I just completed binge-listening to Hidden: A True Crime Podcast and their coverage of the entire Lori and Chad Daybell case. While I thought the overall analysis by forensic psychologist Dr. John Matthias was much stronger than most true crime channels, I still felt that he shared the typical Ivy League education in terms of the literature he often quoted. He would refer to Freud, Jung, Poe, Shakespeare, and more without any assessment of whether they had sound ideas or not—he used them as if they were authorities on the human psyche. However, especially for Freud and Jung, I would not say that those two are followed much by psychologists anymore outside of the classroom environment. I also found him rubbing me the wrong way when he deemed all people a mixture of good and bad, emphasizing the gray in all of us. He treated those who believe in good and evil and pointing it out in others as simplistic and childish. As an Objectivist who has spoken about this on my channel before, Ayn Rand does believe that morality consists of good and bad people. It is the culmination of their actions that results in them, overall, being either or. I think Dr. Matthias is still too much a part of the mainstream in terms of his thoughts on morality.
Besides those issues with the main host, I was genuinely appreciative of the analysis I gained about the legal case from listening to their thorough coverage and in-depth interviews with people embroiled in this mess created by Chad and Lori. The podcaster duo knew more about the Mormon religion than I had ever cared to learn, and so they allowed me to peer into one of the wackier religions out there.
If you are unfamiliar with what has been dubbed the “doomsday cult” case by many, then allow me to catch you up quickly in my own words. Lori and Chad Daybell were each married to other people (Tammy Daybell and Charles Vallow) when they met at some sort of Mormon preppers conference. Chad seduced Lori by telling her that they had been married in a past life and were destined to be together now. Apparently, this line worked on Lori, and she fell for the mealy-mouthed, dull, slug of a man. But their spouses were in the way. So, all within 2019, Tammy and Charles were both murdered. As for Chad’s children, they were already brainwashed enough to remain safe. Chad had formed extreme Mormon rules, such as rating people as light or dark or declaring people as zombies filled with the spirit of the devil. However, his children were light while Lori’s younger children were deemed dark. They were getting in the way of their relationship, so like the biblical story of Abraham and Issac, it appears that Chad told Lori to sacrifice her kids for him, and they, too, were murdered in that same year. Finally, after the missing children were found buried in Chad’s own backyard, Lori was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole and Chad was sentenced to death in the state of Idaho.
Dr. Matthias mentions in some of the later podcasts the cult that Charles Manson led. Though Manson was clearly more mentally ill than Charles Daybell seems to be, it was an interesting point to me that, once again, people who considered themselves to be on the extreme “far right” and the “far left” can both end up in the same place of murder. When extreme beliefs delude a person, take them away from reality, the value of human life becomes significantly degraded. I believe that people, like Chad and Lori Daybell, only get “so complicated,” as Dr. Matthias discusses, when they compartmentalize and rationalize their lives away from reality. They are no longer simply value-seekers but delusional “truth-seekers.”
I get so offended when Christians openly say that atheists would have no qualms about murdering people. And yet, you have people like Chad and Lori Daybell, who completely devalue people and actually commit murder without acknowledging what they have even done. Now, the communists killed many people, too, in the name of the state, so religiosity can take form in various places. But what we can take from this behavior is to avoid anything that devalues human life. Because guess what? There is nothing more important on earth than you and your fellow rational man. They are the ones who have given you clean drinking water, unspoiled food, and safe, beautiful shelters to flourish in. Nature (or the environment) does not make these specific kinds of gifts for mankind and neither does god nor the state—people do. So praise those people, live with gratitude, and with your eyes wide open to the reality of living right here on earth.
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Links: https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/my/collections/1632031–mary-carr/cult/objecten#/RP-P-OB-15.310,0; https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65567072; https://theobjectivestandard.com/2016/11/ayn-rands-intellectual-development/; https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hidden-a-true-crime-podcast/id1521619380; https://www.beckydimattia.com/stories-in-art/2013/04/01/abraham-and-isaac/
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Views Expressed Disclaimer: The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily represent the postings, strategies, or opinions of American Wordsmith, LLC. Please also know that while I consider myself an Objectivist and my work is inspired by Objectivism, it is not nor should it be considered Objectivist since I am not the creator of the philosophy. For more information about Ayn Rand’s philosophy visit: aynrand.org.