2 Quotes by James Waller

A myopic focus on the proposed psychopathology of perpetrators, or on their alleged extraordinary personalities, tells us more about our own personal dreams of how we wish the world to work than it does about the reality of perpetrator behavior. In that role, such explanations satisfy an important emotional demand of distancing us from them.

There is a dark side to religious belief systems, which are often fused with ethnic and national identities. In this sense, religion is epiphenomenal – attached to and living off other phenomena. As such, religious belief systems do not always liberate humanity from extraordinary evil. Rather, they are often part of the problem – if not as a primary cause, certainly as something that worsens rather than mitigates conflict.