Germanwings Airbus Crash: Possible Motivations

They could have been the culmination of a plan over a long period of time. If he was indeed unbalanced, had a personality disorder or depressed then this starts him off in a bad place. I do not know what medications he was prescribed, but I have had some that made me worse rather than better. Anti-psychotics or anti-depressants have an eye-watering amount of warnings in the literature of side effects. In my darkest hours I planned my own demise quite thoroughly. It is possible that he worked on this in his head and once he locked the door behind the Captain, there was no going back.


Psycho is a unhelpful word, as its open to interpretation to what it means.

yes your right what should i change it to?? is sociopath more correct
 
yes your right what should i change it to?? is sociopath more correct

I know what you are trying to say, but I don't think it is helpful trying to diagnose him with any label. It seems to me that he was thought of as normal (which also has interpretive issues) by his employer up until he locked the door.

I don't know what the correct term is.
 
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I know what you are trying to say, but I don't think it is helpful trying to diagnose him with any label. It seems to me that he was thought of as normal (which also has interpretive issues) by his employer up until be locked the door.

I don't know what the correct term is.
oh please. people have been arm-chair psychoanalyzing him all over this page. at least "psycho" uses what we do know to offer a guess, vs. analyzing based on the actions of others who never killed 149 strangers.

yes your right what should i change it to?? is sociopath more correct
I think psycho is fine. esp since you didn't use it as a diagnosis, you used in the 'common sense'/ popular vernacular, as it were.
 
I think psycho is fine. esp since you didn't use it as a diagnosis, you used in the 'common sense'/ popular vernacular, as it were.
Except that "psycho" is derogative to people who suffer from mental illness through no fault of their own, given that we have just spent the last two pages talking about depression etc. it's just tarring people with the same brush.
 
Except that "psycho" is derogative to people who suffer from mental illness through no fault of their own, given that we have just spent the last two pages talking about depression etc. it's just tarring people with the same brush.
Just because some people want to associate this tragedy with 'depression', does not make underwoodi's statement any less correct in this context. Underwoodi isn't talking about depressed people, he specifically is talking about 'high functioning psychos'.

its derogatory to associate depressed people with this psycho Lubitz, if you ask me. I mean, if we want to lessen the social stigma of mental disorders/depression, I don't think implying that all depressed or stressed out people are potential mass murderers like Lubitz.. is really helping the cause.

or am I misunderstanding something?


PS : ) Psychos (by definition) don't care what underwoodi or we think about them.
 
Underwoodi isn't talking about depressed people, he specifically is talking about 'high functioning psychos'.
But what is a "high functioning psycho"? What qualifies a person as psycho? There are lots of people that have depression and psychosis relating to depression that are successful, driven people (which sometimes, ironically, causes their downfall).

It's akin to talking about people who are autistic or had Down's syndrome - would it be ok to just label them "a retard"?

I'm not defending lubitz and especially not his actions,
Just that when we spend the last few pages discussing the potential disorders that might have caused this horror that are the same as a lot of people suffer through no fault of their own, it seems kind of harsh to just then dish out the word psycho.


its derogatory to associate depressed people with this psycho Lubitz, if you ask me. I mean, if we want to lessen the social stigma of mental disorders/depression, I don't think implying that all depressed or stressed out people are potential mass murderers like Lubitz.. is really helping the cause.

But it's not implying that all mentally I'll people are that at all, just that it may be a root cause for what pushed Lubitz to do what he did.
 
been biting my tongue here for a bit to calm down before posting. As a sufferer from mental illness, and having been called 'psycho' by people who did understand me or my illness I find the term very hurtful and distasteful. It is an abusive and discriminatory term that many people with mental conditions get called on a daily basis and implies that all of us are a danger to society. I understand that is not what posters here meant, but it is still as nasty to my ears as the N word is to most black people. Use the full word 'psychopathic' by all means, but not 'psycho'. (unless your going to talk about the Hitchcock film :) )
 
As a sufferer from mental illness, and having been called 'psycho' by people who did understand me or my illness I find the term very hurtful and distasteful. It is an abusive and discriminatory term that many people with mental conditions get called on a daily basis and implies that all of us are a danger to society

It's harsh, mate, and unfortunately not recognised as such because a lot of people don't truly understand how horrible a mental illness can be.
I have to admit I was oblivious to it in much the same way before joining "the job" and dealing with patients regularly.
I think in part it's because most people can't physically see anything wrong and so can't come to grips with what's going on with the person suffering at the time. It's not just a matter of simply changing behaviours, "getting on with it" or "just stop paying attention to it" and everything is better again.
 
It's harsh, mate, and unfortunately not recognised as such because a lot of people don't truly understand how horrible a mental illness can be.
I have to admit I was oblivious to it in much the same way before joining "the job" and dealing with patients regularly.
I think in part it's because most people can't physically see anything wrong and so can't come to grips with what's going on with the person suffering at the time. It's not just a matter of simply changing behaviours, "getting on with it" or "just stop paying attention to it" and everything is better again.
As one now ex-friend put it to me once, 'pull your fucking socks up mate and get on with life, thats what everyone else does.' and he just couldn't get his head around the fact that its the inability to 'pull your fucking socks up and get on with it' has put you in the hole in the first place.
 
As one now ex-friend put it to me once, 'pull your fucking socks up mate and get on with life, thats what everyone else does.' and he just couldn't get his head around the fact that its the inability to 'pull your fucking socks up and get on with it' has put you in the hole in the first place.
Exactly right. Were it that easy, it wouldn't be classified as an illness as opposed to a 'behaviour'.
 
and implies that all of us are a danger to society
that's what I'm saying. Lubitz obviously WAS a danger to society. so I'm having trouble understanding why this thread is discussing OTHER forms of mental illness and depression.

I'm sorry people called you that. People do suck.
 
Lubitz obviously WAS a danger to society

He obviously was in the end, but maybe it wouldn't have come to that if he was following therapy, not ignoring sick notes and such? It's stretching pretty far, but maybe you could say he was scared of the stigma attached to certain mental illnesses and therefore decided to ignore dr's orders and push on like everything was ok. Im still speculating anyway, because we'll never know exactly what his treatment was.

so I'm having trouble understanding why this thread is discussing OTHER forms of mental illness and depression

Because what's been published about him doesn't necessarily just point to depression alone. And some illnesses don't just stand on their own i.e. as "just depression". For example depression, anxiety, mania, psychosis are not all exclusive to one another or to just one illness, but can occur in a pattern of an illness or as separate symptoms. Which is why sometimes mental illness is so hard to accurately diagnose and treat.

a psycho is a psychopath. that how I see underwoodi using the term.

Yeah sure, I see why he would call him that in the slang term. But again, psycopathy is a recognised disorder also, there are plenty of diagnosed psycopaths that walk amongst us too that lead productive lives and don't go on to cause mass murder. Which raises the first argument again - is it ok to just marginalize all mental illness sufferers with derogatory labels?

And Lubitz was being treated with anti depressants and anti-psychotics which points to him not being a psycopath...since psycopathy is not generally regarded as 'treatable' in terms of medications, but more behavioural modification.
 
...since psycopathy is not generally regarded as 'treatable' in terms of medications
and the treatments didn't work. so perhaps the diagnosis was wrong. I don't want to bring up the two most obvious triggers reported, s that seems indecent to me, but I still see this thread as comparing non violent mental illness with a psychopath who murdered 149 people.

Since I obviously cant grasp where y'all are coming from in your discussion, i'll drop out.

If you have a better word for Lubitz than psychopath. a word that diffentiates him from the mentally ill who do NOT feel the need to kill people, I'm more than happy to use that term to describe him.
 
I still see this thread as comparing non violent mental illness with a psychopath who murdered 149 people.

That's the thing - mentally ill people can be violent or not, there's a lot of factors that can determine that. The majority aren't, for example I've met plenty of schizophrenia sufferers who are not violent in the slightest, they just hear things that noone else can, and they can't stop hearing them, but appear for the most part to be relatively 'with it'. Then there are the few who hear voices and are paranoid to the point of being delusional, who can be violent and lash out at everyone who's trying to help because they think that they will be harmed. It's very real to them, they're genuinely scared or angry so they fight like hell.

Since I obviously cant grasp where y'all are coming from in your discussion, i'll drop out.

No, all good, just a difference in terminology. Im not a Dr either, just from what I've collected via experience I guess, and a lot of reading. Lubitz has been talked about in the media as suffering depression or similar, I just didn't think it would be fair to use the slang term of 'psycho' attached in the same conversation as depression, bipolar etc is all.

This is getting derailed into something entirely different from topic anyway so I'll shut up too.
 
This is from the telegraph article linked in the other Germanwings thread:

Dr Lepastier said Lubitz’s initial severe depressive episode “could have been the first manifestation of schizophrenia, which often first strikes in one’s early twenties”.

“Patients can then feel they have fully recovered only to discover years later that their condition is worsening and they require treatment that could be very long. It is at this stage that the temptation to commit suicide is greatest. What we don’t know is if Lubitz had been told he might require hospitalisation and realised his pilot career was well and truly over.” German prosecutors this week revealed that Lubitz had conducted Internet research on “cockpit doors” and “suicide” right before the crash.

Dr Lepastier said there was a “documented desire” among schizophrenics with suicidal tendencies to “end their life by breaking their body into pieces – as was the case here”.

He added that along with the drug’s side effects of visual impairment, drowsiness and impotence, “one is also cut off from one’s own emotions and in moments of stress, can make entirely the wrong decisions”.

Asked whether he would have been aware he was committing mass murder, Dr Lepastier said “probably not”.

“Melancholic or deliriously depressed people are so narcissistic that others don’t count in their mind. There may well have been no real desire to kill others; rather one can say he forgot about everyone else and in the end nothing counted except his own situation
.” “That said, one should never forget that a suicide is in fact a murder committed against oneself.”
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Here is a link about psychopaths and sociopaths: http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2015/02/12/differences-between-a-psychopath-vs-sociopath/ which includes this:

The common features of a psychopath and sociopath lie in their shared diagnosis — antisocial personality disorder. The DSM-5 defines antisocial personality as someone have 3 or more of the following traits:

  1. Regularly breaks or flaunts the law


  2. Constantly lies and deceives others
  3. Is impulsive and doesn’t plan ahead
  4. Can be prone to fighting and aggressiveness
  5. Has little regard for the safety of others
  6. Irresponsible, can’t meet financial obligations
  7. Doesn’t feel remorse or guilt
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These may help to show where me and others have been coming from talking about depression and schizophrenia rather than psychopathy and cold blooded murder of 149 people., but the truth is, we have NO IDEA what went on in his mind.
 
been biting my tongue here for a bit to calm down before posting. As a sufferer from mental illness, and having been called 'psycho' by people who did understand me or my illness I find the term very hurtful and distasteful. It is an abusive and discriminatory term that many people with mental conditions get called on a daily basis and implies that all of us are a danger to society. I understand that is not what posters here meant, but it is still as nasty to my ears as the N word is to most black people. Use the full word 'psychopathic' by all means, but not 'psycho'. (unless your going to talk about the Hitchcock film :) )

apologies if my insensitive use of word is cause of harm or grief. my grasp of medical terms is poor, yours and others replies have enlighten my understanding
 
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