Such sentiments motivate the serial killer. I'm not a serial killer because my mind is too strong (or too weak, depending on your perspective) but the motivating factor is the same. No, I don't wish to be associated with that class of people: I am in fact the antithesis or the nemesis of the serial killer.
Thus thinks the serial killer: "If I cannot have you, then nobody else might have you!" and the act of killing commences. The serial killer relishes the (real) death of another.
Thus thinks the antithesis: "If I am not yours, then nobody else is permitted to have me!" and the sudden withdrawal from situations which might entail meetings with women begins. The nemesis partakes in the (partial or virtual) death of the self.
Oh, the same mechanism is at work so frequently! I imagine that millions of people tolerate it, but don't accept the conclusions they draw if they ask themselves what's really happening.
Depressive people function asymmetrically - that is, their idea of causality has been skewed in some way. This skewing is the defining characteristic of depressive behaviour: positive events are ascribed to extrinsic causes; negative events are the whole responsibility of the person concerned.
Cognitive behavioural therapy attempts to correct the asymmetry, so that the former depressive is capable of enduring a difficult event without reasoning that he or she brought that event about with their own actions.
We can form a series of 'word equations' which link the properties of (anti) serial-killing with the asymmetrical thoughts of (non) depressive people:
- (1)If I can't have you, nobody else can have you!
- (2)If I can't have you, nobody else can have me!
- (3)If I can't have you, somebody else can have you!
- (4)If I can't have you, I'll do for somebody else!
- (5)I've had a good day: that was lucky!
- (6)I've had a good day: that was my doing.
- (7)I've not had a good day: it's all my fault.
- (8)I've not had a good day: that sometimes happens.
I think that statements 1 and 7 express broadly the same sentiment, as do 2 and 6; the other statements are there for the sake of completion. (1+7) is the mindset of the depressive/murderer, while (2+6) is its negation.
