One of TV's darkest shows is Criminal Minds - which follows a team of profilers from the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unity (BAU) based in Quantico, Virginia.  The BAU is part of the FBI National Center for the Anaylsis of Violent Crime.  The typical show focuses on the team as attempt to prevent gruesome serial crimes as they try to solve them, utilizing the powers of profiling.  There is definitely a sensationalism to the show as episodes show various perpetrators are shown doing their grisly crimes. Thomas Gibson, who plays Unit Chief Aaron Hotchner, I think, however, touches upon a significant reason why the show is as popular as it is. 

"When I read these horrific stories that seem to happen metaphorically in the house next door, there's something that's captivating about it in a very dark way," Gibson says. "There's something that we as a society want to understand about how some of us turn out this way."

I would go a little further.  Because these serial killers are part of us, they reflect to a certain degree the spectrum of humanity.  We will call them such things as "monster" as a way to separate them from the rest of us, to make them "not-us,".but when we stop to think about it even Hitler, Ted Bundy, and Charlie Manson were as human as the rest of us.

Others will inject the notion of evil as an entity that is outside of humans into the equation.  But I think it is to the credit of the people who write and produce the show that they do not shy away from the more unsettling notion that what separates a Bundy or Manson from the rest of us isn't much.  It may be a trauma from childhood or a neurological misfiring.  In other words, the worst monsters among us are in some way a reflection of us.

One of the ways that they do is with the show particular hook, which is to begin and end each show with a quote from the great and creative minds of history.  The quotes are spoken by the various characters of the BAU team.  These quotes tend to highlight the nuances of the drives and internal wounds and demons that make these crimes a reality. A few examples:

From Season 1, episode 10 “Popular Kids,” spoken by Jason Gideon

"Unfortunately, a super-abundance of dreams is paid for by a growing potential for nightmares."

- Sir Peter Ustinov

"Ideologies separate us. Dreams and anguish bring us together."

- Eugene Ionesco

 

From Season 4, episode 2 “The Angel Maker,” spoken by Aaron Hotchner

“We all die. The goal isn't to live forever, the goal is to create something that will.”

- Chuck Palahniuk
 

“The past is our definition. we may strive, with good reason, to escape it, or to escape what is bad in it, but we will escape it only by adding something better to it.”

- Wendell Berry

 

From Season 6, Episode 5 “Safe Haven,” spoken by Derek Morgan

"All humanity is one undivided and indivisible family. I cannot detach myself from the wickedest soul."

- Mahatma Ghandi
 

From Season 6, Episode 12 “Corazon,” spoken by Spencer Reid:

"No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks."

- Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Our culture's latest monster is, of course, Jerry Sandusky.  Perusing the comments on articles about the Penn St scandal, there are few people identifying with Sandusky.  Variations on the monster theme are abundant. 

 But one of the reasons that this particular dark episode has captured the attention of the media and public is that the other people involved in the story are not so easily tossed aside as monsters, especially Joe Paterno. 

As the story unfolds it is becoming increasingly apparent that there are many non-monsters who were complicit in ensuring that the monster was able to keep on doing his monstrous acts.  What is so unsettling to many is that someone like Joe Paterno, who was believed to be the embodiment of integrity and decency, could allow such a monster to remain on the loose.

In order to explain it, people will reach for such things as "absolute power corrupts absolutely," replacing the entity of evil with another entity such as power.  Just as a society cannot believe that they could become like the Germans during the reign of Hitler, to look aside as the Holocaust occurred, people do not want to believe the potential resides within them that could enable an monster to prey upon children.

This is not to say that anyone in Paterno or McQueary shoes would have done the same thing - put the University and himself above the welfare of children.  I believe that most people would have done the right thing.  But the difference between those who do and those who don't do the right thing is so slim as almost not to exist. 

And this in no way is a long way to state because of this that we should not judge those who do not do the right thing.  If anything it is the basis for a imperative that we do judge and judge with a passion.  

What could be referred to as the current media storm swirling around Penn State can also be referred to as collective reflection.  We are drawn in as we see ourselves, or at least our potential selves, reflected back at us.  The students tipping over the media van is us and they are we, just as those who light candles for the victims of Sandusky tonight are us and we are them. Just as the victims are us and we are they.

Going forward, as this story unfolds, we can find a way through continued reflection to touch upon that part our humanity which embraces love, that part of humanity upon which we all depend.  It is true that being human means not being perfect.  Being human means to fail.  But we can strive to struggle for the best which is in us, even though we are for the most part the walking wounded.  

It all reminds me of a part of lyrics from the Sarah McLaughlin song: Fumbling Toward Ecstasy, something we should tell each of us, tell ourselves:  

Peace in the struggle for peace;

Comfort on the way to comfort.

It also reminds of a song from Jane Siberry - and here is a video of her performing it live to a small audience.