This is an interesting direction you're going with your content line-up. Both parents have weird expressions, there. I wonder what kind of back story there was to this.
In similar news, I just happened to learn about this game with a similar theme and it seems pretty interesting, so here it goes for anyone who's into murder mysteries:
Ah yes, The Return of Obra Dinn. Zero Punctuation, who is known for absolutely tearing games apart really liked that one. I checked it out, but it just isn't my style.
As for the content, I asked for what the audience would like to read to give everyone a break from all the noise of the world. Strange stories got the largest number of votes.
Oh, I see. The world is a bit noisy these days, so I can relate to that sentiment.
You know, I think you can raise the bar on these strange stories if you add some of your insight into why it could have happened like it did, somewhat as I reflexively did when opening my previous comment.
You could even add, for good measure, whether some of the people involved could have had factor 1 psychopathy, or why such possibility would be unlikely. I would certainly like to read such speculations.
That's an interesting idea, and certain I can do that if I can understand the thinking. John List's thinking is a bit of a mystery to me. I know what he says, but imagine that his internal thought process was not we represented by his statements. I think that they are very simplified and sterilized versions.
Family annihilators have always interested me. There was one in France that I also want to dig int, and a more interesting story that comes out of India that very much looked like a mass killing, or family annihilation, but turned out to be far stranger than that.
I have a lot of weird stories that I have read, or researched. I haven't run across a lot of them that said "psychopath" to me, but there is probably a good reason for that. Most of these stories are picked up and retold because of how they tingle the emotional senses. For instance I am listening to one about the Kim family on Bear Camp Road at the moment, and the comments section has a lot of responses that speak about the emotional aspects of the story. I think that the more emotional a story is, the more it is perpetuated in the urban lore.
Granted, there is something to be said for the entirely strange stories as well, that lack the emotional spin, they are just odd and without explanation, but that would be difficult to perhaps pick out anyone that might be psychopathic either.
It does give me an idea though, while I am listening to the Kim's experience, that in this case what I would do being psychopathic, versus what they did, and how the outcome might have been different.
It is a terrible story. Religion comes into this in such strange ways... the guy sounds so rule-based it's bizarre, if he's telling the truth about the suicide thing -- but he's not consistent, assuming he's Christian, murder is also a sin, so he doesn't follow his religion's rules there.
Another bizarre and terrible story... At the library where I work, several decades ago there was a terrible murder of a family by someone whose work life had similarly fallen apart. I had just started work there; there were FBI agents interviewing staff who knew the librarian, Alice. I had just met her a few times.
It is hard for me to guess the neurotypes of these two perpetrators. Both cases seem to involve men whose "normal" lives had fallen apart; Hightower seemed more anger-motivated and vicious than List, maybe. We at the library learned of some truly awful things done to the family before they died, including to the young daughter.
The idea that he would be "reunited" with his family after he died says to me that his notion of religion was very based in his own ego. He thought that he somehow was not subject to the judgement of murder because his intentions were, in his mind, "good". That takes some strange rationalization.
Rationalization can let people take what they want as well as maintain a sense that they are "good" people, according to their own moral/ethical code. The extreme flexibility of rationalization for some people seems to combine with social rules wherein it's "impolite" to criticize illogic... until one gets to the point of murdering families. Except if the humans being murdered are of the wrong group, and one's society is engaging in genocide against that group at the moment. Then people historically have indeed done that. I think people hoped that by studying these historical events and naming them, people would not do this... but instead, society fragmented more and some states in my country are just not listening to the histories and in fact outlawing them being taught to kids... it potentially will let them repeat the dynamics.
One opinion here!
Hurricane Henri is coming ashore near us, that's an exciting dangerous thing that I like watching -- hoping no one dies of course.
I haven't read about it for maybe 30 years now! But my memory is that Hightower was lying about investing he was doing for the Brendel family; the dad in the family might have confronted him? Hightower had lost a lot of money I think, and Mr. Brendel had filed a complaint about it, officially; I don't remember what else was published but you can google stuff like, "Hightower, Brendel, Barringtown" and see lots of stuff.
It is weird, personally, for me, that the thing that most fills me with rage about it (and there were loads of terrible things) is that the daughter was forced by her school officials to get in the car with Hightower, who took her to the family house where torture and murder had occurred, and I'm not sure of the sequence of murders but I think people saw each other killed. The daughter had told the officials that her parents wouldn't have been ok with Hightower driving her home. I guess the officials have had to live with that though.
There’s always a solution to a problem,sometimes it’s not the one we consider ideal,but that’s part of life I suppose. Why someone would take another’s life over something as simple as money,which is printed out by the millions everyday,beyond my understanding. I have a dear friend who in a moment of weakness threatened suicide because her credit score dropped to rock bottom, I told her that of all the stupid reasons to die,that’s probably the worse,thankfully she came to her senses and is successful now,but the gist is, why does money have such power over others?
I don't know that it is the money itself, but rather the perception of being a failure. That really weighs on people for some reason, and they can't face that mirror in other people's gaze.
wonder why someone would think murder is the answer to a financial problem. It's like adding gas to the flames. Weird.
A very good question, but one I don't have an answer to.
List reminds me of William Bishop who also killed his family and has been on the run since 1976.
I will have to look into this one. I don't know about him, and new information is always interesting.
This is an interesting direction you're going with your content line-up. Both parents have weird expressions, there. I wonder what kind of back story there was to this.
In similar news, I just happened to learn about this game with a similar theme and it seems pretty interesting, so here it goes for anyone who's into murder mysteries:
https://youtu.be/V0qxLrFycrc?t=25
Ah yes, The Return of Obra Dinn. Zero Punctuation, who is known for absolutely tearing games apart really liked that one. I checked it out, but it just isn't my style.
As for the content, I asked for what the audience would like to read to give everyone a break from all the noise of the world. Strange stories got the largest number of votes.
Oh, I see. The world is a bit noisy these days, so I can relate to that sentiment.
You know, I think you can raise the bar on these strange stories if you add some of your insight into why it could have happened like it did, somewhat as I reflexively did when opening my previous comment.
You could even add, for good measure, whether some of the people involved could have had factor 1 psychopathy, or why such possibility would be unlikely. I would certainly like to read such speculations.
That's an interesting idea, and certain I can do that if I can understand the thinking. John List's thinking is a bit of a mystery to me. I know what he says, but imagine that his internal thought process was not we represented by his statements. I think that they are very simplified and sterilized versions.
Family annihilators have always interested me. There was one in France that I also want to dig int, and a more interesting story that comes out of India that very much looked like a mass killing, or family annihilation, but turned out to be far stranger than that.
I have a lot of weird stories that I have read, or researched. I haven't run across a lot of them that said "psychopath" to me, but there is probably a good reason for that. Most of these stories are picked up and retold because of how they tingle the emotional senses. For instance I am listening to one about the Kim family on Bear Camp Road at the moment, and the comments section has a lot of responses that speak about the emotional aspects of the story. I think that the more emotional a story is, the more it is perpetuated in the urban lore.
Granted, there is something to be said for the entirely strange stories as well, that lack the emotional spin, they are just odd and without explanation, but that would be difficult to perhaps pick out anyone that might be psychopathic either.
It does give me an idea though, while I am listening to the Kim's experience, that in this case what I would do being psychopathic, versus what they did, and how the outcome might have been different.
It is a terrible story. Religion comes into this in such strange ways... the guy sounds so rule-based it's bizarre, if he's telling the truth about the suicide thing -- but he's not consistent, assuming he's Christian, murder is also a sin, so he doesn't follow his religion's rules there.
Another bizarre and terrible story... At the library where I work, several decades ago there was a terrible murder of a family by someone whose work life had similarly fallen apart. I had just started work there; there were FBI agents interviewing staff who knew the librarian, Alice. I had just met her a few times.
It is hard for me to guess the neurotypes of these two perpetrators. Both cases seem to involve men whose "normal" lives had fallen apart; Hightower seemed more anger-motivated and vicious than List, maybe. We at the library learned of some truly awful things done to the family before they died, including to the young daughter.
https://www.upi.com/Archives/1991/11/08/Brendel-family-bodies-found/2676689576400/
The idea that he would be "reunited" with his family after he died says to me that his notion of religion was very based in his own ego. He thought that he somehow was not subject to the judgement of murder because his intentions were, in his mind, "good". That takes some strange rationalization.
Rationalization can let people take what they want as well as maintain a sense that they are "good" people, according to their own moral/ethical code. The extreme flexibility of rationalization for some people seems to combine with social rules wherein it's "impolite" to criticize illogic... until one gets to the point of murdering families. Except if the humans being murdered are of the wrong group, and one's society is engaging in genocide against that group at the moment. Then people historically have indeed done that. I think people hoped that by studying these historical events and naming them, people would not do this... but instead, society fragmented more and some states in my country are just not listening to the histories and in fact outlawing them being taught to kids... it potentially will let them repeat the dynamics.
One opinion here!
Hurricane Henri is coming ashore near us, that's an exciting dangerous thing that I like watching -- hoping no one dies of course.
Sounds like it would be fun
Weird. Has anyone since then figured out a motive?
I haven't read about it for maybe 30 years now! But my memory is that Hightower was lying about investing he was doing for the Brendel family; the dad in the family might have confronted him? Hightower had lost a lot of money I think, and Mr. Brendel had filed a complaint about it, officially; I don't remember what else was published but you can google stuff like, "Hightower, Brendel, Barringtown" and see lots of stuff.
It is weird, personally, for me, that the thing that most fills me with rage about it (and there were loads of terrible things) is that the daughter was forced by her school officials to get in the car with Hightower, who took her to the family house where torture and murder had occurred, and I'm not sure of the sequence of murders but I think people saw each other killed. The daughter had told the officials that her parents wouldn't have been ok with Hightower driving her home. I guess the officials have had to live with that though.
oops, it's "Barrington" not ...town.
Ah ha, the "light bulbs" finally came on for the neighbors!
Yeah... seems like maybe the opera music would have been a hint, but...
Wonder how many months it took for the neighbors to notice?
They were found a little less than a month after the killings.
This real life story is a bit too much for me.
I can understand that
It is perplexing.
There’s always a solution to a problem,sometimes it’s not the one we consider ideal,but that’s part of life I suppose. Why someone would take another’s life over something as simple as money,which is printed out by the millions everyday,beyond my understanding. I have a dear friend who in a moment of weakness threatened suicide because her credit score dropped to rock bottom, I told her that of all the stupid reasons to die,that’s probably the worse,thankfully she came to her senses and is successful now,but the gist is, why does money have such power over others?
I don't know that it is the money itself, but rather the perception of being a failure. That really weighs on people for some reason, and they can't face that mirror in other people's gaze.