“Brain Scans Show Bullies Enjoy Others’ Pain” screams the headline in this breathlessly reported Washington Post article. Well, ya’ think?

We sometimes find ourselves a little incredulous at the nattering boobery of the so-called media elite, especially when it’s over something as obvious as this.

Of course bullies enjoy spreading misery. Otherwise they wouldn’t do it. It may come as something of a shock to the Washington Post staff writers but there are a limited number of things that motivate fallen man. Avoidance of pain and pleasure lead the list. Bullies get pleasure by inflicting pain. It’s pretty simple, but it took a study by a Psychology professor at the University of Chicago to get the WaPo to see what most of us “lesser lights” grasp more-or-less intuitively. The fact that parts of their brain “light-up” when they are feeling the pleasure of inflicting pain is one of the “stunning revelations” of the study.

We’re underwhelmed.