Editorial

In the previous issue of this journal, we focused on the theme “From pain to violence” drawing on our stimulating IAFP Conference in Turin, where we referred to the shocking eruption of violence in the Middle East, as well as the ongoing war in Ukraine, noting how many other conflicts are raging across the world, on the background of climate crisis. Alas, these conflicts continue with a vengeance, alongside a rise in political polarisation in many countries (as we write this, Donald Trump's ear wound following an assassination attempt is barely scabbed over).

A glimmer of hope for the future has emerged with less polarised political governments being voted in recently, for example, in the UK and France. There is no doubt that a confluence of ingredients, including many toxic ones, have come together as the world becomes increasingly divided between a few extremely wealthy individuals and masses of people living in poverty and destitution: conditions befitting to outbreaks of violence which always dehumanise people. The impact on the mental health of humans cannot be overstated. So again, we ask ourselves, how can talking therapies contribute to ameliorating so many such dire situations? It is essential for us to persevere in not taking sides and in contributing to interrupting the cycles of violence—those within us all and those that are external to us.

In this July 2024 issue, we offer our readers a rich mix of articles, beginning with Professor Kahr who makes a link between the historical concept of castration anxiety and acts of murder. Each killing of a human by another human has its own unique complex “fingerprint” and Kahr illustrates this with two particular cases where copious notes happen to have been taken, enabling a degree of psychoanalytic understanding as to why these killings happened. Both perpetrators were severely traumatised in childhood, but as we all know, so many babies and children are traumatised and yet relatively few killings are carried out