Thanks, this is an interesting explanation. Do you mean sadism? Or something slightly different, a need to see justice done, like “justice porn”? Or something like wanting to see some kind of order in the world through violence?

I think there is a very primitive drive in humans who want to “remove the weak link” and drive out the village idiot or “removed”. An ugly reproductive strategy that helped the tribe to stay stronger which explains some impulses for bullying. This is of course unscientific speculation.

But I can imagine that impulse might have played a role to go after this autistic child.