Personally, yes.

Murder, blood, acts of violence used to make me shiver in fright. But lately I can honestly say I really don't react to it in the same way anymore. Mabey becuase I transfer fear over to a more unemotional, scientific, police detective, "What's really going on here" before I even let any emotions get to me. Mostly it's how I react to deaths reported on the news. I always look for more clues, while the news reporters just try and force the idea of innocence or guilt already.

It hasn't sensitized me to it, maybe because Bobby cares so much about the victims. Believe you me there are shows out there that will desensitise you, but this show isn't one of them. CSI would probably do it.

i think there is a different between seeing a murder or a violent scene on film then seeing it in real life. america is becoming a very violent country, so seeing it in movies or TV doesnt have the same shock value for me as it used to. but if i saw something being murdered infront of me, i would be very disturbed by the whole thing.

I have had a personal experience witnessing a violent death (an accident not a murder) and I am here to say that really you're better off not seeing someone *really* die violently in front of you. It really changes you for life in a way I don't think I can describe to someone who has not been through the experience in a way that they would really *get it*. The thing is now I can kind of relate better to people who in the normal course of their day are likely to see death first hand (soldiers, cops, hospice workers, doctors, EMTs, etc). By far they were the most understanding and willing to let me talk about what I went through and I found them to be the most helpful in my recovery process (it's still ongoing by the way...there are more good days now than bad days, but the bad days still pop up from time to time). We have a very strange bond all being members of a club none of us really wanted to join but you don't always get a choice in the matter.

Having said that, I think that people who have experienced any kind of death even if it wasn't violent or they didn't actually see the moment of expiration should know that there is such a thing as grief counseling. I have gone from time to time and although it wasn't all I needed to help me through my experience--I was the youngest person in my group and while I was experiencing parental loss, the other group members were all recent widows and senior citizens--I think I helped the other people I was around and that indirectly helped me (unfortunately to a much lesser degree than I had hoped). If someone you love dies in any fashion, grief counseling can be helpful but it may not be all you need.

Trust me...real violent death is nothing like TV or movie death (actually the show that is the closest to getting real death right is 'Six Feet Under'...there is an episode of that show called 'Dancing For Me' that is very close to what happened to my mother and to me).

Whether death is slow, expected and peaceful or fast, unexpected and violent it's still life altering.

im really sorry that you had to witness something like. its good to hear that you talked to people about. the last thing im sure you want is to let that sit inside you and build up. again, im really sorry if i brought something up that might have upset you, that is the last thing i wanted to do.

There is more murder on the news in real life lately than on Crime drama.

First thing I do after the alarm goes off is turn on the news- mostly for weather and traffic, but OMG, all you hear is murder, beatings, rape, hit and runs, and break-ins (and they say the cxrime rate is down!). Yes, these soundbites always seem to open even the local network news programs. The "sensational" is supposed to grab your attention - - just another day in NYC. You almost never hear the good stuff anymore. IJS

I don't think LOCI, LOSVU, CSIs, and all the other shows can desensitize us to the reality of murder because we know TV's not real - - but I have noticed that I can eat dinner while watching them now w/o getting "grossed out".

Hotaru no apology is necessary...and no it doesn't bother me to talk about it as much as it would bother me to *never* talk about it. I am convinced that some of the problems my father has with what happened (besides his not being there for the accident) is that he steadfastly refuses to talk about it and pretty much banned me from discussing it with him the day the accident happened. He also doesn't talk about what he saw on his 2 tours of duty in Vietnam (which I am sure was far worse than what he would have seen had he been in my shoes). It's a pity to me really because there are certain groups of people out there who could handle it and yet I know he'll never say anything about it to them. That's men of his generation for you though...they're hard to change.

If anything I worry more about what to say to other people about my experience so as not to make them too uncomfortable (in some ways your imagination can be far worse than the real deal). But to get back to the original question, I really don't think that acted deaths desensitize you to the real thing unless there's something going seriously wrong with you in your head or you have some undiagnosed medical condition. If you saw a steady stream of the real thing on TV that might desensitize you more, but unless you're sociopathic or something, when you experience the death of someone you love, you almost certainly will react to that and it will change you.

Does that make more sense?

The Vault

That's what makes the world so scary!

ok then! *hugs* i can understand what you mean about feeling worried about how people will react when confide in them. cuz im sure i acted the way you expected () but i totally agree with if you lose a loved one, it will change you. its happen to me, and im sure to others.

it does seem like when you watch the news all they talk about is death and murders, but thats when they get their ratings. if they talked about lost kittens everyday, no one would tune in. well, i would but that besides the point. ~_~() no matter how many shows, or news casting you watch about murder, it still has an affect on one in someway. we are people not robots.

Sounds like we're cool hotaru...I didn't want you to feel to distressed or anything about what I said. I'm pretty honest about this topic but there's a fine line between telling people like it is and upsetting them. If you've lost someone then you're probably less prone to freak out or get too upset by what I wrote than if you had never lost someone. Most people in our culture are really uncomfortable with real death but they're fascinated by it enough to watch things like crime dramas

I heard something once that one of the guys about whom the Oliver Stone movie 'World Trade Center' was made said to the media about watching the TV news. He said that he figured that having been a rescuer at the WTC on 9/11 he had earned the right to permanently opt out of having to watch the TV news every night.

My mom was killed June 30th 2005, and we had relatives in the house (there for her funeral) on 7/7 (the day London was bombed in terrorist attacks) and frankly seeing people on the TV so injured and dazed and bleeding from the head (my mom died of blunt force trauma to the head), etc, I turned right around and walked out of the room (they didn't notice I had left for quite some time because that stuff is normally hypnotic). From that moment on I just stopped watching the TV news. Like that guy in WTC, I now know I not only have the right to turn it off or walk away, I've *earned* it. I get my news online and it means I can skip the daily gorefest. Frankly I feel not only better for dropping out of the TV news watching scene but smarter...there are so many more important stories that don't get covered on TV because they aren't shocking images and I am amazed at how unaware most people are of them.

To each his own though.

The Vault

It is downplayed.The generation that has grown up with movies,tv,now video games,even music have become jaded.
I tell ya when I watched the series "Murder" on Spike TV it is shocking especially to those participating.
Even then the people participating don't get the full blown experience.For example the smells.
We don't live in a war zone and have the "million mile stare".Being traumatized to the point of no response.
I wanted to go into the field of reconstructing faces on skulls(Frank Bender is the best!)
I just couldn't do it.

@ VDOVault :

I am totally understand what you're going through. When I was 8 years old I saw a body of a woman who was just beheaded by a some guy. I didn't really know what happened, all I remembered seeing crowded in front of my house so I just walked there and saw it. I remember couldn't sleep for weeks, scared of being alone, and having nightmare. I had no idea why I didn't even tell my mother. Only few weeks later, I saw another crowded again so I went there and it turned out that the guy that killed the woman was hang himself in jail and they brought his body back home and I SAW another dead body again!

Fortunately, years later I made it to forget it and as far as I know it didn't really affect my life, I didn't really think about it unless I saw something that can make me think about it, but not in traumatic way. That's why now I don't really mind talking about it.

Back to the topic, long time ago I used to get scared when saw horror movies, dead bodies on TV show or anything like that, then we got cable and then I started to get used to the "violence" thing on tv/movies because I know there were fakes. I remember there were programs in TV about "surgery" and I just couldn't stand it because I know it real. The weird part is my cousin enjoy watching it but she got scared when watching horror movies (wonder what's wrong with her ).

I think Criminal Intent still isn't that graphic as the other shows, so it didn't really affect me to see blood or bodies. However, when I saw the people who lost their loved ones in the show started to cry or just looked so shocked, then THAT'S the one that usually can affect me emotionally.

(However, I couldn't stand the violence in some Asian movies, it's just more than I can handle).

My mother had alzheimers, and I am the youngest of 3 kids. She didn't have me until she was 38 years old, so I grew up as an only child. To make a lone horrible story short, she didn't remember me at all. She said she only had 2 children, it was devastating, and put me in a state of depression, I wanted to crawl in in a hole, and never come out! I can see what Bobby meant when he told Eames when you lose someone close, it screws you up, and it does, for a while.

MajFrukt I know where you are coming from when you talk about the reactions of the loved ones on CI when they are told about or see something related to the death...that never used to bother me, but now sometimes it does. I'm not known for being easy to make cry when I watch a drama but that has changed a little bit. One of the few things that did make me choke up a little before my mother was killed was the Homicide: Life On The Street episode 'The Subway' (it's from the 6th season of Homicide). Now I find that episode very comforting (which is kind of odd) and instead am more upset by the Homicide episode 'The Heart Of A Saturday Night' (it's from the 5th season of Homicide) where a bunch of people who have had loved ones murdered or killed meet in a support group (including that show's coroner). That seems more raw to me now.

I also know where you are coming from in the story about the woman and later the man you saw...I think it is a little harder when you have a relationship with the person than if they are just a stranger, but a stranger's injury or death can be difficult to see too. Also culturally I don't think Americans and Europeans see all that much death in their everyday lives the way people from other cultures do. Maybe if we did, violence in movies and TV shows wouldn't be so popular?

I guess what is also interesting is how different people can talk their minds into and out of thinking things are scary or upsetting. That can change a lot over time but it's fascinating how that changes.

The Vault

KRodgers I admire you for turning out so well. As an only child who grew up with two loving parents (although admittedly my father was not in the picture as much as I would have liked him to have been because of his military career), I can say that being an only child is different but not necessarily bad or lonely. However having a parent that isn't reliably there for you whether you're an only or you have siblings has to be hard...I think that affects you more negatively than not having brothers and sisters. In your case KRodgers though it sounds like you had some other adult who was there for you so kudos to that person and kudos to you for where you are today!

The Vault

I wasn't an only child, my sister is 8 years older, and my brother 6 years older, so I was raised as an only child because they were already gone from home. I can tell you this, I wouldn't wish that devastation on anyone! It was the worst time of my life!

Wow, Krodgers, what more do we have alike, we have the same birthday, My two brothers are 12 and 14 yrs older than me, so I also was raised as an only child. Are you 5'2 with eyes of Brown? My mom was 32 when she had me and my dad was 37 I was a late in life child I guess, I asked my mom if I was a mistake, she told me I was the only one who was planned, My mom didn't suffer with the same disease as your mom, thank God, so sorry yours did. I can't imagine what that would be like.

KRodgers and JRyan it sounds like you were both for all practical purposes only children even though you had older siblings. It's too bad yours weren't around for you KRodgers when you were younger though...they might have helped you cope better.

I don't know of too many onlies who felt that being an only child was a disadvantage unless of course there were issues with their parents...then they did feel lonely growing up. I really didn't think about it unless someone brought it up to me and even then I almost never felt lonely...more lucky for the extra attention than lonely.

The only big disadvantage to being an only (regardless of who your parents are) is that things are harder to hide from your parents. If you bring home a bad report card you can't blame it on the family pet or say that a sibling's is worse LOL

The Vault

I know for me it was an advantage,I know we're OT but bear with me, my brothers would say they had our parents when they were poor and I had them when they had money. So at christmas I had more gifts, at 16 I got a car. Not only was I the Baby, I was the only girl, so that came with perks. But when I was real little, too little to remember they tell me stories of how one brother would give me something to play with and the other brother would fuss me for having it, so, guess there was a down fall. But when my brothers were little I guess times were tough, they told me a story of a pet duck they had and times were so hard mom had to kill and cook the duck, but my brothers were so depressed they wouldn't eat it. They didn't get airconditioning in the house till I was born. Mom still calls me the air conditioning baby. Now I will really feel old, I didn't get air conditioning in a car till I got married in 1982 also thats when my parents decided to finally get it too. Also they were very tight with their money, guess thats why they always have it, my first car they bought me was a standard toyota, I didn't know how to drive it, I had to learn how to drive a standard, and it only had an AM radio. But It was new. They always believed in buying new cars. I have great parents. Who are getting remarried on Oct 28.

VDOVault of course we are kool! *hi fives* ^__^

but i just want to let you all know that i really respect you all for putting yourselves out there and opening up. it really helps the healing process, even though it may not seem like it. i have trouble telling friends i have known for years some personal things about myself. but i know if i do tell them, they will treat me different. i should just take a page from all of your books.

i know what you mean MajFrukt about the asian horror movies. i wrote a paper about it. their type of horror is very different from ours cuz of the culture. but i think they are more psychological than the movies you might see in the states

Maybe we are related? How cool!

I'm 5'3, green-eyed. blonde hair, and weigh,ok 133!

Guess I'll weigh in.
I've stared down the barrel of a gun at two different hold-ups, the second of which with a friend shot at point blank range. She lived, but was never the same emotionally. The thing I remember is that at the time of these incidents I wasn't freaked out. The shakes and nightmares came after the shock wore off. From what I've been told, this isn't an unusual reaction. As a result, I don't get numb to televised violence.
When I watch "L&O:CI", I note that the violence (or aftermath) is only shown for brief amounts of time onscreen to give the viewer an idea of what may have happened. I don't get a sense of gratuity or perversion. I can't say that about any of the "CSI" series. The vibe I get from those shows is, "As long as it's within the context of the storyline, anything can be shown in great detail."
That's a concept taken from theatrical action films and it makes me wonder whatever happened to the "Hitchcock Method" of only showing vague hints and leaving the rest to the viewer's imagination.
I don't like being lead around by the eyes from one gorey moment to the next. Leave me something to speculate about, some cleverly written characters to be suspicious of and some gifted cops to figure out their dirty deads.
The imagination is still the most powerful tool.

Horrible thing to witness, but I agree, I believe some things are best left to the imagination. Guess thats why some movies aren't as good as the Books.

Too true...the freak out reaction if it doesn't happen to you instantly comes later (or at least it came a lot later in my case). And what I saw at no time was I in danger nor were there guns involved, just a freakish accident.



I still think Hitchcock is scary stuff, probably because of just what your own head logically fills in to complete the picture. Great point huntre!

The vault

Was it the one with Vincent on it? I have never seen the show but I think I looked the clip (because of Vincent) somewhere in the internet, and it was so tragic and sad.

I think somehow violence is still interested stuff to watch(or to read) even in the countries where violence happen all the time. I don't know the real reason though, I just assumed that human always interested in something dramatic, and violence part of it.




That sounds like an interesting paper I am Asian by the way and grew up in Asia, the strange part is when we saw violence movies/tv show, we usually blame the westerners culture for THAT influence

That's the episode...I don't know if there are any clips of that other episode I mentioned ['The Heart Of A Saturday Night'] online...I'll look and see

The only Heart of A Saturday Night clip I could find that was sort of moving

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=og69Pvemk1w



We might very well be guilty...it's hard to say

The Vault

PS Here's Mike Logan on H:LOTS
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9XT_I1t5aA

yea i know what you mean, and part of it is true. i lived in asia (japan) for a year. its a fairly safe country, but most of the crime that takes place there are done by foreigners. and most of the stuff they are getting from the west are the violent movies and shows. they kept asking me if i owned a gun, cuz they thought everyone and their mothers had a gun in america

I lived in Japan too. It is way safer there. And you are right, most of the crime is foreigner based.

I'm not sure if watching CI has made me desensitized. I probably freak out if I saw a real body but very little on TV shocks me any more.

I can't imagine not being somewhat desensitized to certain experiences and even emotions.
I remember when my son served his first tour in afghanistan, he would email about all the children he would see in the towns with missing limbs from all the mine fields. It disturbed him greatly. then after he was there for a few months he described seeing these children as *routine*. He was exposed to it so much, it had become routine.
then he went for his second tour and he never mentioned them again.. and I know these children were still there.. still missing limbs.. but now.. they were just *children*. Real life experiences most definitly desensitize us.. it's inevitable. graphic scenes in movies and tv will do the same over time... but to media.. not so much real life.. I think our minds .. whether we realize it or not.. knows how to seperate the two.

*bug*

With out having to open a vault of kleenex, I meant to be specific to TV shock value.

I would think a great example would be the 9/11 attacks on tv. On my way from Mexico to Texas, in Laredo, the tv had it plastered on the news. I SERIOUSLY could not even tell if it was a hoax or not. I'm from the internet generation who's grown up with a keen sense to question everything they "see" in videos. (especially those on CNN) But my point being that, becuase I had seen plenty of buildings blowing up, and people gettin slaughtered,(and maybe becuase I wasn't in NY) the reality of it didn't sink in till there was a formal announcement form the president.

I truthfully, just laughed at it, and continued shopping, shrugging it off. "A small fire and now they're blowing it out of proportion."

And now with the constant abduction of children, I think I may put too much faith in our real-life detectives (tv HAS real-life consultants [even with as many liberties as they may take])that I don't even bother with expressing any kind of emotion towards the family's predicament. Believing that they will find the missing child.

so.. are you saying you have been desensitized in the other direction.. believing that all will be well in the end as in television .. when in actuality.. as the example you gave with missing children.. that's hardly ever the case in real life?

*bug*

DET, have you taken your meds today? Just jokin'!

Uh this might be pointless, but once again I'll go back to my point of distinguishing fictional depictions of death from documentary/news type broadcasts of death (which are one step closer to reality) to witnessing it firsthand yourself and no camera to reinterpret it with or to distance yourself from it. They're all very different. If you haven't experienced category number three, on one hand you have my envy for not having to go through something awful, but on the other you have my sympathy because you might not have the capacity to understand a cataclysmic event in the way someone who experienced it first hand might.

As for 9/11, I got my first word of it by phone from my father (I was living in Houston at the time, while he and my mother were still living in the suburbs of DC). I had been out of town the weekend before, had worked late for several straight days and was taking a day off to catch up on my sleep. In fact I was sleeping late that morning when I awoke to a phone call from him telling me 1) to turn on the TV 2) that the Pentagon was involved 3) that my father had been in the Pentagon when the plane hit it but on a different side of the building and in a ring far enough away that he was in no danger 4) that he tried to rush over to help but they were literally turning scores of people away who had volunteered to help (my dad by this time was now working for a military contractor rather than at a Pentagon job, but his military and command training kicked in on old instincts) 5) that to the best of his knowledge no one from his old office in the Pentagon was hurt or for that matter anyone we knew was injured but that because of the total chaos we couldn't possibly know that for sure and 6) that it was probably a terrorist attack, the casualties would be high and the images would shock me.

I get that you normally don't believe what you see on TV (I probably wouldn't either but for my father's phone call and my knowledge of the Pentagon prior to 9/11) but I'm not sure I understand where your lack of empathy comes from nor am I convinced you speak on behalf of an Internet generation. In fact I'm not sure where you would have seen "plenty of buildings blowing up, and people gettin slaughtered" unless you were either from a country where there is a lot of that happening and or broadcast on the TV news or you had watched a lot of movies with exploding buildings and mass casualties (in fact I can't name 5 such movies). I found it really easy to put myself in the shoes of a friend or family member of someone killed on 9/11, even before I expereinced a violent death first hand, but even if DC hadn't been involved, I could have empathized with the people who lost people in NYC. In fact what you wrote that I'm quoting below disturbs me.



I don't think you meant any offense by it or maybe you're exaggerating your reaction to get a rise out of us on the board or maybe psychologically that's how you cope with hearing horrific news because you haven't got the kind of unenviable first hand experience some of the rest of us have with calamitous events or you just aren't as empathetic as I imagine the average person to be. But I have to be honest with you that I don't understand your initial reaction. And I'm not sure I want to.

To get this back on point and relevant to people who are interested in CI, I remember well that CI's debut was pushed back because of 9/11. I remember well that the NBC network rushed to change advertising artwork and publicity materials for the show in order to remove images of and references to the twin towers. And I remember well an interview with VDO at the time where he was struggling to do all the promised publicity interviews for the show, considering his new venture pointless and insignificant in comparison to what had happened, feeling helpless and irrelevant, concerned for both NY firefighters he knew personally and for the real MCS detectives who would have a hand in the investigations of 9/11 and have a front row seat to witness its impact. Maybe you weren't aware of that before now, but perhaps you will see why I am struggling with what stuck me as your very casual tone and your tossed-off probably-meant-to-be-humorous comment about "opening a vault of kleenex" where others here have responded with their genuine experiences and have tried to make you see my point (and their's)...that TV drama is not TV news is not real life and that most of us can make the distinctions without a lot of difficulty.

Unfortunately your apparent ignorance of other people's potentially different feelings doesn't stop with 9/11 though



This is one experience I have never lived through and by the grace of fate or God, I hope no one here ever has to experience this kind of injury to or loss of a child.

I'll close by saying that yes, I may be too attuned to the real pain of others who have been through real world tragedies, maybe a little more attuned than I would choose to be if I were granted the choice. But that is who I am now and frankly given your thoughts and input into this discussion, I think I prefer being overly sensitive to others rather than being in the cozy but oblivious dearth of emotion you apparently can muster towards others and their plights. It's a wonder to me you find fiction and reality so indistinguishable and if that is typical of how a significant number of people out there operate in the whole wide world, then I am somewhat disturbed by how things will work out for humanity.

The Vault

Guys, this is about politics, not the people. They control the people, this subject upsets me to no end! Try working hard your life to establish a reputable company, and then here comes the IRS! This topic is not this thread,IMO.

Some people lack empathy, and some of us have too much of it. Thats why there are some caring Doctors and Nurses out there and some that are just in it for a paycheck.

Too true also in the "lower" health care field of personal care - that's where I work. We recently lost a little client with disabilities, to cancer, and you could easily tell we people on her staff who *were* her family. The people who are just here for the paycheck didn't even go to her memorial service.


spook

People like that make me want to throw up!

I fell asleep half-way through the second sentence. Nutshell- or i'll read it later.

well.. my question was short.. why didn't you answer it?

*bug*

No, it hasn't desensitized me. It's a Televison show, it's entertainment, the corpses are actors.

There has been violence in film since it's beginning (look at some of the old silent movies) Radio mystery programs were violent (gun shots and screaming in the background) Television has always been violent (How many people did they kill on Gunsmoke?) It's nothing new.

Yes.

My uncle served in Korea, then Vietnam. When he needed to cope with the end results of what he was commanded to do, he would bury the images in his mind and the emotions that threatened to interfere with his future duties. As he told me in later years, "It's not about getting desensitized. It's a way to protect yourself from the aftermaths of war. How else could I keep going?"
I bring this up only to offer another way to look at the topic.

well. having lived through 9/11(i live in New York), that day evryone was walking around numb. no one knew where their family or friends were , the phones , cells and all were out. smoke and papers were filling the sky. we knew for sure what it was and it was terrifying! but i think new yorkers became more sensitive that day, we all felt what the other was feeling, very empathetic, i see more people trying to help others when something happens now either individually or as a whole.

DETNathalie 3 quick things

1) Remember you *started* this discussion. If you want short answers either do a poll (you're technically savvy enough to set one up) or don't even bring it up on a *discussion* topic in the first place.

2) I didn't jump all over you in your first thread here for having a different voice and behaving differently than others here would have liked...but if you can't avoid being flippant to others in your responses and refuse to consider reading what others post, then I respectfully suggest you not respond at all

3) Discussion implies you ought to read and think...not just post to be posting

The Vault

hmm.. and how does that make you feel?

*bug*

*hi five*