Charlie Manson Research Paper

     Charles Manson has been named "the most dangerous man alive." Society referred to him as the devil. They believed he was the reason society was so bad in the 1960's. The 1950's to the 1960's was uncontrollably filled with violence. Our culture was shattered by the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., and Senator Robert F. Kennedy. At the same time, body bags from Vietnam were building up from a war that was tearing our nation apart. Riots and antiwar protesters marched across America. Many people worried that the US was getting out of control. "The Sixties ended abruptly on August 9, 1969..." wrote Didon in The White Album. On August 8,1969, director Roman Polaski's housekeeper found

He believed that waging a war between races was the right thing to do. Any sane person would be able to tell that waging war is wrong in this aspect. However, due to the Anti-social Personality Disorder, Charles Manson was unable to see the error in his ways. Also, those with Anti-social Personality Disorder then to exploit those around them. In the case of Manson, he manipulated his followers into committing murder for him by using religion. This trait could also be connected to the superiority complex that is often found in those with Anti-social Personality Disorder. Those with this disorder may consider themselves superior to those around them. This was evident in Manson as he claimed to be both the reincarnation of Jesus Christ and Satan. This sense of superiority over his followers allowed Manson to manipulate them as he saw fit and continuously fueled his delusions of grandeur. Manson fit other symptoms that fit this disease as well. Manson undoubtedly has Anti-social Personality Disorder.

Manson was happy with the death of those six people, but was upset with the sloppiness of that night’s murders (“Manson Family Murders”). “Last night was too messy, Manson told the group when they assembled back into their bunkhouse. This time I’m going to show you how to do it” (Bugliosi 355). After driving for hours Manson stopped at a house in the suburbs. He had his ‘Family’ drive around the block while he looked through the window. After a few minutes Manson returned to the car and told them that the house had pictures of children. He continued on to

Some characteristics of a cult can be: that the leader becomes the person worshiped instead of a god. It has thought reform like characteristics that are systematic in principle with a great focus on confession, criticism, and self-criticism, in a systematic way. The last characteristic has to do with heavy exploitation from the leader and other high ranking people and exploitation can be economical and sexual. This was given from a documentary given on the history channel that I had watched many years ago. The definition of a cult given by Wikipedia is: a cult is a religious or other social group with socially deviant and novel beliefs and practices. The Merriam-Webster’s definition is also similar: a small religious group that is not part of a larger and more accepted religion and that has beliefs regarded by many people as extreme or dangerous. A different definition that I had found for a cult and I think is a better explanation is: By its primary dictionary

His father is a Vietnam veteran, who was exposed to agent orange on the battlefield. When Manson was young, he had to complete scientific testing to make sure he didn’t have any issues from the exposure. At an early age he was opened up to a world of children with deformities, and children missing arms and legs. When he was old enough, his parents sent him to a Heritage Christian School, which was a private school that emphasized academics. It was there be became driven with an animosity for Christianity and instinctively started rebelling. Candy was considered contraband at his school, so he was peddling candy. Sketching his own

As I’ve said previously, the life of Charles Manson revolved around interpersonal violence. From an early age Manson was the victim of child neglect – his mother (Kathleen Maddox) would leave him with neighbors, “for an hour, then disappear for days or weeks,”

His followers claimed that he was their “God”. They said that he made them feel like they were one with him and that he could be whatever they wanted him to be. Manson had manipulated them to thinking they could do nothing or be nothing without them.

Charles Manson had a long history of neglect and abandonment since his childhood and this may have played a role in the development of his personality. The psychoanalytic analysis could argue that since he spent his childhood and feeling he had no control of his life due to the instability, this could have led to his personality traits.

Richard’s behavior and attitude was altered and messed with many times growing up as a teen, but one thing that could have had the greatest effects on him was one mesmerizing event that happened to him in his early teenage years. The event that occurred happened on May 4, 1973 was a traumatizing one that happened to Richard. Richard’s uncle Miguel got angry during a domestic argument between him and his wife, Jessie. Their already heated argument resulted in Miguel to shoot his wife in the head with a .38 caliber. Richard being present during this incident must have changed him drastically, because after this event he began to become cultivated in lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD, Acid, etc.) and Satanism. This resulted in one aspect of Richard’s teenage years that were very important were his religious beliefs. Richard’s beliefs were strongly oriented towards a satanic faith towards the devil and many other related topics. His religious beliefs could have had one of the biggest effects on him since he began practicing Satanism at a seemingly young age. Ever since Richard came in contact into Satanism he never let go of his religion and became a stronger believer partaking in satanic rituals and many other satanic related activities. This type of behavior at such a young teenage year could have altered the way he thought and effect the way that he behaved. The last thing event that helped mold Richard’s behavior and decision making skills were drugs. The drugs that Richard mainly abused were LSD and marijuana, these two drugs only had minor effects on the human body, but could have possibly opened his eyes to more seeing the evil in people and the bad that they were capable of. All of these events that occurred in his life lead up to his first major criminal offense. Richard got a job while still in school at an old Holiday Inn, where he used his passkey to

Merriam Webster, a cult is a religious group that is not part of an accepted religion because

Each killer uses their own different killing methods. Charles Manson believed in an impending apocalyptic race war, which he called “Helter Skelter” after the song written by the Beatles. Manson had a group of 100 followers,

Charles Manson was born to a 16 year-old unmarried girl named by the name of Kathleen Maddox. ("Charles Manson Biography", n.d.) Kathleen was sent to jail for auto theft and Charles spent much of his early childhood with his strict and religious grandmother and aunt. Soon Charles began living a life of freedom with his mother, he began to commit crimes and live the lifestyle of a criminal. Though it would seem that Manson would live a strict lifestyle because he was with his grandmother during a critical age, reuniting with his mother changed his entire makeup. This story is a prime example of the psychological theory. One of the fundamental assumptions of the psychological theory is inappropriate learning, improper conditioning, and the emulation of inappropriate role models ("Three Theories of Criminal Behavior," n.d.). It is clear that due to Manson’s upbringing, it possibly enhanced his criminal behavior. The influence of an individual’s criminal behavior can be related to the environment and family dynamics of such individual. Charles Manson is the father of Charles Manson Jr. It is not correct to say that because Charles Sr. was a criminal that Charles Jr. would grow up to become a criminal like his father. If the biological theory was true, Charles Jr. would have inherited his father’s criminal behavior.

Manson is a convicted serial killer who has become an icon of evil. In the late 1960s, Manson founded a hippie cult group known as "the Family" whom he manipulated into brutally killing others on his behalf. "Helter Skelter," Manson believed, was going to occur in the summer of 1969 when blacks were going to rise up and slaughter all the white people. He told his followers that they would be saved because they would go underground, literally, by traveling to an underground city of gold located in Death Valley. However, when the Armageddon that Manson had predicted did not occur, he said he and his followers must show the blacks how to do it.

The Family consisted mainly of Susan Atkins, Leslie Van Houten, Patricia Krenwinkel, Charles "Tex" Watson, Bobby Beausoleil, Mary Brunner, and Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme. Manson’s motive to begin killing all started when he had told the family “Helter Skelter” was coming, Helter Skelter was the uprising of a racial war between the blacks and the whites. Manson would facilitate this war by killing the whites and implicating the African-American community with various acts. (crimemuseum.org)

Because cultic behavior underlies more than extremist religious sects, many psychologists refer to these groups as charismatic groups. "A charismatic group consists of a dozen or more members, even hundreds or thousands. It is characterized by the following psychological elements: members (1) have a shared belief system, (2) sustain a high level of social cohesiveness, (3) are strongly influenced by the group's behavioral norms, and (4) impute charismatic