explosive consequences

Freudian fun from the Smoking Gun:

Terry Nichols, the domestic terrorist who teamed up with Timothy McVeigh to murder 168 people, 19 of them children, in the Oklahoma City bombing, is unhappy with his prison diet, which has left him struggling with "chronic constipation, bleeding, hemorrhoids" due to a lack of insoluble fiber. Remarkably, a federal judge yesterday rejected Nichols's bid for a preliminary injunction against the Bureau of Prisons, though a lawsuit filed last month by the 54-year-old killer remains pending. As seen on the following pages, the complaint filed by Nichols--who is imprisoned at the "Supermax" lockup in Florence, Colorado--contends that "God created mankind to consume unrefined whole foods" that work "in a synergistic way to keep one's body (i.e. God's holy temple) in good health to ward off various diseases."

A big fan of Kellogg’s bran products, apparently. He’s been joined in his quest by Eric Rudolf, the anti-abortion terrorist who planted the bomb at the Atlanta Olympics in 1996.

His thoughts on this also echo the original manifesto of John Harvey Kellogg, whose various dietary innovations – he invented peanut butter as well as corn flakes – were intended to purify the intestinal flora, which when left untended were the source of all foulness and disease. Kellogg was also a big fan of yoghurt, administered from both ends.

For his part, Nichols wanted to cleanse America of unclean and impure races. Rudolph’s thoughts ran in that direction too. The metaphors sometimes drawn between internal and external purity can sound a bit overblown, but here you have it: from my bowels to the master race.

Comments

[Alex]

He's going to purge and cleanse his precious bodily fluids...

[Paul Yarbles]

It's too bad both the internal and external purging is such an ugly business. Shitting and genocide. Get it over with as quick as possible, flush the results away, and don't dwell on the ugliness.

[ajay]

There does seem to be a bit of a link between weird fascist views and intestinal problems. Hitler, Gaddafi and Goering all come to mind.
The question might be: which comes first? Does constipation make you right-wing or does being right-wing make you constipated?

[Richard J]

I seem to recall that the core argument of Norman Dixon's Psychology of Military Incompetence was that the authoritarian personality type could be tied back to toilet training.

[dsquared]

I wouldn't exactly say the core argument, but it was definitely in there.

[Richard J]

Actually, I would - IIRC, the basic argument in the book boils down to 'military incompetence is a consequence of the institutional structures of a peacetime military promoting authoritarian-type personalities into positions of command. Authoritarian personalities are unable to cope with the fast-moving and unstructured demands of war. This personality type emerges in, and is identifiable from, early childhood. The main traumatic event of early childhood is toilet training..."

[ajay]

"The battle of Waterloo was won on the potties of the Home Counties" - Duke of Wellington (attrib.)

Toilet training is probably the main traumatic event of early parenthood as well. Certainly of early fatherhood.

[jamie]

"Toilet training is probably the main traumatic event of early parenthood"

That was the nappy stage I found: like bomb disposal. Eventually you just sigh and march towards the sound of guns, or rather explosions.

[ajay]

"This is great training for fatherhood, you know. You manage to get half an hour's sleep, then some little fat guy starts screaming at you and you have to get up in the middle of the night and clean something."
-- unidentified British Army recruit