Book Description
Why do some men, women and even children assault, batter,
rape, mutilate and murder? In his stunning new book, the
Pulitzer Prize-winner Richard Rhodes provides a startling and
persuasive answer.
Why They Kill explores the discoveries of a
maverick American criminologist, Dr. Lonnie Athens -- himself
the child of a violent family -- which challenge conventional
theories about violent behavior. By interviewing violent
criminals in prison, Dr. Athens has identified a pattern of
social development common to all seriously violent people --
a four-stage process he calls "violentization":
-- First, brutalization: A young person is forced by violence
or the threat of violence to submit to an aggressive
authority figure; he witnesses the violent subjugation of
intimates, and the authority figure coaches him to use
violence to settle disputes.
-- Second, belligerency: The dispirited subject, determined
to prevent his further violent subjugation, heeds his coach
and resolves to resort to violence.
-- Third, violent performances: His violent response to
provocation succeeds, and he reads respect and fear in the
eyes of others.
-- Fourth, virulency: Exultant, he determines from now on to
utilize serious violence as a means of dealing with people --
and he bonds with others who believe as he does.
Since all four stages must be fully experienced in
sequence and completed to produce a violent individual, we
see how intervening to interrupt the process can prevent a
tragic outcome.
Rhodes supports Athens's theory with historical evidence
and shows how it explains such violent careers as those of
Perry Smith (the killer central to Truman Capote's narrative In
Cold Blood), Mike Tyson, "preppy rapist" Alex
Kelly, and Lee Harvey Oswald.
Why They Kill challenges with devastating evidence
the theory that violent behavior is impulsive, unconsciously
motivated and predetermined. It offers compelling insights
into the terrible, ongoing dilemma of criminal violence that
plagues families, neighborhoods, cities and schools.
