something clear here and that is we must not conflate paedophilia with child abuse. Many non-paedophiles abuse children and many paedophiles do not abuse children. There’s an English teacher in Korea who has set up something grandly entitled The Raven project, the reason being that Ravens are associated with carrion and he thinks that some ideas that he doesn’t like are similar to rotting meat. Or something like that. It seems to me that there are two ways of not liking something; I don’t like it, but if my preconceptions are challenged, and I am willing to allow that to happen, I can be flexible and consider my opinion I don’t like it and I am not going to consider anything, because I am right The latter version is often associated with heavy intellectual lifting, setting up a series of barriers that protect you from having to consider anything, because there is always prime facie , a reason not to. Plus, one can conflate so...

I care about you. That could feel very positive; someone has your best interests at heart, likely thinks good of you, has your back. Nice. It might not if my caring for you is transactional in any way, but let's leave that for a moment and assume it is just plain, old fashioned caring. That's quite a hard thing to do though. My caring for you might not be transactional at all, but that doesn't mean you don't think it actually is, either because you know it is or your expectation is that it will be at some point. Which means we need to think about what I mean by transactional things. Transactional Things We have transactions all the time. When we buy something, that is a transaction, it is understood that we will exchange something of ours, usually money, for something that someone else has that we want. I really want a copy of the Ghost Hounds' album (and who wouldn't, have a listen to their tune Bad News ) and I understand that to get it I need to part with so...