Group Video: "Crazy, Not Insane"

I'm actually really disappointed that we decided not to finish the documentary in class because I was so immensely interested in this video. I may have to finish it on my own because I was really intrigued by all the stories that Dorothy Lewis and others had to share.

I was especially fascinated by the man named Max that Lewis spent a lot of time with (I can't remember his last name). Max was a killer with dissociative identity disorder (DID or formerly known as multiple personality disorder) who killed multiple of his girlfriends. Max's two alternate personalities consisted of Kalki who was a god's avatar who would basically tell Max to commit murder, as well as a monk who I can't remember the name of but would recite religious phrases and bless others and seemed to have developed to provide comfort to Max. I think what fascinated me so much about Max was not the fact that he was a murderer (we don't condone the romanticization of murder in this household) but rather the way each of his alternate personalities could literally take hold of his body. Whether he was Max or Kalki or the monk, he had completely different mannerisms, completely different expressions, and even spoke in a different accent.

Something that stood out to me and that I find is prevalent in a lot of these studies and documentaries regarding serial killers and criminals in general is the argument of nature v.s. nurture. Dorothy Lewis explains how many of the killers that she's sat with have revealed that they had been abused when they were young and overall had incredibly traumatic childhoods, many of them developing dissociative identity disorder or some other brain dysfunction as a defense mechanism or coping response to the trauma they've experienced. Several of the inmates with DID even had alternate personalities that mirrored their abusive family members. Many people believe that bad people are born bad but I think this supports the idea that nurture has a bigger influence than nature on someone's behavior and that bad people are created and influenced by their environment.

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