Crazy or Not: Don Quixote and the Real World
Crazy or Not: Don Quixote and the Real World
There have been a number of well-known “mad men” over the course of time, a list made up of autocratic rulers, serial killers, mad scientists and other psychopaths who became infamous because of their violation of human rights and disregard for human life. Caligula, a Roman emperor in the early centuries, was notorious due to his cruelty and sadistic tendencies, extreme extravagance, and sexual perversity. Much later in the eighteenth century came Napoleon Bonaparte, a French emperor and scheming battle commander with a massive ego and delusions of grandeur, who sought power through war and conquest.
In the early part of the twentieth century were two leaders who amassed absolute power and wrecked havoc on the European continent. Who would not know Adolf Hitler, the dictator who ordered the mass annihilation of at least five million Jews in every country Germany occupied and caused years of hardship and chaos in Europe? Another leader, the Russian Dictator Joseph Stalin, instigated widespread purges, tortures and executions in the Soviet Union on his way to gain total control of the government. The second part of the twentieth century saw the emergence of the Cambodian tyrant, Pol Pot, leader of the Khmer Rouge, who caused mass executions of nearly one fourth of his countrymen, about one to three million people. Of recent times, Saddam Hussein of Iraq and Moammar Gadhafi of Libya would also probably fall in this category because of their genocidal mentalities.
These leaders have been identified as psychopaths who deliberately caused pain, misery and death to millions of people for their own personal gains. Surely, we could easily identify these people as crazy, mad men because of their deviant mental behavior in causing pain and suffering to millions of people in clear violation of their human rights. What about some less universally infamous people who did horrible deeds to fewer people? In this list would include
There have been a number of well-known “mad men” over the course of time, a list made up of autocratic rulers, serial killers, mad scientists and other psychopaths who became infamous because of their violation of human rights and disregard for human life. Caligula, a Roman emperor in the early centuries, was notorious due to his cruelty and sadistic tendencies, extreme extravagance, and sexual perversity. Much later in the eighteenth century came Napoleon Bonaparte, a French emperor and scheming battle commander with a massive ego and delusions of grandeur, who sought power through war and conquest.
In the early part of the twentieth century were two leaders who amassed absolute power and wrecked havoc on the European continent. Who would not know Adolf Hitler, the dictator who ordered the mass annihilation of at least five million Jews in every country Germany occupied and caused years of hardship and chaos in Europe? Another leader, the Russian Dictator Joseph Stalin, instigated widespread purges, tortures and executions in the Soviet Union on his way to gain total control of the government. The second part of the twentieth century saw the emergence of the Cambodian tyrant, Pol Pot, leader of the Khmer Rouge, who caused mass executions of nearly one fourth of his countrymen, about one to three million people. Of recent times, Saddam Hussein of Iraq and Moammar Gadhafi of Libya would also probably fall in this category because of their genocidal mentalities.
These leaders have been identified as psychopaths who deliberately caused pain, misery and death to millions of people for their own personal gains. Surely, we could easily identify these people as crazy, mad men because of their deviant mental behavior in causing pain and suffering to millions of people in clear violation of their human rights. What about some less universally infamous people who did horrible deeds to fewer people? In this list would include