Mad Doctor

NOTE: I wrote this yesterday during computer problems and it hung in limbo. So when it says "today", it was really yesterday. So yes, I'm behind the curve.

How we respond to being deprived of our desires reveals our true character. There are two extremes that are actually different sides of the same coin. The two extremes: suicide and murder. The really morally depraved person will indulge in both.

Today a 66 year old doctor being divorced acrimoniously from his "gold digging" wife decided he would rather die and even kill others than being deprived of what he wanted--his house. So he burnt the house down and nearly killed himself and some firefighters in the process. At least, that's what the story looks like right now.

With mental diagnoses thrown at anything that moves these days, and the diagnosis "depression" already attached to the good doctor, I would like to respectfully offer a different possiblity: that this is a guy who was really, really pissed off and decided to follow through on his verbal (words-don't-mean-anything) threats.

In lieu of depression, I would like to offer a new diagnosis: Anger Managment Disorder or, how about Conflict Irresolution Syndrome. While this AMD or CIS take many different forms--Deb Frisch, Dr. Nicholas Bartha, Suicide Bombers, Phil Hartman's wife, O.J. Simpson (yeah, yeah, I know, he's innocent)--the root cause is the same: uncontrolled rage.

I'm tired of pathologizing every bad act. Evil exists. Anger is it's root.