ABSTRACT
Now and then an act of violence explodes into our lives and we are shockingly reminded of the human capacity for destructiveness. At that moment our reality feels violated and fragmented. ‘Who is responsible?’ ‘When will justice be done?’ ‘How can it be prevented in future?’ Making sense of the trauma may feel like acquiescing to the atrocity, even excusing it. Violence begets violence we know. Yet the violated mind is incapable of the thoughtful understanding that could contain our destructive reactions. Unable to think, we violently repudiate the violent act: terrorists fly aircraft into the Twin Towers and war is declared on the ‘axis of evil’; a child is found dead and public outrage is violently unleashed on paedophiles; brutal murders activate demands to reinstate the death penalty. All too often the tragedy is seen as the product of an evil rather than disordered mind. Our fear of human violent and destructive capabilities paradoxically prompts us to react punitively, destructively.
