Sicko Doctors: Suffering and Sadism in 19th-Century America | Hacker News Reader

Sicko Doctors: Suffering and Sadism in 19th-Century America

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16 pointstintinnabula9 comments

I instantly think of Hostel, where they kidnap tourists for their underground torture business. Unironically, the first Client is a failed Doctor due to his unsteady hands, & has a sick fetish of performing meaningless surgeries on his victims. Even though it's just a movie, I believe there is a very big audience when it comes these morbid subjects like Torturing. It was sport back then and still is today in some 3rd world countries. And when I say "back then", pretty much just 200 to 300 years ago! It's still an undocumented tradition in other countries.

Article mentions how one might of turn sadistic by being fascinated for the first time seeing someone get amputated, an unexplainable enjoyment which leads them down to a sicker path if uncontrolled. Something to think about when you've got confused or especially younglings seeing things they shouldn't be seeing. Taboo subjects often leave a permanent seed

>I say "back then", pretty much just 200 to 300 years ago! It's still an undocumented tradition in other countries.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_detention_cam...

“That’s likely because popular views on medicine have changed radically since 1848, when the above passage was penned. These days, it would seem borderline blasphemous to group physicians — now regarded by most as healers and helpers, sworn to do no harm”

1848 was before antibiotics and even before antiseptic hand washing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis).

Then, the correlation between “going to a hospital” and “dying” was much stronger than it is today. That didn’t do much good for the reputation of doctors. People really had to be desperate before they chose to visit them.

When I was a kid some doctors did freak me out and i developed an anxiety for hospitals. The smell of disinfectant had a strong effect on me for a long time, I’d get stomach butterflies and nausea from it or whenever stepping into a hospital.

We have to realize that a percentage of doctors out there are psychopatic and can’t empathize with their patients. If one’s unlucky of encountering one of these early on they can develop a doctor phobia.

I need to clarify that psychopatic doesnt mean serial murderer, it’s just people who are incredibly smart but lack the capability to empathize.

It's fascinating to me how all these parts of the culture we take for granted have been born out of chaos, populism and technical progress just a century or two ago. And how very little discussion is there about it.

There's a lot of this in history and cultural studies, but for some reason it doesn't always make it into popular awareness. And official history teaching tends to put a lot of emphasis on war, sometimes to the exclusion of all else. The kings/dates/battles approach.

Yes, and it is to be feared that it would not take much to get back to that level.

Critiques that violent games and movies numb youths simply by exposure and lead them to become violent in real life eventually follow this exact same patterns.

I don’t know if that is exactly the case that exposure leads to follow the same patterns. But, a lot of exposure to a lot of violence must come with some effects after all and it may be hard to pinpoint those as they might be subconscious or latent. I watch some horror movies when I was a kid and I was scared shitless to even go to the bathroom at night as I was imagining creatures coming out of the dark, etc.

Now I am not scared of darkness or horror movies at all, they seen stupid and unrealistic so in a way I must have been desensitized. But I do have some anxiety popping up out of nowhere. Whether that is related or not I will never find out.

As a parent I’ll make sure my kids don’t have an over exposure to anything at all but I dont know how successful that will be, kids can sneak behind ones back and do what other kids do.

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