Media Watch

6/4/00

Why not Mention Genes?

Kilroy's audience today basically consisted of women who blamed their parents for most of their current problems. Some of the stories of abuse and/or neglect when they were children were lurid and quite horrific. It is unfortunate, however, that chatshow hosts like Kilroy never show awareness of the scientific research that shows fairly conclusively that 'who we are' and 'how we function' depends to a very large extent on our genes, and on the peers whom we befriend as youngsters.

For example, one woman claims that her parents never loved her or cuddled her. They were deficient emotionally in the way that they dealt with her as a child. And now, as an adult, she too found it difficult to know what to do when bringing up her own children.

Well, no-one is suggesting that extreme, long-term effects of abuse or neglect have no effect on us as adults. However, the effects of genetics are too easily ignored.

For example, the fact that violent parents tend to have violent children (who then become violent adults) is always taken by the politically-correct media to prove that the poor behaviour of the parent leads to the poor behaviour of the offspring. But it could equally well be argued that the genes for violence have simply been passed on. Or, more accurately, the gene configurations (and the resulting brain 'chemistry') which result in a predisposition towards violence (say, when angry) are passed on.

In a recent BBC documentary about Mary Bell (who killed two young boys when she was eight years old) the fact that her mother was a prostitute and her father was a drunkard was taken to be strong evidence that the young Mary Bell was influenced into a psychopathic and deadly form of behaviour as a result of her upbringing. But nothing of the sort could be concluded.

In fact, scientific evidence would suggest very strongly that the production of her psychopathy was mostly genetic (or, at least, physiological). She had never been 'taught' to kill little boys, and she had never witnessed such events. Her actions were self-generated, and they simply revealed a complete lack of concern for her victims. This was almost certainly due to a lack of empathy for others, and the ability to 'empathise' has been shown to have a strong genetic component. (And more evidence for this view keeps accumulating.)

There is clearly some balance of effects between the two, genes vs environment, but genes are rarely considered in these politically-correct, unscientific programmes. The parents are always to blame.

It is also true that no-one ever seems to consider the poor parents themselves when discussing such issues. If the parents were indeed drunkards, emotionally shallow or abusive, then, presumably, following the politically-correct view that environment is everything, they must also have suffered as children. So, why do we blame them? After all, if offspring can absolve themselves from responsibility by blaming their parents, then surely parents can do the same by blaming their own parents. And so the buck never stops!

How come studio audiences (mostly women) can be absolved from poor, dysfunctional behaviour because of their upbringing whereas their parents cannot?

Were the badly-behaved parents not 'victims' too? Deserving of our sympathy?

No, of course not. Indeed, on the Kilroy programme one 76 year-old even wished that she could have killed her father because of the way that she still, apparently, suffers from his alleged abuse. And the audience applauded the idea that he should be killed.

But what about him? What caused him to behave the way that he did?

Typically, the feminist-dominated media will tell us that men behave badly or dysfunctionally because they are 'evil'. Women, on the other hand, do so as a result of some 'trauma'. Bad women are constantly portrayed as 'victims'- Myra Hindley being the only notable exception to this rule of thumb. And who is responsible for them being victims? Men.

There were three shining lights in this particular programme, however.

Kilroy Touches People

The first was Kilroy, himself. He was questioning a woman who, apparently, had never hugged her own children. He was surprised. He said,

"You see, I feel the need to do that [hug]. It's not just that I do it to show affection. I'm very tactile. I'm always touching people. Men, women. My kids and my wife. And my grandson. I'm always touching them and telling them that I love them. I'm always kissing them. My son is thirty-three, and every time we meet, we kiss on the lips and on the face. And I say 'I love you'. I can't imagine not doing this.

But it's not just a thing of showing them affection. I need it, for myself. I do it for myself. The act of hugging does something for me. It's doing something for me. I have a need."

What a nice man - though feminists would probably portray him as a pervert.

But, if he reads this, let him understand that, for some people, a hug means absolutely nothing. It never did. Not because of the way that they were treated as children, but from birth.

Some children exhibit a complete lack of response to hugs from the very beginning. And they often grow up into dysfunctional adults. For them, a hug is no more than a touch. It doesn't connect to any lovey, warm bits in the brain. Indeed, touching itself is no more than that. Touching a person is as unwarming as touching the screen of a computer or a wall.

An Appalling Mother

Now, here is a boy, of about 20 years old, who was treated badly by his mother. I relate his story verbatim simply to show readers what some women are really like, and to give yet another example of the total incompetence of the social services who deprived this young boy, and his brothers and sisters, of the chance to be with their father.

"I can't forgive my Mum for what she did to me. She did it not just to me, but to my father, and to the rest of my brothers and sisters. There were eight of us children altogether in the family. And we were taken into care from school. She didn't even know until she returned back from the pub that night.

Then we went to live with my father, but she didn't want us to live there, so we were taken out of his care. And he went off, and, basically, got depressed. And then he was refused access to us (typical ploy of the social services) Then my mum didn't want us, so we had to go back into care.

And since then, she's been causing trouble. All the foster parents that I went to from the age of three, she would tell the social services that she didn't like the people that I was with. So they moved me on. I was shipped on here, there and everywhere. Once I ended up on Christmas Day sitting in the social services offices as a result of this. She didn't want me with my foster parents on Christmas Day.

It is ridiculous what she did, and then, afterwards, when I was a teenager, I wanted to change my name to that of my foster family, so that I could belong, and be part of the family. But she put a stop to that, which has caused me great problems now, because, for example, I can't get a bank account.

It's not just that she gave me up. It's everything that she did afterwards. She's constantly getting at me, trying to ruin my life. In everything I've tried to do. She's even tried to stop me settling down with a proper family that loves me.

She's always in there causing trouble. She keeps ringing me up.

When I was about eighteen, I was living with my partner and she went round trying to find out who most of my friends were at school. And she would ring them up and tell them what a nasty son I am because she was dying and I wouldn't visit her.

After a month of this I was getting really depressed and I went to see her. There was nothing wrong with her at all. She just can't stop trying to mess up my life!"

His words say it all, don't they?

I merely point out that this is just one example, out of thousands, where the feminist-indoctrinated social services acted solely on behalf of the woman; not the father, and certainly not the children.

Kilroy's not so Daft

And, finally, Kilroy gave us a gem.

"Some people here today have been through the most appalling circumstances. There are some terrible things that have happened to them. Awful, unimaginable things. But all of us have, at some time, been through something that affected us very badly. Life isn't perfect. Life has to be lived the way it is.

However, to go forward, you have to put the past behind you, and you have to move on.

And you can.

You really can."

And what Kilroy has summarised so perfectly here is just about what all the VALID scientific evidence really shows. You can pull yourself out of even the most terrible of life's past events - by just moving forward, putting the bad past behind you, and closing the door on it.

Forget the mumbo-jumbo world of analysis and therapy which makes you re-visit the bad times month after month so that the fees can accumulate.

Just close the door. And keep it closed.