Social scientists are inclined to surveys of the general population, noting the coincidence of increased probabilities of outcomes with specific types of experiences. It's a valuable technique to determine general patterns, but hardly predictive except in the most general sense.

Athens' research, as he worked his way through undergraduate and graduate classes, took a different approach. He visited prisons to interview men convicted of committing violent crimes, trying to learn what they had in common. This led him to conclude that "violentization" was a four-step process that consisted of brutalization, belligerence, violent performance and virulence. One followed the other, in that order, and failure to complete all four would not result in a violent individual. This explains a higher incidence of violence among those who have themselves experienced brutalization, and for that matter a higher incidence among populations where brutalization is more likely to occur, but it allowed for the many with similar backgrounds who do not commit acts of violence.

It would be nice to think that somewhere in the mid to late seventies social science considered Athens' theories, tested and developed them, then perfected techniques to reduce the incidence of violence in society at large. Nice, but not bloody likely.

Faced with an individual who consorted with violent criminals, who boasted of his skills in gaining their trust, an individual who looked more like his subjects than his tweed-ruffled colleagues, and whose methods were subjective and anecdotal, academia responded by defending its turf. Despite having earned his Ph.D. with the support of a well-respected criminologist, Athens found it difficult to get work in the field. In the brief periods that universities took him on, he did not advance, and often had to find his own funding to continue his research. Yet he did continue, even while working in construction or otherwise unemployed. This shunning not only cost Athens his academic career, but his financial security and his first marriage. It severely tested his mental balance.

Rhodes shows that Athens theories dispel many of the myths of violent behavior, chiefly the belief that killers just snap, lose their mental bearings for the time it takes to lash out. On the contrary, Athens shows that violence is the result of a long and pre-considered process that often gives the perpetrator the advantage of acting before the victim can respond. Rhodes applies Athens' theories to some public personalities involved in violent incidents, including Lee Harvey Oswald and Mike Tyson. At this point his consideration of what constitutes the fulfillment of each step toward violentization seems to broaden. It narrows again when he discusses the failure of military training to turn all recruits into killing machines, despite the implicit understanding and use of all four steps in boot camps.

Rhodes wants to convince readers that violence is not a natural tendency for our species. He presents the development of Western criminal justice systems as evidence. Once, life was nasty, short and brutish. "Spare the rod and spoil the child" was a maxim applied with a virulence that would give pause to present-day disciplinarians. Children were beaten often and savagely for minor transgressions. Wives did not fare much better. Disputes were frequently settled in the field of battle. Violence was widespread, but declined, Rhodes contends, as citizens gradually handed its application over to the state, until it became the exclusive preserve of police and the military. Rhodes even has some statistical evidence that would put an end to the frequent short-term speculation about currently rising crime rates.

Of course, statistics that by definition exclude any act of violence committed by the sate, the punishment of criminals for instance, or military actions, are bound to show dramatic downward trends. Sure, life is easier if we all leave our broadswords at home, but assigning violence to someone else, even the state, is not the same as being non-violent. Rhodes failure to consider this is doubly ironic, given his detailed description of the violence done indirectly to Athens' career by established academic criminologists.

Rhodes also ignores the demand by victims of violence for closure, which is usually a euphemism for punishing perpetrators. He ignores the pressures applied to police to make arrests and gain convictions, often at the expense of accuracy. Do people take violence back into their own hands when conviction rates are low? Does that explain the rise of gated communities, security systems, and private police forces? Rhodes also ignores the successful use of violent external actions by major military powers to distract their citizens from domestic issues. Would the discussion of some of those issues turn violent without this outlet? The question is almost moot. If a tendency toward violence is not a part of our make-up, it is certainly an ever-present alternative. What would happen to a country that was unwilling to use violence to defend the interests of its citizens? It would not enjoy the benefits of cheap oil from the Middle East; that seems certain.

Rhodes and Athens have defined people's use of violence too narrowly to be able to claim knowing Why They Kill. Still, it is a long way from supporting others' uses of violence to further our own ends, to actually firing the shots ourselves. Four steps away, according to Lonnie Athens and his biographer, and those may be the first small steps towards truly understanding our dependence on violence in all its forms.