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Stoic
I think that to be as Dave McKay has been and will continue to be is a sad waste of a human life, but he is responsible for his actions and behaviour and so deserves no pity.

He would not pass up a chance to take advantage, to your detriment, of any feelings of pity that he sniffed out. He's an opportunist, always on the lookout for a kindly frog.

Don't get me wrong: I do not "feel sorry" for David. I, in a sense, pity him. But it's not the same. I think he's an evil man.

He is a human being who is completely lacking any overriding sense of obligation to others based on an emotional attachment. He cannot have a truly reciprocal relationship with another human being. He does not have friends, he only has fans and sees opportunities.

And the reason I pity him in my heart, is because he is a human being who lacks the capacity to love in any sense. Think of it. He cannot feel, experience, give or receive love. This makes me sad.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/2011 07:00AM by zeuszor.

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zeuszor
Milgram-Asch-Zimbardo.

Modern social psychological research demonstrates that across the board that on average, about two-thirds of individuals (socioeconomic status, age, and other variables) will obey the authority figure, disregard the evidence of their own perceptions in order to conform to a group expectation, or subjugate their own identity and internal ethics in the face of a situational logic, in the process of assuming some role.

Sixty-six percent, on average. Milgram-Asch-Zimbardo.

Remember that.

Oops, that should have said "...regardless of SES, age, and other variables." But you get the idea.

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zeuszor

Quote
Stoic
I think that to be as Dave McKay has been and will continue to be is a sad waste of a human life, but he is responsible for his actions and behaviour and so deserves no pity.

He would not pass up a chance to take advantage, to your detriment, of any feelings of pity that he sniffed out. He's an opportunist, always on the lookout for a kindly frog.

Don't get me wrong: I do not "feel sorry" for David. I, in a sense, pity him. But it's not the same. I think he's an evil man.

He is a human being who is completely lacking any overriding sense of obligation to others based on an emotional attachment. He cannot have a truly reciprocal relationship with another human being. He does not have friends, he only has fans and sees opportunities.

And the reason I pity him in my heart, is because he is a human being who lacks the capacity to love in any sense. Think of it. He cannot feel, experience, give or receive love. This makes me sad.

And not only that, but he lacks the capacity to feel at all.

Fear, guilt, empathy, love, these feelings are more like concepts to him rather than experiences, and understanding the experience of love to him would be on the same intellectual level as trying to find the answer to an algebra problem. In other words, no emotional component is involved.

Think of it; try to wrap your heads around that. Remember, other old-timers to this thread, when David used to write of how he just doesn't "get" poetry and good music, in terms of how it appeals to a lot of people? That was a long time ago...but that is what it boils down to, in my opinion: David cannot feel, emotionally speaking.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/2011 07:47AM by zeuszor.

Sixty-six percent, on average. Milgram-Asch-Zimbardo.

Remember that.


Well, I guess you have to say "Thank god for the 34%, the incorrigibles, the rogues, the downright difficult ones who refuse to do as they're told, the rakes and reprobates, the spurned, the outcasts and the marginalised."

Without the unruly rabble of the 34% it would be Orwell's '1984' with some Anointed Apostle calling the shots.

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Stoic
Sixty-six percent, on average. Milgram-Asch-Zimbardo.

Remember that.


Well, I guess you have to say "Thank god for the 34%, the incorrigibles, the rogues, the downright difficult ones who refuse to do as they're told, the rakes and reprobates, the spurned, the outcasts and the marginalised."

Without the unruly rabble of the 34% it would be Orwell's '1984' with some Anointed Apostle calling the shots.

Something like that, Stoic, indeed. Hooray for the rabble!

Dave McKay traded the uncertainty of a wide range of emotional responses for the rigid security of being a control freak--it was a trade-off--its not as if he doesn't have a functioning hormonal system (not under conscious control) with the chemical messengers that register fear, lust etc. The capacity is there he has just never developed it, it was more gratifying to pretend to be the mouthpiece of a god and con others.

Love, empathy etc are, strictly speaking, behaviours, not emotions. I can sit on my own and tell myself I feel enormous love for the world but it is pointless and solipsistic unless it translates into external action. I don't mean by going out and loving everybody indiscriminately either--thats farcical--I mean the mundane humdrum stuff of just maintaining a good working relationship with your neighbours.

Its part of the reason we need others, if you sit on your own long enough you disappear--we actually need that mutual recognition and interaction with many varied others to maintain the idea of a personal identity.

So Dave McKay decided on a different kind of transaction to rule his life, one where he stayed in the power position and never, ever ceded it to anyone.
His choice. And completely undeserving of anyone feeling sorry for him.

I guess I'm pretty much pitiless. I've always thought that the concept of pitying another is a form of condescension as I look down from my supposedly higher position.
I know when I have been on the receiving end of pity, no matter how kindly intended, I have always experienced it as being horribly condescended to.
Catholic priests and nuns that I recall seem to be adepts in pitying others, they must have a required course on it in the seminary.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/2011 08:47AM by Stoic.

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Stoic
I guess I'm pretty much pitiless. I've always thought that the concept of pitying another is a form of condescension as I look down from my supposedly higher position.
I know when I have been on the receiving end of pity, no matter how kindly intended, I have always experienced it as being horribly condescended to.
Catholic priests and nuns that I recall seem to be adepts in pitying others, they must have a required course on it in the seminary.

Now we are getting into the realm of philosophy and theology, and it's probably best not to go too far off-topic in that direction.

Suffice to say that in my opinion, David doesn't have a choice but to be who, and what, he is. He is only acting according to his own evil nature, and I do not blame him for it any more than I blame a viper for being a viper. He is neurologically hard-wired that way and in that sense has no choice in the matter, at least not anymore. He's just doing what his kind do. He is a human toxin.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/08/2011 05:10AM by zeuszor.

Dave McKay is selfish, narcissistic, committed to his own pleasure, and committed to the feeding of his own grandiose self-image, no matter what it might cost anybody else. Never forget that. "Dialog" with him at your own risk.

What it boils down to, is that David hates anything or anybody that he cannot control.

DM derives pleasure from manipulating people, period. If he figures he can take someone down the garden path by exploiting some ambiguity of language, then he will. But if that doesn't work, he has no problem with out and out deceit. It doesn't matter to him, the only point is to get a reaction.

His behavior is similar to that of serial murderers, who, once in custody, pretend to wish to divulge information about unsolved crimes, but really don't want anything but attention. He loves to make folks dance.

He isn't concerned with his own credibility, just with exerting control over other people, whether it's by enraging them, or deceiving them, or as he must do in his work exploiting people's misery, feigning empathy.

The only goal for him is to get a response that he feels he controlled. It's all about control and nothing about dialogue with David.

He is only a "human being" in a strict, biological sense of the term. But in a very real sense he has no humanity. He is one of the coldest persons that you will ever run into, so to speak.

Here's poor old Dave and his consort rummaging through the bins.

[channel.nationalgeographic.com]

I notice he conveniently fails to mention his daily trip to McDonalds!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/08/2011 06:30AM by Apollo.

Oh, yeah, that was originally aired back in '08 or '09. I remember watching that very episode when it was first on, having no idea that the McKays were going to be there. When they came on the screen, I couldn't believe it. Like here I am watching TV and trying to enjoy myself, and this guy pops up again! But they're only on for a very short time, less than five minutes to my recollection.