Editing Anders Behring Breivik (section)

==Background==
Breivik was born in Oslo on 13 February 1979, the son of [[Wenche Behring]] (1946–2013), a nurse, and Jens David Breivik (born 1935), a civil economist, who worked as a diplomat for the Norwegian Embassy in London and later in Paris. He spent the first year of his life in London until his parents divorced when he was a year old. His father, who later married a diplomat, fought for, but failed to achieve, custody.

When Breivik was four, living in Fritzners gate in Oslo, two reports were filed expressing concern about his mental health, concluding that Anders ought to be removed from parental care. A psychologist in one of the reports made a note of the boy's peculiar smile, suggesting it was not anchored in his emotions but was rather a deliberate response to his environment. In another report by psychologists from Norway's centre for child and youth psychiatry (SSBU) concerns were raised about how his mother treated him: "[[Child Abuse|She 'sexualised' the young Breivik, hit him, and frequently told him that she wished that he were dead]]." In the report, [[Wenche Behring]] is described as "a woman with an extremely difficult upbringing, borderline personality disorder and an all-encompassing if only partially visible depression" who "projects her primitive aggressive and sexual fantasies onto him [Breivik]". The psychologist who wrote the report was later forbidden to give evidence in court by Behring, who herself was excused from testifying on health grounds.

Breivik lived with his mother and his half-sister in the West End of Oslo and regularly visited his father and stepmother in France until they divorced when he was 12. His mother also remarried, to an officer in the Norwegian Army.

Breivik chose to be confirmed into the Lutheran Church of Norway at the age of 15. In his adolescence, Breivik's behaviour was described as having become rebellious. In his early teen years, he was a prolific graffiti artist, part of the hip hop community in Oslo West. He took his graffiti much more seriously than his comrades did and was caught by the police on several occasions; child welfare services were notified once and he was fined on two occasions. According to Breivik's mother, after he was caught spraying graffiti on walls in 1995, at the age of 16, and fined, his father stopped contact with him. They have not been in contact since then. The opposite view is claimed by Breivik's father, that it was his son who broke off contact with him and that he would always have welcomed Anders despite his destructive activities. At this age, he also broke off contact with the hip hop community after he fell out with his best friend.

Since adolescence, Breivik had spent much time on weight training and started using anabolic steroids. He cared a lot about his own looks and about appearing big and strong. Breivik has criticised his parents for supporting the policies of the Norwegian Labour Party and his mother for being, in his opinion, a moderate feminist.