"Let’s use caution with that claim. It’s a word that can allow us to wrongly minimize the significance of the attack. There is a huge difference between obsessed, violent, unstable, and truly insane. And that difference matters both legally and practically. When a person who’s afflicted with severe mental illness assaults another person (think of the terrible attack on Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson, Ariz.), the reasons are often so completely disconnected from reality that preventing such attacks is mainly a question of medication or other forms of mental-health intervention.
"But there are other kinds of violent people, including angry obsessives. They’re not normal. They act strangely. But they’re also legally and morally responsible for their actions. If you spend any time in politics or the public eye, you encounter them with some frequency. Usually they’re harmlessly annoying, but sometimes they launch harassment campaigns online, sometimes they make violent threats, and sometimes they’ll show up at, say, a pizza place with an AR15.
"The angry obsessive is absolutely vulnerable to being stoked, inflamed, and inspired by angry rhetoric. Speech can inspire violence. It can. It’s one reason why civility and a sense of proportion in your speech aren’t just abstract, sanctimonious, or elitist concepts. They’re moral responsibilities for people with any kind of meaningful platform. Not all listening ears are sober-minded or entirely rational. And when they hear a public figure they admire thunder against his political opponents with extreme language, sometimes they’ll take extreme action in response. " . . . Full article...
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