Looks like the mainstream media still love Cullenbine....

DCullen- "Rachel Maddow gave me an extended shoutout in her opening monologue tonight. Yea!!!

She summarized "Columbine" and read a passage from my new Slate piece. Love her!"




No Brooks Brown or Mark Ames in charge... just Cullen.

Mark Ames says things like "School was absolute torture for Eric and Dylan." I don't think we need him on TV.

It sure beats, "Eric Harris was a pussy-pounding stud who outscored much of the football team and fucked Brenda Parker," and "Eric was a psychopath and Dylan was his easily brainwashed, emo follower."

MnM wrote:

It sure beats, "Eric Harris was a pussy-pounding stud who outscored much of the football team and fucked Brenda Parker," and "Eric was a psychopath and Dylan was his easily brainwashed, emo follower."

AGREED!!

MnM wrote:

It sure beats, "Eric Harris was a pussy-pounding stud who outscored much of the football team and fucked Brenda Parker," and "Eric was a psychopath and Dylan was his easily brainwashed, emo follower."

We don't need either of them on TV.

No Brooks or Ames? That's because Brooks is to busy hitting on little girls and Ames is busy hiding from Rocky. So, guess that leaves us with Cullen.

Lifetime wrote:

No Brooks or Ames? That's because Brooks is to busy hitting on little girls and Ames is busy hiding from Rocky. So, guess that leaves us with Cullen.

Lifetime wrote:

No Brooks or Ames? That's because Brooks is to busy hitting on little girls and Ames is busy hiding from Rocky. So, guess that leaves us with Cullen.

Brooks isn't hitting on any girls, despite what certain fanatical tumblr Columbine fangirls might claim.

MnM wrote:

Lifetime wrote:

No Brooks or Ames? That's because Brooks is to busy hitting on little girls and Ames is busy hiding from Rocky. So, guess that leaves us with Cullen.

Brooks isn't hitting on any girls, despite what certain fanatical tumblr Columbine fangirls might claim.

I have a feeling that Lifetime was being sarcastic when making that comment.

Jenn wrote:

Lifetime wrote:

No Brooks or Ames? That's because Brooks is to busy hitting on little girls and Ames is busy hiding from Rocky. So, guess that leaves us with Cullen.

"Rocky" as in Joe Wesbecker; the standard gravure shooter?

Cullen is mentally ill. He admits it. He says he had Secondary Post Traumatic Stress Disorder because of Columbine (Time interview). Why has the media let a mentally ill person become the authority on this shooting?

RaiseTheFist wrote:

Cullen is mentally ill. He admits it. He says he had Secondary Post Traumatic Stress Disorder because of Columbine (Time interview). Why has the media let a mentally ill person become the authority on this shooting?

I heard about that. News media doesn't usually filter good vs bad sources. It just uses what is available and it lets the public decide for themselves. It would be like censorship if they didn't. I find it better to ignore his presence than to interact with him. He is so stubborn with his book that he does not take criticism well. It is either his way by way of praise or you are blocked from his reality. I personally think he is tried of defending his book from critics and would rather hear the company comments of those that accept his book as it is.

I always wonder if Cullen came to the conclusions that he did about E/D because they are the ones which are most healing to himself (and his Secondary PTSD) and not the most honest ones. When I watch Cullen interviewed on TV, he gets so animate about the whole subject -as if he really NEEDS to believe that Eric was a psychopath for some reason.

The media kisses Cullen's asshole. In the Time interview, they accept everything this dipshit has to say. They fall over themselves congratulating him on how amazing it is he finally unearthed the "truth". I've never seen any interviewer ask Cullen the difficult questions. They don't have to be rude about it, but for fuck's sake, Cullen's chapter on Psychopathy would be laughed out of university if it were written by a student.

RaiseTheFist wrote:

I always wonder if Cullen came to the conclusions that he did about E/D because they are the ones which are most healing to himself (and his Secondary PTSD) and not the most honest ones. When I watch Cullen interviewed on TV, he gets so animate about the whole subject -as if he really NEEDS to believe that Eric was a psychopath for some reason.

The media kisses Cullen's asshole. In the Time interview, they accept everything this dipshit has to say. They fall over themselves congratulating him on how amazing it is he finally unearthed the "truth". I've never seen any interviewer ask Cullen the difficult questions. They don't have to be rude about it, but for fuck's sake, Cullen's chapter on Psychopathy would be laughed out of university if it were written by a student.

Probably the reason why Cullen has never(to my knowledge) planned university visits. High schools are okay, because the questions are not tough to answer.

I look at these two articles. He really takes his ideas too seriously. I haven't read the The Bully Society book, but I give her more credibility than a journalist with a creative writing background.

Dave Cullen's critical review
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Authors rebuttal
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RaiseTheFist wrote:

I always wonder if Cullen came to the conclusions that he did about E/D because they are the ones which are most healing to himself (and his Secondary PTSD) and not the most honest ones. When I watch Cullen interviewed on TV, he gets so animate about the whole subject -as if he really NEEDS to believe that Eric was a psychopath for some reason.

The media kisses Cullen's asshole. In the Time interview, they accept everything this dipshit has to say. They fall over themselves congratulating him on how amazing it is he finally unearthed the "truth". I've never seen any interviewer ask Cullen the difficult questions. They don't have to be rude about it, but for fuck's sake, Cullen's chapter on Psychopathy would be laughed out of university if it were written by a student.

Can you please explain or clarify the top part more? I don't quite understand. But I do agree with Cullen being completely content with the conclusion that Eric was a born physcopath. It's like he doesn't want to explore any other alternatives at all!

The media definitely kisses Cullen's ass. But there are a lot of people who think Cullen's book is the end all be all to Columbine. And believes because he spent 10 years studying the tragedy that everything in the book must be true. And this just proves and shows they don't know much about it and what really happened because of all the lies that are spread in the book such as they were very popular students, never bullied, Eric outscored more than the football team, Brenda Parker, etc. If people want to believe Eric was a physcopath and Dylan was the follower then they are entitled to think that. But I think they should decide that for themselves instead of believing it because of Dave Cullen.

RaiseTheFist wrote:

I always wonder if Cullen came to the conclusions that he did about E/D because they are the ones which are most healing to himself (and his Secondary PTSD) and not the most honest ones. When I watch Cullen interviewed on TV, he gets so animate about the whole subject -as if he really NEEDS to believe that Eric was a psychopath for some reason.

The media kisses Cullen's asshole. In the Time interview, they accept everything this dipshit has to say. They fall over themselves congratulating him on how amazing it is he finally unearthed the "truth". I've never seen any interviewer ask Cullen the difficult questions. They don't have to be rude about it, but for fuck's sake, Cullen's chapter on Psychopathy would be laughed out of university if it were written by a student.

I feel he needs to believe that conclusion. He knows that many others "need" to, as well. It is the only way that they can cope with what occurred without taking a long, hard look at themselves in the mirror. I feel he knows this is what most narrow minded people want to hear, so he continues promoting it and financially capitalizing on it.

Quote :

I feel he needs to believe that conclusion. He knows that many others "need" to, as well. It is the only way that they can cope with what occurred without taking a long, hard look at themselves in the mirror. I feel he knows this is what most narrow minded people want to hear, so he continues promoting it and financially capitalizing on it.

I completely agree with you. You basically, in better words, said what I was trying to say.

RaiseTheFist wrote:

Quote :

I feel he needs to believe that conclusion. He knows that many others "need" to, as well. It is the only way that they can cope with what occurred without taking a long, hard look at themselves in the mirror. I feel he knows this is what most narrow minded people want to hear, so he continues promoting it and financially capitalizing on it.

I completely agree with you. You basically, in better words, said what I was trying to say.

Thank you very much, but I think you said it very, very well yourself!

Dude. Dismissing his argument on the basis of psychiatric diagnosis is a shitty thing to do.

There are many other reasons to dispute Cullen. First, the bias in his writing towards certain conclusions that the public wanted, to the point of ignoring contrary data, even skewing data, in favor of a good bestselling yarn. Two, his sloppy fact-checking and over-reliance on the work of another, i.e, Dwayne Fuselier's psychological profiles. Three, his taking on the mantle of psychologist when he himself does not possess any degree or licensure enabling him to expound, with any authority, on the potential diagnoses of the two shooters.

He may also have biases against Eric and Dylan because he was bullied for being homosexual and he actually was, therefore making him oversensitive to their heavy usage of the word "fag" and less inclined to see them as human beings because they weren't him. And bullying only matters when it's based on an Acceptable Axis of Oppression (tm).

But do not drag mental health into the issue. It is the weakest ad hominem known to modern debate. His views are not less valid because of PTSD, ADHD or ETC. D. I am wary of using psych labels as counter-arguments.

After all, that's what he did.

That's what people wanted to believe about Columbine.

FredPete wrote:

Dude. Dismissing his argument on the basis of psychiatric diagnosis is a shitty thing to do.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not dismissing Cullen because he was mentally ill at the time when he wrote his book -I'd already dismissed this miserable bastard based on his extremely poor journalistic skills and his downright quackery long before I found out about his illness.

I'm speculating that his mental illness could be the reason why he was so bias in his book.

Cullen's Secondary PSTD isn't just a psychiatric diagnosis, it's a sickness he picked up from RESEARCHING COLUMBINE. Since Columbine is the SUBJECT of his book, it's only fair to ask whether his illness affected his outlook on the whole thing.

Look, simply put, I fucking hate Cullen. This guy seriously pisses me off in a way I didn't even know was humanly possible. Cullen wrote a book about the subject that caused his Secondary PTSD and the media should DEFINITELY ask him if his illness affected his perception of the event.

I don't mean any offense to people with a diagnosed mental illness.

Brooks and Marjorie Lindholm both had PTSD and wrote about it....

I remember one of the gals on the board said Cullen was kind of a big softey when they were talking about something.

He could still be traumatized about a subject and write a good book about it, I don't think that significantly impacted how the book turned out.

I know that he's wrong in much of his information and so do many others but why does no-one pull him up on it? I've never heard one person say anything bad about the image that he presented. That bothers me more than people believing his book is a good source because they don't know any better, other people do but keep quiet and allow his shit to continue. I don't think I'll ever understand people...

MnM wrote:

Brooks and Marjorie Lindholm both had PTSD and wrote about it....

Brooks and Marjorie wrote books from the perspective of being a survivor of the event. They shared their personal stories in their books. When people pick up those books and read them, they know they are getting the perspective of a survivor.

And neither of these two claimed to have definite answers about why Eric and Dylan attacked their school.

Brooks' book was titled "No Easy Answers". Cullen's essay was titled, "At Last We Know Why The Columbine Killers Did It".

It's true that Cullen could have still written a good book despite being traumatized by the event. But he didn't.

He chose not to include the violent details of what happened during the library shooting, he chose not to let the reader know that E/D allowed John Savage to walk away, and he chose not to repeat ANYTHING Dylan said during the attack which might make it sound like he was enjoying himself. And he chose not to interview anyone who might have witnessed E/D being treated badly, instead painting the school as some sort of bizarre utopia.

Cullen's early articles on Columbine are completely different and much more professional. Somewhere along the line Cullen became incapable of writing about Columbine without bias. And MAYBE this was because he was traumatized by the event.

Obviously I have my own bias against Cullen, so what I say is colored by the fact I think Cullen is an arrogant prick. I don't care so much that he has his own opinion on Columbine as much as the fact that he believes that NO ONE ELSE IS RIGHT.

Cullen says that Eric was born sick in the head and that the reader should ignore Eric's claims that he was treated poorly because he's too sick in the head to be taken seriously. Yet Cullen, by his own admission, isn't so well in the head either. Cullen believes that Eric's sickness undermines anything Eric has to say... I'm merely asking Cullen if the same applies to himself.

I know this is going to offend everyone, but... What the hell kind of sickness is SECONDARY Post Traumatic Stress Disorder anyway? I didn't even know that existed? Ever since reading Cullen's book I keep having nightmares about stupid people, I'm prone to bouts of anger, and seeing Cullen's face on TV is "triggering" to that anger... Do I have "Third-Party Post Traumatic Stress Disorder"?

areyoulistening wrote:

I know that he's wrong in much of his information and so do many others but why does no-one pull him up on it? I've never heard one person say anything bad about the image that he presented. That bothers me more than people believing his book is a good source because they don't know any better, other people do but keep quiet and allow his shit to continue. I don't think I'll ever understand people...

Amen to that.

I was just thinking about this earlier. If Eric truly was the person that Cullen had made him out to be(big man on campus, ladies man, filled with confidence and swagger). Then high school would have been a very great experience for him. Those would have been his glory days. So why on earth would he try to blow and shoot the place up? There would be no need to get revenge against the school and no reason to gain power. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

RaiseTheFist wrote:

Cullen says that Eric was born sick in the head and that the reader should ignore Eric's claims that he was treated poorly because he's too sick in the head to be taken seriously. Yet Cullen, by his own admission, isn't so well in the head either. Cullen believes that Eric's sickness undermines anything Eric has to say... I'm merely asking Cullen if the same applies to himself.

Very nicely worded.


Personally, don't know if Cullen's PTSD affected his view of Columbine although I can't imagine that it wouldn't. For me, it is as simple as the fact that his "evidence" is wrong.

On a side note, I just googled secondary PTSD and it looks like most of the people who suffer from it are people who live with and/or care for people with primary PTSD. Seems like it is a big problem among families of veterans.

CatherineM813 wrote:

I was just thinking about this earlier. If Eric truly was the person that Cullen had made him out to be(big man on campus, ladies man, filled with confidence and swagger). Then high school would have been a very great experience for him. Those would have been his glory days. So why on earth would he try to blow and shoot the place up? There would be no need to get revenge against the school and no reason to gain power. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

Cullen DOES believe that high school was Eric's "glory days". Cullen (somebody send this guy a mail bomb, already**) clearly states that Eric was having a great time at school and that he just wanted to hurt people because he was born a psychopath.

Cullen states that Eric had no rational reason to be angry. If Eric had a reason to be angry, Cullen would no longer be able to diagnose him as a psychopath.

For Cullen and his experts to diagnose Eric as a psychopath, they have to first rule out him having a genuine reason to be angry.

**This is a joke, OK? I didn't sleep last night. I'm not seriously threatening Cullen's life. So please don't kick me off the forum and make me go to all the trouble of re-registering under a different name, or anything like that.

RaiseTheFist wrote:

CatherineM813 wrote:

I was just thinking about this earlier. If Eric truly was the person that Cullen had made him out to be(big man on campus, ladies man, filled with confidence and swagger). Then high school would have been a very great experience for him. Those would have been his glory days. So why on earth would he try to blow and shoot the place up? There would be no need to get revenge against the school and no reason to gain power. Just thought I'd throw that out there.

Cullen DOES believe that high school was Eric's "glory days". Cullen (somebody send this guy a mail bomb, already**) clearly states that Eric was having a great time at school and that he just wanted to hurt people because he was born a psychopath.

Cullen states that Eric had no rational reason to be angry. If Eric had a reason to be angry, Cullen would no longer be able to diagnose him as a psychopath.

For Cullen and his experts to diagnose Eric as a psychopath, they have to first rule out him having a genuine reason to be angry.

**This is a joke, OK? I didn't sleep last night. I'm not seriously threatening Cullen's life. So please don't kick me off the forum and make me go to all the trouble of re-registering under a different name, or anything like that.

Don't worry. We all know you wouldn't actually physically harm Cullen. And I should have thought about that before I wrote that post. I don't know what I was thinking.

Has anyone read Marjorie Lindholm's book?

In one of the summaries it states she does talk about the bullying at Columbine, namely with Dylan.

I always find what others say about them to be VERY interesting. Brooks says it was painful to watch Dylan because he was so shy and awkward, it was sad. Others describe him as sweet and awkward. Very funny.. sometimes very mean and angry. Same with Eric.

I mention this because Marjorie was mentioned above, not trying to hijack old threads ;)

People eat this kinda stuff up, its just not healthy for the media but what can you do.

I have ptsd from my childhood and have never heard of secondary ptsd.. I imagine it would highly colour his view of the event! My views of the events of my childhood and the other children I lived with during that period are quite different. We all met up as adults for a few trials from those events and talking with them I heard a lot of things that I remembered differently. There were many things that I wanted to remember as not so bad when in reality they were just as nightmarish.
I read his book very recently and one of the first things I noticed was when he describes the shooting - when it's Eric he puts in every word he uses and every shot he makes. When it's Dylan he says 'one of the shooters' and doesn't explain as much. It's biased right from the start. For some reason Cullen wants to give Dylan a complete pass. so much so that at the start he says Dylan is having second thoughts when the bombs don't go off and mean old Eric has to run over to Dylan to force him to go shooting into the school!

Cemetery Jones wrote:

I have ptsd from my childhood and have never heard of secondary ptsd.. I imagine it would highly colour his view of the event! My  views of the events of my childhood and the other children I lived with during that period are quite different. We all met up as adults for a few trials from those events and talking with them I heard a lot of things that I remembered differently. There were many things that I wanted to remember as not so bad when in reality they were just as nightmarish.
I read his book very recently and one of the first things I noticed was when he describes the shooting - when it's Eric he puts in every word he uses and every shot he makes. When it's Dylan he says 'one of the shooters' and doesn't explain as much. It's biased right from the start. For some reason Cullen wants to give Dylan a complete pass. so much so that at the start he says Dylan is having second thoughts when the bombs don't go off and mean old Eric has to run over to Dylan to force him to go shooting into the school!

No doubts there. Cullen never distributed the blame with an even hand. Eric shouldered the majority of it, as Cullen had deemed him the psychopath ladies man, and Dylan the depressed, suicidal, coerced follower.  Adding in true facts like how Dylan laughed and shot people would have conflicted with his story line.

He's probably say Dylan was putting on a show for Eric when he was laughing and stepping on Sean Graves. Inside it was hurting his soul....

I don't believe either of them were inherently monsters. However the way Dylan was behaving that day was not the behavior of someone forced to kill. His own mother admits that.

Screamingophelia wrote:

He's probably say Dylan was putting on a show for Eric when he was laughing and stepping on Sean Graves. Inside it was hurting his soul....

I don't believe either of them were inherently monsters. However the way Dylan was behaving that day was not the behavior of someone forced to kill. His own mother admits that.

Completely agree! Cullen seems to want people to think of Dylan as a sad little puppet and Eric as some sort of Evil Puppet Master who forced him or tricked him into doing his bidding.

Dylan did what he wanted to do, what he had planned to do. Also by the things he was reported to have said during the shooting, he was enjoying himself.

Cemetery Jones wrote:

I have ptsd from my childhood and have never heard of secondary ptsd.. I imagine it would highly colour his view of the event! My  views of the events of my childhood and the other children I lived with during that period are quite different. We all met up as adults for a few trials from those events and talking with them I heard a lot of things that I remembered differently. There were many things that I wanted to remember as not so bad when in reality they were just as nightmarish.

That is understandable. You can take two people put them in a room show them the exact same thing, tell them something, etc. Then later ask them to talk about it. Its very doubtful they will have the same story, in the same sequence.

The same event would have effected everyone differently, with everyone having their own versions of what happened. While anyone else's version would seem untrue, or strange to them.  Especially with something traumatic in nature.

philosopher_king wrote:

RaiseTheFist wrote:

I always wonder if Cullen came to the conclusions that he did about E/D because they are the ones which are most healing to himself (and his Secondary PTSD) and not the most honest ones. When I watch Cullen interviewed on TV, he gets so animate about the whole subject -as if he really NEEDS to believe that Eric was a psychopath for some reason.

The media kisses Cullen's asshole. In the Time interview, they accept everything this dipshit has to say. They fall over themselves congratulating him on how amazing it is he finally unearthed the "truth". I've never seen any interviewer ask Cullen the difficult questions. They don't have to be rude about it, but for fuck's sake, Cullen's chapter on Psychopathy would be laughed out of university if it were written by a student.

Probably the reason why Cullen has never(to my knowledge) planned university visits. High schools are okay, because the questions are not tough to answer.

I look at these two articles. He really takes his ideas too seriously. I haven't read the The Bully Society book, but I give her more credibility than a journalist with a creative writing background.

Dave Cullen's critical review
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Authors rebuttal
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Cullen is right. Ive read the Bully society. Or parts of it, that is. The book is probably a good point if you want to understand bullying more. But it makes some eggrerious errors in regards to Columbine . I liked that it tried to go in depths in regards to the cultural roots behind bullying- masculinity, gender conformity and so on. I think that they have a tremendous impact or influence on why Kids bully, a lot of the times. I also think that bullying is a factor in regards to school shootings; albeit the extent to which it plays a role is hard to Come to terms with.

Nevertheless, She relied too much on outdated press reports, like Cullen says. Katherine Newman and Jack Levin also made the same mistake of making some really inaccurate claims when they published their books. Allthough, I think Levin got hes facts straight more than Newman.

Guest wrote:

Cemetery Jones wrote:

I have ptsd from my childhood and have never heard of secondary ptsd.. I imagine it would highly colour his view of the event! My  views of the events of my childhood and the other children I lived with during that period are quite different. We all met up as adults for a few trials from those events and talking with them I heard a lot of things that I remembered differently. There were many things that I wanted to remember as not so bad when in reality they were just as nightmarish.
I read his book very recently and one of the first things I noticed was when he describes the shooting - when it's Eric he puts in every word he uses and every shot he makes. When it's Dylan he says 'one of the shooters' and doesn't explain as much. It's biased right from the start. For some reason Cullen wants to give Dylan a complete pass. so much so that at the start he says Dylan is having second thoughts when the bombs don't go off and mean old Eric has to run over to Dylan to force him to go shooting into the school!

No doubts there. Cullen never distributed the blame with an even hand. Eric shouldered the majority of it, as Cullen had deemed him the psychopath ladies man, and Dylan the depressed, suicidal, coerced follower.  Adding in true facts like how Dylan laughed and shot people would have conflicted with his story line.

The psychopath- theory doesnt Come from Cullen. Dwayne Fuselier and Ochberg are amongst the experts that concluded Harris was a psychopath. Or very likely in the process of becoming one.

Other than that I dont think its so much wanting to give Dylan a free pass as that its considered to be a Bonnie and Clyde- syndrome. Its the narrative that when you have killer couples, theres a leader and a follower. Of course, that doesnt give one a free pass, either, Just for being a follower. But its a perspective/theory/fact that I know has been studied in regards to many couple murders.https://www.adlibris.com/no/bok/killer-couple-the-true-story-of-christina-marcum-and-jason-singleton-9781983630828.

Im not skilled enough to say that this analogy is true or false. But some of what Ive seen from online documentaries and so on, talk about this type of relationship as far as Im aware. The follower(s) relying on a leader to commit a Crime.

Only thing Im aware of is that Kate Battan suggested once that E&D were equally responsible for the massacre

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(Coincidentally, this appears to be an Old news report, so take it with a huge grain of salt).

So has Jeff Kass.