Do you enjoy horrible things?

Chessie

Chessie

Community Member
MBTI
INfJ
This is a really weird question to ask, I know. I am a deeply empathetic person but I have a streak of malevolence which runs good and deep. Yes, on the one side I love My Little Pony. On the other, I sit and study the Holocaust, Unit 731, the Rape of Nan King, and North Korea. I listen to survivor stories and imagine the sensations.

Don't get me wrong. I empathize and feel no-one should have lived through such things. Our species is capable of being so much better than these stories would seem to give us credit for. I've seen amazing acts of kindness and connection. I believe sincerely that we are becoming something fantastic and this century we will see the greatest shift towards becoming a collective species rather than fearful individuals whispering in the dark.

In my dreams I see death and depravity. I see endless blackened vistas, oceans of screaming flesh and hooks.

Then I am in a garden of thorn-less roses and live in peace forever under sunny skies.

All of it is a sensation. It's a feeling and some part of me is unwilling to judge it good or bad. It just is, regardless of my judgments. I can't change the past. I still enjoy it, whether it's shocking and horrid or beautiful. Sometimes the most lovely things are also the most terrible.

Do you experience this? Can you give me some examples? I'm trying to connect here and it's tough to ask these questions anywhere else.
 
darkness is part of b eing a human. i enjoy brutality, (being myself a little violent) death, doom, and express it through both music and writing and actual actions xD
im a misanthrope, pessimist and nihilist, but i also have a nice side! im deeply empathic to other people (depends on the person) and care about humanity in general. I hate it but i feel compelled to help it xD so dont be ashamed its normal. I think that to really appreciate nice things you have to know the bad ones
 
I relate to you with this.

I guess using our imaginations to try and feel the limits of human emotion and the human experience, which are inspired by both the most horrible and the most beautiful events or ideas, are, well, just another part of the human experience.

I don't know if I would call it "enjoying" it per se, but when I imagine it from the safety of where I am, I do bathe my mind's eye in all the intricacies of what I'm imagining, and I don't feel that much aversion from it because I know that I'm safe and sound and trying to very hypothetically voyeur it. The ideas of the things I do this with do intrigue me, but it isn't in that I take pleasure in the idea and details of the fact that the event happened; instead it's in myself taking pleasure in knowing that I'm trying to imagine and relish it, and the empathy and sensitivity and softheartedness that can be expressed with it as well, is something I like getting in touch with in myself and in connecting with the world.

This is probably also why I'm so fascinated by poop and bodily functions lol. I just observe how the people around me are so disgusted by it, and I observe how my own senses seem to be repelled by these things, and then the tabooness of it all just completely intrigues me and makes me want to know more about it. I feel like if people are so often repelled by things, then less people are going to take on the task of exploring and looking into trying to understand things. It makes me wonder if things really are just so gross and bad, and if I can challenge or overcome these impulses of mine to see these things as disgusting, and it makes me more motivated to challenge the view that everyone seems to have and to find out if these things really have their own place in things and their own merit. I think I also feel like people are trying to protect me from things I really don't need to be protected from, or to withhold information from me, which frustrates me, and that contributes to this. I don't attribute this to internet desensitization, because I've had this mild fascination with gross or morbid things for as long as I can remember. I remember as a little kid, I would take a long stick and dissect dog poop I found at the park. The idea that I'm thinking and talking about this so seriously is weird I guess, and it's not really something significant that the people I know in real life notice about me, but it is a little interesting and I mean if you think about it it shouldn't be that odd or taboo to talk about, should it?
 
I'd say that the holocaust, nuclear war, torture etc. are basically serving the same function as porn. These things release endorphins… but if you like them too much then you'll probably end up being desensitized.

My buddy hates realistic violence in movies because he thinks that it's hard to get these things out of your brain once they're in there, and I guess in some ways that's true-- because I'm sure a lot of us still have commercials and jingles and such in our brains right now. I don't really know what these images/messages are doing, though… maybe it's like some sort of light trauma or something.

The movie 'Videodrome' sort of touches on how violence and sex open up new pathways in the brain-- in the film they expose people to sex and violence in the media in order to make them more receptive to control.

Some religions also do similar things by exposing children to horrific images-- crucifixion, hell, damnation, etc-- in order to control their behaviors/dispositions.

Really, any commercial culture is going to be full of sex and violence/violent sex, and the younger you are the more likely your mind is to take that and run with it.

I don't see oceans of screaming flesh and hooks though-- that's pretty messed up.
 
Seeing and enjoying and thriving are three different things. That is in the realm of sensing; in the realm of understanding, of processing, of reaction; there will be different sort of cause-and-effect altogether.
 
Without delving into the necessary discourse about the distinction between thoughts and actions:

Yea, I enjoy horrible things.
 
Apone said:
I don't see oceans of screaming flesh and hooks though-- that's pretty messed up.
Click to expand...

Trust me, I know exactly how messed up it is...and that's only the gentle, easy to get along with parts of my brain spitting back up some of the stuff I expose it to. The really gritty stuff is just GROSS. Heee!
 
No, I don't to be honest.

I get amused by some weird things that would be considered horrible by some, but they are ultimately harmless.
 
I know I am very gentle. I mean, aside the proclivity for BDSM and some pretty intense masochistic tendencies. It's not like I'd set myself on fire.

...Again.


Arg. There are so many things I'd like to be able to say I'd never tried. I don't like hurting people despite the interest in what people do to each other in their darkest moments. If I had my way, people would be... better. I'd throw myself into giving people a sense of peace and joy and fulfillment. I do my best but it's so draining even with the tiny group around me. Maybe INFJ's collectively can do better than any one of us isolated. I do love the forum for that particular reason.
 
Chessie said:
I know I am very gentle. I mean, aside the proclivity for BDSM and some pretty intense masochistic tendencies. It's not like I'd set myself on fire.

...Again.


Arg. There are so many things I'd like to be able to say I'd never tried. I don't like hurting people despite the interest in what people do to each other in their darkest moments. If I had my way, people would be... better. I'd throw myself into giving people a sense of peace and joy and fulfillment. I do my best but it's so draining even with the tiny group around me. Maybe INFJ's collectively can do better than any one of us isolated. I do love the forum for that particular reason.
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Collective INFJs? Setting oneself on fire? This thread may be of interest to you: http://www.infjs.com/forums/showthread.php?t=21901 .
 
Torture interests me.
 
I can't watch any type of graphic violence or similar anymore. I was pretty much raised on totally un age appropriate horror and splatter films. After I had children I'm unable to watch any such thing. Only japanese horror movies. They have a different style. :)
I don't much read the news either because they break my heart. I have always been slightly morbid though... I think the kids call it being emo, but I'm too old for such words. We didn't have Emo back in the day....Maybe I'm a bit of a goth on the inside ;D Edgar Allan Poe, Baudelaire, Bukowski, Diane Arbus, Rimbaud, Lynch, Misfits...
I was like this as a kid:
[video=youtube_share;EXuS7diMBxQ]http://youtu.be/EXuS7diMBxQ[/video]
 
I have a curiosity about things.
I read a lot about serial killers and child psychopath murderers.. but it is because I want to understand their motivations.
It interests me because it scares me and I like to try to understand what I am afraid of.

It's the psychology that interests me. I don't enjoy people being murdered and I don't get off reading accounts of it.
In fact, I feel a little bit of a pang of sadness or grief when I come upon the gruesome details.

I don't watch gory horror movies because I can't.. it puts me in a weird sad mood for hours afterward.
 
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I have more time. I'll expand a bit on one aspect of this.

The extinction of a species is fascinating to me. I like the thought of an entire group existing and then not existing. Alive then dead. Relegated to artifacts on the landscape. It seems more natural to me than unrestrained growth and the 'success' of the species to the point where it consumes more than is sustainable. Stories about the extinction of the human species are awesome. I always root for the character who has developed some disease or scheme to kill everyone. Sometimes it's accidental or other beings. Zombies, aliens, whatever. Films like Twelve Monkeys, Terminator, The Matrix... countless mad scientists who try and wipe humanity off the face of the Earth.

And so it's clear: This is homicide on a grand scale I'm talking about. Plain and simple. Forget the fantasy of it. These are the same kinds of thoughts that countless zealots and despots have had throughout history. Except I don't believe anyone deserves to be spared. No bunkers. No escape. It's all or nothing.

And the thought of nothing--of that collective silence. It's beautiful.


When I've talked about this I get asked, "Would you do it? If you had your hand on the button?" The answer depends on when you ask.
 
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You know what else is interesting? The forgotten. Every few years you'll see an article or book about someone who died and is found quite some time afterward. Their passing simply goes unnoticed. It's not the death that I find interesting but the unknown events leading up to it. A person's life and whole sections of it that are just blanks. It's an unfinished narrative. The researcher in me wants to know who they were. I want to know the full story.

Anyway, not so much horrible as morbid. It's the death that triggers my interest.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2011/oct/09/joyce-vincent-death-mystery-documentary

http://www.tampabay.com/news/humaninterest/article1181888.ece
 
I dont normally enjoy horrible things but I find everything fascinating. I enjoy learning about anything and everything and I think its better to try understand things rather than bury your head in the sand and think its too hard or bad. There is a reason for everything

I feel that if something bad happens to anyone in the world, I owe it to them to hear and understand their story. Thats the least I or anyone else can do. So I try to absorb as much news, docos and other media as I can. And I do have an absolute fascination with war and the psychology of human aggression.

I also really enjoy dark humour, gory, action, morbid and horror movies. They never disturb me- except The Ring cos it had the little girl in it and that was bloody creepy.

But every time Ive seen 'real' violence - where I knew i was watching a real person in agony and pain and being hurt or murdered- it makes me sick to the stomach and I normally throw up. When I was learning counselling I cried whenever anyone shared anything really horrible. And there have been times when people have related horrible experiences to me and I havent been able to stop myself from throwing up.
 
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