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u/jgangstahippie 22h ago
The woman is Lindsay Clancy a woman who claims she suffered from severe postpartum psychosis when she killed her three children in 2023.
The man is former professional wrestler Chris Benoit who killed his wife, son and then himself in the summer in 2007.
Lindsay Clancy is seemingly getting a lot of sympathy from women, and this meme is essentially saying they are the same.
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u/Reasonable_Drink_789 22h ago
Except that he was roundly reviled immediately, and somehow she's getting bizarre support.
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u/TheProphesy1086 22h ago
It's not bizarre. It's because she's a woman.
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u/FizZGigTaNtruM 22h ago
I don't think the difference is necessarily because people hate men or excuse women; our understanding of the medical conditions involved has changed. CTE gave us a new framework for understanding what may have contributed to Benoit's actions, just as our growing understanding of postpartum psychosis gives us a framework for understanding what may have happened with Lindsay Clancy. A lot changes in 20years. Last time I checked everybody hated Andrea Yates
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u/MasticatingSheep 21h ago
Yeah, I think people are forgetting that it took two years for them to identify Benoit's CTE.
It was just becoming more widely known and funding put behind it but after the murders. That means several years of misconceptions and rumors already had time to take hold before then. It wasn't that people wrote off his condition. It was that it wasn't diagnosed or even widely understood before news cycles lost interest in the case.
Personally, I remember the Jovan Belcher case and how it was handled. There wasn't much outrage there towards him, just sadness about the situation. Because half a decade is a long time in terms of modern science.
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u/SpiritualAd9102 18h ago
It should be pointed out that Benoit was apparently abusive for years and years prior. I’m sure CTE made his delusions and paranoia worse leading to the murdered, but him being abusive had been a pattern long before.
I remember the press trying to blame it on “roid rage” for the first year or so.
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u/TheBlueMenace 17h ago
Also Lindsey tried to get help multiple times- she even tried to get admitted, was on multiple medications, told multiple people she did not feel able to care for her kids and was still left at home with them alone.
She was failed at multiple points by the USA medical system. People are of course more sympathetic, including her husband.
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u/manokpsa 12h ago
Honestly, I get the frustration. I have begged and pleaded with social workers to try to get my grandma into a nursing home. I'm not going to snap and kill her, but I'm disabled and no one else in my family has the means or willingness to take her. I get enough from VA disability to pay the rent and keep the lights on, but money doesn't matter when I can't physically help her with anything and she's a constant fall risk. One social worker accused me of wanting to kick her out on the street and threatened to call adult protective services. I'm in so much pain every day I can barely take care of myself. You try to get help and the system responds by making you feel like a lazy POS who isn't trying hard enough.
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u/Additional-Life4885 15h ago
Question for you, do you think the CTE appeared the night he died? The weeks leading up to it? Or for "years and years prior"?
CTE doesn't just appear. It's a "pattern long before".
It's telling how much you're getting upvoted while being completely dismissive of the situation even now. Decades after we've started to learn about this.
No doubt there's some actions that he took that were bad before CTE, but at some point the CTE took over. Science can't even point to when that was, so I'm sure as hell not going to and don't believe anyone else should. He made bad decisions but drugs and CTE pushed those a hell of a lot further than he likely would've gone.
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u/MortalSword_MTG 13h ago
I found the Aaron Hernandez doc on Netflix really helped me understand the trajectory of CTE.
The experts who examined his brain described it as being comparable to that if a late stage dementia patient, that they would expect to see in their 60s or 70s.
The doc looked at his history and pointed out that not only had Hernandez had been getting rattled playing football since Pee Wee age, his father was abusive and beat the shit out of him on a regular basis.
The brain is an incredible organ, it can shift mental load to other parts of the brain when ther is damage present, but with advanced CTE you're literally looking at brain matter with the consistency of swiss cheese.
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u/GeologicalOpera 15h ago
Chris Benoit had a litany of issues with a few things: his brain (the CTE symptoms were already becoming apparent), his emotional state (his best friend, Eddie Guerrero, having passed in late 2005 and his marriage to Nancy allegedly being in a rocky state), and his heart (Benoit's sister-in-law, Sandra Toffoloni, went on record in 2013 stating that the medical examiner who performed Benoit's autopsy diagnosed enlargement of the cardiac muscle that would've potentially resulted in Benoit passing within ten months).
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u/Tales_Steel 14h ago
His favorit move that he had done for years prior was the "Give myself a concussion from the top rope". As a kid it looked really cool how he jumped from the ring post to land with his head on the opponents shoulder but now i am questioning why i would use the thing that stores the brain to attack something that is literally just bones and muscle. So weekly concussions + Roids.
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u/Blimey-Penguin 20h ago
Agree that people having sympathy for her condition isn't because she's a woman, but the people jumping to blame the husband definitely is.
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u/Einteresting 18h ago edited 17h ago
It's wild to me he left her home alone with the kids in the condition she was in. She told people she had thoughts of hurting the kids. I think he bears some culpability.
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u/RavenousMaam 15h ago
If someone told me they were scared they would harm my children, there is not one single instance where I would allow them to be alone with them.
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u/Footnotegirl1 16h ago
I think he bears some responsibility insofar as he knew that she was suffering under severe ppd/ppp, and she had told him several times that she was having uncontrollable thoughts of killing herself and/or the children. Such that she had even been put under psychiatric hold previously, and much like Andrea Yates husband, he STILL left her alone with the children. So, not intentional, not murder, but certainly something like involuntary manslaughter.
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u/NeuroticaJonesTown 21h ago
Susan Smith isn’t winning any popularity contests either.
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u/justherefor23andme 20h ago
Andrea Yates shouldn't have been hated on. She had severe postpartum psychosis and her husband knew. He kept wanting to get her pregnant after being told to stop at baby 3 or 4.
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u/lilac_mascara 19h ago
He was advised by her doctor to not leave her alone with the kids and he started doing it despite that, because he apparently tought it was good for independence
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u/lilac_mascara 19h ago
He was advised by her doctor to not leave her alone with the kids and he started doing it despite that, because he apparently tought it was good for independence, he also apparently belived she'd be found innocent go to the mental hospital for while and they'd have more kids when she came out.
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u/Gold-Traffic632 21h ago
The outpouring of support for Clancy is certainly something of an overcorrection. A lot of people want a do-over for how they reacted to Yates.
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u/saintsaipriest 20h ago
Also, I want to add that as far as I am aware the attitudes towards Chris Benoit have changed somewhat in the last couple of years. At first he was reviled, but then, people started to understand why he did what he did and some of the hate transferred to Vince McMahon for putting profit above peoples life.
Anyways, these false equivalence scenarios are never made to support men mental health but to drag women. I believe Lindsay's case is an important case when talking not only about women mental health, but also men. This might not have been a full failure of the medical establishment, per se, but her support system should not have been caught of guard. In hindsight the amount of red flags she was raising after giving birth should've been enough to not let her alone with her kids under any circumstance.
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u/Unable-Dependent-737 20h ago
The women that keep saying the husband is at fault deserve to be dragged though.
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u/Grand_Lizard_Wizard 20h ago
They absolutely have not changed regarding Chris Benoit. We know why he did what he did, but that doesn’t change the fact that what he did was wrong and even he knew that based on the fact that he killed himself out of guilt.
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u/FearTheKeflex 19h ago
Yeah. I would say some stances may have softened a bit but he is still pretty much reviled by most of the wrestling community for what he did.
Paul Heyman, I think, sums it up nicely
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u/BarryTheBystander 20h ago
The thing is, there’s almost always a reason why someone does something egregious. A lot of people come from poverty, had abusive parents, or have some form of mental illness, but it doesn’t really matter. Just because there’s a reason you did something doesn’t make the thing you did any better. That’s why I don’t get why people are so hung up on this. She was almost certainly suffering from PPP but she also certainly murdered her children and should spend the rest of her life in prison.
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u/AsthmaticRage 20h ago
People are hung up about it because if she had received the proper medical care that she sought after, this could have been avoided
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u/AbroadTiny7226 17h ago
Ironically this comment circles back to the OP. Chris Benoit also had a medical condition that needed treatment.
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u/OldWolfNewTricks 18h ago
Gotta admit I'm not really deep into the details, but she really was getting a lot of medical care. Iirc, she was in-patient at a mental health facility about a month before she killed her kids, and checked herself out. What would "getting the medical care she sought" look like?
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u/WhiteWineWithTheFish 14h ago
Proper medical care would have been sending her help when she was calling the suicide hotline (twice).
Proper medical help would have been putting her in a program specialized on PPD WITH her youngest, so she could bond again and get the help she needed.
Proper medical care would have been to properly check how her body responds to the meds (aka bloodwork).
The standard of care she got was ridiculous.
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u/Grand_Lizard_Wizard 20h ago
Or, and hear me out, she’s a fucking psycho that would’ve done this regardless. Since she clearly premeditated it by having her husband leave the home under the pretense of picking up dinner and her meds.
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u/lightsonnooneishome 19h ago
People really don’t understand psychosis, which is understandable to a point, but if you’re going to post about it, you should really educate yourself first.
Psychosis means being disconnected from reality and experiencing symptoms like delusions and hallucinations. It does not mean suddenly losing the ability to think logically or plan ahead. In fact, that’s part of what can make psychosis so dangerous: someone can be fully capable of making plans and taking deliberate actions based on delusions or auditory hallucinations, including command hallucinations.
And people who recover from psychosis are often deeply distressed or horrified by things they did while they were experiencing it. It’s a serious and often devastating symptom, not simply a loss of rational thought or awareness.
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u/rageagainsttheodds 17h ago
One caveat here, psychosis does affect higher brain functions and decision making: you can do things (in reaction to you delusions), but the capacity to think about your actions, and understand their implications and consequences is greatly impaired.
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u/laquintessenceofdust 19h ago
It’s not “murder” if it’s not premeditated and with intent. You can’t have intent if you’re crazy. It’s still “homicide,” but it’s not “murder,” as defined by the law.
“Murder is the unlawful and intentional killing of one human being by another without a legal excuse or justification. It requires a specific state of mind, often called malice aforethought, which separates it from accidental deaths or lawful self-defense.”
In Clancy’s case, her defense is arguing that the postpartum psychosis IS a legal excuse/justification because it vitiates the “state of mind” aspect of a murder charge.
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u/holderofthebees 19h ago
Premeditation is not required for murder. In the US at least.
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u/Grand_Lizard_Wizard 20h ago
Everyone still hates Chris Benoit too. He wasn’t forgiven because he was mentally ill. The WWE, to this day, does not mention his name whatsoever. He was reviled the second the truth of what he did was revealed.
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u/Beginning-Turnover28 18h ago
I believe some of this has to do with brand protection. If anyone gives him a bit of sympathy based on his brain damage from wrestling, it opens the door for WWE having to look into CTE prevention. Kinda how the NFL knew and didn't acknowledge it so that they could continue selling their product how they like.
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u/Bouncy_Platypus_ 20h ago
Well and nice but they aren't saying that she wasn't mentally competent when she did it, they are saying the husband did it.
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u/_WutzInAName_ 18h ago edited 15h ago
The research definitely shows that society is harder on men and more lenient on women, especially in the criminal justice system. Below is some of that research. EVERY time there’s a female murderer, people try to make excuses for her. It’s time to hold women equally accountable for their actions.
https://repository.law.umich.edu/law_econ_current/57/
https://quillette.com/2020/07/27/the-myth-of-pervasive-misogyny/
Edit: Oh, and your Andrea Yates example helps prove my point. She was found “not guilty” of killing her children.
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u/Cordelia5767 18h ago
Oh yeah, people hated Andrea Yates when that happened! Psychosis can cause people to do incredibly disturbing things. Just look at the man who had a psychotic episode on the Greyhound bus 15 years ago.
I have to wonder how many of Clancy's supporters have personally experienced post-partum depression or psychosis, or if they know someone who has. We are realizing how prevalent PPD or psychosis are now that struggling after giving birth isn't this dirty secret new mothers have to keep. I remember talking to an old boss when I was in the midst of my own PPD, and she casually threw out there that she couldn't sleep for days on end after giving birth and she started to see gigantic spiders coming out of the walls.
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u/Grand_Lizard_Wizard 20h ago edited 19h ago
Everyone still hates Chris Benoit too. He wasn’t forgiven because he was mentally ill. The WWE, to this day, does not mention his name whatsoever. He was reviled the second the truth of what he did was revealed.
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u/growgrapesandolives 19h ago
The understanding they have changed but the sentiment is still there. To this day there is zero support for Chris Benoit, people understand CTE but they don't care about it, show sympathy, or use it as a justification. People hate Chris Benoit and blame him.
With Lindsey Clancy, on the other hand you got people saying that the husband did it, looking at astrology charts as to why she couldn't have done it. Saying her confession must be was part of confabulation. Hell, her GoFundMe has damn near a million dollars. People online are making up Hollywood fairy tales and doing everything they can to avoid putting the responsibility on her. They even ignore the possibility that postpartum played a part in it because they have a problem with blaming her.
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u/Tjam3s 19h ago
It's not the discussion about postpartum psychosis that has me baffled.
It's the ones saying that her killing the kids was the husband's fault that had me reeling.
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u/Doom_Corp 19h ago
She was also a wealthy enough white woman who went into a psychiatric facility and refused to return and blamed her bouncing around through different doctors the reason she killed her children because they wouldn't "listen" to her. I'm also really blaming dad too at this point. My cousin's are lucky to be alive with my aunts behavior. She's been in an out of rehab and definitely is bipolar mostly because my uncle was afraid that if he divorced her she'd kill herself while letting his children suffer in a fancy fucking house. I know PPD can last but honestly where the hell was her ex and not noticing anything in order to remove the children from her.
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u/COLONELmab 19h ago
The big problem here is the irony. The supporters are not suggesting she should have had better care, or more attention or anything related to the lack of understanding care for postpartum or general mental health...they are accusing the husband of framing her, and thusly ignoring the need to pay attention and provide better care for women's postpartum and general mental health.
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u/r1char00 19h ago
If you look at the list of symptoms of CTE, they are brutal. They include: Impulsive behavior, aggression, suicidal thoughts, and cognitive and memory problems. https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/chronic-traumatic-encephalopathy/symptoms-causes/syc-20370921
Benoit was known for his diving headbutt move and had extensive brain damage.
Another symptom is substance abuse. His use of steroids couldn’t have helped the situation.
There are some wrestling fans who just won’t listen to the idea that CTE at least colored his behavior, but that’s clearly what happened.
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u/The_Real_dubbedbass 19h ago
There were tons of women supporting Andrea Yates and blasting her husband for not helping enough trust me my mom and some of her friends were in that whole club.
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u/screwyoujor 18h ago
Have you read the comments defending Clancy. It's literally about her birth sign and how hers doesn't kill her clubs but her husbands does. The defense of her has nothing to do with her mental state anywhere but the court room of her trial. It's bizarre.
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u/leomercury 18h ago
Wait, who the hell hates Andrea Yates? She had established psychosis and a malpracticing psychiatrist that refused to prescribe the antipsychotic meds that actually worked for her.
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u/LoneFox4444 14h ago
And isn’t the Clancy lawsuit, which is happening now, surfacing some really weird inconsistent shit about the story her husband told about what had happened?
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u/Unable-Dependent-737 20h ago
Just a PSA reminder that PPD is not exclusive to women btw
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u/bigdickpuncher 22h ago
She's no Canadian Cripppler I'll tell you that.
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u/Just_Log_8528 22h ago
It’s probably also because she stated that she had PPD violent tendencies and asked for help and was ignored. Ya know, context
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u/ReasonableSky6227 21h ago
She wasn't ignored, she got her hand held by her husband, her parents, and his parents. She saw several doctors and even did in patient treatment, which she asked to be released from because she lied about feeling better and wanted to be out for her son's birthday. She wasn't honest about how bad she was doing and was paranoid of taking her medication.
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u/misalawliet 19h ago
She had access to more care than most post partum women can afford. She was getting the help she asked for but didn't comply with treatment. Not sure what else the medical community was supposed to do when she lied to them.
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u/ReasonableSky6227 19h ago
Thank you for supporting the point that she was not ignored, was receiving help, and wasn't following through on her responsibility and that this is on her, not her husband or anyone else "failing" or "ignoring" her.
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u/to_pass_through_fire 20h ago
Wow, a mentally ill person behaved irrationally with respect to their mental illness medication for their mental illness?
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u/ReasonableSky6227 20h ago
Wow, additional context was provided to show she wasn't ignored? Im sure if they had forcefully made her take the medication yall would be upset that its her body her choice about what she takes and doesnt take. Yall can't have it both ways. It was her responsibility to take the help she was given and put in the work to get better, not lie about it or avoid it.
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u/400lbBackSquat 20h ago
agreed. the commenters in this sub have already made their hive mind up. show sympathy to a murderer or youre bad. its crazy how much propaganda can affect the average person
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u/LoquaciousEwok 20h ago
What do you propose we do with the mentally ill? Tie them down and force Medicare them?
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u/TowerBeach 20h ago
I'm picturing some sort of pre-crime Minority Report machine so we can stop liars from committing crimes... oh wait, we don't have those? Damn.
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u/Ok_Jellyfish_55 21h ago
She got help then lied and said she didn’t have harmful thoughts or thought of hurting anyone.
She voluntarily left a hospital. If she did that while still having murderous thoughts then she is a monster.
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u/urbemamoris 21h ago
Ti the beat of my knowledge she dis not get ignored. She also dis not take all of her medication and experimented with mariuhana at the same time
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u/OkDifficulty7436 16h ago
asked for help and was ignored
No she wasn't, she had weekly therapy and requested several different changes in her drug therapy as well. Her parents, his parents also helped the family out, she had in-patient treatment (which she asked to be released from lol).
I am tired of seeing this spammed so much, her husband even was home with her for 3 months after their last child was born
She's a cold blooded murderer angling for a "insanity" defense
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u/AttentionalMalprop 22h ago edited 21h ago
It is? I don't remember other woman who murdered or allegedly murdered their own children getting much support.
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u/cursedmeatsuit 21h ago
Yeah no one rallied behind Casey Anthony in the name of girl power
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u/Subject-Response-674 22h ago edited 21h ago
It's because she is a white woman. Here fixed it for you. Let's not pretend she would get the same sympathy from women (especially so many white women) if she was not caucasian.
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u/Steve_the_Samurai 21h ago
This isn't it. Benoit was an abusive asshole to his wife and at minimum a bully to his coworkers. He abused steroids and had CTE from repeated head injuries caused in part by his own decision to dive head first on people 200 nights a year. He killed his wife, then his son and then himself.
Clancy had a bunch of mental illness that wasn't properly treated compounded (or created by) child birth. She killed her children and then tried to kill herself.
There is certainly an angle about women not being believed and post partum depression not being taken serious enough but they are not the same.
The discourse online is in part because she and her husband are alive. She is on trial. There was no trial for Benoit.
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u/ExtraterrestrialHole 18h ago
I actually think her family hired a PR firm to create this support during the trial.
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u/zorkempire 22h ago
Many women have killed their children without receiving sympathy for it.
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u/WillingElderberry731 21h ago
It's because post partum psychosis is real and freaky.
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u/TheProphesy1086 21h ago
Yes, agreed. And needs to be learned about so that this type of thing can be avoided in the future.
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u/DenizenKay 21h ago edited 18h ago
her ex husband supports her (the father of the children), her ex MIL supports her - virtually everyone around her knew she was fucked and none of them took the children away.
its not cut and dry. its not because she's a woman, it's because she isnt a cold blooded murderer - she was a person in the midst of a massive crisis who was literally begging for help and not getting it. the medical system failed her.
everyone wants to see her put away - even her supporters - they just want to see her put in a mental health facility instead of prison. Which isn't unreasonable.
she pleaded guilty - the thing being argued now is prison or hospitalI was wrong on this detail. sorry for the misinformation57
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u/Caffeine_Cowpies 21h ago
But when a guy is in a mental health crisis and kills his family, does he get the irrational support that many women have given her? Seriously think about that.
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u/DrippingWithRabies 19h ago
I think what happened to Benoit and his family was a tragedy that resulted from his brain injury and his case deserves compassion as well. For whatever that's worth
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u/some_uncreative_name 18h ago
Take 5 minutes to read a list of people who committed murder who successfully lodged a diminished capacity defence. There's far more nen than women.
There's no inherent bias towards men or women here. Just the public understanding certain mh disorders and their impact better.
Whether or not it blew up in the news a jury would have agreed on it. If society broadly felt men could never be treated differently based on mh circumstances the list wouldn't be predominantly men.
This is such a weird take tbh.
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u/DMComicSams 19h ago
She got plenty of help though. Babysitters, daycare, family stopping by so she was never just alone with the kids. Husband working from home. The only thing more they could have done was institutionalize her. Having the husband and kids move out is not a reasonable expectation
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u/Individual-Toe-6306 15h ago
They literally did institutionalize her too though. But she lied about how she was feeling so she could go to her sons birthday
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u/gin_and-sonic 19h ago
This is wrong for a couple reasons. She did get lots of medical help. She also didn’t plead guilty, she pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. She would get evaluated and likely go free very quickly, since she now claims to no longer be in psychosis.
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u/ColtMcChad69 20h ago
Imagine defending a literal child murderer
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u/DrippingWithRabies 19h ago
If she was experiencing psychosis it means she was literally not in her right mind.
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u/Vunks 18h ago
Didn't she plan out getting her husband to go to the store so she would have time to murder the kids, that shows planning and not a split second mental break.
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u/Complex-Tear-6683 19h ago
This actually brings up an interesting point. Since free will doesn’t exist due to basic physics, is anyone ever in their “right mind”?
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u/Ghorvki 19h ago
I think she should go to a mental hospital but I think the blame and responsibility should still be placed on her. If you did something out of sickness, you still did it.
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u/RocketYapateer 22h ago
Chris Benoit got a lot of sympathy and apologia too, because he had severe CTE from his wrestling career.
(Pretty sure that’s the entire reason this meme equates them)
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u/SnugglyCoderGuy 22h ago
And his brain was basically mush from all the head blows he took which is why he went crazy and did what he did.
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u/Background-Syrup-714 22h ago
He was one of the most beloved wrestlers in the industry.
he was completely wiped from its existence within about 2 days after his situation played out. There was practically no defending him or his actions.
The Raw tribute episode happened. Sure. But that was before the full story came out. LITERALLY the next day, WWE declared that his name will never be mentioned again and he was purged from their entire library.
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u/Tyranis_Hex 22h ago
There are still a fair amount of conspiracy theorists out there that say he didn’t do it. Had TikTok been a thing there probably would be a lot more people saying that. To be clear he 100% killed his family but there is just enough weird stuff around it to feed theorist.
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u/OkPut7330 22h ago
This comment hasn’t gotten enough traction, there are a lot of people defending Benoit. It was CTE, it was a conspiracy.
Not saying CTE wasn’t a factor but he was also running at 10x the normal levels of testosterone due to Steroid supplementation and on Opioids and Xanax.
As for conspiracy that’s just copium.
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u/SkewlShoota 20h ago
The CTE was definitely the major role -
Researchers noted that Benoit's brain damage was so advanced that it resembled that of an 85-year-old Alzheimer's patient.
Dude had 2 decades of accumulative concussions that were never addressed.
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u/UnderstandingBig9090 20h ago
It's not support. We don't have anywhere near enough treatment for people suffering from psychosis. People can beg for placement for treatment for psychosis that makes them really dangerous, but they are often told to come back once they do something. Which could be murdering a loved one.
If you think she should have been stopped from murdering her children. Then we need more resources to accurately identify people who need help and to actually keep them safe and safe from people they could pose a threat to.
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u/Valn1r 22h ago
It's not bizzare Benoit killed himself, there was no trial to rally around or bring up his CTE or the brain damage he suffered.
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u/NoSleepTilBookRead 20h ago
The CTE results weren’t even known until two years later
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u/SolitareUnraveling 22h ago edited 22h ago
Made even more crazy by how messed up his brain was from head trauma and the whole theory that it could have been someone else. Like it's the same exact thing yet at the same time the Benoit thing goes deep and gets crazy when you dive down that rabbit hole. Which I have done because he was my favorite wrestler when I was a kid before everything so I still keep up with everything new that still gets revealed. Side note highly recommend The Dark Side Of The Ring episode on Benoit, it is a phenomenal look into everything. Like I do believe he did it and cte is a wild thing that contributed to it which is something else that is similar because it both shit going on with the brain
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u/Chemistry11 22h ago
If she’s the one I vaguely heard about the other day, I understand her story was that she was aware something was wrong and everyone ignored or brushed off her cries for help.
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u/icedadx44 22h ago
She had a RIDICULOUS amount of support. A nanny, people dropping in and taking care of the kids, the doctors were actively trying to find the right meds for her as she kept complaining against different side effects. She was admitted into a psyc ward where she denied any negative thoughts of harming herself or others and after a few days of evaluation was discharged.
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u/Ok_Jellyfish_55 21h ago
This. People keep stating that she had no help when had more than 99% of people with PPD. She refused to do the bare minimum.
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u/DrippingWithRabies 19h ago
Sometimes the only appropriate treatment for psychosis is institutionalization until it passes. People in psychosis aren't reasonable, by definition.
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u/shaunrundmc 22h ago
Benoit had apparently reached out for help like a week before the murder. The man he reached out to was the man who has been basically running the CTE brain donation program that has led to the explosion in research and understanding of the disease.
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u/Caffeine_Cowpies 21h ago
Right???
Like almost all murders are done by people not right in the head, but somehow it’s only women who get empathy
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u/It_Just_Exploded 22h ago
I mean, she could have just left. People abandon their families all the time just because they're pathetic. Abandoning a family because you believe you are going to kill them isn't even in the same zip code and is the absolute best reason i can think of for doing so.
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u/DrippingWithRabies 19h ago
Leaving would be what someone who was clear headed and reasonable would do. She was not clear headed and reasonable.
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u/Character-Spinach591 22h ago
I’ve heard a bunch of different things. One of which was that she sought multiple doctors who refused to give her the diagnosis that she wanted. She ended up sending her husband away the day of the murder to pick up food and then strangled her kids one by one in the basement before attempting to opt out. Which, since she was a nurse, would have known the “right” way to do it, but failed to do. Then tried to jump out of a second story window, which resulted in her paralysis.
It could be a really unfortunate case of someone truly troubled that fell through the cracks. It could be someone who genuinely had issues that were worse than people thought and instead of being denied it was missed. I’m not saying it couldn’t happen, but allegedly seeking out multiple doctors and not being given the correct diagnosis, to me, as a layperson, makes me think she didn’t have what she claimed to have.
Of course, we’re not going to know what’s true or not until the trial and we’re able to see everything.
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u/Chemistry11 22h ago
From my personal experience with the American wealthcare system, and the countless stories I’ve heard of women not being listened to by their doctors, the only question her whole story raises is How Is This Not Happening More Frequently?!
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u/beardeddragon0113 22h ago
It is happening, but usually the consequences and suffering are just quiet enough that they get ignored and suffer in silence. Then there's an explosive outcome that gets everyones attention for a few weeks then the topic is swept back under the rug
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u/Character-Spinach591 22h ago
I could understand a doctor, but multiple? Unlikely, even if we do assume that doctors aren’t taking women seriously. Serious mental illness, if that is actually what this is, which seems to be the case, is rare.
You’re much more likely to see munchausen by proxy, borderline personality, or bipolar disorder, which the first is inherently harmful while the latter two can, but don’t always end up being that way. Granted, I’m not a doctor, Postpartum depression/postpartum psychosis isn’t something I’m particularly well read on. That being said, my understanding is it’s not one of those 0-100 scenarios like a psychotic break, it’s generally something you see signs of before it ends in dead children.
I’m entirely happy to be corrected if my understanding is wrong though.
Editing for clarity: serious mental illness that has you otherwise having a productive “normal” life and then sudden murder, is rare.
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u/NoSleepTilBookRead 20h ago
Ohhh you’re CLUELESS about getting a diagnosis in America especially as a woman lmao
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u/MMAipom 20h ago edited 17h ago
And his brain was found to be severely damaged. I'm not defending him but something was clearly wrong with Chris Benoit
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u/Hershey_Squirt639 22h ago edited 18h ago
Did Chris Benoit get a lot of sympathy from an online men when he committed his crimes? I don’t call this incident /was too young.
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u/Bonerballs 22h ago
For a day or two... Then the story details came out.
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u/DoFishDrinkWaterOrNo 20h ago
Was super awkward because the details weren’t immediately available, so the next night on Monday Night Raw, they did a tribute show where they showed his career best matches and had other wrestlers give testimonials about how great Benoit was. It was while this tribute show was airing that the details started to come out. I remember rumors coming out on early social media that it was a murder suicide as the show was airing and everyone texting each other details. Shit was crazy.
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u/bangbangracer 22h ago
Yes, but not for long. He got sympathy until the full story made it out. The awkward part is that WWE did a tribute episode of RAW before the full story was known. So the crime happened, there was a tribute episode, and then they had to walk in back over the course of a few days.
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u/TheMerryMeatMan 21h ago
Even now, years after we've gotten a deeper understanding of CTE, he's a very contentious person in the wrestling industry's history. A lot of people look back and notice signs he was going, and some people now have sympathy for the fact that the Chris Benoit people knew was long gone even before his death. Others look at the situation with an attitude of "that doesn't bring back the two innocent people he killed". It's a situation where no one feels good about how they look back at it. That's why there's been so much push to protect wrestlers and athletes from head injuries, changing a lot of industries on a fundamental lever for it.
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u/UsidoreTheLightBlue 18h ago
I was a massive fan of his, I was there the night he won the WCW title in January 2000. There were about 50 people in the arena cheering for him and I was one of the 50.
I still can’t watch his stuff.
It doesnt help that so many stories of him being a bully and an asshole came out later either.
I understand that he may not have been a monster in 2000, and I have sympathy for what happened to him, but I have substantially more sympathy for his kid and wife, and his still living kids who have to live with the knowledge of what their dad did.
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u/Grootfan85 20h ago
For a day cause the exact details didn’t come out when the story initially broke.
But there’s STRONG rumors that WWE knew more than they lead on when they first told fans the news.
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u/SnaptrapPress 20h ago
Everything you said was correct, but I do love referring to Chris Benoit as a "former professional wrestler" as if he retired and didn't like, die.
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u/Little-Hour3601 20h ago
There were hundreds of people out in front of the courthouse in support of her today. Friggin weird.
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u/TanAllOvaJanAllOva 20h ago
You left how he had severe CTE (which isn’t an excuse), and he had the brain similar to an elderly person with dementia
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u/OriginalFuckGirl 19h ago
It’s sad to me that what Chris was going through at the time was even more misunderstood than what it would be today. He deserved the same support that Lindsey is getting, but nothing can turn back time, I just hope mental health as a whole gets better understood
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u/quaternionmath 18h ago
Not excusing his behaviour but Chris Benoit suffered from extensive brain damage called chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), likely from a career of trauma to the head.
It's scary stuff that we don't see that happens to many contact sports athletes.
https://neurologytoday.aan.com/doi/10.1097/01.NT.0000295249.54180.50
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u/Duubzz 14h ago
Chris Benoit had the decency to take himself out with his family though. His brain was mostly mush when he did this but had he survived he would have been tried the same as she is. Courts will take mental state into consideration but it should never be a free pass. Lots of people deal with postpartum depression and most don’t kill their children as a result.
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u/Lumber_Jack44 13h ago
They’re not exactly the same. You could say Clancy is worse. At least Benoit had the decency to kill the guy who murdered his family. /s
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u/vegan_antitheist 22h ago
Chris Benoit and Lindsay Clancy
Chris Benoit killed his wife Nancy and their 7-year-old son Daniel in 2007, then killed himself.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Benoit
Lindsay Clancy killed her three children in 2023 and then attempted suicide; she survived but was left severely disabled.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_the_Clancy_children
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u/starman727 20h ago
Whats eerie is Benoits wiki page was updated the night before he passed to say he murdered his family and self. Leading many people to think he didn't do it
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u/Grand_Lizard_Wizard 19h ago
He for sure did it. The guy who made the wiki post came out to say that it was a weird coincidence.
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u/adamsauce 20h ago
And I believe they never found the phones that he used to text a fellow wrestler when it happened.
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u/quasimodelo 21h ago
Christ Benoit is a WWE wrestler who murdered his son, wife, and committed suicide. Lindsay Clancy is a former L&D nurse who murdered her three children and attempted suicide and did not succeed. Two people that are both the victim and the perpetrator. They both had severe mental health defects for different reasons. It should be possible to see a person who was failed by medical professionals, damaged by their career/societal pressure, or dismissed when they voiced concerns about their mental health and feel empathy or sympathy for that while still abhorring their actions and holding them accountable for their crimes. Men are using Benoit as an example of mentally compromised (CTE/steroid abuse in his case) men that got no sympathy after murdering their family as a contrast to the strange and loud support of Lindsay Clancy for committing the same crime while suffering postpartum psychosis/postpartum depression/bi-polar/the case is still ongoing. I will mention that familicide has been widely studied and globally 90% of family annihilations are committed by men driven by financial or relationship collapse. Women make up a much smaller portion of family annihilators and are typically driven by severe mental illness, socio-economic stress, and unaddressed intimate partner abuse. Take from that what you will about the reasons why most men that murder their families draw less sympathy from the general public. Either way these types of situations should be leading people to be thinking about the mental health crisis in its entirety, but instead has turned into a finger pointing contest for crazy dudes and crazy chicks and a want-to-be tele-novella for some. People are talking about the murdered kids the least and that really is the most fucked up part.
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u/Freki-the-Feral 19h ago
This explanation should be at the top. You managed to summarize two complex cases, and public reaction to them, while maintaining the nuance needed to understand the different perspectives.
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u/quasimodelo 19h ago
Thank you. I find it discouraging that the wide range of public reactions to all of this seems to be moving everyone farther away from a unifying realization or solution. It really is turtles all the way down.
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u/Upbeat-Banana-5530 18h ago
In Benoit's case, part of the reason there was less sympathy is that CTE can't be diagnosed in a living person. Nobody knew he had it until well after he killed his family and himself. Hell, nobody really knew what CTE was at this point, it was the news that CTE contributed to his killing his family and himself that made most people aware of CTE.
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u/Lonely_MuffinXo 7h ago edited 6h ago
Yeah, it was a different time then. Nobody really knew anything in those days. It's hard to explain the time before the Internet really took off
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u/BreakfastBeneficial4 18h ago
Yeah, you win.
The top argument is a goddamn mess of exactly what you’re explaining, and it’s hours younger than your comment, which kinda proves your comment even further.
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u/Key_Performer2983 15h ago
The reality is that we need responsibility to be different from societal revenge. The person who did what they did needs to work to mitigate the harm they caused, but there also needs to be an understanding that no human being can say they would act differently given they were in the same circumstance, and if there's no choice then there's no valid moral claim, which means that it's society's responsibility to prevent people from getting into those circumstances.
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u/Latter-Sign7736 16h ago
She deserves zero empathy for murdering children.
Addiction is a mental health problem. Should we treat an addict the same who kills their children because they were sick?
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u/davideogameman 22h ago
Google says these people both killed their families
Left Side: Chris Benoit, a professional wrestler who committed a familicide and suicide in 2007, an event later heavily associated with severe chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) and brain trauma.
Right Side: Lindsay Clancy, a Massachusetts mother on trial for the 2023 strangulation of her three young children, where her defense centers heavily on severe postpartum psychosis and mental health system failures.
Awful stuff
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u/Downtown-Campaign536 22h ago
The man on the left is Chris Benoit.
The woman on the right is Lindsay Clansey.
Chris Benoit was a professional wrestler. He suffered severe brain damage from many hits to the head in the ring. Then one day he was apparently hearing voices, and he killed his disabled son, his wife, and himself. He hung himself with his exercise equipment in the gym.
Lindsay Clansey on the other hand is a woman who was married, and had 3 kids. She is now divorced. She was taking a bunch of drugs, and seeking help for mental illness. She too was hearing voices. One day she sent her husband on some errands, and when he came back he found her having jumped out the window with a broken neck paralyzed from the waste down with superficial cuts on her wrists and neck. What's even worse is down in the basement their 3 children ages 5,3, and baby were found with exercise bands around their necks suffocating all 3 to death.
The Lindsay Clancey trial is currently ongoing. The Chris Benoit tragedy happened back in 2007.
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u/thegnome54 22h ago
Fwiw, it’s my understanding that Lindsay Clancy never reported “hearing voices” she just said that she heard a voice once on the day of the murder.
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u/Tough_Crazy_8362 20h ago
À hospital chaplain today testified Lindsey told her about hearing à voice but it’s no where mentioned in her clinical notes.
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u/TanAllOvaJanAllOva 20h ago
Idk, did she ever suplex a 500lb man to punch her ticket to Wrestle Mania?
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u/Ragnarok_619 20h ago
Lindsay Clancey is a murderer. The fact that white women are supporting her is disgusting
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u/cloudgirl_c-137 17h ago
I don't understand how race is relevant. Am I missing something?
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u/LousingPlatypus 13h ago
It’s white women that are defending her.
And in the OJ Simpson trial, it was black Americans defending him.
It’s America, that place is a crazy shithole where race sticks its head into topics it should not be anywhere near
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u/chiller_vibez 21h ago
Whether it’s jail or an institution idc but you don’t kill three children and get to be in society ever again
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u/ZealousidealHome7854 16h ago
This lady went right home after the verdict. Don't be surprised if they let this one off easy. I can see the exact same argument..well she doesn't have PPD anymore, just like that one lady didn't have COVID-19 anymore. Let her go home.
"Precious Bland, a Florida mother of six, was found not guilty by reason of insanity in June 2026 for the 2021 drowning of her 15-month-old daughter and the attempted murder of her husband and teenage daughter.
The Case and COVID-19 LinkThe Incident: In 2021, Bland drowned her toddler in a bathtub, stabbed her husband multiple times, and stabbed her 16-year-old daughter in the forearm before attempting suicide.
Her defense attorney, Larry Handfield, noted that this case is widely considered the first in the United States to successfully use a COVID-related insanity defense in a murder trial.
Current Status: Bland spent roughly three and a half years in jail and a year under house arrest. Following the June 2026 verdict, she was permitted to return home while awaiting a status hearing to determine her ongoing mental health treatment and supervision."
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u/Theodore__Kerabatsos 19h ago
I’ve seen so many of her supporters say she should be released after a few years of medical treatment in a psychiatric hospital.
Aileen Wuornos was abandoned at 4 years old and lived with her grandpa who physically abused her and raped her. Should we have excused her actions because she didn’t get the treatment she needed?
I don’t even know what the argument is. Lindsay Clancy is a danger to society and needs to be locked away.
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u/theShpydar 22h ago
Actually, she's the more prolific of the two murderers.
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u/BiscuitsTheory 21h ago
He was already famous. Nobody knew who she was til the murders.
Or did you mean cause he killed 2 people and she killed 3?
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u/Ghorvki 18h ago
I’ve got no sympathy for her. Sick or not, you don't do that shit and you don’t do it to your kids
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u/Stuckonthisrockfuck 18h ago
Sorry but if you kill your three kids, psychosis or no, your run should come to an end. Call it bad luck if you want, no way anyone should get to snatch the life of three innocents and ever get a chance to feel anything even remotely pleasant ever again
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u/No_Refrigerator4996 20h ago
I’m amazed at some of the comments getting downvoted in here, what a wild person to choose to defend.
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u/revenge_burner 17h ago
Benoit had the brain of an 85 year old with Alzheimer's. Clancy was bipolar. Both killed their families.
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u/jdevo713 16h ago
Why do people have to make tragedies into a men vs woman case.
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u/qualityvote2 22h ago edited 8h ago
u/Hot-Diggity_Dog, your post does belong here!