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THE ANALYTIC SPACE: COUNTERTRANSFERENCE AND EVOCATIVE KNOWLEDGE

by Robert M. Young

The analytic space is the mental space within which psychoanalysis
and psychotherapy occur. It is a space shared between patient and
therapist. In this essay I shall characterize the two main processes
which occur in the analytic space — transference and
countertransference — and, while doing so, offer some philosophical
reflections on the relations between psychoanalysis and the modern
world view. I wish to begin with an important distinction — that
between didactic and evocative knowledge. Didactic knowledge is
imparted, while evocative knowledge is elicited.

Everything with which I am concerned in this essay comes from what
may at first glance appear to be a relatively trivial technical
problem in psychoanalysis. I wish to argue, however, that it leads to
the very heart of the analytic process and, beyond that, to our
conception of human nature and how we may fruitfully think about how
we come to know — the theory of knowing or epistemology. This is a
considerable weight to place on the concept of countertransference,
but I shall try to argue that it can bear it. My story has a nicely
linear plot, taking us from the simple to the complex and on to the
interactive and the dialectical.

I want to start with the traditional stance of the therapist in the
analytic session — that of neutrality, holding up a mirror to the
patient. But in offering the image of a mirror Freud did not mean
that one should not be human (Freud, 1912a, p. 118). He was not
urging the theraspist to be inanimate glass and silver nitrate; he
was saying that one should not tell about oneself. There was a
tendency among the early psychoanalysts to be self-revealing. The
mirror was an image in the service of the rule of abstinence: speak
to the patient only about himself or herself and about characters who
inhabit the patient's inner world.

Before turning to countertransference, we must consider transference.
Freud said, 'What are transferences? They are the new editions or
facsimilies of the impulses and phantasies which are aroused and made
conscious during the progress of the analysis; but they have this
peculiarity, which is characteristic for their species, that they
replace some earlier person by the person of the physician. To put it
another way: a whole series of psychological experiences are revived,
not as belonging to the past, but as applying to the person of the
physician at the present moment' (Freud, 1905, p. 116). In a way,
then, transference is a mistake, and, as Freud was to learn, the
analytic process is based on this mistake — that the patient
experiences the analyst as someone else. The patient, according to
Racker, '"displaces" or "transfers" infantile and internal conflicts
to current situations and objects which are out of place and
inappropriate' (Racker, 1968, p. 15).

A transference interpretation is basically pointing this out to the
patient. Fenichel said, 'The process that requires demonstrating to
patients the same thing again and again at different times or in
various connections, is called, following Freud, "working through...
Again and again the patient must in analysis reexperience 'there too'
and 'there again'"'(Fenichel, 1941, pp. 78-80, quoted in Searles,
1978-9, p. 176). Fenichel's view of the task in working through is
this: 'An analyst giving a transference interpretaion says,
schematically: "It is not I toward whom your feelings are directed;
you really mean your father." But there are many patients who know
about transference and defend themselves against emerging emotional
excitement by referring to its transference nature. In such instances
the "reversed transference interpretation" is necessary; "You are
aroused at this moment not about your father but about me"'
(Fenichel, 1945, p. 522, quoted in Searles, l978-9, p. 176).

All of this seems relatively straightforward, even mechanical. The
concept of transference became increasingly enriched, however, so
that it was eventually perceived that what is transferred is the
total situation, a relationship or objects in a context, and not
merely an individual. Moreover, the objects transferred are not
external ones but internal objects (Joseph, l989). As a consequence,
ideas of the transference became broadened into a wider context and
deepened into the object relations of the inner world.

Turning to countertransference, you may think of it as an arcane
topic; it is certainly an unwieldy word, one which conjures up the
most abstract of latter-day metapsychological conceptualisations. In
fact, it arose very early and was very immediate: it is why Freud's
first collaborator, Joseph Breuer, gave up. He ran away from Anna O
because she aroused him. If transference is projection,
countertransference is projective identification — something elicited
by the patient in the therapist: evocative knowledge. Anna O elicited
in Breuer a sexual excitement which he found unacceptable and was
unbearable to himself and his wife, so he abandoned the work (Gay,
1988, pp. 63-9).

For Freud the transference went from being an annoying interference
to an instrument of great value to the main battlefield of the
analysis. An analogous story can be told about the
countertransference, but it is a story with profound implications.
Now, to define countertransference. Freud rarely discussed the topic;
he saw countertransference as the patient's influence on the
analyst's unconscious. He said that no analyst could go farther than
he or she had progressed in their own analysis, so the analyst's
analysis was all-important. He first mentions the concept in
1910: 'We have become aware of the "countertransference", which
arises in [the analyst] as a result of the the patient's influece on
his unconscious feelings, and we are almost inclined to insist that
he shall recognize this countertransference in himself and overcome
it. Now that a considerable number of people are practicing
psychoanalysis and exchanging their observations with one another, we
have noticed that no psychoanalyst goes further than his own
complexes and internal resistances permit; and we consequently
require that he shall begin his activity with a self-analysis and
continually carry it deeper while he is making his own observations
on his patients. Anyone who fails to produce results in a self-
analysis of this kind may at once give up any idea of being able to
treat patients by analysis' (Freud, 1910, pp. 144-5). (Later, of
course, Freud also insisted on a training analysis conducted by a
suitable analyst.)

It is often thought that Freud held a limited view of
countertransference, and he certainly had little to say on the topic.
Even so, I would argue that the following quotation, properly
contemplated and making due allowance for the technological imagery
of his day, contains all we need to know: 'To put it into a formula:
[the analyst] must turn his own unconscious like a receptive organ
toward the transmitting unconscious of the patient. He must adjust
himself to the patient as a telephone receiver is adjusted to the
transmitting microphone. Just as the receiver converts back into
sound waves the electric oscillations in the telephone line which
were set up by sound waves, so the doctor's unconscious is able, from
the derivatives of the unconscious which are communicated to him, to
reconstruct that unconscious, which has determined the patient's free
associations' (Freud, 1912, pp. 115-6). This quotation takes us much
deeper; it is much more resonant and in touch with primitive
processes than the previous one, even though it was penned only two
years later.

With respect to the subsequent history of ideas about
countertransference, Laplanche and Pontalis trace three successive
positions on the subject: (1) Get rid of it by means of one's own
analysis, and concentrate on the patient's transference. (2) Exploit
it in a controlled way, using the therapist's unconscious as an
instrument for fathoming the patient's unconscious. (3) Go with it,
treating the resonances from unconscious to unconscious as the only
authentically psychoanalytic form of communication (Laplanche and
Pontalis, 1983, pp. 92-3).

Before embarking on that history, I want to say something about
projective identification, since we will need this concept as we go
along. I want to point out a congruence between projective
identification and countertransference. In the countertransference
relationship, the patient puts something into the therapist which the
therapist experiences as his or her own. That's not a bad definition
of one of the forms of projective identification, in which the
patient splits off an unaccceptable or undesirable part of the self
and puts it into another person. That person must have, if only to a
degree, the potential to identify with and express that feeling. It
rises up from the general repetoire of potential feelings and gets
exaggerated and expressed. The projector can then feel: 'It's not me;
it's him', while the identificatory process in the recipient may
yield a bewildering feeling, reaction or act (Hinshelwood, 1989, pp.
179-208). In an attentive therapist it can lead to a fruitful
interpretation.

We can now see this congruence in action, in a passage where Freud is
quite explicit about a concept usually seen as originating with
Klein. He is talking about the projections of jealous and persecuted
paranoiacs, of whom it it said that they project onto others that
which they do not wish to recognize in themselves. He
continues, 'Certainly they do this; but they do not project it into
the blue, so to speak, where there is nothing of the sort already.
They let themselves be guided by their knowledge of the unconscious,
and displace to the unconscious minds of others the attention which
they have withdrawn from their own. Our jealous husband perceived his
wife's unfaithfulness instead of his own; by becoming conscious of
hers and magnifying it enormously he succeeded in keeping his own
unconscious' (Freud, 1922, p. 226).

Fenichel writes in the same vein: 'It is interesting to note that the
hatred is never projected at random but is felt usually in connection
with something that has a basis in reality. Patients with persecutory
ideas are extremely sensitive to criticism and use the awareness of
actual insignificant criticisms as the reality basis for their
delusions. This basis has, of course, to be extremely exaggerated and
distorted in order to be made available for this purpose... The
paranoid individual is particularly sensitized to perceive the
unconscious of others, where such perceptions can be utilized to
rationalize his tendency toward projection' (Fenichel, 1945, p. 428,
quoted in Searles, 1978-9, p. 177).

Anyone who has ever worked in a mental hospital will recognize this
instantly. Paranoid patients are geniuses at getting under the skin
and ferreting out latent tendencies in others, especially staff. But,
of course, this is only a relatively apparent exaggeration of the
norm, as any of us can attest from our experiences of how much can
get tangled up in a moment during telephone calls with prospective
patients, and in relations with lovers or one's own children.
Projection, introjection, exaggeration, reprojection — these are
norms of social interactions. It is all a matter of degree.
Nevertheless, as in the rest of life, everything can depend on
matters of degree. Projective identification is a normal mechanism,
but when employed excessively or virulently, it lies at the heart of
paranoid processes, racism, narcissism, and innumerable other
pathological conditions (see Young, 1994, chs. 6,7). When employed
excessively, it is central to pathological conformism and ruthless
ambition and acts as a defence against schizophrenic breakdown
(Meltzer, 1992). Relinquishing its excessive use is essential to
becoming a decent person.

There is a rich history of ideas of countertransference, some phases
of which I will not spell out, except to list familiar names, since
the relevant papers are competently reviewed in a collection edited
by by Edmund Slakter (1987): Stern (1924); Deutsch (1926); Glover
(1927); Sharpe (1930); Hann-Kende (1933); W. Reich (1933); Strachey
(1934); Low (l935). There are other overviews, for example, by Kohon
(l986) and Orr (l988), a collection of Essential Papers on
Countertransference (Wolstein, 1988) and a growing number of
monographs and papers, which has brought forth the inevitable: Beyond
Countertransference (Natterson, 1991).

I want to begin my own story of recent work with a paper by
Winnicott, startlingly entitled 'Hate in the Countertrans-ference'
(1947). I am re-entering the history of ideas at the point where the
transition is occurring between countertransference as 'that which is
to be got rid of', to 'that which is to be made something of' or
exploited. Winnicott said that to feel hate, when it has been
projected into you and evoked by the patient, is part of the
therapist's proper responsiveness. When the patient seeks the
therapist's hate, the therapist must be able to make contact with it,
to bear it without retaliating and to contain it; otherwise the
analysis fails.

Two years after Winnicott made this point, Paula Heimann took up the
topic and began with the traditional view: 'I have been struck by the
widespread belief amongst candidates that the countertransference is
nothing but a source of trouble' (Heimann, l949-50, p. 73). She takes
a contrary position: 'My thesis is that the analyst's emotional
response to his patient within the analytic situation represents one
of the most important tools for his work. The analyst's
countertransference is an instrument of research into the patient's
unconscious' (p. 74). 'Our basic assumption is that the analyst's
unconscious understands that of his patient' (p. 75). She claims
that 'the analyst's countertransference is not only part and parcel
of the analytic relationship, but it is the patient's creation, it is
a part of the patient's personality' (p. 77).

Winnicott was writing about psychotics and borderline personalities;
Heimann extended the point to include work with all patients.
However, when she returns to the topic a decade later, she reflects
at length on how to handle countertransferential material and takes
up a cautious position, eschewing self-revelation. But in her
conclusion, she reverts to the early view of Freud. In so doing, it
seems to me, she fails to see the larger potential of the concept.
She says, in her last paragraph, 'In conclusion, Freud's injunction
that the countertransference must be recognized and overcome is as
valid today as it was fifty years ago. When it occurs, it must be
turned to some useful purpose. Continued self-analysis and self-
training will help to decrease incidents of countertransference' (p.
160). For her, countertransference was still a hot potato - something
to learn from when it occurs but preferably to be got rid of.

Another writer in this period, Roger Money Kyrle, takes up a position
that acknowledges that countertransference can be both useful and a
serious impediment. As his title implies, countertransference was
coming to be seen as a normal part of the analytic process: 'Normal
Counter-transference and Some of its Deviations'. He draws our
attention to the fine texture of the process, whereby something is
put into the analyst, re-projected in an interpretation and then
taken in by the patient. If the receiving parts of the analyst are
intact, what gets reprojected is likely to be helpful, but if the
projection falls afoul of unresolved issues in the analyst's
unconscious, a mess can be created. Everyone would be happy
if 'normal countertransference' was all there was. 'Unfortunately, it
is normal only in the sense of being an ideal. It depends for its
continuity on the analyst's continuous understanding. But he is not
omniscient. In particular, his understanding fails whenever the
patient corresponds too closely with some aspect of himself which he
has not yet learnt to understand' (Money-Kyrle, 1956, p. 24).

In such cases, what ensues is a reprojection of something which is
not helpful, not congruent with the patient's analytic needs. The
analyst may recover then or in the next session, but the patient is
not simply waiting for him to get it right. He or she may well have
moved on and be relating to the analyst as a damaged object as a
result of the distorted interpretation. The result will take some
sorting out. What is attractive about Money-Kyrle's reflections is
the light they shed on the process — the minute details — of these
interrelations.

A sense that countertransference was, in the 1950s and 1960s, still
basically seen as something to be wary of has been driven home for me
by a revealing incident in the publishing history of the work of
Margaret Little. In l951, she wrote a paper on 'Countertransference
and the Patient's Response to It'. It was duly reprinted in a
collection of her writings, Transference Neurosis and Transference
Psychosis, in l981. But when the book came out in a paperback edition
five years later, she added an intriguing footnote: 'I read this
paper in 1950, almost exactly three years after my analyst's death. I
could not then give the true account, but disguised it as best I
could. (That version has rightly been questioned.) I have given this
account in chapter 21 [a dialogue between her and Robert Langs], and
also in my paper 'Winnicott Working in Areas where Psychotic
Anxieties Prevail: A Personal Record' in Free Associations (1985) 3:
9-42' (Little, 1986, p. 33n). The last-mentioned article had been
submitted to the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis and
rejected with the suggestion that it should be put in a vault until a
suitable date well in the future. One of the referees told me that he
had urged its sequestration because it revealed that a practising
training analyst continued to work while she was very ill, that her
analyst, Donald Winnicott, permitted this and had broken various
boundaries with respect to the analytic frame, and that knowledge of
this would be too distressing to her former patients, including some
analysts still in practice. When, after the most careful
consideration, the article was published in Free Associations,
Margaret Little received a gracious note from the Editor of the
International Journal, saying how pleased he was that the article had
been sufficiently modified so as to make it suitable for publication.
Yet not a word had been altered from her original submission.

My justification for telling this rather gossipy tale about the
context of publishing these pieces is that when we are dealing with
the complex, subtle and primitive processes which occur in
transference and countertransference, we are moving about on a very
perilous terrain, one which puts at risk the boundaries of the
analytic frame, the maintenance of which are essential to the
successful conduct of psychoanalytic work. Taking full account of
countertransference — and not confining attention to transference,
keeping the therapist's unconscious processes out of the question —
means that the analytic frame is constantly at risk of being
violated. Margartet Little has been remarkably candid about the
vicissitudes of these interrelations, and I believe that this has
troubled many of her colleagues. Many feel that the relations between
her and D.W. Winnicott went beyond the appropriate boundaries.

A strong reaction to Little's views came from an orthodox Freudian,
Annie Reich (1951), who argued that countertransference was not a
therapeutic tool and was not useful for understanding or
communicating with the patient. Slakter comments that Annie Reich was
defending a conception of psychoanalysis as the analysis of the ego's
defences and rejecting 'the seductive, regressive pull of id
psychology' (Slakter, 1987, p. 23). I thnk this reveals an important
difference in approach to analytic work. Little has stressed in these
and subsequent writings (l957, 1987, l989, 1990) that the relations
between analyst and patient are much more primitive, both consciously
and unconsciously, than is acknowledged by orthodox models of the
therapeutic process. I believe tthat this and related debates about
the relationship between countertransference and the analytic frame
has an important bearing on how we do analytic work and how we
conceptualize the maintenance of analytic integrity.

At this point I want to interrupt my narrative of the history of
countertransference and to broaden the frame of reference to revert
to the philosophical issues raised by the ways we picture the mind. I
have suggested that in the history of psychoanalysis there has been a
subtle tension between 'picture thinking', on the one hand, and
personal, evocative, story-telling accounts, on the other. These two
ways of representing things are intermingled in two of the classic
texts, `Project for a Scientific Psychology' (1895) and The
Interpretation of Dreams (1900), and one can almost feel Freud's
relief when he abandons the imagery of the telescope and the diagram
(Freud, 1900, pp. 536-8) and replaces them with stories (pp. 611,
615). After chapter seven of The Interpretation of Dreams spatial
representations and pictoral diagrams are rare, e.g., the rendering
of the structural point of view in The Ego and the Id (Freud, 1923,
p. 24) and the oval diagram diagram in Lecture XXXI of The New
Introductory Lectures (Freud, 1933, p. 78), and when they do appear,
they are rather more metaphorical than truly spatial.

In the traditional pictorial approach the knowing subject is at one
end of an investigative instrument - typically a telescope or
microscope (Freud, 1900, p. 536). What is essential about this way of
representing the mind and the process of knowing is the spatial gap —
the subject is at one end, while the object is at the other end or
out there. The subject is the knower; the object is to be known. The
object is open to scrutiny, and the subject is not. I now want to
tell a story in which this representation of the problem of knowing
within and between people is increasingly complicated, starting with
the picture-thinking view and moving on to an interactional and then
to a dialectical one.

I am a subject. You are an object. I am here; my essence is in here.
You are there — out there, across a physical and epistemological
space. I can infer that you are also a subject — by eye contact, by
tone of voice, by analogy to my own experience and by other cues —
but you easily revert to being experienced as an object, and I may
easily lapse into treating you as one — as someone who does not touch
me: alien. You may sense this and be alienated from me.

But the situation can be seen as much, much more complicated. I may
experience myself as alienated from myself — as a thing, as dead.
This is of the essence of the concept of alienation, where a person
or a worker can experience himself or herself as alienated from the
product, the means or instruments of production, from fellow workers
and from one's own humanity (or 'species being'). Alienation is the
subjective moment of the objective condition of exploitation at work,
just as an analogous estrangement can occur in bad human
relationships or in psychotic moments or states. Rather than
experience yourself as dead, you may put that feeling into me by
projection, and if I take up the projection (unconsciously) and
display it, a successful projective identification is in being
between us. There are other forms of projective identification which
do not depend on what I feel or display, so that you can be in
projective identification with me in other ways, depending on your
inner state and mine.

As we enrich the model, mental and interpersonal space lose the
quality of a picture with simple locations. There are no simple
spaces in this enriched account, one which can be called interactive,
phenomenological or dialectical, depending on how mutually
constitutive the relationships are conceived as being. In an
interaction, things get batted back and forth. In a phenomenological
description, you are no longer an 'it' but a 'thou', a person with
whom I can identify and empathize, as I am for you. In a dialectical
account, there are many layers and reverberations. I am here and
there at once, as you are. You are in me. I can expel a part of
myself. You can take it in and re-expel it, and I can experience it
as you, while, in another part of my mind, knowing where that part
came from. (It should be obvious that I am not listing the
permutations systematically. I only want to make the point that
interpersonal relationships are much richer and multi-layered than
the subject-object 'picture' account allows.)

Moving on to related expressions: I enter you. You withdraw. Or you
may contain my distress. I push through your defences. We become one
and then separate but feel love, hatred or ambivalence or frequent
oscillations among these at many levels: a relationship. If we move
on further to part-object relationships and on still further to
tenderness, envy, spite and reparation, it soon becomes obvious that
the simple subject-object model is a reductio ad absurdum of human
relationships.

Returning to my main theme, I suggest that the history of ideas if
countertransference is a progressive closing of the spatial gap
between therapist and patient. It is at the same time a turning away
from pictoral models toward story-telling ones, in which knowledge is
not seeing but evocation. I offer two longish examples to drive this
point home.

The first is from Tom Main's essay on 'Some Psychodynamics of Large
Groups': 'Although projective processes are primitive attempts to
relieve internal pains by externalizing them, assigning or requiring
another to contain aspects of the self, the price can be high: for
the self is left not only less aware of its whole but, in the case of
projective identification, is deplenished [sic] by the projective
loss of important aspects of itself. Massive projective
identification of — for instance — feared aggressive parts of the
self leaves the remaining self felt only to be weak and unaggressive.
Thereafter, the weakened individual will remain in terror about being
overwhelmed by frightening aggressive strength, but this will now be
felt only as belonging to the other. Depending on the range of this
projective fantasy the results will vary from terrified flight,
appeasement, wariness and specific anxieties about the other, even
psychotic delusions about his intentions.

'The above instance concerns only the projector's side of the
projective relationship: but projective processes often have a
further significance. What about the person on the receiving end of
the projection? In simple projection (a mental mechanism) the
receiver may notice that he is not being treated as himself but as an
aggressive other. In projective identification (an unconscious
fantasy) this other may find himself forced by the projector actually
to feel his own projected aggressive qualities and impulses which are
otherwise alien to him. He will feel strange and uncomfortable and
may resent what is happening, but in the face of the projector's
weakness and cowardice it may be doubly difficult to resist the
feelings of superiority and aggressive power steadily forced into
him. Such disturbances affect all pair relationships more or less. A
wife, for instance, may force her husband to own feared and unwanted
dominating aspects of herself and will then fear and respect him. He
in turn may come to feel aggressive and dominating toward her, not
only because of his own resources but because of hers, which are
forced into him. But more: for reasons of his own he may despise and
disown certain timid aspects of his personality and by projective
identification force these into his wife and despise her accordingly.
She may thus be left not only with timid unaggressive parts of
herself but having in addition to contain his. Certain pairs come to
live in such locked systems, dominated by mutual projective fantasies
with each not truly married to a person, but rather to unwanted,
split off and projected parts of themselves. Both the husband,
dominant and cruel, and the wife, stupidly timid and respectful, may
be miserably unhappy with themselves and with each other, yet such
marriages although turbulent are stable, because each partner needs
the other for pathologically narcissistic purposes. Forcible
projective processes, and especially projective identification, are
thus more than an individual matter: they are object-related, and the
other will always be affected more or less' (Main, 1989, pp. 100-01).

This is an excellent exposition of some of the complexities of
unconscious processes at work in everyday life. I trust that the
analogy to transference and countertransference is obvious. In case
it is not, I want to follow this example with a lovely account of the
power of countertransference and the use that can be made of it in a
clinical setting.

I shall excerpt the relevant passage from a dense and illuminating
account of a clinical case of Margaret Rustin's, which, for reasons
of confidentiality, I do not wish to quote in detail. What is of
interest in the present context comes out very clearly in the
therapist's reflections, which is the point at which I shall begin
quoting: 'There is much to explore in these associations, but I now
want to add an important fact about this session which I was not able
to make use of at the time. I myself was having two experiences in
addition to the conversation I have reported. I was struggling with a
frustrating conviction that I could not properly get hold of the
transference situation in the session... Much more uncomfortable than
this intellectual frustration was a state of irritable anxiety which
was building up, particularly focussed on an urgent desire to suck or
bite my fingers. Trying to understand these feelings and impulses is
the process required of the therapist to work through the
countertransference. I am here using the term countertransference to
refer not to the neurotic response of analyst to patient, but to the
broader current conception of countertransference which pays close
attention to the feelings stirred up in the analyst by the patient's
material.

'In the following session, the meaning of this projection began to
emerge.' There follows more material in which alcoholism and stealing
drink loom large. Rustin continues, 'I found myself plagued by
similar surges of anxious discomfort to those of last week's
session...' Then more clinical material, including the alcoholic's
sitting there with thumb in mouth saying how delicious the stolen
drink was, which enraged and overwhelmed the patient. The account
continues, 'At this moment, I felt the relief of illumination. The
image of X with... thumb in... mouth linked with my impulse to suck
and chew my fingers during these last two sessions, an impulse which
I felt was being irresistibly projected into me. Now I knew where
this was coming from. So I gathered together the threads I could now
follow...' (Rustin, 1989, p. 315). The author's account makes
admirably clear the central importance of the countertransference to
the interpretation and its evident usefulness to the patient.

There is an equally graphic - and, in this case, excruciating -
account of projective identification and countertransference, in
which the therapist found herself unaccustomedly an unaccountably
buying and cooking squid, only to find to her chagrin and amusement,
as she contemplated the cut up pieces frying in oil, that she was
retaliating against a particularly murderous 'prick' of a suicidal
patient (Eigner, 1986).

I have chosen the foregoing examples to convey the power of the
projective processes involved in countertransference.

The person who has looked into these most extensively is Harold
Searles. The collection of his papers on Countertransference (1979)
contains what I regard as two profound essays on the subject, while
the dialogue between Searles and Robert Langs explores in a very
illuminating way the details of the interrelations between analyst
and patient (Langs and Searles, 1980).

In 1949 (just when Winnicott and Little were challenging the
orthodoxy in Britain) Searles, an American psychoanalyst, sought to
publish a paper which significantly broadened the clinical importance
of the countertransference, but it was rejected by both of the
psychoanalytic journals to which he submitted it. It was only
published in the wake of his achievements as an analyst of
schizophrenics. In it he anticipates much of his subsequent work on
the real basis, in the analyst's personality, for transference
phenomena, phenomena which appropriately evoke the
countertransference. He summarizes his article as
follows: '...transference phenomena constitute projections, and that
all projective manifestations - including transference reactions -
have some real basis in the analyst's behavior and represent,
therefore, distortions in degree only. The latter of these two
suggestions implies a degree of emotional participation by the
analyst which is not adequately described by the classical view of
him as manifesting sympathetic interest, and nothing else, toward the
patient. It has been the writer's experience that the analyst
actually does feel, and manifests in various ways, a great variety of
emotions during the analytic hour' (Searles, 1978-9, p. 165).

In his papers on 'The Patient as Therapist to His Analyst'
and 'Transitional Phenomena and Therapeutic Symbiosis', as well as in
his dialogue with Langs, Searles drives home again and again the
centrality, the normality, the basic and essential utility of
countertransference. Langs grants its ubiquity, but - if I read him
aright - still wants to master and minimize it (e.g., Langs and
Searles, 1980, pp. 96-7). Searles glories in its omnipresence and
rich potential.

Although the main sources of his ideas are the interpersonal
psychiatry of Harry Stack Sullivan and his extensive psychoanalytic
work with schizophrenics (he has worked with one woman for more than
twenty years), he also makes alliances with the (independently
developed) ideas of Winnicott and Little. I commend his cornucopia of
examples to the reader; after reflecting upon them I would be
surprised if anyone could retain the traditional view of the analyst
as mirror or as a subject looking at the patient across physical or
metaphorical space as an object to be known by peering, as it were,
through some sort of technological instrument.

I now have to draw breath and speak about the analytic frame. You
will recall that this topic was raised in the context of discussing
Margaret Little's work with Winnicott and Annie Reich's objections.
Lurking around my whole account has been a whiff of scandal - a
suspicion that if we get too involved with the countertransference,
there's no telling where it will all end. Annie Reich feared that it
would end in the id, not in the ego, where she seemed to assume that
good analytic work is done. It is noteworthy, then that the writers
who have set out to broaden and deepen the concept of
countertransference have been people who were exploring primitive,
psychotioc processes: Winnicott on borderline and schizophrenic
patients, Little on her own psychotic illness and Searles, who has
worked a great deal with schizophrenics.

The analytic space is bounded by the analytic frame; it is the
emotional environment in which it is seemly and safe enough to
conduct the therapeutic alliance. It is a container, and containment
is its essence. It is made up of a set of conventions quite mundane
ones, but they are under constant threat. The session starts and ends
on time; confidentiality is total; you never take notes (though many
do); no interruptions are permitted; no personal information about
the therapist should be made available; accounts should be presented
on the same day of the month; there should be due warning for breaks;
other missed sessions should be minimized and announced well in
advance; patients should not be touched (though my analyst shook
hands at the end of each term).

Others would extend this list in various ways. Practically all would
say that social relations between therapist and patient should be
taboo, and most would say that those with ex-patients should be
minimized. Sexual relations are strictly taboo. Others would make a
distinction between current patients, recent ex-patients and ex-
patients some years later (I would not).

These aspects of the frame are important, but the essence is an
attitude of abstinence. If that is right, and if the essence is
internalised, it is silly to make a long list of prohibitions. As the
cellist Tortellier was fond of saying, one must be pure but not
purist. The frame must provide a bounded space in which it is
bearable to do the work - for the patient to be safe enough to
explore what is unsafe, i.e., defenses built up and maintained over a
lifetime. Praising, blaming, encouraging - all such dimensions of
normal social relations are eschewed in a strict interpretation of
the analytic frame. What is on offer is interpretation, the
understanding that the patient can take away and treat as food for
thought. In their dialogue, one point on which Langs and Searles
agree is that 'the therapist's appropriate love is expressed by
maintaining the boundaries' (Langs and Searles, 1980, p. 130). Langs'
view is that as soon as you modify the frame, the likelihood of a
misalliance or pathological symbiosis is greatly increased (pp. 44,
127). As he says, 'frame' is 'a nonhuman term for a very human set of
tenets and functions. It serves to hold and to contain, to establish
boundaries and conditions of relatedness and communication' (p. 179).

There are those who advocate occasional suspension of what can be
seen as rigid or strict maintenance of the boundaries of the frame -
what Christopher Bollas has called 'Expressive Uses of the
Countertransference' (Bollas,1987). Related views have been expressed
by Symington (1986), Little (see above) and - perhaps most
notoriously - by Nina Coltart, in a lovely essay entitled '"Slouching
Toward Bethlehem"... or Thinking the Unthinkable in Psychoanalysis'
(1986), in which she tells a gripping tale, the denoument of which is
shouting at her patient to what appears to be good effect. Symington
and Bollas tell similar stories. Indeed, Bollas tells us that on one
occasion he quite deliberately and temperately said to a
patient, 'You know, you are a monster' (Bollas, 1989, p. 38), and it
turns out that she did know and in due course professed to be
relieved that he could say so. Searles also owns up to revealing, at
selected moments, aspects of his subjective feelings toward patients,
though much more often with schizophrenics than with others (Langs
and Searles, 1980, pp. 123-4). As I mentioned above, Paula Heimann
counselled against such self-revelations and criticized Margaret
Little for advocating them (Heimann, 1959-60, p.156). Rayner (1991)
reports that the approaches of Coltart and Bollas are widespread
among members of the Independent or Middle Group in the British
Psycho-analytical Society, while it is usual among Kleinians to
eschew such self-revelations. Among the authors I have mentioned,
however, it is common ground that such practices are open to abuse,
and great care must be taken to avoid 'acting out in the
countertransference' (Heimann, 1959-60, p.157).

While there are important differences in the degree to which various
practitioners may be willing to express their countertransference, it
is my impression that there is a growing consensus that being closely
attuned to it is a, if not the, basis for knowing what is going on
and for making interpretations. I want to leave this issue open,
while making clear that my own bias is against expressive uses of the
countertransference (which is not to say that I have never done it
and never will). The tendency to 'get rid of it' is certainly waning
among the writers whom I am examining, while more and more is being
made of it. My best experiences in supervision have resulted from the
supervisor asking me what I was feeling at a particlular moment -
usually a moment when I felt I did not understand the material. I
would go so far as to say that this has never failed to provide at
least some enlightenment.

I want now to move to the third of Laplanche and Pontalis' renderings
of the countertransference: the injunction, not merely to exploit it
but to 'go with it'. The experience of countertransference is, in the
first instance, appprehensible but not comprehensible. What is
occurring between patient and therapist is not merely interactive; it
is interpenetrative or dialectical. Much, often most, of what goes on
in an analytic session is non-verbal and atmospheric, and one could
not say how it is imparted. The atmosphere may be soporific, tense,
comforting, assaultive, arousing.

I had a patient who spoke so horribly and in such a sustained way in
one session that she filled the room with her (symbolic) vomit and
had to flee, since, if she opened her mouth again, she would have to
take in her own spew. I was able to make an interpretation in these
terms, because I was feeling nauseous. I had another patient who
spent many sessions standing on the threshold of the room. He had
panic attacks. It took me the longest time to figure out that he was
imparting to me the cliff-hanging feeling that was characteristic of
his attacks. One reason I could not figure it out, by the way,
because he was a training patient, and I was in a panic that I might
lose him. When I belatedly made the interpretation, fruitful work
began.

Another patient would come to a session, never looked at me, would
speak one or two sentences and often remain silent for the rest of
the session. It eventually dawned on me that she unconsciously wanted
me to feel starved the way her mother had made her feel. I had been
feeling that way, but it took some time to convert that sense into a
thought. When I did make that interpretation, she slowly began to
give more, though she remained likely to revert to sullenness and
withholding. Yet underneath this mean exterior was a longing and
warmth and gratitude that no camera could detect but which I came to
know and to find sustaining in innumerable bleak sessions.

A patient can rob one of the ability to think. Indeed, there was one
in a group I conducted who was able to project her sexulaity so
powerfully that, on occasion, no one in the group, including me,
could think of anything but her breasts and legs. As Bion
said, 'Refuge is sure to be sought in mindlessnsess, sexulaization,
acting out and degrees of stupor' (Bion, 1970, p.126).

A paper by Irma Brenman Pick takes the normalityy of
countertransference to its logical extreme, without a trace of seeing
it as something to be got rid of. She carefully considers is as the
basis of understanding throughout the session: 'Constant projecting
by the patient into the analyst is the essence of analysis; every
interpretation aims at a move from the paraniod-schizoid to the
depressive position' (Brenman-Pick, 1985, p. 37). She makes great
play of the tone, the mood and the resonances of the process: 'I
think that the extent to which we succeed or fail in this task will
be reflected not only in the words we choose, but in our voice and
other demeanour in the act of giving an interpretation' (p. 41). Most
importantly, she emphasizes the power of the projections and what
they evoke counterrtansferentially: 'I have been trying to show that
the issue is not a simple one; the patient does not just project into
an analyst, but instead patients are quite skilled at projecting into
particular aspects of the analyst. Thus, I have tried to show, for
example, that the patient projects into the analyst's wish to be a
mother, the wish to be all-knowing or to deny unpleasant knowledge,
into the analyst's instinctual sadism, or into his defences against
it. And above all, he projects into the analyst's guilt, or into the
analyst's internal objects.

'Thus, patients touch off in the analyst deep issues and anxieties
related to the need to be loved and the fear of catastrophic
consequences in the face of defects, i.e. primitive persecutory or
superego anxiety' (p. 41). As I see it, the approach taken by Brenman-
Pick takes it as read and as normal that these powerful feelings are
moving back and forth from patient to analyst and back again, through
the processes of projection, evocation, reflection, interpretation
and assimilation. Moving on from the more limited formulations of an
earlier period in the writings of Winnicott, Heimann and even Money-
Kyrle, these feelings are all normal, as it were, in the processes of
analysis. More than that, as she puts it, they are the essence.

Implicit in the way I have been writing about the phenomena of
countertransference is a model for knowledge - that the way we really
learn is from the Other's response to what we convey. We learn by
evoking and provoking. We do not learn by imparting but by re-
experiencing what we have projected and has then been passed through
another human being (though that person may be held in imagination).
We learn by putting something out and finding out what comes back.
Our relationship with the world is a phenomenological 'I-thou',
not 'I-it'. It is evocative knowledge.

It may be thought that this model for knowledge is appropriate to
relations between people (and perhaps pets) but that it in no way
applies to knowledge of the external world. Some such distinction
would seem to be common sense. However, it does not take into account
recent thinking in the history, philosophy and social studies of
science which argues that we project onto nature particular versions
of reality and frame it according to the prevailing value systems and
preoccupations - the 'world view' or weltangschuung of a period or
subculture or discipline.

What is true for a particular version of the world is also true for
the individuals who inhabit it. Jerome Bruner (1951) has shown this
with respect to children's perceptions of ordinary objects: what they
see - even the size of coins - is dependent on their social location.
M.L.J. Abercrombie (l989) has shown it for the anatomical and
scientific perceptions of medical students: the most mundane
observations only make sense in the light of unconscious forces.
Donna Haraway (l989, l991) has shown it for various fields of
scientific research, particularly toe social construction of
primatology, providing a pedigree for our humanity (see Young, 1992).
Other versions of this position are now commonplace among students of
scientific thought, e.g., Figlio, 1978, 1979, 1985; Hesse, 1980;
Young, 1977, 1981, 1985, 1990).

In the clinical realm, Searles' first book was a major study of how
schizophrenics projectively perceive the external environment (1960).
This provides an interesting link between views of the inner world
and ideas of the outer one: both worlds are are highly interpretive.
Karl Figlio has generalized this view to nature as projectively
experienced by nuclear disarmers and members of the peace movement.
These 'friends of the earth' relate to the planet as a significant
Other - a thou. Moving beyond our culture, we have seen that the
history of social anthrolpology can be seen as a case study of my
thesis, as the work of Mary Douglas exemplefies (above, ch. 2).
Similarly, philosophers now argue that truth is made, not found
(Rorty, 1980, 1982, 1989). Those who reflect on the philosophical
implications of the belief systems of different epochs, tribes and
disciplines point out that each of these social groups has its own
cosmology, which articulates more or less well with that of other
tribes (Horton, 1967, Bloor, 1977; Douglas, 1975). Ordinary, didactic
imparting of knowledge and learning from teachers and from the media
do not thereby cease to occur; they become special, limited cases of
a richer model for the process of knowing.

The integration of psychoanalytic theory with developments such as
those outlined here is, in my opinion, an important desideratum. What
I have provided here is the barest sketch, in the hope that it will
make attractive the project of bringing together a social, and
cultural account of ways of knowing (epistemology) with the
philosophical bearings of recent developments in psychoanalysis.
Aspects of the work of Winnicott, Klein, Bion, and Meltzer seem to me
to lie at the centre of this project. I have in mind, in particular,
the concept of transitional space (chapter 6) and the notion that all
experience is mediated through primitive processes and known through
the mother's body (chapters 3, 7; cf. Young, l986, 1989).

Returning to the psychoanalytic sphere, the weight I have put on the
concept of countertransference need not be borne by that concept
alone; it can be shared by ways of thinking across a broad range of
disciplines. In the analytic relationship, it turns out that the real
justification for the free-floating attention that is characteristic
of psychoanalysis is that it makes our minds available for the
patient's projections and facilitates their search for the resonances
in us for what they feel. Freud said, 'He should simply listen, and
not bother about whether he is keeping anything in mind' (S.E. 12, p.
112). Bion put it poetically in his injunction that the analyst
should 'impose upon himself the positive discipline of eschewing
memory and desire. I do not mean that "forgetting" is enough: what is
required is a positive act of refraining from memory and desire'
(Bion, 1970, p. 31).

If this sounds a bit mystical, so be it. Racker shares an
appropriately Oriental parable: One day an old Chinese sage lost his
pearls. 'He therefore sent his eyes to search for his pearls, but his
eyes did not find them. Next he sent his ears to search for the
pearls, but his ears did not find them either. Then he sent his hands
to search for the pearls, but neither did his hands find them. And so
he sent all of his senses to search for his pearls but none found
them. Finally he sent his not-search to look for his pearls. And his
not-search found them. (Racker, 1968, p. 17).

Once one is in this state, one is open to the patient's unconscious
and to the injunction that 'Constant projecting by the patient into
the analyst is the essence of analysis' (Brenman Pick in Spillius,
vol. 2, p.37). And at the other end of the analysis lies the ability
of the patient to take back the projections. This is an important
criterion of improvement. Bearing projections is the whole basis of
containment: the therapist can bear to take in and contain the
projections, to hold them and give them back, in due course, in the
form of accessible interpretations.

I am suggesting that countertransference is not only the basis for
analytic work but the basic process in all human communication and
knowing. We only know what is happening because we are moved from
within by what we have taken in and responded to from our own deep
feelings. The space between people is filled when it is and to the
extent it is - by what we evoke in one another.



This essay was joint winner of the Kelnar Essay Prize of the Lincoln
Clinic and Centre for Psychotherapy, 1990. It appeared in a modified
form in Mental Space (Process Press, 1994).

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Address for correspondence: 26 Freegrove Road, London N7 9RQ.

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Papers: Who's the fairest of them all?: The impact of narcissism on
self- and other- rated fairness in the workplace

This dissertation examines individual differences in self-perceived
and other-assessed fairness. Specifically, it tests whether the
personality trait of narcissism can predict higher self-rated
fairness, lower other-rated fairness and a larger divergence between
self-rated and other rated fairness. Additionally, this study
considers the impact of narcissism on the accuracy of one's
perceptions of how one is viewed by others as well as the accuracy of
others' perceptions of how one views oneself.

Messick, Bloom, Boldizar & Samuelson (1985) published a study in the
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology entitled "Why we are fairer
than others" in which they found that people associate more fairness
with their own behavior than that of other people. Given that not
everyone can be fairer than average, the authors conclude that people
have a self-enhancement bias in their perceptions of fairness.

Cates & Messick (1996) describe how the "I am fairer than others" (or
the "dual slope phenomenon" in which the "self" and "other" lines in
a plot of the frequency of behaviors on the dimensions of fair vs.
unfair, frequent vs. infrequent have different slopes and cross one
another) has been replicated cross culturally, in the Netherlands by
Liebrand, Messick and Wolters (1986), in Hong Kong by Chan (1987) and
in Japan by Tanaka (1993). One shortcoming of these studies is that
they lack criterion measures against which self-ratings of fairness
could be compared and evaluated.

Some theorists have claimed that inflated self-perception, within a
reasonable range, is necessary for and diagnostic of healthy mental
functioning (Taylor, 1989). Completely accurate self-perceptions may
be a function of "depressive realism," which is the tendency of
depressed individuals to see themselves and the world more accurately
than non-depressed individuals. The "I am fairer than others"
phenomenon may be one realm in which "positive illusions" comprise
mental health.

Overly positive self-ratings of fairness can also be considered
within larger frameworks such as the actor-observer effect, which
involves different patterns of attributions for self versus others
(Miller and Ross, 1975) or self-enhancement biases, which cause
individuals to rate themselves more highly than others rate them on a
wide variety of evaluative dimensions (Taylor and Brown, 1988). Both
the actor-observer effect and self-enhancement biases have been
explained in terms of self-esteem maintenance.

John and Robins (1994) describe two competing views of self-
enhancement- the first is that self-enhancement biases are a
universal, general "law" of human nature, and the second is that the
presence or absence of self-enhancement biases is a function of
individual differences. John and Robins argue for and found evidence
supporting the latter position, specifically citing narcissism as an
individual difference that influences self-perception and the
tendency to make self-serving attributions. Farwell and Wohlwend-
Lloyd (1998), commenting on the results of John and Robins, assert
that contextual factors interact with narcissism in causing self-
enhancement.

In some contexts, there can be benefits of narcissism. Emmons (1984)
speculates that there may be a curvilinear relationship between
narcissism and adjustment-- too little narcissism may be as
maladaptive as too much. For example, attributional training for
depressed people might entail teaching them to acquire a more
narcissistic attributional style (Emmons, 1987). Narcissists can be
assertive, socially poised and confident (Wink, 1991) and charming
and helpful (Yukl, 1994). Narcissistic people can also appear
special, win other's confidence, (Hogan, Raskin & Fazzini, 1990) and
attract envy and admiration (Jacoby, 1990).

The presence of some narcissistic traits might actually be a
prerequisite for the attainment of a leadership position (Kets de
Vries and Miller, 1985) or a predictor of who will rise to the top of
an organization (Hogan, Raskin & Fazzini, 1990) partly because the
strength and inflexibility of a narcissistic leader's worldview can
cause followers to identify with and participate in the leader's self
involvement. The narcissistic leader's strong conviction that his or
her group or nation is superior to others might inspire loyalty,
group identification and nationalism, which can itself be considered
as analogous to narcissism at a societal level of analysis (Emmons,
1987). There is also likely to be a "dark side" to the narcissistic
leader (Hogan, Raskin & Fazzini, 1990) and the accompanying distorted
view of reality may have disastrous consequences when the leader
begins to use his or her followers to attain narcissistic goals.

While political leaders may benefit from narcissism at certain times
and under certain circumstances, narcissism is likely to be more of a
consistent obstacle for business managers, who comprise the subjects
in the present study. Unlike leaders at the top of organizations who
may have the power to establish a vision and set rules, middle level
business managers must operate within the framework of existing
organizational rules and their effectiveness is partly dependent on
the discretionary efforts of employees. The goal of this research is
to determine how and to what extent a middle level business manager's
narcissism impacts employees' perceptions of and satisfaction with
the interactional manner in which the manager executes an
organization's existing procedural rules.

In their 1994 Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
paper "Accuracy and bias in self-perception: individual differences
in self-enhancement and the role of narcissism", John and Robins
tested the relationship between individual differences and self and
other rated performance in an assessment center task. The authors
found that subjects high on narcissism (As measured by 2 observer-
based measures and 2 self-report measures, the Narcissistic
Personality Inventory and the California Psychological Inventory)
overestimated their contributions (self-enhancement bias), those low
on narcissism underestimated their contributions (self diminishment
bias), and those in the middle of the narcissism scales showed
neither bias.

In the introduction to their study, John and Robins (1994)
wrote "although the relevance of narcissism for an individual-
differences account of self-enhancement bias seems rather obvious,
the construct has not yet been examined in studies of self-perception
accuracy against observer criteria." (p. 209). While there has been
more empirical investigation into narcissism in the last few years,
the area remains largely unexplored. As recently as 1998, Farwell and
Wohlwend-Lloyd wrote that one important area for future research
is "the social consequences of variations in dispositional
narcissism." (p. 81), which is exactly what the present study
endeavors to explore.







© 2002 Dattner Consulting LLC. All rights reserved. Design by Tien-Yi
Lee

Pathological Narcissism - A Dysfunction or a Blessing?

Click on this link to read the article:

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/90196

Additional articles here:

http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/6514

1 April 2002
Pathological Narcissism - A Dysfunction or a Blessing?
The narcissist's enhanced performance is predicated on the existence
of a challenge (real or imaginary) and of an audience. Baumeister
usefully re-affirmed this linkage, known to theoreticians since
Freud.

14 March 2002
Narcissistic Routines
The behaviour of the narcissist is regulated by a series of routines
developed by rote learning and by repetitive patterns of experience.
The narcissist finds change extremely distasteful and unsettling. He
is a creature of habit. The function of these routines is to reduce
his anxiety by transforming a hostile and arbitrary world into a
hospitable and manageable one.

1 March 2002
The Opaque Mirror
I keep getting surprised when confronted with reality. My feelings
are hurt, my narcissism injured, my self esteem shaken, my rage
provoked.

10 February 2002
For the Love of God
God is everything the narcissist ever wants to be: omnipotent,
omniscient, omnipresent, admired, much discussed, and awe inspiring.
God is the narcissist's wet dream, his ultimate grandiose fantasy.
But God comes handy in other ways as well.

1 February 2002
Trauma and Abuse
Trauma is not always the result of abuse, of course. We are
traumatized by mishaps, setbacks, disasters, and death. Trauma always
entails grief and bereavement. Whether abuse translates to trauma
depends, to a large extent, on the intricate interaction between
victim and society.

10 January 2002
The Delusional Way Out
The narcissist resorts to self-delusion. Unable to completely ignore
contrarian opinion and data - he transmutes them. Unable to face the
dismal failure that he is, the narcissist partially withdraws from
reality. To soothe and salve the pain of disillusionment, he
administers to his aching soul a mixture of lies, distortions, half-
truths and outlandish interpretations of events around him.

1 January 2002
A Holiday Grudge
In times like that, in holidays and birthdays, I am reminded of this
fundamental truth: my voluptuous, virulent, spiteful, hissing and
spitting grudge is all I have. Those who threaten to take it away
from me - with their love, affection, compassion, or care - are my
mortal enemies indeed.

31 December 2001
Ideas of Reference
The narcissist is the centre of the world. He is not merely the
centre of HIS world - as far as he can tell, he is the centre of THE
world.

12 December 2001
The Silver Pieces of the Narcissist
Antagonizing and alienating my potential benefactors is a pleasure
that I cannot afford on an empty purse. When impoverished, I am
altruism embodied - the best of friends, the most caring of tutors, a
benevolent guide, a lover of humanity, and a fierce fighter against
narcissism, sadism, and abuse in all their myriad forms. I adhere, I
obey, I succumb, I agree wholeheartedly, I praise, condone, idolize,
and applaud. I am the perfect audience, an admirer and an adulator, a
worm and an amoeba - spineless, adaptable in form, slithery
flexibility itself. To behave so is unbearable for a narcissist,
hence my addiction to money (really, to freedom) in all its forms. It
is my evolutionary ladder from slime to the sublime - to mastery.

1 December 2001
The Selfish Gene - The Genetic Underpinnings of Narcissism
Is pathological narcissism the outcome of inherited traits - or the
sad result of abusive and traumatizing upbringing? Or, maybe it is
the confluence of both? It is a common occurrence, after all, that,
in the same family, with the same set of parents and an identical
emotional environment - some siblings grow to be malignant
narcissists, while others are perfectly "normal". Surely, this
indicates a predisposition of some people to developing narcissism, a
part of one's genetic heritage.

14 November 2001
The Self-Deprecating Narcissist
I have a riotous, subtle, ironic, and sharpened sense of humour. I
can be self-deprecating and self-effacing. I do not recoil from
making my dilapidated ego the target of my own barbs. Yet, this is
true only when I have narcissistic supply aplenty. Narcissistic
supply - attention, adulation, admiration, applause, fame, celebrity,
notoriety - neuter the sting of my self-directed jokes. In my more
humorous moments I can present myself as the opposite of what is
widely known to be true. I can unfold a tale of fatuous decisions
followed by clumsy misbehaviour - yet, no one would take me to be
fatuous or clumsy. It is as though my reputation protects me from the
brunt of my own jocular modesty. I can afford to be magnanimously
forgiving of my own shortcomings because they are so outweighed by my
gifts and by my widely known achievements or traits.

2 November 2001
Conspicuous Existence
Small wonder the narcissist is tired. His exhaustion is all-pervasive
and all-consuming. His mental energy depleted, the narcissist can
hardly empathize with others, love, or experience
emotions. "Conspicuous existence" malignantly replaces "real
existence". The myriad, ambivalent, forms of life are supplanted by
the single obsession-compulsion of being seen, being observed, being
reflected, being by proxy, through the gaze of others. The narcissist
ceases to exist when not in company. His being fades when not
discerned. Yet, he is unable to return the favour. He is a captive,
oblivious to everything but his preoccupation. Emptied from within,
devoured by his urge, the narcissist blindly stumbles from one
relationship to another, from one warm body to the next, forever in
search of that elusive creature - himself.

14 October 2001
It is My World, Who are You?
I belong. I am a narcissist. And you? You are deviants. You have mal-
adapted to my brave new world. The world of the Narcissist.

1 October 2001
Beware the Children
I see in children feigned innocence, relentless and ruthless
manipulation, the cunning of the weak. They are ageless. Their
narcissism is disarming in its directness, in its cruel and absolute
lack of empathy. They demand with insistence, punish absent-mindedly,
idealize and devalue capriciously.

15 September 2001
Studying My Death
I wouldn't mind to see it go. But I resent the farewell price - those
protracted, bilious, and bloody agonies we call "passing away".
Afflicted by death - I wish it only to be inflicted as painlessly and
swiftly as possible. I wish to die as I have lived - detached,
oblivious, absent minded, apathetic, and on my terms.

3 September 2001
The Weapon of Language
In the the narcissist's surrealistic world, even language is
pathologized. It mutates into a weapon of self defence, a verbal
fortification, a medium without a message, replacing words with
duplicitous and ambiguous vocables.

18 August 2001
Other People's Pain
The narcissist inflicts pain and abuse on others. He devalues sources
of supply, callously and off-handedly abandons them, and discards
people, places, partnerships, and friendships unhesitatingly. Some
narcissists - though by no means the majority - actually ENJOY
abusing, taunting, tormenting, and freakishly controlling others
("gaslighting"). But most of them do these things absentmindedly,
automatically, and, often, even without good reason.

1 August 2001
Physique Dysmorphique
For most of my childhood and adolescence I believed that I had an
enormous, elephantine skull. I didn't. Actually, I am told that my
head is unusually small in comparison to my body. This is especially
true after I put on another 20 kilos in weight.

1 August 2001
Being There
My life is not a thread, it is a patchwork of chance encounters,
haphazard exams, and the drug of narcissistic supply consumed. I feel
like a series of still frames, somehow improperly animated. I know
the audience is there. I crave their adulation. I try to reach out,
to break the mould of the album of photographs that I became - to no
avail. I am trapped in there forever. And if none of you chooses to
inspect my image at a given moment, I fade, in sepia colours. Until I
am no longer.

18 July 2001
The Disappearance of the Witnesses
I live through others. I inhabit their memories of me. Bits and
pieces of Sam are strewn across continents, among hundreds of casual
acquaintances, friends, lovers, teachers, admirers, and despisers. I
exist by reflection. This is the essence of secondary narcissistic
supply - the secure knowledge that I am replicated in the minds of
many. I want to be remembered because without being remembered I am
not. I need to be discussed because I have no being except as a topic
of discussion.


http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/6514/21-40


4 July 2001
The Ubiquitous Narcissist
The narcissist feels omnipresent, all-pervasive, the prime mover and
shaker, the cause of all things. Hence his constant projection of his
own traits, fears, behaviour patterns, beliefs, and plans onto
others. The narcissist is firmly convinced that he is the generator
of other people's emotions, that they depend on him for their well-
being, that without him their lives will crumble into gray
mediocrity. He regards himself as the most important part in the life
of his nearest and dearest. To avoid painful contradictions with
reality, the narcissist aims to micromanage and control his human
environment.

23 June 2001
No One Counts to Ten
I am devoid of energy. I am denuded of defences. I stumble. I get up.
I stumble again. Floored, no one bothers to count to ten. I know I
will revive. I know I will survive. I just don't know what for.

3 June 2001
The Malignant Optimism of the Abused
People refuse to believe that some questions are unsolvable, some
diseases incurable, some disasters inevitable. They see a sign of
hope in every fluctuation. They read meaning and patterns into every
random occurrence, utterance, or slip. They are deceived by their own
pressing need to believe in the ultimate victory of good over evil,
health over sickness, order over disorder. Life appears otherwise so
meaningless, so unjust and so arbitrary... So, they impose upon it a
design, progress, aims, and paths. This is magical thinking.

21 May 2001
That Thing between a Man and a Woman...
Most narcissists go through schizoid phases in their inexorable
orbits of gloom and mania. Sometimes the schizoid prevails. A
narcissist that is also a schizoid is an unnatural hybrid, a chimera,
a shattered personality. The push and pull, the approach and the
avoidance, the compulsive search for the drugs that only humans can
provide and the no less compulsive urge to avoid them altogether...
it is a sorry sight. The narcissist shrivels and withers as the
battle is prolonged. He becomes almost psychotic at the tug of war
inside him. Alienated even from his False Self by his schizoid
disorder, such a narcissist is turned into a gaping black hole, out
to suck the vitality of those around him.

7 May 2001
The Ghost in the Machine
In my mind, I am not human. I am a machine at the service of a madman
that snatched my body and invaded my being when I was very young.
Imagine the terror I live with, the horror of having an alien within
your own self. A shell, a nothingness, I keep producing articles at
an ever accelerating pace. I write maniacally, unable to cease,
unable to eat, or sleep, or bathe, or enjoy. I am possessed by me.
Where does one find refuge if one's very abode, one very soul is
compromised and dominated by one's mortal enemy - oneself?

6 May 2001
Narcissists, Violence and Abuse - Orientation Article
The narcissist has conflicting needs. On the one hand, he derives his
sense of self-worth and the regulation of his self-esteem from
others. On the other hand, he needs to feel superior and contemptuous
towards the very sources of his sustenance. Hence his erratic
unpredictability, callousness, cruelty and dangerous capriciousness.

23 April 2001
I Cannot Forgive
I home in on the chinks in their laboriously constructed armours. I
spot their Achilles hill and attach to it. I prick the gasbags that
most people are. I deflate them. I force them to confront their
finiteness and helplessness and mediocrity. I negate their sense of
uniqueness. I reduce them to proportion and provide them with a
perspective. I do so cruelly and abrasively and sadistically and
lethally efficiently. I have no compassion. And I prey on their
vulnerabilities, however microscopic, however well-concealed.

2 April 2001
Pseudologica Fantastica
Pseudologica Fantastica is the compulsive need to lie consistently
and about everything, however inconsequential - even if it yields no
benefits to the liar. I am not that bad. But when I want to impress -
I lie.

13 March 2001
Portrait of the Narcissist as a Young Man
I am not preoccupied with my age, nor am I obsessed with my
dwindling, fat flapping body. I am no hypochondriac. But There is a
streak of sadness in me, like an undercurrent and a defiance of Time
itself. Like Dorian Gray, I want to remain as I was when I became the
centre of attention, the focus of adoration, the heart of a twister
of media attention. I know I can't. And I know that I have failed not
only at arresting Chronos - but on a more mundane, degrading level. I
failed as an adult.

4 March 2001
Dr. Jackal and Mr. Hide
Narcissists are either cerebral or somatic. In other words, they
either generate their narcissistic supply by applying their bodies or
by applying their minds. The somatic narcissist flaunts his sexual
conquests, parades his possessions, exhibits his muscles, brags about
his physical aesthetics or sexual prowess or exploits, is often a
health freak and a hypochondriac. The cerebral narcissist is a know-
it-all, haughty and intelligent "computer". He uses his awesome
intelligence, or knowledge (real or pretended) to secure adoration,
adulation and admiration.

23 February 2001
The Discontinuous Narcissist
"But you hate kiwi!" - protests my girl - "How can anyone detest kiwi
and then eat it so eagerly?". She is baffled. She is hurt. To some
extent, she is even frightened to find herself with this kiwi-
guzzling stranger.

10 February 2001
The Green Eyed Narcissist
I am constantly envious of people. This is my way of interacting with
the world. I begrudge others their success, or brilliance, or
happiness, or good fortune. I am driven to excesses of paranoia and
guilt and fear that subside only after I "act out" or punish myself.
It is a vicious cycle in which I am entrapped.

28 January 2001
The Lonely Narcissist
The narcissistic landscape is fraught with contradictions. The
Narcissist depends on people - but hates and despises them. He wants
to control them unconditionally - but is also looking to punish
himself savagely. He is terrified of persecution ("persecutory
delusions") - but seek the company of his own "persecutors"
compulsively. The narcissist is the victim of incompatible inner
dynamics, ruled by numerous vicious circles, pushed and pulled
simultaneously by irresistible forces.

18 January 2001
The Sad Dreams of The Narcissist
Perhaps I choose narcissism, as I have been "accused". And if I do,
it is a rational choice of self-preservation and survival. The
paradox is that being a self-loathing narcissist may be the only act
of self-love I have ever committed.

6 January 2001
Why I Write Poetry
They say, with a knowing smile: "If he is really a narcissist - how
come he writes such beautiful poetry?". "Words are the sounds of
emotions" - they add - "and he claims to have none". They are smug
and comfortable in their well classified world, my doubters.

26 December 2000
The Happiness of Others
I spent this Christmas consumed by a paranoid delusion. They were
after me, I knew it. The persecutory images overwhelmed me. I had no
one to talk to. None of those I so gleefully abused, so mercilessly
exposed, so sadistically tormented and so meticulously avoided would
communicate with me any further. I finally entered the terminal phase
of narcissism: excruciating social isolation, the result of schizoid,
paranoid and sado-masochistic behaviours.

15 December 2000
The Narcissist in Love
The narcissist is emotionally attached to only one thing: his
disorder. The narcissist loves his disorder, desires it passionately,
cultivates it tenderly, is proud of its "achievements" (and in my
case, makes a living off it). His emotions are misdirected. Where
normal people love others and empathize with them, the narcissist
loves his False Self and identifies with it to the exclusion of all
else - his True Self included.

30 November 2000
A Great Admiration
To paraphrase what Henry James' once said of Louisa May Alcott, my
experience of genius is small but my admiration for it is,
nevertheless, great. When I visited the "Figarohaus" in Vienna -
where Mozart lived and worked for two crucial years - I experienced a
great fatigue, the sort that comes with HASHLAMA. In the presence of
real genius, I slumped into a chair and listened for one listless
hour to its fruits: symphonies, the divine Requiem, arias, a
cornucopia.

18 November 2000
When Victims Become Narcissists (MODIFIED)
Many people here - and on my mailing lists - adopt the role of a
professional victim. In doing so, they become self-centred, devoid of
empathy and, abusive and exploitative. In other words, they become
narcissists. The role of "professional victims" - ones whose
existence and very identity is defined solely and entirely by their
victimhood - is well researched in victimology. It doesn't make for a
nice reading. These victim "pros" are often more cruel, vengeful,
vitriolic, discompassionate and violent than their abuser. They make
a career of it. They identify with this role to the exclusion of all
else. It is a danger to be avoided. And this is precisely what I
called "Narcissistic Contagion" or "Narcissism by Proxy".

12 November 2000
The Anxiety of Boredom
I find myself most worried when I am bored. It goes like this: I am
aggressive. I channel my aggression and internalise it. I experience
my bottled wrath as boredom. I am bored. I feel threatened by it in a
vague, mysterious way. Anxiety ensues. I rush to construct an
intellectual edifice to accommodate all these primitive emotions and
their transubstantiations. I identify reasons, causes, effects and
possibilities in the outer world. I build scenarios. I spin
narratives. I feel no more anxiety. I know the enemy (or so I think).
And now I am worried. Or paranoid.


http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/6514/41-53


1 November 2000
The Split Narcissist
The Narcissist is our first encounter with carbon-based artificial
intelligence. Many wish it were the last.

13 October 2000
Wasted Lives
I think a lot about the desultory waste that is my biography. Ask
anyone who shared a life with a narcissist, or knew one and they are
likely to sigh: "What a waste". Waste of potential, waste of
opportunities, waste of emotions, a wasteland of arid addiction and
futile pursuit.

27 September 2000
The Entitlement of Routine
I hate routine. When I find myself doing the same things over and
over again, I get depressed. I oversleep, over-eat, over-drink and,
in general, engage in addictive, impulsive and compulsive behaviours.
This is my way of re-introducing risk and excitement into what I
(emotionally) perceive to be a barren life.

8 September 2000
Grandiosity Deconstructed
Sometimes I find myself bemused (though rarely amused) by my own
grandiosity. Not by my fantasies - they are common to many "normal
people". It is healthy to daydream and fantasize. It is the
antechamber of life and its circumstances. It is a process of
preparing for eventualities, embellished and decorated. No, I am
talking about feeling grandiose.

9 August 2000
I Love to be Hated
The persecution of the narcissist IS his uniqueness. He must be
different, for better or for worse. The streak of paranoia embedded
in him, makes the outcome inevitable. He is in constant conflict with
lesser beings: his spouse, his shrink, his boss, his colleagues.
Forced to stoop to their intellectual level, the narcissist feels
like Gulliver: a giant strapped by Lilliputians. His life is a
constant struggle against the self-contented mediocrity of his
surroundings. This is his fate which he accepts, though never
stoically. It is a calling, a mission and a recurrence in his stormy
life.

24 July 2000
The Glass House of the Narcissist
The Narcissist MUST control his environment - human and physical. His
(mental) life depends on it. His sources of supply depend on it. His
sanity depends on it. He cannot afford to lose control.

13 July 2000
The Music of My Emotions
Narcissists can feel - but their emotions are negative and reactive.
I feel sad, hate, anger. Above all, I feel envy.

29 June 2000
The Magic of My Thinking
Magical thinking - I believe that I am immune to the outcomes of my
own actions, that I shall always prevail, that good things will
always happen to me.

19 June 2000
Looking for a Family
The narcissist does not want to recreate the source of his own
disorder - his family. The echoes of his own sad childhood warn him
against having children. He remembers the abuse and hurt too vividly.
A string of broken relationships and a landscape of emotional waste -
constitute both the narcissist's past and his future.

9 June 2000
Narcissist, the Machine
To be a narcissist is to lie to yourself constantly, to hide the fact
that you are lying to yourself from yourself and to conceal this
hiding mechanism as well. It is to feel superior and to treat others
as instruments.

26 May 2000
My Woman and I
No woman has ever wanted to have a child with me. It is very telling.
Women have children even with incarcerated murderers. I know because
I have been to jail with these people. But no woman has ever felt the
urge to perpetuate US - the we-ness of she and I.

12 May 2000
How I "Became" a Narcissist
A narcissist realizes that he is one usually only after a severe life
crisis and a narcissistic injury.

21 April 2000
Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited
What is narcissism - rather, what is pathological narcissism? And why
is it important to learn about it?

http://psychopath.bsd.uchicago.edu/Lecture28-Personality-Goldman.htm

Lecture #28: Personality and Personality Disorders (L. Goldman)
Objectives

To understand the concepts of temperament, personality style, and
personality disorder
To know the different frameworks for conceptualizing personality and
personality disorders
To know the 10 personality disorders listed in the DSM-IV, what
cluster to which they belong, and their relationship to Axis I
disorders with which they may overlap symptomatically
To know the general principles of treating patients with personality
disorders

Background

What is personality? It's probably like one Supreme Court justice's
definition of obscenity: everyone knows it when s/he sees it, but no
one can define it exactly. Personality is best thought of as the
usual or characteristic way that an individual deals with interper-
sonal relationships, stress, and self-image throughout life. It is
probably a function of:


· innate temperament (likely  hard-wired and under mainly genetic
control),
· early life experiences (parental personalities, childhood events,
etc.),
· perhaps certain post-childhood experiences (especially if
traumatic), and
· the interaction of the two over time.

The way that personality manifests itself at times of stress is
related not only to the specific personality style itself, but also
to the specific challenges one faces, the developmental stage one is
working on, and the buffering effects of a support system.

A personality disorder (PD) is a constellation of traits (enduring
patterns of perceiving or relating to others or oneself) which are
rigid and maladaptive and lead to functional impairment or subjective
distress. We can say a number of things about PDs in general:


· there are no PDs on desert island (i.e., they really become
symptomatic only in an interper-sonal field),
· those w/PDs have an uncanny ability to get under others' skin,
· the traits are ego-syntonic in nature, and
· people with PDs are often quite resistant to treatment - they feel
that the problem is "others," not themselves.
In general, aspects of a PD are evident by adolescence/young
adulthood but the clinician should be hesitant to diagnose until
adolescence is over. The description of the PD is characteristic of
person's long-term functioning: there may be exacerbations and
remissions but it is not limited to discrete episodes only as with
many Axis I disorders. The problems are most evident in young
adulthood, often waning in middle age or later. About 15-20% of those
seen in Psychiatry clinics will receive a PD diagnosis, while
population estimates are 5% and up to 20%.

Diagnosis

  Today the diagnosis of a PD is largely made descriptively  (i.e., by
signs and symptoms) using DSM-IV or comparable criteria. While this
approach has reasonable reliability, it groups together very
different patients, says little about severity, and offers no clues
about how to conceptualize or treat such patients. Another  model is
to take a psychodynamic approach, looking at defense mechanisms and
ego strengths/weaknesses of the patient. This focus on the patient's
inner and interpersonal world provides a model for thinking about
patients with PDs and doing psychothera-py with them. Unfortunately,
it is limited by a paucity of empirical evidence to support either
etiologic hypotheses or treatment outcomes.

The psychodynamic approach recognizes a hierarchy of defenses which
has been somewhat validated empirically. Although different authors
recognize somewhat different defenses or use differing nomenclature,
there is pretty good agreement about where a particular defense fits
into the hierarchy. Using three categories, we can divide defenses as
follows:


· Immature defenses (denial, extreme fantasy, hallucinations,
delusions, schizoid withdrawal, projection, splitting) - associated
with psychosis and more severe PDs
· Neurotic defenses (rationalization, intellectualization,
displacement, reaction formation, undoing, isolation of affect,
repression, identification) - associated with milder PDs
· Mature defenses (sublimation, altruism, humor) - associated with
mental health, absence of PD
When making a diagnosis one needs to exclude Axis I disorders which
may simulate PDs (especially when in partial remission), particularly
major affective disorders, dysthymic disorder, substance abuse
disorders). Needless to say, Axis I (and at times Axis III) disorders
may co-exist with PDs and each may influence the other). Obviously,
it is very important to get a rather detailed longitudinal history
rather than focus only on cross-sectional symptoms.

Classification

There are three clusters of PDs:


· Cluster A - odd or eccentric, thought perhaps to be the forme
fruste of psychotic disorders (paranoid, schizoid, schizotypal)
· Cluster B - dramatic or erratic (histrionic, borderline,
antisocial, narcissistic)
· Cluster C - anxious, fearful, "neurotic border" (dependent,
obsessive-compulsive, avoidant)
Mixed or atypical versions are very common. Many patients meet
criteria for more than one PD (esp. histrionic, borderline,
narcissistic).  In DSM-IV this is called PD Not Otherwise Specified
(NOS).
  Physiological variables play a role in how people approach or react
to novel situations and thus may determine some of the patterns seen
in personality types and disorders. For example, some people who
experience high levels of physiologic arousal in new settings may
find the arousal unpleasant and thus prefer to avoid new situations.
We may then label these people schizoid or avoidant. On the other
hand, some people with low bas-eline levels of arousal may actively
seek out novel or even risky situations in order to "normalize" their
physiology. We may label them as histrionic or sociopathic, for
example. It is not yet clear how the cognitive patterns seen in
various personalities fit into this type of schema: perhaps there is
some post facto rationalization of physiologically-driven behavior.
Some of the physiological patterns commonly seen correlate roughly
with our understanding of the influence of various neurotransmitter
systems. It is for these reasons that we believe that pharmacological
interventions may affect such a core element of self as personality.
This is a major theme of books such as Listening to Prozac.

Treatment Issues

Sicker patients (especially with acting out/impulsive behaviors, e.g.
antisocial, borderline) may be untreatable in non-institutional
(hospital, prison, long-term psychiatric hospital) setting. Others
are treated over extended periods of time as outpatients mainly using
psychoanalytically-informed therapy, whether group, individual, or
psycho-analysis, though in recent years there have been encouraging
results seen with structured, behavioral-cognitive techniques.
Pharmacologic treatments are under intense scrutiny and hold promise
for many of the PDs.


TYPE DESCRIPTION MAIN DEFENSES BEHAVIOR W/MDs
Paranoid  mistrustful, over-sensitive, possessive, guarded, jealous
Projection doubting, worried about motives; double-checking;
withholding information; not satisfied w/outcomes
Schizoid aloof, avoidant, uninvolved Avoidance, fantasy detached,
impersonal, guarded, uncaring
Schizotypal eccentric, odd, bizarre language magical thinking,
fantasy uninvolved, hard to understand, idiosyncratic
Borderline impulsive, erratic, self-destructive; intense anger or
depression splitting, projective identification, extreme denial
angry, frustrating, non-adherent; suicide attempts, drug abuse; ask
about history of victimization!
Histrionic dramatic, colorful, playful, flamboyant Repression
seductive, manipulative, over- or under-compliant
Narcissistic needy, exhibitionistic, corruptible splitting, grandiose
fantasy charming, but cold, vain, demanding, entitled
Antisocial charming, slick, absent superego, empathy denial,
avoidance manipulative, drug/alcohol
Dependent needy, clinging, idealization Identification quiet, over-
compliant, problems with vacations, coverage
Obsessive-compulsive orderly, neat, miserly, lack of affect, stubborn
Intellectualization, isolation, reaction, formation, rationalization
lists, notes, good with complex regimens, power struggles
Avoidant shy, quiet, eager to please Displacement awkward, unable to
speak mind, uncomfortable w/other pts




Axis I Disorders Which May Simulate Personality Disorders:


Disorder Interpersonal problems
Depression dependency, irritability, poor compliance (decreased
concentration, motivation)
Mania irritability, seductiveness, anti-social behaviors, poor
compliance, grandiosity, depreciation
Panic disorder dependency, reassurance-seeking
Obsessive-compulsive disorder demanding (requests for many facts,
details, time)
Post-traumatic stress disorder irritability, hostility, impulsivity
Attention-deficit disorder poor compliance (impaired concentration),
impulsivity
Schizophrenia poor compliance (lack of understanding, impaired
motivation)
Paranoid (delusional) disorder hostile, demanding
Substance abuse disorders poor compliance, demanding, hostile



----------------------------------------------------------------------
----------

Lecture Outline and Notes

I. Introduction

A. Perhaps most confusing aspect in psychiatry, involves description,
psychodynamics, history, intermix of dx and tx (eg dx by transference)
B. About 15-20% of those seen in Psychiatry clinics will receive PD
dx, population estimates 5% and up to 20%; recent NIMH ECA: 6%
certain, 9% provisional, M>F almost 2:1
C. Description
1. Persistent (enduring) traits: may be increase or decrease, but
common pattern of reaction to most novel situations
2. Aspects evident in childhood, begin to set by adolescence, but
need to be careful making dx prior to then
3. Differentiate from Axis I things seen in cross-section (esp
affective disorders = dependent PD, substance abuse = ASPD/BPD)
4. Occurs in interpersonal matrix: no PDs on desert island (plenty of
neurosis though). Traits are rigid, ego-syntonic, drive others rather
than pt crazy
D. Making diagnosis
II. Diagnosis - four frameworks
A. Trait = Descriptive (DSM-IV) - modern, good inter-rater
reliability, some categories well-established (OCPD, ASPD), others
newer (NPD, avoidant) => question re reliability, validity. Lends
self to instruments, genetic studies, biological correlate research
and treatment studies. Academic psychology favors.
B. Psychodynamic - empirical validation of defense hierarchies,
maturation with time. Shows severity of PD as function of defenses,
gives treatment implications, some prognostic data. Not as rigorously
studied. Favored by therapist community
C. Psychobiology - Talking with Prozac - more currency in academic
psychiatry, lack of good empirical correlations yet
1. cognitive/perceptual disorganization - odd cluster - DA
2. impulsive/aggressive - dramatic - serotonin
3. affective instability - dramatic - ?
4. anxiety/inhibition - anxious cluster - NE, serotonin
D. Sociologic - emphasis on interpersonal/social context, useful re
ASPD, sadistic personality, self-defeating. Little vogue in clinical
circles
III. Cluster A - odd, eccentric, quasi-psychotic, schizophrenia-
spectrum. Projection, marked denial, avoidance, schizoid fantasy
characteristic. Rare in ECA studies (<1%). Associated with dysthymia,
social phobias, agoraphobia
A. Paranoid
1. Well-established
2. Mistrustful, jealous, rigid, moralistic, avoids emotional
closeness - not psychotic, but may see intense response (esp rage) to
perceived interpersonal slight; associated w/agoraphobia w/o panic
B. Schizoid
1. Also long-described
2. Cool, aloof, uninterested in close relations, loner existence, may
see marked anxiety, (near-)psychotic thinking if placed in intimate
situations. May work well in computer, night-shift, post-office jobs.
Negative sx of schizophrenia. Complicated by ETOH and other CD.
Differ from avoidant
C. Schizotypal
1. Separated out from schizoid in DSM-III - also detached, isolated,
but in addition regarded as odd, eccentric, queer in behavior and
language/thought. Idiosyncratic use of language, magical thinking,
extensive use of fantasy life which at times hovers around delusional
thinking. Very frequent in research assessments but rarely used in
clinical settings. 1/3-1/2 with MDD
2. Excess of schizophrenia in first-degree family members and vice
versa; eye-tracking, enlarged ventricles, backward masking similar to
schizophrenia - form fruste?
IV. Cluster B - dramatic, erratic; 4-5% in ECA; problems with impulse
control, social deviance; risk of CD; "recovery" may occur over long
time, fortuitous falling in with benign, controlling groups; risk of
boundary violations
A. Histrionic
1. Formerly hysterical character. Flamboyant, flirtatious, affected,
sex often in air. Shouts rather than speaks, affect always intense.
May be charming but insensitive, manipulative, antisocial behaviors.
Complicated by substance abuse, somatization, sexual dysfunction. 20%
research, rarer clinical dx
2. Repression, denial, displacement, identification (or
introjection). Evidence of familial transmission
B. Narcissistic
1. Newer category, from analytic literature, limited empirical data.
Pt alternates between states of intense longing for external
validation, approval and haughty, grandiose, cold isolation if
narcissistic supplies not forthcoming (rage).
2. May see affective instability, corruptibility, lack of empathy,
exploitation, relative dearth of guilt (shame, fear of being caught,
found out more prominent); <1% in general population yet 15-20% of
all PD diagnoses made clinically
C. Antisocial - covered by Dr. Lahey
1. Perhaps best established, studied, described by Greeks. Not
synonymous with criminality. In addition to childhood (conduct
disorder) and adult antisocial behavior, there is lack of empathy,
respect for feelings of others; use of others for exploitation, at
times without evident reason; absence of dysphoria (guilt, shame) at
being caught: impulsiveness, poor planning
2. psychopath as subset
3. PD most reliably diagnosed yet often need info from police,
family, etc (i.e., high false-negatives, low false-positives); new
line of research re physiologic (cortical) under-arousal
4. Adoption studies show strong genetic influence, also assoc
w/Briquet's, unipolar, ETOH, ADD, soft neuro findings. Had been model
of failure to identify with appropriate values in sociopathic parent
(s), but now seen as more biological failure (occurs when reared
away)
5. Generally untreatable (especially psychopath) except in forced
therapeutic situation (e.g. prison). Counter-transference a problem
(identification with victims or corruption of therapist).
D. Borderline
1. Originally from analytic literature (border between psychosis and
neurosis). Popular, heterogeneous, probably over-diagnosed
(obnoxious, treatment-resistant, impulsive)
2. Identity problems, very unstable, shifting interpersonal
relations, from idealization to depreciation, intense rage and
depression, impulsivity, acting out & self-destructive behaviors,
dissociative symptoms
3. Conceptualizations - affective, schizophrenia
4. Overlap with other disorders (psychotic, dissociative, affective) -
  usually meet criteria for other PD
5. Course
V. Cluster C - Neurotic Border - 2-4% in ECA
A. Obsessive-Compulsive - "doctor's personality"
1. Different from OCD
2. Stiff, rigid, unfeeling, very pre-occupied with morals, rules,
cleanliness, parsimony, details (forest for trees)
3. Intellectualization, reaction formation, isolation of affect,
rationalization
4. By contrast to schizoid, rich internal life, but affective
component hard to access
5. At risk for depressive disorders
6. Increased familial transmission
B. Avoidant
1. Fearful, anxious, shy, insecure. Superficially like schizoid, but
desires involvement, suffers from self-esteem problem
2. Newer category, may be related to social and other phobias
C. Dependent
Needy, clinging, at times may be self-defeating because of fear of
object loss, fear of assertiveness, taking initiative, pre-occupied
with actual or feared loss
Depression (anaclitic) following loss of key person; social phobias
Required readings: Kaplan and Sadock, Chapter 27
Suggested readings: Goldman, Chapter 15

http://www.theartofleadership.com/newsletters/february_99.html

Publisher: Gregory & Associates Issue No.2 Date: February 1, 1999
Gregory & Associates
Executive Consulting Services
15235 Burbank Boulevard • Van Nuys, California 91411
Phone: (818) 781-3098 Fax: (310) 455-4203 E-mail: bgregory@...

Inside This Newsletter

1 Responsibility
How important is the factor of responsibility?
2 Accountability
A logical follow through of responsibility?
3 Narcissism's Role
How does Narcissism effect accountability and responsibility issues?
RESPONSIBILITY

Responsibility is something we often take for granted. We expect that
people we are in relationships with will take responsibility for
their actions. We expect that an adult will automatically be
responsible. But how can we expect that someone who hasn't received
training or role-modeling in such an important issue will be "born
responsible"???

Learning to become responsible is a lot of work!
In school we may learn about responsibility through homework and
tests. In our family we may learn about the so called "one-way"
responsibility wherein our parents take responsibility for what they
want when they want to. It may be quite inconsistent and sometimes
right out confusing.
It may often seem to be easier to blame or be a victim than to take
responsibility.

-What kind of feedback or rewards did you receive when you took
responsibility for something "bad" you had done when you were a
child?

-Do you have positive or negative associations when you think of
responsibility?

-How often do you recall having had an actual conversation about what
responsibility really is??????

Take a moment and think about the word responsibility.

-What does it mean to you?

-How do you take responsibility??

-Are there different forms of responsibility? (financial, personal,
family, business)

-How do you take responsibility during an argument, conflict or
disagreement?

-When you last took responsibility for having made a mistake at work
how did you get rewarded by your boss?

m
m

  ACCOUNTABILITY
-What is the difference between responsibility and accountability?
-Can you be responsible without including a follow through of
accountability?

-How do you hold people accountable in your life?

-Do you hold yourself accountable?



Narcissism's Role
There is a contradiction between the word narcissism and
responsibility and accountability. The narcissistic part of our self
that is grandiose does not believe that it ever (due to its black and
white kind of thinking) should be held accountable for its actions.
This grandiose narcissistic part feels humiliated at the thought of
making a mistake. Therefore, by taking responsibility for a mistake
the narcissistic part would have to admit the mistake in the first
place. We can't take responsibility unless we first admit we were
wrong, made a mistake or made a poor choice. The narcissistic part
persists in holding on to the fantasy that it is perfect. It is
incomprehensible to this part of our self to admit anything but
perfection. So unless the narcissistic part of the person is being
addressed in a constructive and supportive way, a person with
responsibility and accountability issues will have difficulties
admitting flaws, mistakes or poor choices.
-How do you think this issue may affect your business?

-Do you think an employee with a strong narcissistic self will "cover
up" his mistakes, rather than "fess up" and deal with the
consequences?

-Do you think this issue may affect the individual's productivity?

- Do you think the communication within the company suffers if people
avoid taking responsibility?

-Do you know how to recognize when somebody has difficulties taking
responsibility?

-Do you know how to best support a person to recognize his choices
and lack of responsibility?

-Do you get intimidated when somebody avoids taking responsibility?

-Do you recognize when you don't want to take responsibility for a
poor choice, mistake or action?



Food For Thought
How do you think the communication in your office is affected by
narcissism, taking or not taking responsibility and holding somebody
accountable?

  How do you get others to take responsibility for their own anxiety,
defensiveness or actions?

  Can you recognize when somebody is taking responsibility or avoiding
taking responsibility in the way they communicate?

Publisher: Gregory & Associates Issue No.2 Date: February 1, 1999

Titus


Courtesy of EB

http://www.wtictv.com/entertainment/fox/titus/about.html







Inspired by the real life of comedian Christopher Titus, "TITUS" is a
half-hour comedy chronicling the heartbreakingly hilarious world of his
dysfunctional family. And coming from a dysfunctional family means that
nothing rattles him. Once you've driven your drunk father to your mom's
parole hearing...what else is there?
Titus (Christopher Titus) owns a custom car shop, Titus High
Performance, and builds hot rods. His hard-drinking, hard-living father
Ken was married five times which means Christopher was raised in five
broken homes. His mother, Ken's first wife, was a manic-depressive
schizophrenic, which means Christopher was raised by five broken
personalities. She now resides in a mental care facility - or as Ken so
eloquently puts it, she's "shacked up in the wacko basket."
Ken Titus (Stacy Keach) is a noble loving father, a caring human being
who only thinks of others­when he's sober. However, most of the time
he's the "anti-dad" - the most negative human being on the planet.
Wherever there is hope, he will kill it; where self-esteem rears its
shiny little head, he will be there to kick it in the testicles. Titus
notes "My father's always been mean-spirited and evil. It's been a lot
of fun. Except when his mean-spirited evilness is directed at you."
Erin (Cynthia Watros) is Titus' smart, energetic and beautiful
girlfriend. They knew each other as teens, but they went to a segregated
high school - she was in the incredibly "hot-looking babes" group and he
was in the "outcast-pimply-guys-who-hadn't-discovered-deodorant-yet"
group. Now she is the love of his life, and his first relationship that
didn't involve the justice system.
Also working at Titus' car shop is his younger brother Dave (Zack
Ward) - from another mother...and another father - and his best friend
Tommy (David Shatraw), the only member of the group who was raised in a
loving, stable household, which makes him the black sheep of the Titus
team.
Created and executive produced by Christopher Titus, Brian Hargrove and
Jack Kenny, "TITUS" is produced by 20th Century Fox Television.
Christopher Titus is "TITUS"
© FOX BROADCASTING
CR:
Randy Holmes/FOX



This page's design and HTML code © Tribune Interactive
Titus © Fox Broadcasting Company

http://www.anandainfo.com/cult_leaders.html




The following is an excerpt from the book "Captive Hearts, Captive
Minds" by Madeleine Landau
Tobias and Janja Lalich. See other "Resources and Links" for ordering
information.



The Master Manipulator

Let us look for a moment at how some of this manifests in the cult
leader. Cult leaders have an
outstanding ability to charm and win over followers. They beguile and
seduce. They enter a room and garner all the attention. They command
the utmost respect and obedience. These are "individuals whose
narcissism is so extreme and grandiose that they exist in a kind of
splendid isolation in which the creation of the grandiose self takes
precedence over legal, moral or interpersonal commitments."(l8)
Paranoia may be evident in simple or elaborate delusions of
persecution. Highly suspicious, they may feel conspired against,
spied upon or cheated, or maligned by a person, group, or
governmental agency. Any real or suspected unfavorable reaction may
be interpreted as a deliberate attack upon them or the group.
(Considering the criminal nature of some groups and the antisocial
behavior of others, some of these fears may have more of a basis in
reality than delusion!)

Harder to evaluate, of course, is whether these leaders' belief in
their magical powers, omnipotence, and connection to God (or whatever
higher power or belief system they are espousing) is delusional or
simply part of the con. Megalomania--the belief that one is able or
entitled to rule the world--is equally hard to evaluate without
psychological testing of the in- dividual, although numerous cult
leaders state quite readily that their goal is to rule the world. In
any case, beneath the surface gloss of intelligence, charm, and
professed humility seethes an inner world of rage, depression, and
fear.

Two writers on the subject used the label "Trust Bandit" to describe
the psychopathic personality.(l9) Trust Bandit is indeed an apt
descripdon of this thief of our hearts, souls, minds, bodies, and
pocketbooks. Since a significant percentage of current and former
cult members have been in more than one cultic group or relationship,
learning to recognize the per- sonality style of the Trust Bandit can
be a useful antidote to further abuse.

The Profile of a Psychopath

In reading the profile, bear in mind the three characteristics that
Robert Lifton sees as common to a cultic situation:

1. A charismatic leader who...increasingly becomes the object of
worship

2. A series of processes that can be associated with "coercive
persuasion" or "thought reform"

3. The tendency toward manipulation from above...with exploitation--
economic, sexual, or other--of often genuine seekers who bring
idealism from below(20)

Based on the psychopathy checklists of Hervey Cleckley and Robert
Hare, we now explore certain traits that are particularly pertinent
to cult leaders. The 15 characteristics outlined below list features
commonly found in those who become perpetrators of psychological and
physical abuse. In the discussion we use the
nomenclature "psychopath" and "cult leader" interchangeably. To
illustrate these points, a case study of Branch Davidian cult leader
David Koresh follows this section.

We are not suggesting that all cult leaders are psychopaths but
rather that they may exhibit many of the behavioral characteristics
of one. We are also not proposing that you use this checklist to make
a diagnosis, which is something only a trained professional can do.
We present the checklist as a tool to help you label and demystify
traits you may have noticed in your leader.

Characteristics of a Cult Leader

People coming out of a cultic group or relationship often struggle
with the question, "Why would anyone (my leader, my lover, my
teacher) do this to me?" When the deception and exploitation become
clear, the enormous unfairness of the victimization and abuse can be
very difficult to accept. Those who have been part of such a
nightmare often have difficulty placing the blame where it belongs--
on the leader.

A cult cannot be truly explored or understood without understanding
its leader. A cult's formation,
proselytizing methods, and means of control "are determined by
certain salient personality characteristics of [the] cult
leader....Such individuals are authoritarian personalities who
attempt to compensate for their deep, intense feelings of
inferiority, insecurity, and hostility by forming cultic groups
primarily to attract those whom they can psychologically coerce into
and keep in a passive-submissive state, and secondarily to use them
to increase their income."(l)

In examining the motives and activities of these self-proclaimed
leaders, it becomes painfully obvious that cult life is rarely
pleasant for the disciple and breeds abuses of all sorts. As a
defense against the high level of anxiety that accompanies being so
acutely powerless, people in cults often assume a stance of self-
blame. This is reinforced by the group's ma- manipulative messages
that the followers are never good enough and are to blame for
everything that goes wrong.

Demystifying the guru's power is an important part of the psyche-
educational process needed to fully recover.(2) It is critical to
truly gaining freedom and independence from the leader"s control. The
process starts with some basic questions: Who was this person who
encouraged you to view him as God, all-knowing, or all-powerful? What
did he get out of this masquerade? What was the real purpose of the
group (or relationship)?

In cults and abusive relationships, those in a subordinate position
usually come to accept the abuse as their fault, believing that they
deserve the foul treatment or that it is for their own good. They
sometimes persist in believing that they are bad rather than
considering that the person upon whom they are so dependent is cruel,
untrustworthy, and unreliable. It is simply too frightening for them
to do that: it threatens the balance of power and means risking total
rejection, loss, and perhaps even death of self or loved ones.
This explains why an abused cult follower may become disenchanted
with the relationship or the group yet continue to believe in the
teachings, goodness, and power of the leader.

Even after leaving the group or relationship, many former devotees
carry a burden of guilt and shame while they continue to regard their
former leader as paternal, all-good, and godlike. This is quite
common in those who "walk away" from their groups, especially if they
never seek the benefits of an exit counseling or therapy to deal with
cult-related issues. This same phenomenon is found in battered women
and in children who are abused by their parents or other adults they
admire.

To heal from a traumatic experience of this type, it is important to
understand who and what the
perpetrator is. As long as there are illusions about the leader's
motivation, powers, and abilities, those who have been in his grip
deprive themselves of an important opportunity for growth: the chance
to empower themselves, to become free of the tyranny of dependency on
others for their well-being, spiritual growth, and happiness.



The Authoritarian Power Dynamic



The purpose of a cult (whether group or one-on-one) is to serve the
emotional, financial, sexual, and power needs of the leader. The
single most important word here is power. The dynamic around which
cults are formed is similar to that of other power relationships and
is essentially ultra- auhoritarian, based on a power imbalance. The
cult leader by definition must have an authoritarian personality in
order to fulfill his half of the power dynamic. Traditional elements
of authoritarian personalities indude the following:

-the tendency to hierarchy

-the drive for power (and wealth)

-hostility, hatred, prejudice

- superficial judgments of people and events

-a one-sided scale of values favoring the one in power

-interpreting kindness as weakness

-the tendency to use people and see others as inferior

-a sadistic-masochistic tendency

-incapability of being ultimately satisfied

-paranoia(3)

In a study of twentieth-century dictators, one researcher
wrote: 'Since compliance depends on whether the leader is perceived
as being both powerful and knowing, the ever-watchful and all-
powerful leader and his invisible but observant and powerful
instruments, such as secret police) can be invoked in the same way as
an unobservable but omniscient God....Similarly, the pomp and
ceremony surrounding such an individual make him more admirable and
less like the common herd, increasing both his self-confidence and
the confidence of his subjects. The phenomenon is found not only with
individual leaders, but with entire movemnts"(4)

We will see, however, that an authoritarian personality is just one
aspect of the nature of a cult leader.

Who Becomes a Cult Leader?

Frequently at gatherings of former cult members a lively exchange
takes place in which those present compare their respective groups
and leaders. As people begin to describe their special, enlightened,
and unique "guru"--be he a pastor, therapist, political leader,
teacher, lover, or swami--they are quickly surprised to find that
their once-revered leaders are really quite similar in temperament
and personality. It often seems as if these leaders come tiom a
common mold, sometimes jokingly called the "Cookie-cutter Messiah
School."

These similarities between cult leaders of all stripes are in fact
character disorders commonly identified with the psychopathic
personality. They have been studied by psychiatrists, medical
doctors, clinical psychologists, and others for more than half a
century. In this chapter we review some of this research and conclude
with a psychopathological profile of traits commonly found in abusive
leaders.

Cultic groups usually originate with a living leader who is believed
to be "god" or godlike by a cadre of dedicated believers. Along with
a dra- matic and convincing talent for self-expression, these leaders
have an intuitive ability to sense their followers' needs and draw
them closer with promises of fulfillment.
Gradually, the leader inculcates the group with his own private
ideology (or craziness!), then creates
conditions so that his victims cannot or dare not test his claims.
How can you prove someone is not the Messiah? That the world won't
end tomorrow? That humans are not possessed by aliens from another
world or dimension? Through psychological manipulation and control,
cult leaders trick their followers into believing in something, then
prevent them from testing and disproving that mythology or belief
system.



The Role of Charisma



In general, charismatic personalities are known for their inescapable
magnetism, their winning style, the self-assurance with which they
promote something--a cause, a belief, a product. A charismatic person
who offers hope of new beginnings often attracts attention and a
following. Over the years we have witnessed this in the likes of Dale
Carnegie, Werner Erhard (founder of est, now The Forum), John Hanley
(founder of Lifespring), Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, Shirley MacLaine,
John Bradshaw, Marianne Williamson, Ramtha channeler J.Z. Knight, and
a rash of Amway "executives," weight-loss program promoters and body-
building gurus.

One dictionary definition of charisma is "a personal magic of
leadership arousing special popular loyalty or enthusiasm for a
public figure (as a political leader or military commander); a
special magnetic charm or appeal."(5) Charisma was studied in depth
by the German sociologist Max Weber, who defined it as "an
exceptional quality in an individual who, through appearing to
possess supernatural, providential, or extraordinary powers, succeeds
in gathering disciples around him."(6)

Weber's charismatic leader was "a sorcerer with an innovative aura
and a personal magnetic gift, [who] promoted a specific doctrine....
[and was] concerned with himself rather than involved with others....
[He] held an exceptional type of power: it set aside the usages of
normal political life and assumed instead those of demagoguery,
dictatorship, or revo- lution, [which induced] men's whole-hearted
devotion to the charismatic individual through a blind and fanatical
trust and an unrestrained and un- critical faith."(7)

In the case of cults, of course, we know that this induction of whole
hearted devotion does not happen spontaneously but is the result of
the cult leader's skillful use of thought-reform techniques. Charisma
on its own is not evil and does not necessarily breed a cult leader.
Charisma is, however, a powerful and awesome attribute found in many
cult leaders who use it in ways that are both self-serving and
destructive to others. The combination of charisma and psychopathy is
a lethal mixture--perhaps it is the very recipe used at the Cookie-
cutter Messiah School!

For the cult leader, having charisma is perhaps most useful during
the stage of cult formation. It takes a strong-willed and persuasive
leader to convince people of a new belief, then gather the newly
converted around him as devoted followers. A misinterpretation of the
cult leader's personal charisma may also foster his followers' belief
in his special or messianic qualities.

So we see that charisma is indeed a desirable trait for someone who
wishes to attract a following.
However, like beauty, charisma is in the eye of the beholder. Mary,
for example, may be completely taken with a par- ticular seminar
leader, practically swooning at his every word, while her friend
Susie doesn't feel the slightest tingle. Cehtainly at the time a
person is under the sway of charisma the effect is very real. Yet, in
reality, charisma does nothing more than create a certain worshipful
reaction to an idealized figure in the mind of the one who is
smitten.

In the long run, skills of persuasion (which may or may not be
charismadc) are more important to the cult leader than charisma--for
the power and hold of cults depend on the particular environment
shaped by the thought-reform program and control mechanisms, all of
which are usually conceptualized and put in place by the leader. Thus
it is the psychopathology of the leader, not his charisma, that
causes the systematic manipulative abuse and exploitation found in
cults.



The Cult Leader as Psychopath

Cultic groups and relationships are formed primarily to meet specific
emotional needs of the leader, many of whom suffer from one or
another unotional or character disorder. Few, if any, cult leaders
subject them- selves to the psychological tests or prolonged clinical
interviews that allow for an accurate diagnosis.
However, researchers and clinicians who have observed these
individuals describe them variously as neurotic, psychotic, on a
spectrum exhibiting neurotic, sociopathic, and psychotic
characteristics, or suffering from a diagnosed personality disorder.
(8)

It is not our intent here to make an overarching diagnosis, nor do we
intend to imply that ah cult leaders or the leaders of any of the
groups mentioned here are psychopaths. In reviewing the data,
however, we can surmise that there is significant psychological
dysfunctioning in some cult leaders and that their behavior
demonstrates features rather consistent with the disorder known as
psychopathy.

Dr. Robert Hare, one of the world's foremost experts in the field,
estimates that there are at least two million psychopaths in North
America. He writes, "Psychopaths are social predators who charm,
manipulate, and ruthlessly plow their way through life, leaving a
broad trail of broken hearts, shattered expectations, and empty
wallets. Completely lacking in conscience and in feelings for others,
they selfishly take what they want and do as they please, violating
social norms and expectations without the slightest sense of guilt or
regret."(9)

Psychopathy falls within the section on personality disorders in the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which is the
standard source book used in making psychiatric evaluations and
diagnoses.(l0) In the draft version of the manual's 4th edition (to
be released Spring 1994), this disorder is listed as "personality
disorder not otherwise specified/Cleckley-type psychopath," named
after psychiatrist Hervey Cleckley who carried out the first major
studies of psychopaths. The combination of personality and behavioral
traits that allows for this diagnosis must be evident in the person's
history, not simply apparent during a particular episode. That is,
psychopathy is a long-term personality disorder. The term psychopath
is often used interchangeably with sociopath, or sociopathic
personality Because it is more commonly recognized, we use the term
psychopath here.

Personality disorders, as a diagnosis, relate to certain inflexible
and maladaptive behaviors and traits that cause a person to have
significantly impaired social or occupational functioning. Signs of
this are often first manifested in childhood and adolescence, and are
expressed through distorted patterns of perceiving, relating to, and
thinking about the environment and oneself. In simple terms this
means that something is amiss, awry, not quite right in the person,
and this creates problems in how he or she relates to the rest of the
world. 6

The psychopathic personality is sometimes confused with the "anti-
social personality," another disorder; however, the psychopath
exhibits more extreme behavior than the antisocial personality. The
antisocial per- sonality is identified by a mix of antisocial and
criminal behaviors--he is the common criminal. The psychopath, on the
other hand, is characterized by a mix of criminal and socially
deviant behavior.

Psychopathy is not the same as psychosis either. The latter is
characterized by an inability to differentiate what is real from what
is imagined: boundaries between self and others are lost, and
critical thinking is greatly impaired. While generally not psychotic,
cult leaders may experience psychotic episodes, which may lead to the
destruction of themselves or the group. An extreme example of this is
the mass murder-suicide that occurred in November 1978 in Tonestown,
Guyana, at the People's Temple led by Jim Jones. On his orders, over
900 men,women, and children perished as Jones deteriorated into what
was probably a paranoid psychosis.

The psychopathic personality has been well described by Hervey
ClecMey in his classic work, The Mask of Sanity, first published in
1941 and updated and reissued in 1982. Cleckley is perhaps best known
for The Three Faces of Eve, a book and later a popular movie on
multiple personal- ity. Cleckley also gave the world a detailed study
of the personality and behavior of the psychopath, listing 16
characteristics to be used in evaluating and treating psychopaths.
(ll)

Cledde's work greatly influenced 20 years of research carried out by
Robert Hare at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. In
his work developing reliable and valid procedures for assessing
psychopathy, Hare made several revisions in Cleddey's list of traits
and finally settled on a 20-item Psychopathy Cheddist.(l2) Later in
this chapter we will use an adaptation of both the Cleddey and Hare
checklists to examine the profile of a cult ieader.

Neuropsychiatrist Richard M. Restak stated, "At the heart of the di-
agnosis of psychopathy was the recognition that a person could appear
normal and yet dose observation would reveal the personality to be
irra- tional or even violent."(l3) Indeed, initially most psychopaths
appear quite normal. They present themselves to us as charming,
interesting, even humble. The majority "don't suffer from delusions,
hallucinations, or memory impairment, their contact with reality
appears solid."(l4) Some, on the other hand, may demonstrate marked
paranoia and megalomania. In one clinical study of psychopathic
inpatients, the authors wroa: "We found that our psychopaths were
similar to normals (in the reference group) with regard to their
capacity to experience external event~ as real and with regard to
their sense of bodily reality. They generally had good memory,
concentration attention, and language function. They had a high
barrier against external, aversive stimulation....In some ways they
dearly resemble normal people and can thus 'pass' as reasonably
normal or sane. Yet we found them to be extremely primitive in other
ways, even more primitive than frankly schizophrenic patients. In
some ways their thinking was sane and reasonable, but in others it
was psychotically inefficient and/or convoluted."(l5)

Another researcher described psychopaths in this way: "These people
are impulsive, unable to tolerate frustration and delay, and have
problems with trusting. They take a paranoid position or externalize
their emotional experience. They have little ability to form a
working alliance and a poor capacity for self-observation. Their
anger is frightening. Frequently they take flight. Their relations
with others are highly problematic. When dose to another person they
fear engulfment or fusion or loss of self. At the same time,
paradoxically, they desire closeness; frustration of their entitled
wishes to be nourished, cared for, and assisted often leads to rage.
They are capable of a child's primitive fury enacted with an adult's
physical - capabilities, and action is always in the offing.$l6)

Ultimately, "the psychopath must have what he wants, no matter what
the cost to those in his way."(l7)

http://bapfelbaumphd.com/Ego_vs_Self_Psych.html

                                 EGO ANALYSIS VERSUS SELF PSYCHOLOGY
          Kohut describes his transformation from what he calls
a "drive psychologist" to a self psychologist as it happened in his
treatment of Miss F. (The Analysis of the Self, 1971, pp. 283-
295).                  After a prolonged period of ignorance and
misunderstanding during which I was inclined to argue with the
patient about the correctness of my interpretations and to suspect
the presence of stubborn, hidden resistances, I came to the crucial
recognition that the patient demanded a specific
response...and...completely rejected any other
          The specific response that Kohut decided Miss F. demanded
was that he should stop making interpretations and that instead he
should "respond empathically to her narcissistic display,"
by "approval, mirroring, and echoing" (p. 287).
          Now, as you know, Kohut did not mean that he just decided
that Miss F. had this demand. He meant that he decided that this
demand was genuine, that it did not conceal "the presence of
stubborn, hidden resistances," that she wasn't bluffing (in the
Alexander sense; see his case under  "Id Analysis," in Vignettes),
and that he should comply. So he stopped arguing and he stopped
making interpretations. He tried to satisfy Miss F. 's demand for an
all-accepting alter ego.
          This was a remarkable concession for any therapist to make,
especially since Miss F. 's accusatory behavior was not at all
designed to pull for rescue. Whenever Kohut made an interpretation,
even of a very cautious kind, one that was hardly more than a
reflection, Miss F. would explode, becoming "violently angry. " She
would "furiously" denounce him, accusing him of "undermining" her,
and would cap this with the reproach "that with my remark I had
destroyed everything she had built up; and that I was wrecking the
analysis" (p. 286).
          This was no invitation to empathy. It obviously must have
felt to Kohut like "stubborn resistance," as he said at first it did—
as though Miss F. was determined to thwart and defeat him. Clearly,
Kohut's original response must have been to feel tested and to
believe that he had to not give in to Miss F. 's flagrant
provocations —that he had to call her bluff.
          But then in his remarkable turnabout Kohut decided that his
patient was right all along, that he had been undermining and
wrecking the analysis. He saw that he was acting out the narcissistic
countertransference. He hadn't liked being pushed off the stage. But,
more than that, he saw that what made him prone to act out the
countertransference was not only his own dynamics but also was the
drive model (or drive theory, in Greenberg & Mitchell's terminology).
          Originally, Kohut took the id analytic position that Miss
F. 's anger was proof of the correctness of his interpretations. He
later (1977, p. 90f) attacked the drive model's justification of this
position, as formulated by Hartmann, that interpretations loosen
defenses, deneutralizing the aggressive drive-energy that had been
bound up in them, and the patient responds with anger. Kohut opposed
Hartmann's formulation with his own conception that when a patient
responds with anger to an interpretation, this means that the
interpretation is unempathic.
          But in the early stages of Miss F. 's analysis, when Kohut
agreed with Hartmann, he had to see Miss F. as lashing out in a
needlessly self-protective way. This would have made it hard for him
to avoid feeling that she was a stubborn and grossly unappreciative
adversary. When he came to think of her as acting out a "genuine"
phase-specific developmental need he could then feel much more
sympathetic and could indulge it with no felt loss of analytic
authority.
          What Kohut's self psychology and the other developmental ego
psychologies have in common is, essentially, this revised conception
of resistance. The message of the ego psychologies is that the
patient isn't always bluffing, and that much of what looks like
resistance represents attempts to cope by the vulnerable ego. The
recommendation is to suspend interpretation in the presence of
resistance, potential or actual, at least as a resolvable parameter,
and instead to offer some form of reassurance.
       II
           But why give up on interpretations? Can't we correct for
the drive fallacy and can't we interpret without attacking the
vulnerable ego? Must interpretations take the form of calling the
patient's bluff? That's the question.
           Going back to Miss F. , why would Kohut not have continued
to make interpretations from his new perspective and when he was no
longer at odds with her? We know he had concluded that she would
reject any interpretation but how fair a test did he make of this
conclusion?
          After he resolved his parameter and resumed interpreting
with Miss F., Kohut (p. 292) says that first he pointed out "the
intensity of her [narcissistic] demands and of her need for their
fulfillment. " He adds that this was an interpretation "which she
resisted vigorously because she could no longer deny the presence of
an extreme neediness in this area" (emphasis added). "She
resisted...because she...could no longer deny" is a piece of analytic
shorthand. This is to say that she redoubled her denials because,
squirm though she might, she had been caught red-handed, just as in
Alexander's vignette. Kohut had called her bluff.
          In combatting Miss F. 's vigorous denial of her "infantile
grandiosity" hadn't Kohut gone back to his argumentative ways and his
original conception of resistance as confirmation? What of his idea
that interpretations that cause shock to the ego are unempathic?
          Kohut does not discuss these questions or even acknowledge
the issue, but there is no question that he pursued a line of
interpretation that caused severe shock to the ego. His describes
his "continuing revelation of her persistent infantile grandiosity
and narcissism" as "slow, shame provoking, and anxious. " Unlike
Alexander, Kohut called his patient's bluff gradually, but there is
no doubt that, like Alexander, he thought that she had to go through
this grinding agony because no one could stand having to recognize
such infantile grandiosity.
          Thus, when Kohut resumed the use of interpretation he still
made interpretations from the side of the id, but where before he had
been pointing out unacceptable drives he now was pointing out
unacceptable needs.
          As by now is familiar, the inevitability of shame in
narcissistic patients is a key postulate in Kohut's model, and he was
one of those who assume that shame-proneness indicates the lack of a
superego (rather than a more warded-off or "nonmetabolized"
superego). Thus, Kohut thought that "unneutralized exhibitionism" is
inherently painful to the fragmented self and that this "painful
narcissistic tension" is experienced as shame.
          In other words, we are bound to feel shocked when having to
recognize childish exhibitionism. So, as in drive theory, the problem
is the inherent unacceptability of the drive itself. Kohut's
modification is the idea that the drive (exhibitionism/narcissism) is
OK and even necessary, but that it needs to be "neutralized," meaning
expressed in more appropriate ways.
          But, as I argued in my review of  The Analysis of the Self
("Analysis Without Guilt" ), this still is classical id analytic
thinking, since it misses the role of the superego. In the early
theory drives clashed with "reality. " It was not until near the end
of Freud's career that he recognized that drives clash with the
superego (with internal objects or, if you will, negative self-talk).
This is hard to see because our superegos are so much alike that we
agree with patients that you shouldn't be narcissistic.
          This view dictates a different line of interpretation, in
which Miss F. 's agony, rather than taken for granted (though
titrated and empathized with), is itself the focus.
        III
         So Kohut was not in a position to make a fair test of his
conclusion that Miss F. would not tolerate any kind of
interpretation. Ego interpretations could only have been formulated
if it were granted that Miss F. 's intense shame was evidence of a
primitive superego—or superego precursor, if you prefer. Ego analysis
might even better be called superego analysis. Although this would
clear up some misconceptions, the term would be unfortunate because
many patients are thought of as not having a superego, just as Kohut
thought the narcissistic patient didn't, and typically these are just
the patients for whom ego (or superego) analysis is most called for,
as appears to have been true for Miss F.
          In effect, the superego is often on the surface of a problem
and there is the paradox that the surface of a problem can be harder
to see than the depths. In fact, I have already given you one example
from the case of Miss F. that I am sure no one has noticed.
          You remember in the statement from Kohut that I used to open
this discussion, the one I have repeatedly referred back to. He said,
to abridge it a bit:  "After a prolonged period of ignorance and
misunderstanding. . . I came to the crucial recognition that the
patient demanded a specific response" (emphasis added). This is an
interesting locution that everyone immediately grasps even though on
the face of it it makes no sense.
          If Miss F. was demanding a specific response—that Kohut stop
interpreting and confine himself to "mirroring and echoing"—why would
it be a "crucial recognition" for Kohut to see it, one that he came
to only "after a prolonged period of ignorance and misunderstanding?"
Either she was making this demand or she wasn't.
          Everyone knows that Kohut means she wasn't. He was using
another piece of analytic shorthand, which in its general form
reads:  "She really was making this demand." We know it means she
really wasn't, that she was denying it.
          So you read Kohut's statement you didn't think, "Hey, wait a
minute!  What does he mean she 'demanded'? If it took him years to
see it, how demanding could she have been? " You didn't think that
because we all are used to this elision; it's the legacy of id
analysis.
          We know that Kohut means that he figured out why Miss F. had
her tantrums. She got upset when this demand wasn't met and she
calmed down when it was. The fact that she couldn't "demand" this
specific response is treated as a technicality.
          Similarly, Kohut treated Miss F.'s defense against making
any demands as, to paraphrase Alexander, a resistance that is
diminished by the verbalization of what the patient is resisting,
that is, in other words, as largely irrelevant. Thus, at this point
you probably have the picture of Miss F. as a complaining, demanding,
angry, and provocative woman whose stormy outbursts kept Kohut at bay
and, as some classical analysists think, may even have caused him to
give up the practice of psychoanalysis to become a psychotherapist.
But that's how she was "really" acting, meaning that she wasn't
literally acting that way all that much (cf. how she was "really"
demanding).
          In actuality Miss F. 's narcissistic demand was so well
hidden that Kohut was not only unaware of it "for extended phases of
the analysis," as we know, but had quite an opposite impression. This
will surprise you. During this period, Miss F. 's hours had "the
appearance of a well-moving self-analysis" (p. 285), broken only by
her angry responses when Kohut made an interpretation. Miss F. also
was active professionally, had many friends, and "had had several
love relationships and some serious suitors"—all by the age of twenty-
five.
          Miss F. 's narcissism was so well hidden it generated
another countertransference symptom in Kohut. In this phase of the
analysis he was "struggling with boredom and inattentiveness,"
which "was puzzling since the patient dealt with object-directed
preoccupations, inside and outside the analytic situation, and
present as well as past" (p. 285). Kohut says that he finally
realized that what he had been reacting to was Miss F. 's "infantile
grandiosity and exhibitionism," but that it had been "covered for a
long time by a display of independence and self-sufficiency" (p. 293,
emphasis added).
          Miss F. 's independence and self-sufficiency, although
clearly impressive, is taken as merely a "cover" and a "display" by
Kohut, and he says no more about it. Id analysis is characterized by
this treatment of defense as if it is merely the manifest content and
this treatment of the warded-off content as if it is what is really
going on. For Kohut to dismiss Miss F. 's defense as a cover and a
display is to say that she really is narcissistic. It is just like
Kohut's saying that Miss F. is demanding when she can't be demanding.
But if we take her defense seriously we need to say that she can't be
narcissistic, that is, not directly, not whileheartedly, not with
full awareness.
          Obviously, from this ego analytic view one would not think
that Miss F. 's narcissism needed to be indulged rather than
analyzed. Her intense shame about it is, of course, not taken as
inevitable. It becomes the focus of  analysis. This means she needs
interpretations rather than that an ego psychology is needed to
protect her from interpretations.
        IV
          It remains to show how the events Kohut took to be the
direct expression of Miss F. 's unneutralized narcissism could be
seen as indications that she was struggling with a condemnatory
superego. How she was trying to solve the problem of how to get any
narcissistic gratification in view of her unconscious need to prove
otherwise.
          Here I need to bring in one more piece of information about
the case. Kohut reported that Miss F. would typically carry the hour
like a "well moving self analysis," but that "at approximately the
midpoint of the sessions, she would suddenly get violently angry at
me for being silent and would reproach me for not giving her any
support" (p. 286).
          It was only later in the hours, when Kohut did say
something, that "she would again get violently angry. " ("Violently
angry," by the way, is an instance of id analytic hype, designed to
show how deep the feeling is; it is unlikely that Kohut means
anything more by this than that Miss F. shouted at him. In other
words, she wasn't violently angry. )
          Kohut believed that the abruptness of her reaction (p. 286)
and the "high-pitched tone of her voice" (p. 288) revealed "the
archaic nature of her need" (p. 286). This was convincing to Kohut,
so much so that he considered it to be the most telling diagnostic
clue in the case. What makes his diagnosis less convincing to the
reader is the fact that he does not consider the more obvious, ego
analytic, explanation, even to just to dismiss it.
          The more obvious, ego analytic, explanation is that when,
after Miss F. had been accomplishing her well-moving self-analysis,
Kohut was silent—or said anything—she felt slighted. Consider Kohut's
well-known description of the narcissistic patient as someone
who "feels he controls and possesses [the analyst] with a self-
evident certainty that is akin to the adult's experience of his
control over his own body and mind" (1971, p. 90). In other words, he
feels he has the analyst's rapt attention, the very thing the patient
wants (but also can't want).
           This is, of course, a familiar phenomenon and it is easy to
imagine that when Miss F. was acting independent and self-sufficient
and as though she needed so little from him that he felt bored, she
was caught up in a narcissistic fantasy—an experience of his total
and undivided attention and approval. Then when he was expected to
respond and didn't, or when he said something that indicated less
than total approval, she felt slighted—as if he "had destroyed
everything she had built up" (in other words, had destroyed the
fantasy). At that point she could accuse Kohut of "undermining her"
and even of "not giving her any support" (p. 286). Now she could have
a narcissistic claim. She may well have felt cheated of the
appreciation she felt she had earned by acting so independent and
self-sufficient, by not making any demands.
          Here is another one of those key distinctions. Kohut took
her intensity to mean the intensity of her need—that it was archaic,
meaning traumatically unsatisfied in childhood. Nowadays patients
will gratefully agree with such (an object relations) interpretation.
It even is puzzling why Kohut didn't get that kind of response rather
than distress. Probably it is a matter of tone and timing, and modern
day therapists are much less ambivalent about being openly
sympathetic. But, is it not also familiar that when a narcissistic or
borderline patient has this kind of tantrum, it also conveys feeling
unentitled to the need? After all, such an exaggerated complaint—that
by making some inadequate or somewhat disapproving comment, Kohut had
destroyed the whole analysis—seems to directly indicate that Miss F.
did not feel at all confident of the validity of her complaint.
          Grandiose patients may be more ashamed than anyone else of
their need for ordinary approval and recognition. Their experience of
totally possessing the analyst's attention is highly precarious and
easily and invariably yields to the experience of being totally
possessed by the analyst's need for attention, although they are no
better able to tolerate this experience of the analyst's narcissism.
          Interpreting from the side of the ego would mean presenting
to Miss F. her difficulty being narcissistic and how she suffers from
having to be so independent and self-sufficient. It means showing
how, despite all her independence and self-sufficiency, she is always
in danger of feeling childish if she has any needs for approval or
recognition. This sort of interpretation is familiar enough, of
course. The key conceptual operation is to couch the case in terms
that make this sort of interpretation relevant.
          Interpreting from the side of the ego would also mean
showing Miss F. how much trouble she is having organizing her
complaints about the analyst and how she really can't enjoy
complaining. This would expose how she has trouble believing that
Kohut really is destroying what she has built up and really is
wrecking the analysis and, finally, how she has trouble imagining
that the analyst has ordinary narcissistic needs, even ordinary shame
about them.

                                             REFERENCES
Alexander, F. (1935) The problem of psychoanalytic technique.
Psychoanalytic Quarterly. Also in The Scope of Psychoanalysis:
Selected Papers of Franz Alexander, Basic Books:  NY, 1961.
Alexander, F. (1956) Two forms of regression and their therapeutic
implications Psychoanalytic Quarterly, (25). Also in: Selected Papers.
Fenichel, O. (1941) Problems of Psychoanalytic Technique.
Psychoanalytic Quarterly, NY.
Freud, S. (1937) Analysis terminable and interminable. Standard
Edition, XXIII, London: Hogarth, 1964.
Kohut, H. (1971) The Analysis of the Self. NY:  International
Univerities Press.
Kohut, H. (1977) The Restoration of the Self. NY:  International
Universities
     Press.

http://www.apa.org/pubinfo/anger.html

  Controlling Anger -- Before It Controls You


----------------------------------------------------------------------
----------
TOPICS:

What Is Anger?

Anger Management

Strategies To Keep Anger At Bay?

Do You Need Counseling?
  We all know what anger is, and we've all felt it: whether as a
fleeting annoyance or as full-fledged rage.

Anger is a completely normal, usually healthy, human emotion. But
when it gets out of control and turns destructive, it can lead to
problems—problems at work, in your personal relationships, and in the
overall quality of your life. And it can make you feel as though
you're at the mercy of an unpredictable and powerful emotion. This
brochure is meant to help you understand and control anger.

What is Anger?

The Nature of Anger

Anger is "an emotional state that varies in intensity from mild
irritation to intense fury and rage," according to Charles
Spielberger, PhD, a psychologist who specializes in the study of
anger. Like other emotions, it is accompanied by physiological and
biological changes; when you get angry, your heart rate and blood
pressure go up, as do the levels of your energy hormones, adrenaline,
and noradrenaline.

Anger can be caused by both external and internal events. You could
be angry at a specific person (Such as a coworker or supervisor) or
event (a traffic jam, a canceled flight), or your anger could be
caused by worrying or brooding about your personal problems. Memories
of traumatic or enraging events can also trigger angry feelings.

Expressing Anger

The instinctive, natural way to express anger is to respond
aggressively. Anger is a natural, adaptive response to threats; it
inspires powerful, often aggressive, feelings and behaviors, which
allow us to fight and to defend ourselves when we are attacked. A
certain amount of anger, therefore, is necessary to our survival.

On the other hand, we can't physically lash out at every person or
object that irritates or annoys us; laws, social norms, and common
sense place limits on how far our anger can take us.

People use a variety of both conscious and unconscious processes to
deal with their angry feelings. The three main approaches are
expressing, suppressing, and calming. Expressing your angry feelings
in an assertive—not aggressive—manner is the healthiest way to
express anger. To do this, you have to learn how to make clear what
your needs are, and how to get them met, without hurting others.
Being assertive doesn't mean being pushy or demanding; it means being
respectful of yourself and others.

Anger can be suppressed, and then converted or redirected. This
happens when you hold in your anger, stop thinking about it, and
focus on something positive. The aim is to inhibit or suppress your
anger and convert it into more constructive behavior. The danger in
this type of response is that if it isn't allowed outward expression,
your anger can turn inward—on yourself. Anger turned inward may cause
hypertension, high blood pressure, or depression.

Unexpressed anger can create other problems. It can lead to
pathological expressions of anger, such as passive-aggressive
behavior (getting back at people indirectly, without telling them
why, rather than confronting them head-on) or a personality that
seems perpetually cynical and hostile. People who are constantly
putting others down, criticizing everything, and making cynical
comments haven't learned how to constructively express their anger.
Not surprisingly, they aren't likely to have many successful
relationships.

Finally, you can calm down inside. This means not just controlling
your outward behavior, but also controlling your internal responses,
taking steps to lower your heart rate, calm yourself down, and let
the feelings subside.

As Dr. Spielberger notes, "when none of these three techniques work,
that's when someone—or something—is going to get hurt."

Anger Management

The goal of anger management is to reduce both your emotional
feelings and the physiological arousal that anger causes. You can't
get rid of, or avoid, the things or the people that enrage you, nor
can you change them, but you can learn to control your reactions.

Are You Too Angry?

There are psychological tests that measure the intensity of angry
feelings, how prone to anger you are, and how well you handle it. But
chances are good that if you do have a problem with anger, you
already know it. If you find yourself acting in ways that seem out of
control and frightening, you might need help finding better ways to
deal with this emotion.

Why Are Some People More Angry Than Others?

According to Jerry Deffenbacher, PhD, a psychologist who specializes
in anger management, some people really are more "hotheaded" than
others are; they get angry more easily and more intensely than the
average person does. There are also those who don't show their anger
in loud spectacular ways but are chronically irritable and grumpy.
Easily angered people don't always curse and throw things; sometimes
they withdraw socially, sulk, or get physically ill.

People who are easily angered generally have what some psychologists
call a low tolerance for frustration, meaning simply that they feel
that they should not have to be subjected to frustration,
inconvenience, or annoyance. They can't take things in stride, and
they're particularly infuriated if the situation seems somehow
unjust: for example, being corrected for a minor mistake.

What makes these people this way? A number of things. One cause may
be genetic or physiological: There is evidence that some children are
born irritable, touchy, and easily angered, and that these signs are
present from a very early age. Another may be sociocultural. Anger is
often regarded as negative; we're taught that it's all right to
express anxiety, depression, or other emotions but not to express
anger. As a result, we don't learn how to handle it or channel it
constructively.

Research has also found that family background plays a role.
Typically, people who are easily angered come from families that are
disruptive, chaotic, and not skilled at emotional communications.

Is It Good To "Let it All Hang Out?"

Psychologists now say that this is a dangerous myth. Some people use
this theory as a license to hurt others. Research has found
that "letting it rip" with anger actually escalates anger and
aggression and does nothing to help you (or the person you're angry
with) resolve the situation.

It's best to find out what it is that triggers your anger, and then
to develop strategies to keep those triggers from tipping you over
the edge.

Strategies To Keep Anger At Bay

Relaxation

Simple relaxation tools, such as deep breathing and relaxing imagery,
can help calm down angry feelings. There are books and courses that
can teach you relaxation techniques, and once you learn the
techniques, you can call upon them in any situation. If you are
involved in a relationship where both partners are hot-tempered, it
might be a good idea for both of you to learn these techniques.

Some simple steps you can try:

Breathe deeply, from your diaphragm; breathing from your chest won't
relax you. Picture your breath coming up from your "gut."

Slowly repeat a calm word or phrase such as "relax," "take it easy."
Repeat it to yourself while breathing deeply.

Use imagery; visualize a relaxing experience, from either your memory
or your imagination.

Nonstrenuous, slow yoga-like exercises can relax your muscles and
make you feel much calmer.
Practice these techniques daily. Learn to use them automatically when
you're in a tense situation.

Cognitive Restructuring

Simply put, this means changing the way you think. Angry people tend
to curse, swear, or speak in highly colorful terms that reflect their
inner thoughts. When you're angry, your thinking can get very
exaggerated and overly dramatic. Try replacing these thoughts with
more rational ones. For instance, instead of telling yourself, "oh,
it's awful, it's terrible, everything's ruined," tell yourself, "it's
frustrating, and it's understandable that I'm upset about it, but
it's not the end of the world and getting angry is not going to fix
it anyhow."

Be careful of words like "never" or "always" when talking about
yourself or someone else. "This !&*%@ machine never works,"
or "you're always forgetting things" are not just inaccurate, they
also serve to make you feel that your anger is justified and that
there's no way to solve the problem. They also alienate and humiliate
people who might otherwise be willing to work with you on a solution.

Remind yourself that getting angry is not going to fix anything, that
it won't make you feel better (and may actually make you feel worse).

Logic defeats anger, because anger, even when it's justified, can
quickly become irrational. So use cold hard logic on yourself. Remind
yourself that the world is "not out to get you," you're just
experiencing some of the rough spots of daily life. Do this each time
you feel anger getting the best of you, and it'll help you get a more
balanced perspective. Angry people tend to demand things: fairness,
appreciation, agreement, willingness to do things their way. Everyone
wants these things, and we are all hurt and disappointed when we
don't get them, but angry people demand them, and when their demands
aren't met, their disappointment becomes anger. As part of their
cognitive restructuring, angry people need to become aware of their
demanding nature and translate their expectations into desires. In
other words, saying, "I would like" something is healthier than
saying, "I demand" or "I must have" something. When you're unable to
get what you want, you will experience the normal reactions—
frustration, disappointment, hurt—but not anger. Some angry people
use this anger as a way to avoid feeling hurt, but that doesn't mean
the hurt goes away.

Problem Solving

Sometimes, our anger and frustration are caused by very real and
inescapable problems in our lives. Not all anger is misplaced, and
often it's a healthy, natural response to these difficulties. There
is also a cultural belief that every problem has a solution, and it
adds to our frustration to find out that this isn't always the case.
The best attitude to bring to such a situation, then, is not to focus
on finding the solution, but rather on how you handle and face the
problem.

Make a plan, and check your progress along the way. Resolve to give
it your best, but also not to punish yourself if an answer doesn't
come right away. If you can approach it with your best intentions and
efforts and make a serious attempt to face it head-on, you will be
less likely to lose patience and fall into all-or-nothing thinking,
even if the problem does not get solved right away.

Better Communication

Angry people tend to jump to—and act on—conclusions, and some of
those conclusions can be very inaccurate. The first thing to do if
you're in a heated discussion is slow down and think through your
responses. Don't say the first thing that comes into your head, but
slow down and think carefully about what you want to say. At the same
time, listen carefully to what the other person is saying and take
your time before answering.

Listen, too, to what is underlying the anger. For instance, you like
a certain amount of freedom and personal space, and your "significant
other" wants more connection and closeness. If he or she starts
complaining about your activities, don't retaliate by painting your
partner as a jailer, a warden, or an albatross around your neck.

It's natural to get defensive when you're criticized, but don't fight
back. Instead, listen to what's underlying the words: the message
that this person might feel neglected and unloved. It may take a lot
of patient questioning on your part, and it may require some
breathing space, but don't let your anger—or a partner's—let a
discussion spin out of control. Keeping your cool can keep the
situation from becoming a disastrous one.

Using Humor

"Silly humor" can help defuse rage in a number of ways. For one
thing, it can help you get a more balanced perspective. When you get
angry and call someone a name or refer to them in some imaginative
phrase, stop and picture what that word would literally look like. If
you're at work and you think of a coworker as a "dirtbag" or
a "single-cell life form," for example, picture a large bag full of
dirt (or an amoeba) sitting at your colleague's desk, talking on the
phone, going to meetings. Do this whenever a name comes into your
head about another person. If you can, draw a picture of what the
actual thing might look like. This will take a lot of the edge off
your fury; and humor can always be relied on to help unknot a tense
situation.

The underlying message of highly angry people, Dr. Deffenbacher says,
is "things oughta go my way!" Angry people tend to feel that they are
morally right, that any blocking or changing of their plans is an
unbearable indignity and that they should NOT have to suffer this
way. Maybe other people do, but not them!

When you feel that urge, he suggests, picture yourself as a god or
goddess, a supreme ruler, who owns the streets and stores and office
space, striding alone and having your way in all situations while
others defer to you. The more detail you can get into your imaginary
scenes, the more chances you have to realize that maybe you are being
unreasonable; you'll also realize how unimportant the things you're
angry about really are. There are two cautions in using humor. First,
don't try to just "laugh off" your problems; rather, use humor to
help yourself face them more constructively. Second, don't give in to
harsh, sarcastic humor; that's just another form of unhealthy anger
expression.

What these techniques have in common is a refusal to take yourself
too seriously. Anger is a serious emotion, but it's often accompanied
by ideas that, if examined, can make you laugh.

Changing Your Environment

Sometimes it's our immediate surroundings that give us cause for
irritation and fury. Problems and responsibilities can weigh on you
and make you feel angry at the "trap" you seem to have fallen into
and all the people and things that form that trap.

Give yourself a break. Make sure you have some "personal time"
scheduled for times of the day that you know are particularly
stressful. One example is the working mother who has a standing rule
that when she comes home from work, for the first 15 minutes "nobody
talks to Mom unless the house is on fire." After this brief quiet
time, she feels better prepared to handle demands from her kids
without blowing up at them.

Some Other Tips for Easing Up on Yourself

Timing: If you and your spouse tend to fight when you discuss things
at night—perhaps you're tired, or distracted, or maybe it's just
habit—try changing the times when you talk about important matters so
these talks don't turn into arguments.

Avoidance: If your child's chaotic room makes you furious every time
you walk by it, shut the door. Don't make yourself look at what
infuriates you. Don't say, "well, my child should clean up the room
so I won't have to be angry!" That's not the point. The point is to
keep yourself calm.

Finding alternatives: If your daily commute through traffic leaves
you in a state of rage and frustration, give yourself a project—learn
or map out a different route, one that's less congested or more
scenic. Or find another alternative, such as a bus or commuter train.

Do You Need Counseling?

If you feel that your anger is really out of control, if it is having
an impact on your relationships and on important parts of your life,
you might consider counseling to learn how to handle it better. A
psychologist or other licensed mental health professional can work
with you in developing a range of techniques for changing your
thinking and your behavior.

When you talk to a prospective therapist, tell her or him that you
have problems with anger that you want to work on, and ask about his
or her approach to anger management. Make sure this isn't only a
course of action designed to "put you in touch with your feelings and
express them"—that may be precisely what your problem is. With
counseling, psychologists say, a highly angry person can move closer
to a middle range of anger in about 8 to 10 weeks, depending on the
circumstances and the techniques used.

What About Assertiveness Training?

It's true that angry people need to learn to become assertive (rather
than aggressive), but most books and courses on developing
assertiveness are aimed at people who don't feel enough anger. These
people are more passive and acquiescent than the average person; they
tend to let others walk all over them. That isn't something that most
angry people do. Still, these books can contain some useful tactics
to use in frustrating situations.

Remember, you can't eliminate anger—and it wouldn't be a good idea if
you could. In spite of all your efforts, things will happen that will
cause you anger; and sometimes it will be justifiable anger. Life
will be filled with frustration, pain, loss, and the unpredictable
actions of others. You can't change that; but you can change the way
you let such events affect you. Controlling your angry responses can
keep them from making you even more unhappy in the long run.
Back to Top







© PsycNET 2002 American Psychological Association

"AMERICA, ADVERTISING, AND BPD: CULTURAL NARCISSISTIC SUBSTRATE AS
SEEN THROUGH THE POETRY OF CARL SANDBURG."

By: Paul Shirley

*******************

In a recent discussion on my small AxisII list, list members raised
questions about BPD in the context of cultural norms.  I found the
questions quite interesting, since I have been intrigued with that
idea ever since seeing it articulated in Kreisman and Strauss'
seminal book "I Hate You - Don't Leave Me." [1] Clinicians typically
assume that we are able to separate strands of individual
psychopathology from cultural psychopathology, but can we really?  In
the absence of clear, concrete, objective definitions of health and
illness, how can we be absolutely sure that we can identify a
malignant psychopathologic process, if it is well camouflaged within
the everyday give and take of modern society?
It is an uncomfortable question for clinicians, perhaps, but one
which I suspect is worth of consideration anyway.

"John" wrote:
"What if BPs suddenly were put in charge of marketing some products?
I think its something worth considering."

"Steve" (an avowed anti-capitalist) replied:
"By my calculations, Cluster B AxisII process IS necessarily in
charge of ALL capitalistic advertising campaigns."

Paul replies:
That's an interesting point, Steve.  I keep thinking about the
concept of the borderline society, just as Kreisman and Strauss
articulated it in "I HateYou - Don't Leave Me." Is advertising hype
really different from a BP campaign to press certain feelings and/or
beliefs onto someone else?  If it is indeed different, then how so?
Can anyone actually articulate any ways in which the two are
different?  I'd almost like to issue that as a challenge, and that
way any flaws in the concept should rise to the top: how is
advertising unlike a BP campaign?

Suppose we assume, for the sake of argument, that advertisers start
out with an empty "hole in the soul," a subjective BP-like sense of
worthlessness and emptiness that they are trying to fill by gaining
attention from buyers.  Suppose their modus operandus is to take that
subjective sense of emptiness and worthlessness and project it onto
potential buyers so persuasively and convincingly that buyers accept
it, take it in as introject, and who then in turn act on it by
purchasing the product as a means of relieving themselves of the
pervasive borderline guilt and shame?

A strange combination of circumstances recently brought my attention
to the work of American poet Carl Sandburg.  I got a copy of "The
Complete Works of Carl Sandburg," moved partly by the words of
Archibald MacLeish in the introduction to Sandburg's work.  Among
other things, MacLeish said of Sandburg that "This was his great
achievement: that he found a new way in an incredulous and
disbelieving and often cynical time to say what Americans have always
known." I thought one of my profoundest thoughts, which
was "Hmmmm ..." I wondered what Carl Sandburg had heard the soul of
America whispering to himself at night, especially as he sat on the
front porch of his rural mountain home near Hendersonville, North
Carolina.  I noticed a poem called "Good Morning, America." I was
immediately struck by the title because of it's appearance in a line
from one of my favorite songs, "City of New Orleans," by American
folksinger Woodie Guthrie's prominent singer-songwriter son, Arlo
Guthrie.  That song has significant personal meaning to me anyway,
for reasons I won't go into here and now, so I decided to follow that
trail to see where it might lead.  The first thing I noticed in
Sandburg's poem was a Creation Story of sorts -- a Genesis for
America.

"And who made 'em?  Who made the skyscrapers?
Man made 'em, the little two-legged joker, Man." [2]

This is apparently a bastard creation story, with roots in Native
American traditions which refer to human beings as "two-leggeds;" and
also, possibly, it may have oblique references evocative of the
mystical kabbalistic interpretations of imagery in decks of playing
cards, personified in the Joker.  Man the Joker, Man the Prankster,
Man the bastard demi-god creates sky-scrapers.  (For lack of a clear
alternative, I am using last century's unfortunately sexist "Man" as
inclusive of both genders to stay consistent with Sandburg's usage of
language here.) I recognized this as a theme I once pursued in some
poetry, which I wrote around 1985.  I cannot retrieve it at the
moment, but I can describe it.  It is comprised of some lines I
penned to accompany pictures I had taken of various man-made (what's
currently the correct form for that adjective?  Anybody know??)
structures, taken first as impressive close-ups, and then fading into
the distance where they did not look nearly so impressive when
juxtaposed against the grander backdrop of Nature.  I thought I
recognized a theme which the great Sandburg and I had pursued in
common, and so I paid closer attention to his story of America.  He
continues onward from the American Creation Story:

"'There's gold in them hills,' Said old timers on their wagon seats."
[3]

Sandburg is telling us the facts of America's movement Westward.
It's a story famliar to anyone who ever sat in a class on American
History.
Since poets are not literal historians, however, Sandburg must be
setting the stage for something else; some other story, some latent
story lying hidden in the folds of the manifest story.

"Facts are facts, nailed down, fastened to stay.
And facts are feathers, foam, flying phantoms." [4]

And what do we have here, but a clear portrait of BPD thinking as
explicated by Randi Kreger and Paul Mason in "Stop Walking On
Eggshells"?  In describing borderline thinking, Mason and Kreger
insist that "feelings are facts," implying that within the purview of
borderline logic, facts are as fluid and changeable as the bastion of
fleeting feelings upon which they rest.  Whenever a great poet
repeats a phrase, you may be sure it isn't because he didn't know
what else to say.  It also isn't because he doubted that the
reader 'got it' the first time around.  Rather, repeating words,
lines, themes are indications that there is special meaning, possibly
a key meaning, in that segment of the poet's work.  Sandburg
continues, repeating this theme of the dual nature of facts:

"Facts stay fastened; facts are phantom.
An old one-horse plow is a fact.
A new farm tractor is a fact.
Facts stay fastened; facts fly with bird wings." [5]

What else could Sandburg have been perceiving here, other than the
fluidity of reality typical of borderline thinking entrenched deep
within the psyche of the nation who built skyscrapers in the East and
then hurried Westward in search of instant wealth?  For seven more
paragraphs within this longish poem, Sandburg continues his
relentless pursuit of the maddeningly dual nature of facts:

"Facts are phantoms; facts begin With a bud, a seed, an egg." [6]

Then suddenly, he breaks from this theme and peers into the mysteries
of births, of beginnings:

"A hero, a hoodlum, a little of both, A toiling two-faced driven
destiny, Sleeps in the secret traceries of eggs.
If one egg sould speak and answer the question, 'Egg, who are you,
what are you, where did you come from and where are you going?" [7]


Suddenly I believe I may spy part of the core essence of Madison
Avenue with it's hammering, relentless hype in the twin faces of the
hero and the hoodlum.  "Buy Ace Sparkling Dingle-Dangles, and we'll
transform your whole life!  Your children will be smarter, your teeth
will be brighter, we'll do everything short of saving your immortal
soul!  Give our R&D boys a little time, and they might even succeed
at that too!
Meanwhile, we'll put lead in your plumbing and pizzazz in your sex
life
- which is the nearest thing you poor dogs will ever find to soul's
salvation here on earth - wink wink, nudge nudge!" Is that the heart
of Sandburg's searing description of "A toiling two-faced driven
destiny"?
Show me a more likely candidate.  What other reasons would push him
from Chicago, where he once interviewed none other than Babe Ruth
for "The Chicago Daily News," out to the boondocks of rural North
Carolina, exchanging all the urban flash, sizzle and excitement for
the solitude of laughing as he watched the comical antics of the
goats he kept on his farm?  From his heartfelt description of America
as a two-faced hero and hoodlum, I can easily see that Sandburg might
need no other motivation to escape to the deep isolation of the rural
Southern Appalachian mountains.

Sandburg did not stop, however, with the portrayal of the two-faced
half-hero, half-hoodlum.  True to the nature of a great poet, he
asked the question of deeper identity that lies at the heart of a
soul unable to resolve having split itself in two.  "Who are you," he
asks; "what are you, where did you come from and where are you
going?" [8] But the answer is not forthcoming: America does not know
who it is.  Having plumbed the depths of such a question by means of
the "egg" metaphor, Sandburg returns momentarily to exoteric reality
again, much like Jesus did when explaining the esoteric meaning of a
mysterious parable to the Inner Circle of disciples.  An egg is like
a newborn child, Sandburg explains, and a newborn child is like a
nation:

"Nations begin young the same as babies.
They suckle and struggle; they grow up; They toil, fight, laugh,
suffer, die." [9]

There can be little question of Sandburg's meaning here: America the
mystical hero/hoodlum, America the egg, America the child, lacks
identity in her core.  Even as I write these words, I feel the
profound sadness inherent in them, in the way that I suspect few but
fellow poets can do as they contemplate such deeply painful realities
of the soul.
Just like the fundamentalist preacher said: America is lost.  She is
a ship without a rudder.  On this juncture, the poet and the preacher
agree: it must be reality.

But what of the sailors on a ship without a rudder?  Would they not
live in constant terror of running aground?  For years, the clinical
community has considered antisocial persons to be free of emotional
pain, which I suppose means free of anxiety and depression.  I have
always believed the opposite: that antisocial persons live in a great
deal of emotional pain, but that they learn to mask, repress, and
dissociate the pain for purposes of presenting a confident appearance.
When it was discovered that SSRI's dampened Axis II traits, even
antisocial ones, I felt vindicated: antisocial persons do indeed hurt
inside.  As one psychiatrist described it to me, genuine anxiety is a
terribly painful condition.  It is as different from common,
everyday, monentary transient doubt and uncertainty as true clinical
depression is different from an occasional blue mood.  Both are
extremely painful conditions, and both seem woven into the matrix of
Cluster B.  And what does Sandburg's eye reveal about fear in "Good
Morning, America"?

"We are afraid.  What are we afraid of?
We are afraid of what we are afraid of.
We are afraid of this, that, these, those, them.
We are afraid of the earth will blow up and bomb the human family out
of its sleep, it's slumber, its sleepwalking, its pass and repass of
shadows.
We are afraid the sky will come apart and fall on us and in a rain of
sins we will wash out into the Great Alone, the Deep Dark,
saying, 'Good-by, old Mother Earthy, we always were afraid of you.'
We are afraid; what are we afraid of?  We are afraid of nothing much,
nothing at all, nothing in the shape of god, man or beast, we can eat
any ashes offered us, we can step out before the fact of the Fact of
Death and look it in the eye and laugh, 'You are the beginning or the
end of something, I'll gamble with you, I'll take a chance..'" [10]

I would submit that this false bravado, this house build on the sands
of formless and nameless terrors, is an entity that clinicians
familiar with the Axis II, B Cluster, will readily recognize as quite
familiar.
Of course, this fear typically gets expressed as anger in Cluster B,
but it is not difficult to see angry outbursts as being expression of
unresolved fears.  As author and self-proclaimed narcissist Sam
Vaknin described it so well from a subjective point of view:

"The angry person is a worried person.  The personality disordered is
also excessively preoccupied with himself.  Worry and anger are the
cornerstones of the edifice of anxiety.  This is where it all
converges:
people become angry because they are excessively concerned with bad
things which might happen to them.  Anger is a result of anxiety (or,
when the anger is not acute, of fear)." [11]

It is not difficult for me to imagine Vaknin and Sandburg sitting
together at a table over coffee, with a meeting of the minds over
this matter of fear.  Clearly to me, they are describing the same
essence.

But how do these fundamental qualities of lost-ness and fear express
themselves?  Sandburg, a master of language himself, observes the
ways in which America talks to America.  In modern psychology such as
the cognitive-behavioral principles of Albert Ellis, we call
this "self-talk." Sandburg explains:

"A code arrives; language; lingo; slang; behold the proverbs of a
people, a nation:
Give 'em the works.  Fix it, there's always a way.  Be hard boiled.
The good die young." [12]

False bravado: be tough.  Be breezy.  Be arrogant.  Exude confidence.
Above all, cover that deep depressive fatalism, if you want to be
successful, or at least say it cheerfully.  Don't wear it as a tattoo:
sing it instead.  Can it really be that the lines from a recent
popular song, "Only the good die young," emanate from so deep within
the core of our nation?  Somehow that saying eerily reminds me of the
telling tattoo which is sometimes seen visibly etched on some poor
soul who has damned himself with the phrase, "Born To Lose." A
damnable fatalism, fitting hand in hand with the almost-neon sign
that is similarly seen on the knuckles of those equally antisocial
souls who wear "LOVE" on one set of knuckles and "HATE" on the other,
and thus virtually advertise, "Beware:
Antisocial Fatalism.  Engage Me At Your Own Risk." Only the good die
young.  Born to Lose.  Love/Hate.  Enter at your own risk.  Boy, have
I got a deal for you!  Look at this here proppity!  Have you evah
SEEN such a deal as this?  Miss out on this and you ah gonna KICK
yo'self tomorrow!" Am I taking Sandburg too far?  Two stanzas later,
he makes the antisocial Madison-Avenue-hype connection himself:

"Sell 'em, sell 'em.  Make 'em eat it.  What if we gyp 'em?  It'll be
good for 'em." [13]

I feel my own blood grow chilled with recognition of the very same
attitude I have seen openly displayed among blatantly antisocial
characters in medium and maximum security prisons.  "Only YOU can con
YOU," I was once told.  Whatever happens to you, so goes that line of
antisocial beliefs, I'm not responsible.  If you fail to lock up your
bicycle, then it's your own fault if I steal it.  These are the core
beliefs which, though seldom articulated concretely, permeate maximum
security.  The unspoken mantra in those halls of the damned seems to
say, "Whatever I can project onto you is your burden to bear." If we
con 'em, it goes, it'll help 'em get smart.  Help 'em out.  Good
fer 'em.  Clearly to me, Sandburg has created links between Madison
Avenue hype, the ugly underbelly of criminal thinking, and the void,
nebulous reality born of a profound lack of identity inherent in the
suffering borderline soul.  She is not really "America the
Beautiful," except in the song.

She is "America the Borderline."

Oh beautiful, for starving souls, For aching empty eyes; Go quench
your thirsting agony While stifling your cries.
America, America, I sense your throbbing grief That lies still
unresolved, while you Sell crap to seek relief.

I speak not out of mockery, but out of the pain to which I, another
and much lesser poet, now resonate.  America is in pain.  Like the
hundreds of individuals she has spawned, and into whose hurting eyes
I have peered and probed while carrying the label "Social Worker,"
while desperately searching to find that ounce of strength, that
sliver of courage on which to rebuild, that sprig of defiant immortal
spirit that refuses to succumb to circumstances no matter how dire,
my country feels the ravages of identity-less agony tearing and
eating at her soul.  I know it as surely as if she sat across my desk
from me, a nation fidgeting with the buttons on her blouse, nervously
twisting and turning her worn gold wedding-band around and around on
her unconsciously resentful pale and slender fourth finger.  She
would be wearing a simple, light yellow-beige colored belted shift
dress, with simple unobtrusive patterns sprinkled here and there.
She would be valiently trying to stifle tears; one or two might fall
despite her best angry efforts, betraying her.  Where is her
husband?  Why can she not be faithful?  Why, and how, do stray
boyfriends keep seducing her against her will by means of endlessly
promised respite from her soul's poverty?  Why is it always true, as
singer John Prine accused her of in "The Great Compromise," his song
about her illicit Viet Nam affair, that it was always HER that got
into HIS car at the local drive-in?

I don't know.  All I can do is feel her pain.  I cannot cure her; she
has BPD.  She is my mother, my country.  She is America the
Borderline.
She does not know fact from fiction, as Sandburg has taught us; she
is an eerily confident sleepwalker, as the master poet tells us
repeatedly:

"There is a Sleepwalker goes walking and talking - " [14]

So as not to give his readers the chance to miss this, another soul's
core characterization of his subject, Sandburg repeats those lines
twice more.  America is a Sleepwalker, he says, hawking her wares on
Madison Avenue.  She is a drugged hooker.  She peddles her soul to
the highest bidder - again, as the fundamentalist preacher has
stormed and raged while pointing the accusing finger.  He is right;
the preacher is right.  She is lost, she is drugged, she is peddling
her very soul's own Light in a desperate search to find her way Home
again.  She is America.  She is Borderline.

How can we grieve for a Borderline Mother?  How can we grieve for
ourselves, Her poor confused and misled children?  Perhaps we cannot.
Perhaps we can only pray, as Sandburg seems to suggest.  Sandburg
ends his 16-page poem "Good Morning America" with a prayer to an
ancient symbol of femininity, in her purest form: Moonlight.

"Moonlight," he invokes, "come down." Almost as the poetic
counterpart to the fundamentalist preacher calling for Daddy-God's
wrath to come down in Thunder and Lightning and Raze our sinful land
for its lust and other soul's pollution, the poet Carl Sandburg
invokes a gentler figure, the ancient mother, to rock us to solace
with the same gentle rhythms she uses to pull the ocean's tides to
and fro:

"Moonlight, come down - shine down, moonlight - meet every bird cry
and every song calling to a hard old earth, a sweet young earth."
[15]

1.  Kreisman, Jerrold, M.D., and Hal Strauss.  "I Hate You - Don't
Leave Me: Understanding the Borderline Personality." New York: Avon
Books (1989), p.  xiii.
1.  "The Complete Poems of Carl Sandburg." New York: Harcourt Brace &
Company (1970), p.  320.
2.  Ibid.
3.  Ibid.
4.  Ibid, p.  321.
5.  Ibid.
6.  Ibid, p.  324.
7.  Ibid, p.  324.
8.  Ibid, p.  324.
9.  Ibid, p.  325.
10.  Ibid, p.  334
11.  Vaknin, Sam.  "Malignant Love: Narcissism Revisited." Skeopje:
Narcissus Publications (1999)
12.  Ibid, p.  328.
13.  Ibid.
14.  Ibid, p.  333.
15.  Ibid, p.  336.

http://www.antistalking.com/victim.htm


The Antistalking Web Site







What to Do If You Become a Stalking Victim


Introduction

If you become a victim of a stalker you must, above all, educate
yourself. There are several national organizations that provide
information on stalking. These are listed on our resources page. Keep
tuned in to our upcoming educational events page, as well, for
continually updated information.

Security Precautions for Stalking Victims
Stalking victims don't like to be called victims. They will say, "I
won't let myself be victimized," or "I'm not going to change my life
because I'm being stalked." Sorry. Your life has changed. Forever.
And unless you accept that, you will actually be helping the stalker.
You are a crime victim. The crime happens to be stalking. You must
understand that the phrase "stalking victim" says volumes about the
perpetrator, but nothing about you. It does not tell us whether you
stay at home in terror with sheets over the windows, or whether
you've decided to move, or to become active to change the laws in
your state. On the other hand, accepting that you are a stalking
victim serves to remind you that you must, from now on, take extra
precautions that others do not have to take.

Here are some basics to start with. These and other safety
precautions can be found in I Know You Really Love Me:

Tell the stalker "no" once and only once, and then never give him the
satisfaction of a reaction again. The more you respond, the more you
teach him that his actions will elicit a response. This only serves
to reinforce the stalking.
Get a dog. The Los Angeles Police Department's Threat Management Unit
says this is "one of the least expensive but most effective alarm
systems."
Block your address at DMV and Voter Registration. If you don't,
anyone can get it for the asking. This is how Robert Bardo found
actress Rebecca Schaeffer and was able to murder her at her front
door.
Never give out your home address or telephone number. Get a post
office box and use it on all correspondence. For those places that
will not accept a post office box, change "PO Box" to "Apt." and
leave the number. Put this address on your checks.
When the stalker gets your home telephone number, don't change it.
Instead, always let an answering machine pick-up. Get a new, unlisted
number, and give it to everyone who calls but the stalker. Gradually,
only your stalker will be using your old number – it will become his
private line. If it upsets you when he calls, put the machine in a
room you don't use. You can even have someone else monitor the tapes.
This way, the stalker will think he is still getting through to you,
although you will never make the mistake of picking up when he calls.
Whenever you close off one avenue for a stalker, he will find another
and it could easily be worse.
Document everything. Even if you have decided not to go the legal
route, you may change your mind. Keep answering machine tapes,
letters, gifts, etc. Keep a log of drive-bys or any suspicious
occurrences.
Take a self-defense class. A lot of security experts don't advise
this, fearing that it gives victims a false sense of security, but we
do. The best self-defense classes teach you how to become more aware
of your surroundings and avoid confrontations, things that stalking
victims would do well to learn.
Have co-workers screen all calls and visitors.
Don't accept packages unless they were personally ordered.
Remove any name or identification from reserved parking at work.
Destroy discarded mail.
Equip your gas tank with a locking gas cap that can be unlocked only
from inside the car.
Get a cell phone and keep it with you at all times, even inside your
home, in case the stalker cuts your phone lines.
If you think you are being followed while in your car, make four left-
  or right-hand turns in succession. If the car continues to follow
you, drive to the nearest police station, never home or to a friend's
house.
Never be afraid to sound your car horn to attract attention.
Acquaint yourself with all-night stores and other public, highly
populated places in your area.
Consider moving if your case warrants it. No, it's not fair, but
nothing is fair about stalking. If you stay and fight through the
legal system, you might get some justice, (although not necessarily
your definition of it), but you almost certainly won't get safety:
There is no possibility of life imprisonment for stalkers. Research
how to keep your destination secret. Stalking and victims'
organizations can help.
Don't be embarrassed and think you caused this somehow. Stalkers need
no encouragement. Your shame is your stalker's best weapon. It makes
you more likely to engage him or agree to plea bargains, which are
bound to be taken as sympathy and we know where that leads. Instead,
tell everyone you know that you're being stalked, from neighbors to
co-workers, so that when the stalker approaches them for information
about you, they will be alerted not to divulge anything and will let
you know he's been around. One young widow moved to escape her
stalker, a stranger she had never really met. Yet, after finding out
where she moved, he was also able to pinpoint her exact location by
showing her helpful neighbors pictures he had surreptitiously taken
of her and her children, telling them that he was her estranged
husband and she had kidnapped the kids.
Join one of the stalking victims' support groups that are springing
up all over the country. They can be invaluable resources for
information in your community (such as how local law enforcement
handle these cases) as well as provide essential support. See the
resources section for organizations that can help. If there is no
group in your area, start one. It only takes two. Tragically, we can
guarantee you are not the only person being stalked in your area.
  Restraining Orders
Many stalking victims are routinely told to get restraining orders.
When they do, they often assume that the stalking will finally end,
either because the stalker will stop on his own, or because the
police will stop him. Neither of these outcomes happens with any
frequency.

About a quarter of stalking victims obtain restraining orders; in two-
thirds of these cases, the restraining order is violated. About half
of all stalking cases are reported to the police; a quarter of these
result in an arrest.

Remember that a restraining order is just a piece of paper. It cannot
protect you. In fact, the restraining order is just a tool police use
to show intent by the perpetrator. Obviously, the police will not be
there when the perpetrator violates. Only after.

In many, many instances, restraining orders only make a bad situation
worse. From the stalker's point of view, restraining orders are
humiliating; the victim has just announced to the world that she
wants nothing to do with him: She has stepped-up the rejection.
Because of this, many perpetrators feel they must step-up the
pursuit. Or they just get mad and plan to get even. There have been
far too many cases of stalking victims found murdered after they had
obtained restraining orders; one victim's estranged husband knifed
the order to her chest.

There are two types of stalkers that are most unlikely to respond to
restraining orders: those former intimate-partner stalkers who are
very invested in the relationship and delusional stalkers.

Former intimate partner stalkers are less likely to adhere to a
restraining order the more they have invested in the victim. For
example, a man who was married to a woman for ten years and had three
children with her, follows her around until she gets a restraining
order. The same man, a year later, dates another woman a few times
until she becomes concerned about how controlling he is and breaks it
off. In which scenario will the same man be more likely to let go: In
the former instance, in which he has ten years and three kids
invested, or the latter in which he has only invested a few dates?

Delusional stalkers, by definition, cannot be reasoned with. They
just don't get it and never will. A judge saying the same thing the
victim did, "stay away," makes no difference. These types of stalkers
have even been known to call their victims - collect from jail. Since
in most cases the victim hardly knows the stalker, if at all, it
might seem that these stalkers have nothing invested in the
relationship. Remember, however, that in their minds, they have
created an entire relationship with the power to completely transform
their lonely lives. A piece of paper carrying some paltry penalty for
a violation is hardly going to be a deterrent. A victim may assume
that her stalker will respond to a restraining order the way she
herself would. Such an assumption is, at best, terribly foolish; at
worst, deadly.

An erotomanic woman stalked a department store manager who had the
misfortune of smiling in her direction. She was so relentless in her
pursuit that he was eventually forced to leave the country. Here is
what she wrote to the man she had never, in reality, met: "My dearest
beloved…I cannot live without you. You are God of God and I depend
upon your kindly help to save me from this hospital. Your high
learning and important status are your two most admirable qualities.
Your wise breeding will make a perfect lady out of me and in you is
all I need to find security in my life." How can 30 days, 6 months,
even a year in jail put a dent in these sentiments and their
resulting pursuit?

Does this mean that a stalking victim should not obtain a restraining
order? No. It does mean, however, that a stalking victim should not
obtain one routinely. Before a victim obtains a restraining order,
she must research how these orders are enforced in her jurisdiction
in similar cases. Seek out other stalking victims, through support
groups, domestic violence programs, etc. and ask them. Find out if a
restraining order violation is a misdemeanor (as it is in most
jurisdictions) or a felony. If it is a misdemeanor, it is much less
likely to be enforced. When is the last time you heard of someone
being arrested for spitting, littering or loitering? The police will
almost always tell you they will arrest. Find out if this means
taking the stalker to jail or just giving him a citation.

When a restraining order violation occurs and the police just go out
and talk to the stalker or even give him a citation, they have just
made the situation worse. The victim would have been far better off
never obtaining such an order. What the police have done in this
instance is given the stalker further proof that nothing will happen
to him, that he can act with impunity. After all, what more can the
victim do to him than call in the full weight of the legal system;
first a judge to issue the order and a police officer to enforce it?

  Stalker Violence
There are cases in which stalking lasts for years and years and never
turns violent. Then, there are those cases that turn deadly quickly.
How can you tell which cases will lead to murder?

First of all, the cases that seem harmless, may, in fact, be the most
deadly. An Australian singer was stalked by an erotomanic man who
went to all her performances and even followed her to social events.
When her friends expressed their concerns to the young woman, she
told them he was simply sad and harmless. There was no warning before
he finally did approach her in the street, fatally stabbing her.
Weeks before, he had confided to his mother that he was going to
marry the singer. What changed his plans from marriage to murder? A
newspaper article reporting her engagement to a prominent local
businessman. He felt humiliated at her "betrayal" and decided to "get
even."

Most stalking victims erroneously believe that if they have not been
threatened, they are not in any danger. Here's a question, then: If
he really wanted to harm you, why would he warn you ahead of time?
Conversely, think about the many, many times in your own life that
you threatened someone and then didn't follow through on the threat.
Never happened? What about that jerk who cut you off on the highway
last week? Didn't you threaten to – well, never mind. The point is,
study after study indicates that whether or not a stalker makes a
threat has no bearing on whether or not he poses a threat. Of course,
any threat should be taken seriously. But there are other indicators
that cannot be ignored when assessing a stalker's potential for
violence.

Additionally, it is a false belief that if a perpetrator has no
history of violence, the likelihood of his becoming violent in the
future is small. John Hinckley, Jr., Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, Sarah
Jane Moore, Lee Harvey Oswald, Sirhan Sirhan and John Wilkes Booth,
never perpetrated an act of criminal violence on another person
before the attacks that made them famous. That is also true of the
most recent celebrity stalker-murderers, Robert Bardo, who killed
Rebecca Schaefer, and Mark David Chapman, who killed John Lennon.
While a past history of violence, therefore, is an important factor
in increasing the risk of future violence, the absence of such a
history is completely meaningless. After all, a history of violence
is notably lacking before the first time anyone perpetrates a violent
act.

Factors which studies show seem to increase stalker propensity for
violence are: stalking more than one victim, a past criminal history
unrelated to stalking, substance abuse, access to and knowledge of
weapons, high degree of obsession with the victim, great length of
time stalking the victim, travelling a distance to be near the
victim. Male sex is usually added to this list because, in general,
men are more violent than women. However, a recent study found that,
at least for former intimate partner stalkers, women stalkers were
just as likely to become violent as their male counterparts.

It is also important to understand that it is not only the victim who
is in danger, but those surrounding the victim, particularly if the
stalker perceives them to be in his way. Madonna's stalker tried to
kill her body guard because he was seen as an obstacle to the star.
Peggy Lennon's stalker (from the singing Lennon Sisters on the
Lawrence Welk Show) hunted her father down and shot him to death,
believing he was an obstacle to being with Peggy, whom he called, "my
true wife."

http://www.wrightslaw.com/law/caselaw/2001/8th.isd284.ac.htm

Home  >  Law Library  >  Caselaw  >  ISD No. 284 Wayzata Area Schools
v. A. C. (8th Cir. 2001)



INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 284, WAYZATA AREA SCHOOLS, WAYZATA,
MINNESOTA,
APPELLEE,

v.

A.C., BY AND THROUGH HER PARENT, C.C., APPELLANT.

No. 00-2346MN

Before Richard S. Arnold, Lay, and Hansen, Circuit Judges.

The opinion of the court was delivered by: Richard S. Arnold, Circuit
Judge.

On Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
Minnesota.

Submitted: February 14, 2001

Decided: August 3, 2001

This case arises under the Individuals With Disabilities Education
Act (IDEA), 20 U.S.C. §§ 1400-1487 (1994) (amended 1997). A state
hearing officer ordered the appellant, Independent School District
No. 284 ("the District"), to pay the costs of a residential education
and treatment program for A.C., a student with a variety of emotional
and behavioral problems. The District brought this action in federal
district court pursuant to 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(2), and obtained a
ruling that the residential placement was not educationally
necessary. A.C. appeals, and we reverse.

I.

When A.C. moved into the District, she was 15 years old. Her previous
school district had provided her with special-education services for
emotional and behavioral disorders and had developed an
Individualized Education Program (IEP) which assigned her to a
special, "self-contained" classroom. A.C.'s school-related problems
included classroom disruption, profanity, insubordination, and
truancy. School officials in her old district had tried to deal with
these problems by allowing her to take her classes at an off-campus
day center for troubled kids. That didn't work: she would either
leave the center or not show up at all. Outside of school, she used
alcohol and illegal drugs, was sexually promiscuous, repeatedly ran
away from home, was thought to have forged checks, and was
hospitalized three times for threatening or attempting suicide. Her
mother, C.C., tried to get the county social services department to
pay for a residential treatment program. The county offered placement
in a juvenile correctional facility, which C.C. declined. After that,
C.C. stopped telling the county about A.C.'s absences from home. C.C.
also tried, unsuccessfully, to obtain a court order placing A.C. in a
non-correctional residential treatment center.

When District No. 284 first took on the responsibility of educating
A.C., it tried to implement the IEP from her old district. It placed
her in one of two self-contained classrooms for students with
emotional and behavioral problems. On her third day of attendance,
A.C. was suspended for behaving inappropriately, cursing, and
disobeying a school authority. The school returned A.C. to the self-
contained classroom while it reviewed her placement. After a few
days, she stopped coming to class. Meanwhile, C.C. resumed trying to
obtain a court-ordered residential placement. A.C.'s current high
school's social worker, her previous school's staff psychologist, and
her IEP manager wrote letters to the court. All three agreed that
A.C.'s behavior was interfering with her academic progress. The
psychologist and the IEP manager also noted that past educational
strategies had been ineffective, and said that A.C. needed a highly
structured program that would address her behavioral and
psychological problems. The court refused to order a residential
placement. Instead, it ordered A.C. to attend school, an order with
which she did not comply.

C.C. continued to pursue a residential placement. She had several
meetings with A.C.'s IEP team and provided the District with the
information presented to the juvenile court. As an interim measure,
the District provided homebound instruction services, of which A.C.
made sporadic use. For the longer term, the District said that it
would either return A.C. to the self-contained classroom or enroll
her in a day treatment program on the campus of the University of
Minnesota, to which she could travel by city bus. C.C. was not
satisfied with these choices. She asked that A.C. be enrolled at
Rocky Mountain Academy (RMA), a residential treatment center in
Idaho, at District expense. The District agreed to pay
the "educational" costs of this placement, but not costs related to
therapy or lodging. In monetary terms, that meant the District would
pay a little more than one third of the $55,000 annual attendance
charge for RMA.

With negotiations at an impasse, the District agreed to an
Independent Educational Evaluation (IEE) of A.C. by a
neuropsychologist on the faculty of the University of Minnesota. The
evaluator found no major attention problems, hyperactivity, learning
disabilities, deficiencies of intelligence or memory, or the like.
Instead, she traced A.C.'s educational problems to "psychological
difficulties" such as her "oppositionality, manipulative tendencies,
and strong need for control and attention." On the basis of these
observations, A.C. was diagnosed with "conduct disorder," but the
evaluator explained in her deposition that this diagnostic category
was used mainly because the patient was still too young to be
diagnosed with a personality disorder. She said that a diagnosis of
antisocial or narcissistic personality disorder would probably be
appropriate when A.C. reaches the age at which those categories are
applied. The evaluator strongly recommended that A.C. be placed in a
secure facility, largely to prevent truancy, and predicted that,
after a course of treatment, A.C. would probably be able to return to
the classroom. According to findings in the administrative record,
the evaluator considered a day treatment placement, and does not
believe it will be effective as the Student will not attend. While a
day treatment facility could provide educational services, the
services would be ineffective . . . due to the nature and extent of
her emotional and behavioral disorder.

Findings of Fact, Conclusions, and Decision of Independent Hearing
Officer (hereafter IHO Decision) at 11. The state review officer
found that the "IEE Evaluator concluded unequivocally that it is
necessary for Student to be in a secure residential treatment
facility in order for Student to gain educational benefit." Findings
of Fact, Conclusions of Law, and Decision of Hearing Review Officer
(hereafter HRO Decision) at 9. The private psychologist who has been
treating A.C. since 1996 believes that she exhibits borderline
personality development and may have dysthymia, a form of depression.

The controversy next went to an administrative hearing in the
Minnesota Department of Children, Families, and Learning. The
Independent Hearing Officer ordered the District to provide 100 hours
of compensatory education and to convene an IEP meeting for the
purpose of "locat[ing] an appropriate residential placement to meet
the Students [sic] emotional, behavioral and educational needs." IHO
Decision at 21. The Hearing Review Officer affirmed. The District
then commenced this action, as permitted by 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(2)
(A). The District Court affirmed the award of compensatory education,
a decision from which the District does not appeal. As to the
residential placement, the District Court reversed. It noted that the
IEE evaluator had testified that the day program proposed in the
District's IEP " 'would educationally meet her needs, . . . from the
standpoint of the individualized kind of work that she needs to meet
her educational needs.' " Order at 5, quoting Hearing Transcript at
621. Because the Court found nothing in the record to suggest that
A.C.'s behavioral problems rendered her unable to attend the day
program, it concluded that a residential placement was not necessary
to address her educational needs.


II.

The IDEA "was intended to ensure that children with disabilities
receive an education that is both appropriate and free." Florence
County School District 4 v. Carter, 510 U.S. 7, 13 (1993). As defined
in the Act, 20 U.S.C. § 1401(8), a "free appropriate public
education" includes both instruction, which must be specially
designed to suit the needs of the disabled child, see 20 U.S.C. § 1401
(25), and "related services," including "such developmental,
corrective, and other supportive services . . . as may be required to
assist a child with a disability to benefit from special education."
20 U.S.C. § 1401(22). It is undisputed that A.C. is a "child with a
disability" within the meaning of 20 U.S.C. § 1401(3)(A).

The purpose of this action is to determine whether a residential
placement is part of the special education and related services the
District must provide in order to give A.C. a free appropriate public
education. The Supreme Court held in Board of Ed. of the Hendrick
Hudson Central School Dist., Westchester County v. Rowley, 458 U.S.
176, 206-07 (1982), that

a court's inquiry in suits brought under [§ 1415(i)(2)] is twofold.
First, has the State complied with the procedures set forth in the
Act? And second, is the individualized educational program developed
through the Act's procedures reasonably calculated to enable the
child to receive educational benefits? If these requirements are met,
the State has complied with the obligations imposed by Congress and
the courts can require no more. Id. at 206-07 (footnotes omitted).
The parties do not dispute that the procedural requirements of the
IDEA were met here. The question before us, therefore, is whether the
District's IEP is reasonably calculated to provide A.C. with
educational benefits.

This is a mixed question of law and fact, which we review de novo.
Strawn v. Missouri State Board of Educ., 210 F.3d 954, 958 (8th Cir.
2000).

That our review of the District Court is de novo does not mean that
we write on an entirely clean slate. We must afford "due weight" to
the outcome of the state administrative proceedings, giving
particular consideration to state officials' educational judgments.
Rowley, 458 U.S. at 206; see also Strawn, 210 F.3d at 958; E.S. v.
Independent School District No. 196, 135 F.3d 566, 569 (8th Cir.
1998) (a reviewing court should "resist[] any impulse to 'substitute
[its] own notions of sound educational policy for those of the school
authorities' ") (quoting Rowley, 458 U.S. at 206). In some cases,
however, a court may have good legal reasons for rejecting a state's
decision. For example, the IDEA expresses the will of Congress that
disabled students be educated with non-disabled students "[t]o the
maximum extent appropriate." 20 U.S.C. § 1412(5)(A). We have reversed
a state decision concerning an IEP where no educational reasons were
given for placing a disabled child in a separate learning
environment. See Independent School District No. 283 v. S.D., 88 F.3d
556, 561-62 (8th Cir. 1996) (district court correctly reversed
hearing review officer's separate placement, where both the school
district and the first-tier state hearing officer judged a mainstream
placement appropriate, and the review officer gave no educational
reason for disagreeing with them).

Despite the statutory preference for mainstream placements, the IDEA
recognizes that some disabled students need full-time care in order
to receive educational benefit. It defines "special education" to
include "instruction conducted . . . in hospitals and institutions,"
20 U.S.C. § 1401(25); cf. 34 C.F.R. 300.26 (2000). Regulations
promulgated under the statute by the United States Department of
Education require that, "[i]f placement in a public or private
residential program is necessary to provide special education and
related services to a child with a disability, the program, including
non-medical care and room and board, must be at no cost to the
parents of the child." 34 C.F.R. § 300.302 (2000). The reason for
this rule is straightforward: if a residential placement is
educationally necessary because of a student's disability, and the
state does not provide it, then the state's IEP is not "reasonably
calculated to enable the child to receive educational benefits" as
required by Rowley. Thus, the IDEA requires that a state pay for a
disabled student's residential placement if the student, because of
his or her disability, cannot reasonably be anticipated to benefit
from instruction without such a placement. See Mrs. B. v. Milford
Board of Ed., 103 F.3d 1114, 1122 (2d Cir. 1997) (asking "whether the
child requires the residential program to receive educational
benefit"); McKenzie v. Smith, 771 F.2d 1527, 1534 (D.C. Cir. 1985)
(asking " 'whether full-time placement may be considered necessary
for educational purposes, or whether the residential placement is a
response to medical, social or emotional problems that are segregable
from the learning process.' ") (quoting Kruelle v. New Castle County
School Dist., 642 F.2d 687, 693 (3d Cir. 1981)).

III.

The District first argues that the case is moot, because A.C. has
apparently moved to another district and has conceded that the
District is not responsible for prospective relief. In Thompson v.
Bd. of the Special School Dist. No. 1, 144 F.3d 574, 579 (8th Cir.
1998), we held that a student's IDEA claim was moot because his old
district was not responsible for providing him a due-process hearing,
which he requested only after he had left the district to attend
another school. Here, however, A.C.'s due-process hearing is over.
A.C.'s claim in this case concerns obligations the District allegedly
had in the past and failed to meet. The remedy sought is
compensatory. It does not matter whether the District has any present
or future obligation to develop a new IEP for her or to give her
further hearings. If A.C. or her mother had paid the costs of a
private placement at the time, and then sued the District for
reimbursement, the claim would not be moot. See Zobrest v. Catalina
Foothills School Dist., 509 U.S. 1, 4 n.3 (1993). We think that the
same result should obtain here. In either case, the claim is that the
statute obligated the school district to pay for the placement during
the time when it was responsible for the student's education.
Assuming that A.C.'s claim has merit, it would not make sense to deny
her a remedy against the District just because her parent did not or
could not pay for the placement that the District denied her.

We therefore turn to the merits. The District Court held that


the record . . . makes it clear that residential placement is
necessary only to treat Plaintiff's social and emotional problems,
not for educational purposes. . . . Student's problems, and the risks
to which she is exposed, are social and emotional in nature. In fact,
the IEE Evaluator specifically noted that Student has no neurological
deficits which interfere with her learning and is of average
intelligence, with no symptoms of ADD or ADHD, and found that day
treatment would meet Plaintiff's educational needs. [Citation
omitted.] While one manifestation of A.C.'s emotional behavioral
disorder is her unwillingness to attend school or comply with the
requirements of ISD 284's IEP, there is nothing in the record to
support a conclusion that there is anything about A.C.'s disorder
which renders her unable to attend school or unable to comply with
the IEP.


Order of Magistrate Judge at 10. There is much in this assessment
with which we agree. Certainly no one disputes that A.C. has social
and emotional problems, and the record would not support a finding
that she has learning disabilities. We also think it unlikely that
Congress meant for the IDEA to require states to provide a home away
from home for students who simply make bad choices, even if those
choices cause them to fail in school. See, e.g., Springer v. Fairfax
County School Bd., 134 F.3d 659, 664 (4th Cir. 1998) (holding that
student diagnosed with "conduct disorder" did not have an emotional
disturbance but was merely "socially maladjusted" under the precursor
to 34 C.F.R. § 300.7(c)(4)(ii) (2000)).

We do not believe, however, that the analysis can be limited to a
stark distinction between unwillingness and inability to behave
appropriately. There is a grey area between normal, voluntary conduct
and involuntary physiological response, and that area is where
Congress has chosen to locate behavioral problems such as A.C.'s. The
IDEA clearly includes "emotional disturbance[s]" as disabilities. 20
U.S.C. § 1401(3)(A). According to the Department of Education, an
emotional disturbance is

[A] condition exhibiting one or more of the following characteristics
over a long period of time and to a marked degree that adversely
affects a child's educational performance:

(A) An inability to learn that cannot be explained by intellectual,
sensory, or health factors.
(B) An inability to build or maintain satisfactory interpersonal
relationships with peers and teachers.
(C) Inappropriate types of behavior or feelings under normal
circumstances.
(D) A general pervasive mood of unhappiness or depression.
(E) A tendency to develop physical symptoms or fears associated with
personal or school problems. 34 C.F.R. § 300.7(c)(4)(i).

Read naturally and as a whole, the law and the regulations identify a
class of children who are disabled only in the sense that their
abnormal emotional conditions prevent them from choosing normal
responses to normal situations. See Honig, California Superintendent
of Public Instruction v. Doe, 484 U.S. 305, 320 (1988) (stating, of
an emotionally disturbed student, that "[i]t is [the student's] very
inability to conform his conduct to socially acceptable norms that
renders him 'handicapped' within the meaning of the EHA").

Consistently with this reading, a child whose disabling condition
manifests itself in disruptive conduct is exempted, to a degree, from
normal disciplinary procedures.

While Education Department regulations do permit children with
disabilities to be suspended from school under some circumstances,
see 34 C.F.R. § 300.520(a)(1), the Department also instructs schools
that suspension or expulsion is not normally appropriate as a first-
line response to behavior problems resulting from a student's
disability, even if the conduct in question violates school rules.
See 34 C.F.R. Part 300, App. A, Individualized Education Programs
(IEPs) and Other Selected Implementation Issues, VI.38 (2000).
Instead, the student's IEP team should address the behavior in the
first instance, using suspension and other disciplinary measures only
if appropriate in the context of the IEP. Id. This does not mean that
the IDEA has obliterated the concept of personal responsibility, or
that children with disabilities cannot be punished for simple
misbehavior. It merely reflects the Department's judgment that
sometimes, with certain children, what looks like simple misbehavior
is actually a more complicated problem whose remedy should be
integrated into the child's overall program of special education.

The preponderance of the evidence in the record before us supports
the state's conclusion that A.C.'s truancy and classroom disruption
belong in this category. Although the IEE evaluator reported that
A.C. "does not have any significant neurocognitive impairment,"
Summary of Evaluation at 6, cf. Hearing Transcript at 623, she also
found A.C. to be "very impaired" with respect to her disabling
condition, and even repeated the phrase for emphasis. Hearing
Transcript at 653. Asked to clarify, she said that the latter finding
related to "[A.C.'s] conduct disorder and her total functional
impairment. . . . [H]er ability to operate on a day-to-day basis is
impaired. She is not impaired cognitively." Id. at 662. Both the IEE
evaluator and A.C.'s treating psychologist regard her lack of self-
control as a settled disorder traceable to early experiences. See
Summary of Evaluation at 3-4 (noting that A.C.'s treating
psychologist "feels that [A.C.] has suffered significant trauma,"
stating that "[i]t is clear from the interviews with [A.C.] and her
mother that [A.C.] has experienced a significant emotional turmoil
and that this has had a profound effect on her personality
development," and tracing A.C.'s excessive need for control to
her " 'parental' experiences as a young child"). Perhaps these facts
do not show that A.C. is irresistibly compelled to cut school, but
they do tend to show that her truancy and defiance of authority
result from a genuine emotional disturbance rather than from a purely
moral failing. The school district, which has the burden of proof
here, see E.S., 135 F.3d at 569, has presented no evidence to the
contrary.

The District Court accurately described A.C.'s problems as "social
and emotional in nature," and concluded from this that they
were "separable from the learning process." Order of Magistrate Judge
at 9-10. That conclusion does not follow. Apart from other reasons,
the mere fact that Congress regards emotional disturbances as
disabilities entitling a child to special education shows that, at
least in Congress's judgment, social and emotional problems are not
ipso facto separable from the learning process. Nor do we agree with
the Seventh Circuit that a problem resulting from a disability is
separable from the learning process if the problem is "not primarily
educational." Dale M. v. Bd. of Ed. of Bradley-Bourbonnais High
School Dist. No. 307, 237 F.3d 813, 817 (7th Cir. 2001). If the
problem prevents a disabled child from receiving educational benefit,
then it should not matter that the problem is not cognitive in nature
or that it causes the child even more trouble outside the classroom
than within it. What should control our decision is not whether the
problem itself is "educational" or "non-educational," but whether it
needs to be addressed in order for the child to learn.

Moreover, the record here does not permit the conclusion that A.C.'s
behavior problems are separable from the learning process. The IEE
evaluator made quite clear her judgment that A.C. will not receive
educational benefit unless her emotional and behavioral problems are
dealt with. The school psychologist from her old district, drawing on
over two years of that district's experiences with her, said that "[f]
or any placement to be successful, there will need to be the ability
to exert sufficient control while providing a therapeutic approach."
Letter of 9/22/98 at 2, Joint Appendix (JA) at 355. An assessment by
District 284 itself, completed after A.C.'s brief period of
attendance there, says that A.C.'s behavioral and emotional problems
must be addressed if she is to succeed academically. Even the IEP at
issue here states that A.C.'s "[g]rades and credit completion suffer
as a result of her explosive and oppositional behavior," and that "[s]
he needs a high degree of structure and support, including immediate
feedback with her behavior in order to be successful." IEP of 3/19/99
at 2, JA at 357. This is not a case where the correction of
behavioral and emotional problems is merely desirable in order to
improve a student's performance: at the time of her hearing, which
occurred at the end of her tenth-grade year, A.C. had completed only
nine of the 32 credits required for graduation, although she is of
average intelligence and has no learning disability. Both hearing
officers found that A.C.'s truancy and disruptiveness had
substantially prevented her from receiving educational benefit. We
see nothing in the record that would support a finding to the
contrary.


IV.

The remaining question, then, is whether A.C. can reasonably be
expected to make academic progress outside of a residential program.
If we regard this as an educational question, there appears to be a
consensus in the negative. A.C.'s treating psychologist, her IEE
evaluator, her old district's school psychologist, her mother, and
both state hearing officers all have reached the conclusion that a
residential placement is necessary in order for A.C. to get an
education. It is true that the evaluator testified that a day program
like the one recommended by the District "would educationally meet
[A.C.'s] needs," Hearing Transcript at 621, but it is clear from the
context that this remark referred only to the appropriateness of the
kind of instruction provided and not to the "related services." Of
all the educators whose views of the matter appear in the record, the
only one that does not recommend a residential placement is the
school district that is being asked to pay for it. This tends to show
that the District's recommended placement is not reasonably
calculated to enable A.C. to receive educational benefit, or, put
otherwise, that a residential placement is necessary to provide A.C.
with special education and related services.

The District characterizes A.C.'s need for a residential placement as
a need for confinement, and argues that confinement is not a "related
service" it is required to provide. This view has some justification.
The IEE evaluator testified that the real issue is, you know, how can
you get her into an educational setting. When she is with her tutor
and if she shows up for her tutoring, she does her work and she is
able to do her work. There is no problem in doing her work. It is a
question, really, of getting her and a teacher in the same room and
she getting to that place and sitting down with that teacher. Hearing
Transcript at 622-23.

In response to questioning by the District's attorney, she further
stated that her recommendation of a residential placement was based
on her judgment that A.C.

will leave any treatment facility. She will run from any treatment
facility that is not [sic] where she's not confined in some way,
because, ultimately, any treatment facility is going to ask her to do
things that she does not want to do. And that is why she cannot be
educated in a normal way, because she is not - she just will not
attend. Id. at 614.
The evaluator also emphasized the benefit to A.C. of being prevented
from using drugs and from engaging in promiscuous sex. Id. at 618-19,
623.

These statements should not be viewed in isolation, however. Taken as
a whole, the IEE evaluator's testimony suggests that a residential
placement is necessary in order to correct A.C.'s behavioral and
emotional problems, not just to keep her off the streets or to force
her to sit down with a tutor. Although tests reveal A.C. to be a
shrewd problem solver, she fails to exercise good judgment in her
dealings with others because she lacks empathy, defined as "the
ability . . . to gauge behavior according to what other people want
from you." Hearing Transcript at 590. This deficiency was confirmed,
for example, by her Rorschach inkblot test, in which she identified
none of the shapes as human. Id. at 592. When asked to give a
prognosis for A.C., the evaluator said, "I think she can
improve . . . otherwise, you would just put her in a confined
situation without any treatment. Obviously, I think there can be
improvement." She testified that neither medication, individual
psychotherapy, nor family therapy was likely to do much good, but
that the residential aspect of a secure facility would probably have
therapeutic benefit:



the fact is that at a residential treatment program, . . . the
environment is the therapy. And, you know, I think that it's a sort
of a relearning process that she needs. I mean, she needs
socialization. . . . [S]he's very narcissistic and does not have this
sort of sense of what the other feels or what the other is responding
to.


And so, you know, I think in a setting where that kind of emphasis is
placed in terms of the interactions with others - you know, sometimes
peer pressure can be very effective with individuals like her. If
everybody in her unit is pressuring her to behave in a certain way or
her counselor is pressuring her to behave and she has to alter her
behavior under those conditions. So that's what an environment, you
know, is going to do for her. Psychotherapy is not going to do that.
Id. at 617-18.


It would be one-sided, therefore, to say that mere confinement was
the evaluator's reason for recommending a residential placement. An
independent and sufficient reason for that recommendation was to
provide treatment for a psychological problem that has prevented A.C.
from making acceptable academic progress.


The District also argues that the IDEA's preference for mainstream
placements counsels against placing A.C. in a residential facility.
Although our cases have placed emphasis on this statutory preference,
see, e.g., Springdale School Dist. No. 50 of Washington County v.
Grace, 693 F.2d 41, 43 (8th Cir. 1982) (classing the preference among
the "primary directives" of the IDEA); S.D., 88 F.3d at 561 (calling
it a "strong preference"), we do not believe it is implicated here.
The statute requires mainstreaming only "to the maximum extent
appropriate," not to the maximum extent possible. 20 U.S.C. § 1412(5)
(A). As the Supreme Court explained in School Committee of the Town
of Burlington, Mass. v. Dept. of Ed. of Mass., 471 U.S. 359, 373
(1985), in crafting this language "Congress was concerned about the
apparently widespread practice of relegating handicapped children to
private institutions or warehousing them in special classes." Here,
the District itself agrees that A.C. should be in an off-campus
institution where she can receive individualized instruction in a
setting designed for students with disabilities like hers. No one is
proposing a mainstream placement, or anything close to it. Moreover,
the record amply demonstrates that the decision to put A.C. into a
residential facility is not mere "warehousing" but a considered
judgment based on an assessment of her individual needs. The only
question here is whether she should go home at night or remain in a
special institution twenty-four hours a day. Because the
preponderance of the evidence shows that she will not receive
educational benefit in the less restrictive setting, the statute's
preference is overcome here.

Finally, the District argues that neither it nor this Court has the
power to order A.C. placed in a secure facility. That is beside the
point. The question before us here is not whether A.C. must attend
such a facility, but who should pay for it if she does.


V.


For the reasons stated, the judgment of the District Court is
reversed, and the cause remanded for the development of an
appropriate remedy. Fashioning an appropriate remedy will require
findings of fact: for example, it must be determined whether and when
A.C. ceased to reside in the District, and whether RMA was an
appropriate residential placement for her. We therefore remand the
case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

HANSEN, Circuit Judge, concurring.

I agree with the court's analysis in this case which concludes that
the expert testimony of record indicates that this is the very rare
case where a school district is obligated to pay for a residential
treatment setting as a related service in order to ensure that the
child receives the educational benefit that Congress has declared she
is entitled to receive. I write specially to emphasize that the
district court's task on remand of fashioning an appropriate remedy
will be a difficult one. In my view, the student is entitled to
compensatory education but not to compensation in the form of dollar
damages.

The district court has broad discretionary authority to "grant such
relief as the court determines is appropriate." 20 U.S.C. § 1415(i)(2)
(B)(iii) (1998 Supp. IV). The Supreme Court has stated that the
remedy granted must be one that is "appropriate" in light of the
purpose of the Act, which is to provide disabled "children with a
free appropriate public education which emphasizes special education
and related services designed to meet their unique needs." Sch. Comm.
of Burlington v. Dep't of Educ. of Mass., 471 U.S. 359, 369 (1985)
(internal quotations omitted). The definition of related
services "encompasses those supportive services that 'may be required
to assist a child with a disability to benefit from special
education.'" Cedar Rapids Cmty. Sch. Dist. v. Garret F., 526 U.S. 66,
73 (1999) (quoting 20 U.S.C. § 1401(a)(17) (1994), renumbered as 20
U.S.C. § 1401(22) (Supp. IV 1998)). This language indicates that
compensatory educational services are an appropriate remedy. The
statutory language also permits the district court to authorize
reimbursement to parents who have actually incurred expenses in
funding an appropriate special education where the court determines
that the school district's IEP was inappropriate. Sch. Comm. of
Burlington, 471 U.S. at 370. The Supreme Court rejected an attempt to
characterize this remedy as "damages," noting that reimbursement
merely requires the belated payment of expenses that the school
district should have paid in the first instance. Id. at 370-71. We
have specifically noted that appropriate relief under the
IDEA "includes compensatory education services but excludes general
and punitive damages." Birmingham v. Omaha Sch. Dist., 220 F.3d 850,
856 (8th Cir. 2000) (internal citations omitted).

In my opinion, requiring the reimbursement of expenses already paid
by the parents to ensure that a child's education is at no cost to
the parents is to be distinguished from the granting of a windfall
monetary award where the parents never paid for the child's
education. Here, the District violated its obligation to provide a
free appropriate education and must provide an appropriate remedy. In
this case, however, the District's ability to provide compensatory
education to fulfill its obligation to the child has been somewhat
frustrated by the child's removal of herself from the school
district. On the other hand, because the record does not show that
her parent spent any money to enroll her in a residential treatment
setting in order to obtain an appropriate education for her, any
monetary award cannot now be characterized as reimbursement and would
do nothing to fulfill the purpose of the Act. In my view, the student
is entitled to receive from the District at its expense the
residential setting educational opportunity she was entitled to but
did not receive, but only for the length of time she actually resided
within the school district. That opportunity may only exist in a
setting outside of the district. Neither her incorrigibility nor her
parent's inability to keep her in the school district or in the prior
educational placements designed to meet her emotional and behavioral
problems should be rewarded with money. Compensatory education is
appropriate, but compensatory dollar damages that may or may not be
used to fund the education necessary for her and that do not amount
to reimbursement are not.

Copyright © 1999-2002, Peter W. D. Wright and Pamela Darr Wright. All
rights reserved.

The more kindness shown to an envious man, the worse he becomes.
  -- Helmut Schoeck


However human, envy is certainly not one of the sources of discontent
that a free society can eliminate.  It is probably one of the essential
conditions for the preservation of such a society that we do not
countenance envy, not sanction its demands by camouflaging it as social
justice, but treat it, in the words of John Stuart Mill, as "the most
anti-social and evil of all passions.
  -- F.A. Hayek


==============================================================
Freedom's Nest: Anti-conservative. Anti-liberal. Pro-freedom.
http://www.freedomsnest.com

==============================================================

http://www.mundanebehavior.org/issues/v2n2/ziguras.htm


Narcissism and self-care: theorising America's obsession with mundane
health behaviour
Christopher Ziguras
Education, Monash University, Australia


© 2001, Christopher Ziguras and Journal of Mundane Behavior. All
rights reserved.Permission to link to this site is granted; all
copyright permission requests under US copyright laws must be jointly
approved by the author and Journal of Mundane Behavior. Requests for
reprint, archiving, and redistribution permissions beyond those
expressly granted on this site should be forwarded to the managing
editor of Journal of Mundane Behavior.

Abstract: This paper deals with the rather pessimistic
interpretations of the rise of a culture of self-care in the 1960s
and early 1970s offered by Christopher Lasch, Phillip Rieff, Richard
Sennett and other critics of cultural narcissism. These writers saw
the proliferation of mundane health information in the mass media as
stemming from the erosion of meaningful social relationships and the
disintegration of psychic integrity. They mourn the loss of religious
authority and the increasing power of `new sources of self'. They
also argue that a focus on the self results in a loss of social
support, further undermining psychic integrity. The paper argues
against such negative interpretations by exploring the productive
effects of this blurring of the public and the private. Rather than
being caused by erosion and loss, I argue that the new focus on the
self is a result of the colonisation of mundane self-care practices
by the media, the market and new forms of expertise.

Introduction

A new popular health consciousness seemed to emerge in the United
States during the late 1960s and 1970s. There was a surge in interest
in personal health and wellbeing, expressed in a wide variety of
health-related social movements (including vegetarianism, the natural
health movement, the women's health movement, and consumerist
critiques of medical practice) and consumer fads (grapefruit juice,
aerobics, workout videos, etc.). It seemed as though the mundane
world of self-care had become a national obsession. The myriad day-to-
day practices that individuals engage in to recover, maintain or
improve their health had become topics worthy of public discourse,
filling the shelves of bookshops and newsagents, the talkback radio
airwaves and filling television with lifestyle programming.

Self-care practices are one type of `technique of the body', the
broader category of reflexive techniques for managing one's body,
including grooming, posture, adornment, gesturing, eating, swimming,
walking, sleeping and so on (See Mauss, 1973; 1979). These techniques
are learned through corporeal socialization as the `natural' body is
acculturated. In this paper I am concerned with the `coming out' of
self-care techniques of the body, which had always been part of human
daily repertoires but were not formerly considered interesting enough
to be the subject of expert or celebrity opinion. By the late 1980s,
many of the movements that had begun in the 1970s had become major
fields of cultural and economic activity. By 1987, Americans spent US
$74 billion on diet foods, US $5 billion on health clubs, US $2.7
billion on vitamins and US $738 million on exercise equipment and
these figures would certainly have risen much higher today (Glassner,
1989).

Today, personal striving and spending to improve health is taken-for-
granted. In the 1970s, however, when self-care practices were new to
the public sphere and the market, there was much discussion of the
meaning of these new obsessions. People were divided over the
appropriateness of discussing intimate details in public, such as the
colour of one's urine, the contents of one's refrigerator or the
frequency of one's orgasms. To some, such pettiness reeked of self-
obsession, leading Tom Wolfe to famously call the 1970s `the me
decade' (Lasch, 1980, p.5). For others, the body had been liberated
from decades of repression. In order to better understand the society
we live in today, it is worth revisiting these debates, which were
carried out at a time when the public celebration of the mundane was
still shocking and exciting. It is difficult to be shocked or excited
any longer. This era is not only of interest for Americans. With the
exportation of American popular culture, these petty conundrums have
been globalised. These developments in 1970s America had
repercussions across the world, especially in English-speaking
societies, where the influence of American popular culture is
greatest. Around the world there have been similar intellectual
debates, in which writers here in Australia and in many other
countries tried to understand the meaning of such public mundanities.
These debates have been paralleled those within the United States.
The only difference is that whereas Americans saw such phenomena as
peculiarly Californian, the rest of the world sees such a focus on
the self as peculiarly American.

On the Left, popular interest in self-care was interpreted as part of
an anti-institutional critique of medicine. Writers such as Ivan
Illich (1976) and Irving Zola (1972; 1973) saw self-care as a force
against professional dependency. Their critique of institutionalised
healthcare closely followed Parsons' functionalist understanding of
the medical profession. They saw professional-institutional forms of
health care as mechanisms of social control and so saw the rise of
self-care as the expression of a popular liberatory rebellion against
institutional power. This interpretation fitted neatly with the early
consumer backlash against medicine and psychiatry in the 1960s and
1970s. One broad theme in many of these movements was an effort to
reduce dependency on professional healthcare services and
institutions by providing individuals with tools to undertake their
own self-care.

The other major intellectual response to the appearance of these self-
active cultural forms was the critique of cultural narcissism, which
I will discuss in this paper. Best known through the work of Philip
Rieff (1966), Richard Sennett (1974), and Christopher Lasch (1980;
1984), this tradition of disparaging and often despairing
intellectual comment on what are seen as the self-obsessional
tendencies promoted by consumer capitalism has been a major influence
on subsequent critical interpretations of popular interest in mundane
health behaviour. While the anti-institutional writers tended to
confine their discussion to the relationships between individuals and
health care institutions, the critics of narcissism and were more
broadly concerned with the rise of diverse forms of introspectivity
in popular culture. They were critical of what they saw as a new type
of inward looking personality. Instead of celebrating self-care as
resistance to medical dominance as Illich and Zola had done, these
writers saw the rise of self-care practices in popular culture as
evidence of a variety of forms of social decay.

Critiques of cultural narcissism often focused on the extraordinary
new counter-cultural movements that appeared to be particularly self-
obsessed. Peter Marin's (1975) article in Harper's magazine described
the self-religions that were later to call themselves the New Age
movement (see also Heelas 1996). Marin recounts a conversation he had
with a man who had embraced mysticism and spirituality.

He was telling me about his sense of another reality.

`I know there is something outside of me,' he said. `I can feel it. I
know it is there. But what is it?'

`It may not be a mystery,' I said. `Perhaps it is the world.' (p.50)

Marin argues that the worlds of community, history and social action
have been so eroded that people have only the inner world in which to
search for meaning. They often find `in there' one of the many
mystical recollections of a world beyond the self that are produced
by the spiritual fashion industry.

At the same time as these fringe cultures were causing concern to
some intellectuals, the mass media became focused on the private self
in ways that were perhaps less spiritual, but were seen as equally
narcissistic. Self-help books, in particular, concerned the reading
classes. James Lincoln Collier, in The Rise of Selfishness in America
(1991), recounts the growth of self-help book publishing in the 1970s:

In 1971, The Sensuous Man and Any Woman Can! made the [New York Times
best-sellers] list. In the summer of 1973 Dr Atkins' Diet Revolution,
The Joy of Sex, and I'm OK–You're OK were on the list together. In
1975 Sylvia Porter's Money Book, Power! Winning Through Intimidation,
The Relaxation Response, The Save Your Life Diet, and TM were on
simultaneously (p.232).

Why, the critics asked, have Americans become so preoccupied with
such mundane aspects of their private lives?

Diagnosing social forms

Lasch, Rieff and Sennett argued that structural changes in American
society were changing individuals' psychology, leading to a shift in
the dominant personality type of the society as a whole. The
tradition of psychoanalytic diagnosis of culture dates at least from
Freud, but theories of fundamental contradictions between human
nature and society are of course much older. Marx's `species nature',
for example, was based on his notion of the spontaneously arisen
natural community and in part, his theories of alienation in class
society centre on the incompatibility between this species nature and
the psychic requirements of the capitalist mode of production. Freud
(1985) later theorized a fundamental contradiction between human
nature (the id or the pleasure principle) and culture (the ego or
reality principle). The `polymorphous perversity' of primary human
nature, he argued, is incompatible with the co-operative requirements
of civilized societies:

We cannot fail to be struck by the similarity between the process of
civilization and the libidinal development of the individual...
Sublimation of instinct is an especially conspicuous feature of
cultural development; it is what makes it possible for higher
psychical activities, scientific, artistic, or ideological, to play
such an important part in civilized life (p.286).

Freud could see no way out of this fundamental conflict, since the
more civilized a society becomes, the greater the repression
required. The non-satisfaction of powerful instincts results in
hostility in every society, and in neurosis.

In Germany in the 1930s, the welding of psychoanalysis with Marxism
led to a number of psycho-sociological explorations of the modern
psyche. Even before Adorno and Reich had attempted to explain the
rise of fascism in psychoanalytic terms, Karen Horney had written one
of the first overtly psychological diagnoses of modernity (Horney,
1937). In The Neurotic Personality of Our Time, she saw the root of
neuroses in the fears and conflicting tendencies inherent in her
culture. She listed as the most important of these cultural conflicts
those between competition and brotherly love; between desires and
their dissatisfaction; and between alleged freedom and actual
limitations (pp.288–9). Most people, she observed, manage to
negotiate these contradictions and accept them as part of `modern
living', while those who cannot are diagnosed as neurotic. These
three tensions arise from the relatively free-floating nature of
modern life as compared with the more predetermined and restrictive
conditions of more traditional social forms. These tensions have of
course intensified since Horney wrote, and self-care promotion is one
way shaping individuals' personal negotiations of the tensions
between selfishness and cooperation; desires and dissatisfaction; and
perceived freedom and actual limitations.

Decades later in the United States, the psychological conflict
between the individual and the civilized society once more came to
the fore. During the 1950s and 1960s many American social
commentators wrote of the perceived loss of individual autonomy in
the face of the homogenizing and depersonalising effects of `mass
society', in many ways echoing Weber's writings on rationalization.
These critiques responded to the increasing influence of professional-
institutional modes of practice (James, 1996), in which the power
held by the mass media, big business, big government and big unions
was seen to threaten those individualistic values—self-reliance,
independence and personal initiative—that were held up as the motive
force of the American dream. With the heavy influence of psychology,
and especially psychoanalysis, on American social criticism in this
period, the emerging `mass society' was seen to be causing a new type
of psychological make-up. David Riesman (1950), for example,
identified two ideal-typical personality structures, the inner-
directed and the other-directed. The inner-directed person is
typified by the self-reliant individual of the nineteenth century.
This personality type internalises cultural imperatives, using them
as a resource in acting independently. He argued that the inner-
directed personality had given way to the other-directed,
heteronomous personality type. Riesman feared the gradual loss of
individuality in the face of the conformism that accompanies the
other-directed personality. He argued that individual defences are
battered down by `the group', despite the persistence of a
contradictory and increasingly anachronistic ideology of free-
enterprise and individualism. The critiques of medicalisation offered
by Illich and Zola were heavily influenced by the broader analysis of
the loss of personal autonomy in the face of professional-
institutional modes of practice.

The emergence of the `counterculture' in the late 1960s in the United
States, with its heavy emphasis on introspective self-exploration,
was in part an oppositional reaction to the `mass society'. The 1950s
precursors to the counter culture, the Beats, thought of themselves
as spiritual refugees fleeing the uniformity and boredom of suburbia
or, as Kerouac explained, from `the people watching television, the
millions and millions of the One Eye' (Kerouac, 1958, p.104).
Instead, the Beats sought mobility and extremes – wild experiences to
escape from the predictability of suburban life. They were on a
search for meaning and spirit in what they saw as a heartless world,
and a way of living more meaningfully. They were drawn together by
their desire to elude the mainstream and to avoid angst by resorting
to hyper-mobility. They looked to Zen Buddhism to provide deeper
inspiration and meaning to their escapism and to guide the perpetual
search for new experiences (Ziguras, 1996, pp.67-87). Vytautas
Kyvolas, writing in 1970 about the psychological make-up of `post-
modern man', expresses most clearly the approach which sees the
dominant `modern' and oppositional `underground' personality types as
both derived from social structural changes—the one reflecting what
Parsons might have termed systemic imperatives and the other a
reaction to these forces:

If the sociological trend ... is toward an increasingly rationalized
and impersonal bureaucracy, its psychological resultant may be a more
rationally organized and unemotionally performing type of
personality, concerned only with the orderly application of rules
rather than with the solution of immediate existential or ultimate
philosophical problems. But, as a reaction to the sociological trend,
an exaggeratedly irrational kind of personality might emerge—one
inclined toward anarchic romanticism, expressionism, mysticism, and
the politics and education of `ecstasy' (Kavolis, 1970, p.436;
emphasis in original).

The desire of many young people to `drop out' of mainstream society
in the late 1960s and early 1970s in the United States, much noted by
mainstream writers at the time, was only one side of the process. The
critics of narcissism tended to overlook the other side of this
process, captured in the `tune in, turn on' part of Timothy Leary's
famous exhortation. T.R. Young (1972), to pick one of thousands of
possible examples, told his readers that `modern society has become
much too flimsy a fabric out of which to build a self-system', and
instead encouraged readers to turn to the `new sources of self'.
These included `the next generation of psychiatrists, clinical
psychologists, and psychiatric social workers [who] will "help" us to
be unattached rather than adjusted to the social order' (pp.1, x). He
encouraged the rejection of `society' in favour of self-constitution,
with the aid of those new sources.

An inward turn?

While young people were turning in growing numbers to these `new
sources of self', social commentators tended to focus on the loss of
the old sources of self. In 1957, a team of American social
researchers conducted what amounted to a psychological profile of the
American population, which was then repeated in 1976. Between 1957
and 1976, they observed `a reduced integration of American adults
into the social structure', and saw this as `a shift from a socially
integrated paradigm for structuring well-being, to a more personal or
individual paradigm' (Cited in Collier, 1991, p.224; emphasis in
original). This shift was accompanied by a higher degree of
introspection and a tendency to visit others less and belong to fewer
organizations. A similar study, led by Robert Bellah, particularly
interested in the relationship between private and public life,
suggested that an `expressive' or `lifestyle' individualism had
replaced the earlier utilitarian or economic individualism. The new
individualism was putting in jeopardy the survival of democratic
institutions which, they argued, depend on `the extent to which
private life either prepares people to take part in the public world
or encourages them to find meaning exclusively in the private sphere,
and the degree to which public life fulfils our private aspirations
or discourages us so much that we withdraw from involvement in it'
(Bellah et al., 1985, p. ix). They argued that work continued to be
centrally important to the self-identity of Americans and their
concern with self-reliance, so the work ethic remained strong, but
was now accompanied by an isolating preoccupation with the self
(Bellah et al., 1985, p.56). Rieff, Sennett and Lasch drew upon such
empirical studies to argue that a narcissistic form of individualism
that celebrates self-expression and self-gratification was replacing
the rugged individualism of the nineteenth century (Lasch, 1980, p.
xv). While those involved in the new social and cultural movements
saw opportunities for growth, exploration and transformation in the
new tools for rethinking the mundane, conservative critics such as
Lasch saw the growing interest in practices of the self as an inward
turn that involved the withdrawal from the social or public sphere
and a narcissistic and solipsistic obsession with the inner self.

Sennett wrote in The Fall of Public Man (1974) that impersonal
relations in the public sphere were increasingly seen as phoney
obligations, causing people to turn to their private lives for
authenticity and meaning. Intimacy and private life were coming to be
seen as ends in themselves and `the psyche is treated as if it had a
life of its own' (p.4). He believed that one result of the
preoccupation with the self was a confusion between public and
intimate life. Increasingly, people were dealing with public matters
in terms of personal feelings—matters that Sennett believed could
only properly be dealt with through codes of impersonal meaning. This
confusion of boundaries between the self and the external world,
between the private and public spheres was a major concern for the
critics of narcissism for a number of reasons:

1. Democracy was seen to rest on the ability of citizens to rise
above self-interest in order to act for the public good, and this
blurring raised the fear that people would no longer be able to think
beyond their own self-interest.

2. The public seemed to be more interested in their leaders' private
lives than their political actions.

3. They did not welcome the politicisation of the private sphere.
Being well-educated white middle-class men, they were members of the
most privileged segment of the population—those with most to lose
from the politicisation of the interpersonal relations with regard to
gender, race or class.

It is now fashionable to deconstruct the public–private dichotomy as
a fiction complicit with the maintenance of established power
relations. Nikolas Rose (1990), for example, states that `the
distinction between public and private is not a stable analytical
tool, but is itself a mobile resource in these systems of knowledge
and power' (p.217). While this may be true, it begs the question of
why this `fiction' held up for so long, and has only become visible
as an imaginary construct relatively recently. The distinction
between public and private did indeed serve as a stable analytical
tool until very recently. It has become a mobile resource primarily
because the relative autonomy of these spheres has been seriously
eroded. The value of Lasch, Rieff and Sennet's work is in theorising
this shifting of boundaries that allowed the mundane details of
private life to suddenly become worthy of public exposure.

The mediation of the mundane

These commentators were witnessing the birth of new therapies, new
forms of expertise, new types of radio programs, new dietary fads,
and so on. People have always been involved in the types of self-care
that was the focus of these `new sources of self', but previously
these mundane conversations had been conducted in the privacy of
one's house or one's own head. Now they were being broadcast, bought
and sold, and studied as never before. These writers saw the media's
interest in the private self as a major influence in eroding public
life in America. Sennett (1974), for example, lays some of the blame
at the feet of electronic media:

Electronic communication is one means by which the very idea of
public life has been put to an end. The media have vastly increased
the store of knowledge social groups have about each other, but have
rendered actual contact unnecessary. The radio, and more especially
the TV, are intimate devices; mostly you watch them at home (p.282).

They saw the media and professional interest in mundane self-care as
separating people from one another, facilitating a withdrawal from
social interaction. This sentiment was expressed powerfully by James
Lincoln Collier (1991), who claimed that the increasing amount of
time Americans spend in front of television is a major cause of what
he called the rise of selfishness in America:

What is troubling about this enormous immersion in television and the
media in general, is the extent to which it has isolated people one
from one another. At bottom, television is a machine which helps
people to wall themselves off from one another. So long as we are
engaged with the magic box, we are not engaged with others (p.245).

What Collier forgot was that while TV watchers may not be engaged in
face-to-face interaction with others, they are certainly involved in
a form of communication with others. Lasch, Rieff and Sennet also
focused on the erosion of face-to-face interaction and generally
missed the fact that self-care practices were increasingly
reconstituted through mediated communications with others.

While these writers focused on the mental health implications for
individuals, they generally overlooked the production and
dissemination of mediated self-care advice. One early exception was
Arthur Brittan who in The Privatised World (1977) described
the `invasion of consciousness' as a process of privatisation in
which `the subjective experience of individuals in industrialised and
capitalist societies is distorted and influenced by the mass media
and bureaucracy' (p.147). He emphasized the extent to which the
private sphere is reconstituted by mediated information, so that even
the most intimate aspects of private life have become the subject of
public discussion:

`Sexual privacy, supposedly an essential requirement of personal
identity, is now subject to the dispassionate analysis of experts who
comment on technique, performance and impotence, to a world-wide
audience who suddenly discover their own sexual inadequacies. …
Sexual privacy is, therefore, an illusion because each sexual episode
is geared into a vast network of performance requirements, which in
turn generate anxiety about the sexual adequacy of the participants
(p.147).

Brittan argued that the analysis of this situation was torn
between `mental health' analyses that saw this emphasis on the
private lives of individuals as narcissism as the writers I am
considering do, or else as `media manipulation', as Frankfurt School
social theorists such as Horkheimer (1972) and Althusser (1969) had
done. Both of these approaches tended to see the individual as being
in a vulnerable and unhappy situation, as did the Foucaultian
approaches to this issue in the late 1980s and 1990s (see for
example, Rose 1990 and Lupton 1995).

The loss of religious authority over the mundane

To understand the basis of Lasch, Rieff and Sennett's pessimism, it
is worth considering the religious tone of their critique. The
critics of narcissism saw the popular demand for self-care advice as
being fuelled by a deep void—a loss of meaning generally attributed
to a loss of religious faith, a distrust for authority, and the
fragmentation of close-knit social relations in favour of looser
connections. Philip Rieff argued in The Triumph of the Therapeutic
(1966) that the power of psychologically trained professionals was
causing a shift in the dominant culture of Western societies, from
a `Christian culture' to a `therapeutic culture'. The emergence of
psychological man was one of the effects of the collapse
of `Christian culture' and its attendant institutions, which, he
argued, had previously saved believers from `destructive illusions of
uniqueness and separateness' (p.3). Rieff proposed that whereas

Religious man was born to be saved, psychological man is born to be
pleased. The difference was established long ago, when `I believe',
the cry of the ascetic, lost preference to `one feels', the caveat of
the therapeutic. And if the therapeutic is to win out, then surely
the psychotherapist will be his secular spiritual guide (pp.24–5).

Rieff may have exaggerated the hold which psychoanalysis and
humanistic psychology had over the fields of psychology and
psychiatry as a whole in this period when behaviourism was becoming
dominant in mainstream psychology. Nevertheless, he pointed to a
dramatic shift in professional practice to align professional
expertise with the self-care capacities of the patient, so that
rather than surrendering to the professional and `following doctor's
orders', the practitioner and patient began to work together and
alongside one another in a cooperative manner.

Paul Halmos (1970) developed Rieff's thesis in more detail, arguing
that the `personal service professions', as he termed them, had
developed a relatively coherent counselling ideology. He grouped
professionals into either `personal service professions' (clergy,
doctors, nurses, teachers, social workers) or `impersonal service
professions' (lawyers, accountants, engineers, architects). The
principle function of personal service professions, he stated, is
to `bring about changes in the body or personality of the client' by
implementing techniques applied from the social and psychological
sciences (Halmos, 1970, p.22). Whereas Rieff saw all professional
intervention in psychological and emotional realms which was not of a
religious orientation as therapeutic, even describing political
ideologies such as Marxism as `therapies of commitment', Halmos
distinguishes between `reformist' and `therapeutic' interventions,
where reformist orientations attempt `to change the rules which
regulate social relationships' and therapeutic orientations aim
to `change the personality of the client or the patient' (Halmos,
1970, p.18). Halmos argued that the therapeutic approaches to dealing
with personal problems were not merely a result of the
professionalisation of self-care advice, but must also be studied in
terms of the ideological and political trends within such
professions.

Before the advent of new forms of expertise on the mundane aspects of
daily life (pop-psychology, health and fitness experts, alternative
therapies), the only public institutions to deal in any depth with
such matters were religious authorities. Now the clerics had lost
significant ground in the battle to shape dietary, emotional and
sexual practices. Lasch argued that the religious desire for
salvation by surrendering oneself to a higher power had given way to
the desire for well-being and health which is to be achieved through
the taking of control over one's self rather than surrendering it. In
contrast to Rieff however, Lasch contended that therapy constituted
an anti-religion. While religions construct a moral realm that
extends far beyond the space and time occupied by the person, modern
societies cannot envisage anything beyond immediate needs, and
therapeutic cultures can conceive of nothing beyond the immediate
desires of the individual (Lasch, 1980, pp.7–13). On one side of the
division of labour between religion and psychology, therapy
substituted religious salvation with the attainment of a desirable
mental state – `self-actualisation', `happiness' or `wholeness'.
Meanwhile, on the religious side of this divide, new religious
movements with decidedly therapeutic approaches emerged. The New Age
movement is a loose collection of such `self-religions' that treat
the inner self as the ultimate source of contentment and well-being.
The self is conceived as a quasi-spiritual entity, existing on a
different plane and requiring transcendent practices in order to be
reached (Heelas, 1982; 1996).

Lasch argues that because of the loss of stable sources of authority,
those in narcissistic societies are increasingly dependent on
celebrities, media personalities, professionals, experts and
bureaucracies for validation. The lack of deep engagement with others
leads to a craving for approval and admiration, and this need cannot
be satisfied by the fleeting or absent others from whom it is sought.

His apparent freedom from family ties and institutional constraints
does not free him to stand alone or to glory in his individuality. On
the contrary, it contributes to his insecurity, which he can overcome
only by seeing his `grandiose self' reflected in the attentions of
others, or by attaching himself to those who radiate celebrity, power
and charisma (Lasch, 1980, p.10).

In contrast to the reliance on one's family, Lasch saw a `new
paternalism' emerging – a dependence that was encouraged by the
professionals and bureaucracies on who people were increasingly
relying. In turn, these institutional agents transform collective
grievances into personal issues amenable to therapeutic intervention
(p.14). In his later work, Lasch (1984) increasingly cast reflexive
practices of the self as mere coping mechanisms. He argued that
people had turned inward because of the desperate state of a world
threatened by environmental disasters, nuclear apocalypse, decaying
cities and other seemingly intractable crises over which individuals
have no control. Crisis, he argued, had been normalized to the extent
that people no longer expected to be able to make sense of the world
or to find a meaningful existence with reference to once reliable
meta-narratives or institutions. Narcissism, the retreat into the
mundane self, is thus a defensive strategy – a reaction against fears
of abandonment and feelings of anxiety and guilt.

The loss of social support

As well as mourning the loss of more authoritative forms of religious
practice, the critics of narcissism mourn the loss of face-to-face
community and the sense of meaning and belonging afforded by such a
community. Before the therapeutic culture, there were positive
psychological, religious and ethical rewards for pro-social
behaviour, good citizenship and communal values, and these were
mutually reinforcing. According to Rieff, there was `a design of
motives directing the self outward, toward those communal purposes in
which alone the self can be realized and satisfied' (Rieff, 1966,
p.4). In modern industrial societies however, the bonds between each
person in the chain of social responsibility are broken, so that
everybody lives a truly private life, and individualistic
philosophies that attempt to make sense of this condition
increasingly take hold.

The emergent therapeutic culture attempts to soothe the descent into
meaninglessness experienced by late-modern subjects. Rieff, Sennet
and Lasch contend that the therapeutic remedies actually exacerbate
the social problems they seek to cure. They argue that the forms of
community that exist in individualistic societies are not strong
enough to establish a positive culture. Rieff concludes that the
desire for freedom is self-defeating. Satisfaction, he argues
(perhaps rather anachronistically), can only be attained by surrender
to a Higher Power, an unquestioned designer of communal purposes.
This religious critique of self-help is often encountered in
conservative responses to contemporary cultural issues of many kinds
(e.g., Carroll, 1974).

Lasch likewise interprets the narcissist's obsession with the self as
a desperate search for the means to counter the insecurity produced
by the weakening of the social super-ego that was formerly
represented by the father, teachers and preachers. The rugged
individual of the nineteenth century could act confidently in the
world because these sources of authority could be taken for granted.
In contrast, Lasch argues, the `psychological man' of the twentieth
century searches desperately for a personal peace of mind while the
social and personal conditions of contemporary life make that end
harder to achieve (Rose, 1990, p.216). Lasch sees the preoccupation
with consciousness as an indication that there is a void within,
which creates a desire for therapeutic interventions. Rather than a
hedonistic pursuit of pleasure for its own sake, Lasch sees the
contemporary demands for therapeutic assistance as part of
a `struggle for composure' by individuals who feel lost or
fragmented. However, this recourse to expert help is thoroughly self-
defeating, according to Lasch. Therapeutic approaches that seek to
counter this sense of meaninglessness by helping the person to
overcome their inhibitions and helping them in satisfying their
desires only heighten the individualization of the person,
exacerbating the problems of disconnection they experience. Lasch
characterizes all therapeutic systems as advocating social
withdrawal, and so sees all therapy as inherently self-defeating.

Arising out of a pervasive dissatisfaction with the quality of
personal relations, it advises people not to make too large an
investment in love and friendship, to avoid excessive dependence on
others, and to live for the moment—the very conditions that created
the crisis of personal relations in the first place (Lasch, 1980,
p.27).

To use the example of love, according to Lasch, in the therapeutic
enterprise love is discussed in terms of the emotional self-interest
of the patient rather than to encourage the individual to subordinate
their needs to those of others. Because of the self-interested nature
of such a relationship, the resulting emotional attachment lacks
meaning, according to Lasch, when compared with more traditional
notions of love as self-sacrifice and self-abasement. The
meaningfulness of relationships in earlier times was conveyed by the
requirement for self-sacrifice for the other, or submission to a
higher loyalty (Lasch, 1980, p.13). Lasch here characterizes all
therapeutic advice as encouraging a withdrawal from interpersonal
relationships. He ignores those types of therapy that work to help
the person reintegrate themselves with a network of caring others and
to rebuild damaged relationships.

Arlie Russel Hochschild (1994) analysed the degree to which
contemporary women's self-help literature encourage their readers to
withdraw from social relationships (which she calls `cool' advice) or
encourages readers to engage more fully with others (`warm' advice)
in order to overcome various life crises. Warm and cool forms of
advice differ in their attitudes to emotional investment. Warm advice
emphasizes the desirability of connectedness, stability and safety,
whereas cool advice values positively individual freedom, self-
sufficiency and disengagement. Hochschild sees a distinct contrast
between the generally warm tendencies of the self-help books
advocating `traditional' gender identities and the cool tendencies of
those favouring feminist-informed `modern' identities. Many of
the `cool moderns', as Hochschild terms them, argue that the desire
to be safe and warm is the cause of women's problems. While her
observations support Lasch's argument, Hochschild advocates a warm
modern approach, reminding us that advice (whether delivered by a
professional or a text) is able to encourage cooperation and
connection, just as it can advocate withdrawal.

Lasch often characterized therapy as inevitably anti-social, but at
times conceded that such `warm' and sociologically informed forms of
advice-giving are possible. A productive form of therapy, he argued,
would involve providing critical insights into a person's condition
so they can `gain insight into the historical forces, reproduced in
psychological form, that have made the concept of selfhood
increasingly problematic' (Lasch, 1980, p.17). Giddens likewise
observes that therapy is not simply `a means of adjusting
dissatisfied individuals to a flawed social environment' but instead
is often a proactive method of life-planning which responds in
appropriate ways to the `dislocations and uncertainties to which
modernity gives rise' (Giddens, 1991, p.180).

Conclusion

The path followed by Lasch, Rieff and Sennett identifies the limits
one reaches when analysing self-identity based on readings of images
of self in electronic and print media. The critics of cultural
narcissism focus too heavily on the media image, while overlooking
both the practices of consumption used by audiences and the politics
of media production. They read contemporary culture by looking at the
assumed audience written into texts by the producers of
individualistic self-help cultures (like the Martians who study life
on earth by analysing intercepted television transmissions). The
culture may in fact be no more self-obsessed than it has ever been,
but the way its self-obsession is worked out through professional and
mediated relationships is much more striking to the cultural critic.
Intimate discussions over a coffee table are not as visible to the
cultural critic as intimate articles in magazines. They may have
identified a powerful trend, but in the end they echoed media hype,
in the process overstating the fears and cravings of American society.

How then are we to understand the cultural politics of self-care
promotion, and the entry of mundane health behaviour into the
mediated public sphere? Firstly, I think we should acknowledge that
meaningful face-to-face interaction with loved ones is still a most
important source of information and encouragement. What we are seeing
in the media preoccupation mundane health behaviour is not a
withdrawal into the self, but the addition of a new layer of
communication about the mundanities of embodiment. In past decades,
professionals and the media have become powerful `new sources of
self', but the messages they convey reach people who are still
enmeshed in networks of interpersonal relations, who share worries
and solutions with those close to them. `Expert' self-care advice is
usually not being passively accepted by isolated individuals starved
for information, as these writers tend to make out, but becomes
another part of an increasingly complex mix of information sources to
be drawn on. In contrast to these writers, I think what we are seeing
is a more robust sense of self that results from the mundane
practices of strategic information accumulation and decision-making
which ordinary people must employ in their actual self-construction
projects. What this discussion has shown us is the value of empirical
studies of consumers of mediated health information. People often
gather information and advice strategically, deciding which sources
to consult and how to weigh the information they obtain from various
sources. They may consult friends, healthcare professionals,
advertising material, self-help books, magazines, and, now, the
Internet (Rogers, Hassell and Nicolaas 1999). The media does not
mirror the nation's soul, and theorists who attempt to describe
social practices based on an analysis of mediated content often
underestimate the agency of the audience.

At the same time, we should not underestimate the constitutive power
of the media over mundane body techniques. The way people live is
changing, and the elevation of the mundane aspects of self-care into
the mediated public sphere is definitely a contributing factor. Just
as it is important to study the way in which these messages are taken
up, it is important to study the ways in which they are produced. The
separation between a private sphere framed by face-to-face
interaction and a public sphere composed of institutions and abstract
relationships has been eroded. Social life has changed in ways that
make the distinction between public and private acts impossible to
sustain analytically, and the politicisation of the bodily mundane
inevitable. New social movements, as Alberto Melucci (1989) observed,
provide tools for the political transformation of the self as well as
the society one lives in. When studying the production and
distribution of self-care advice, one needs to be aware of the
diversity of ideological approaches that inform it. We need to be
aware of the presence of `warm' advice that seeks to use mediated
sources to bring people closer together, even though it may be buried
in a mountain of individualistic recommendations. As the corporate
production of culture draws on scientific and media expertise to
penetrate ever deeper into the most mundane aspects of embodiment, so
too does the politics of cultural production become ever more
personal.

Note: I owe a great debt to Paul James, whose comments on an early
draft of this paper were most helpful, and whose kind advice over the
years has been indispensable.

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Sennett, Richard. The Fall of Public Man. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1974.
Young, T. R. New Sources of Self. New York: Pergamon Press, 1972.
Ziguras, Christopher. "Paying your respects to someone else's elders:
The Western appropriation of Asian and indigenous religious
discourses." Aedon: The Melbourne University Literary Arts Review. 4
(1), 1996, 67–87.
Zola, Irving Kenneth. "Medicine as an institution of social control."
Sociological Review. 20(4), 1972, 487–509.
---. "Pathways to the doctor—from person to patient." Social Science
and Medicine. 7, 1973, 677–689.

About the Author: Christopher Ziguras completed a doctoral thesis on
the cultural politics of self-care, and is currently a Postdoctoral
Research Fellow in the Faculty of Education, Monash University. He
has written widely on the ways in which mediated communications shape
self-identity, and his most recent research deals with the cultural
dimensions of technologically-mediated transnational higher
education.

http://www.jgballard.com/gravenewworld.htm




    www.jgballard.com

Grave New World

BBC Radio 3 10/11/98
Interview by David Gale

David Gale talks to leading thinkers about their radical vision of
the future.

J.G. Ballard writes about the collisions between people and a world
transformed by technology. In the 1970s he wrote the novel 'Crash',
recently filmed by David Cronenberg, in which his protagonists
derived erotic satisfaction from car crashes. Other works, such
as 'The Atrocity Exhibition', 'High Rise' and most recently 'Cocaine
Nights', explore a territory in which the self is splintered and
invaded by a myth-ridden mediascape that has eclipsed the real world.

Jim Ballard; many of the characters in your books seem to be able to
thrive in circumstances that most people would find fairly
destabilizing, to say the least, and these circumstances appear to be
futuristic extensions of things that are already going on in our
current experience. Do you think that you might have therefore laid
out a blueprint for personality types that could thrive in the 21st
Century?

Of course some people over the years have suggested that mental
illness is a kind of adaptation to the sort of circumstances that
will arise in the future. As we move towards a more and more
psychotic landscape, the psychotic traits are signs of a sort of, you
know, a kind of Darwinian adaptation. After all, my grandparents,
were they able to visit this country today, Western Europe or the
United States for that matter, would find it an extraordinary place;
I mean a landscape of sensation, dominated by the mass media, who're
selling everything on the strength of... eroticism, violence, and, in
terms of advertising, huge claims to a sort of mythic wonderland of
possibility that buying the latest, you know, refrigerator or
electric toothbrush will usher you into. My grandparents would have
thought this place absolutely mad, and they might well think that
someone as disturbed as some of the characters in my fiction were
rather sensible in the way they behaved.


So a conventional psychoanalytic view would be that we can adjust, we
must be well adjusted, and the psychopath is not well adjusted. So
are we leaving behind the notion of being well adjusted?

Well the psychopath may not be well adjusted to a society such as
existed, say, 30 or 40 years ago, but there are periods of history,
and we've passed through quite a number of them and are still doing
so where, you know, the psychopath is highly adjusted to whatever,
you know, is going on around him, and look at the Second World War;
look at the former Yugoslavia today. Psychopaths roved both these
sort of nightmare terrains and were probably the best adapted of all.
I mean the sane and cautious and quotes 'well adjusted' were the
people who sadly were unable to cope.

I mean, another conventional view of the genesis of psychopathy would
lay the originating incidence at the door of the family. But you
don't seem to write about that much, you seem to think we have a
pathogenic media culture that is as powerful if not more powerful
than anything your parents could do to you.

I think that's true, I mean I take the view that... the environment
today is itself so filled with pressures of every conceivable kind -
the pressures to conform, the pressures to amuse oneself, the
pressures to find oneself - and the constant bombardment of everyday
life by advertising, the media landscape, together represent a
continuing kind of challenge to one's sanity. And, of course, many of
my characters are wilting under the pressure; they don't want to buy
any more refrigerators or electric toothbrushes, you know, they want
to find some truth about themselves, so they embark, generally
speaking in my fiction, on some sort of voyage of discovery.

If you look at a book of mine like 'The Atrocity Exhibition', there
you have this psychiatrist who's having a mental breakdown, who is
obsessed with what he sees as the great tragedies of the mid-20th
Century, above all the assassination of Kennedy, and he sets up a
whole series of psychodramas in which Kennedy is, as it were,
assassinated again, Marilyn Monroe commits suicide again, and so on.
But as he himself says, he wants to kill Kennedy, but in a way that
makes sense. He's trying to re-mythologise these terrible tragedies
in order to lay them to rest. And outwardly some of his behaviour
in 'The Atrocity exhibition' might seem very bizarre, but in fact
it's all logically constructed. They're constructing their own
logical alternative universe to what they see as a sort of poisoned
realm. Which is a fair description of the world today, still.

So, by that token, in 'Crash', the people who seek that great
physical intimacy with automobiles and parts of automobiles are
embarked on a sort of healing process.

Absolutely. Absolutely. They're faced with a conundrum that faces
almost all the characters in my fiction; sensation rules our world,
and a sort of perverse logic is operating which thrives on violence,
and to some extent, a lesser extent I think, sex. The media landscape
is saturated with images of violence and sexuality, desperately
trying to extract a sort of flicker, a galvanic response from the
sort of dead frog's leg of, you know, the human spirit, and my
characters are trying to sort of establish a more meaningful sort of
psychological circuitry, that at present is completely overwhelmed by
our sort of perverse entertainment landscape.


You've spoken about predictive mythologies, as distinct from
mythologies that were shaped in the distant past, and that our aids
to living in a rather unchanging present; I suspect you think that
the present is changing so fast that the old conceptions of mythology
are no longer useful. Predictive mythologies are those which you have
said equip us to live in the future. If you're not bound to be
psychopathic, if you don't tend to be hysterical, what predictive
mythologies, or strategies if you like, can you conceive of that
would help get people through this media informational avalanche that
seems to induce such tremendous stress?

Well, the 20th Century has been a huge manufacturer of what I call
predictive mythologies. I mean one of the greatest is the notion of
space travel; the idea that one day mankind will leave this planet
and move outwards into the solar system, colonizing other planets,
and then beyond the solar system into, you know, the universe as a
whole. I would say that that dream of colonization of space has
rather faded now because the problems of moving large populations out
into space are so... well, they're virtually insuperable. That's I
think one of the greatest predictive mythologies of the 20th Century,
the notion of space travel, but there've been others.

The others, the sort of classic Wellsian, I suppose, dream of a
society perfected by science, it's the dream one saw laid out in
Aldous Huxley's 'Brave New World', countless novels and films, the
notion that science, sensibly applied to social problems, will solve
most of them, and that we can all live in a kind of Corbusier world
where tensions are defused by enlightened social legislation, and so
on. That's another great predictive mythology. Hasn't really worked
out; human beings perhaps haven't evolved sufficiently to be able to
enjoy living in high rise blocks or, you know, something like
Corbusier's radient city seems much too regimented. We seem to need a
certain element of sort of street level chaos in our lives. We aren't
as enlightened as we'd like to be; but that's another great
predictive mythology.

Another is that vision of the better life which advertising has been
trying to convince us of, you know, again for the last sixty, seventy
years: Buy the latest model Buick, move into the right style of ranch
home, make sure your wife is dressed in, you know, in the latest high
street fashions - and life will seem better. It's complete mythology,
as complete as anything, you know, the ancient Greeks came up with.
And it's extremely potent, only most people half believe it. In fact
you can say today that we live entirely on a whole system of
predictive mythologies that actually are all we have to give our
lives any meaning.

There's the predictive mythology of the obsolete body: There is a
vocal cyber -community who say that technology allows us now a
digitised electro-space, or something like that, where we can
communicate more freely than ever before. Do you buy into that one?
What about the internet?

I am extremely impressed by the internet. I think it's a whole series
of private universes that are paraded across the screen in an
absolutely riveting way. It's a form of self-publishing that is
obviously just in it's infancy now.

Virtual reality is something slightly different. I mean I take for
granted that eventually virtual reality systems will be available to
us which create a simulated reality that is more convincing than that
which our central nervous systems create. I mean one must remember
the brain is itself a virtual reality machine, the illusion we have
of the real world, of factories and streets and office blocks and
other people talking to us is itself a virtual reality simulation
generated by our brains.

I think when the first true virtual reality systems become available,
and contain more visual information and are more visually convincing
than ordinary reality, the temptation for the human race will be to
enter this virtual reality system and close the door behind it. I
mean, I think there's a danger there because one will really be able
to enter into a fantasy world which, unlike all fantasies in the
past, would be more convincing than everyday reality.

In two hundred years' time it may be possible to author your own
virtual reality, but there may come a point at which the social will
simply collapse in favour of highly individualized, designed virtual
worlds?

I think that probably will happen, and it creates all sorts of moral
dilemmas. I mean when people enter their virtual reality world, where
they can play games with their own psychopathologies, where if they
want to they can assume, you know, the role of any character in
history, or any imaginary character, if they want one day be a Nobel
Prize winning physicist, and the next day, you know, play a
concentration camp commandant, they'll be able to step beyond the
sort of conventional bounds of morality alogether; I mean one would
be morally free to play with one's own psychopathology as a game.
That's rather dangerous, putting it mildly.

I mean to some extent that happens today, I mean, sort of, one can
watch violent films on, you know, one's own TV set, read pretty
psychotic novels, and briefly enter into the world of 'Die Hard 3' or
novels of William Burroughs or the Marquis De Sade, but generally,
you know, one switches off and turns the last page and returns to,
you know, the business of making one's supper. But I mean I can
imagine a virtual reality world so rich that one scarcely bothers to
leave it, except for sort of basic necessities.

I imagine it will come and will pose a vast challenge to society as
we know it.


When we talk like this, highly speculatively, these things may not
come about but nevertheless, they seem to be fascinating things to
talk about, and here we are talking about them at the end of the 20th
Century - why are they so fascinating? It may be that we don't get
virtual reality that's as good as the real thing, but it's certainly
compelling to think about. Why is that?



Of course we already do get a kind of virtual reality that is
superior to the real thing; the average cinema screen contains more
units of visual information than our eyes perceive in ordinary
reality, that's why the big screen is so much more gripping than the
small TV screen.

Why are we fascinated by, you know, the prospect of virtual reality
systems and talk about them? Well I mean they offer such a challenge
to our perception of what a sort of sane life in a sane society is. I
think people do perceive now that there is a radical, a whole series
even, of radical alternatives to the present world. They look back on
the 20th Century and they see it as a period of gigantic advances,
and yet they see it as exhibiting deep flaws. Not just its great
world wars, and its violent and often psychopathic entertainment
culture, but that there's something missing from the world that we
all inhabit. I think most people realise the gods have died, we've
lost our faith in the far future, and that we're living in a
commodified world where everything has a price tag; a world filled
with, you know, dreams that money can buy, but dreams that soon pall.

I think people perceive that life is probably meaningless, that we're
an accident of fate biologically, and that societies that we inhabit,
far from being social structures that reflect deep, enduring needs,
are in fact gim- crack, almost extemporized sets of rules that
someone in charge of a lifeboat might impose on survivors sitting
around him; so many biscuits per day, you know, and half a pint of
water. And that society's just a set of opportunistic conventions
that we accept in order to facilitate ordinary life, just as we
accept that we drive in this country on the left side of the road;
and we all know that that doesn't reflect some deep pre-existing
meaning within our lives.

I think most people realise that for all it's complexity contemporary
society is an artificial construct that can be moved offstage at a
moment's notice, as people find at times of war, as I found during
the Second World War as a child in Shanghai. You know, reality is
just a stage set that can be pushed aside, and a very different set
of rules can then apply.

I mean, given the hollowness of existence, I think people are
beginning to wonder, sort of, what does life really offer us in terms
of it's possibilities. Some people reach out to bizarre cults, others
move into drugs, but these are all rather desperate remedies and I
don't think they touch the truth.



You're talking about a difficulty of being social, but you move
across and almost talk about the difficulty of being, period. As if
the 20th Century saw, amongst other things, the peak of the social,
and it's decline, and that we've run out of strategies, and that some
of our most alluring options seem to be recreational psychopathology
in cyberspace.

Well, I think that puts it very neatly, and that's what I fear. I
mean, what do we see at the end of the 20th Century? We see the
churches empty, in the West that is, and people in the most advanced
societies, in Western Europe and the United States, moving more and
more into gated communities, where security is the dominant concern.
And that's in many ways to be deplored, I mean if you think of what
society invests in the training of it's leading professionals, it's
doctors, architects, lawyers and so on, for them then to opt out and
move into a gated community where they exist behind huge arrays of
electronic padlocks, and have no interaction with the rest of society
in their social hours, is a deplorable state of affairs. I think the
way in which the gated community is springing up all over the world
now is an ominous sign. It's a sign that something is deeply wrong
with the societies that have evolved at the end of the 20th Century,
and it's not... people aren't moving into gated communities simply to
avoid muggers and housebreakers, they're moving into gated
communities to get away from other people. Even people like
themselves, that's the curious thing. 'Cos inside most gated
communities there's very little social life; people are happy to
enter their executive houses and stay there.

In your recent book, 'Cocaine Nights', the book takes place in a
community off the Costa Del Sol; you introduce the figure of Bobby
Crawford, tennis coach, who's a psychopath by just about anybody's
definition.

Well of course Crawford is in many ways a benevolent psychopath who
is trying to revive this moribund community.

Could you read us an excerpt?

Yes I think, as the psychiatrist in the book remarks:

"In a sense, Crawford may be the saviour of the entire Costa Del Sol,
and even the wider world beyond that. You've been to Gibraltar? One
of the last outposts of small-scale greed, openly dedicated to
corruption; no wonder the Brussels bureauocrats are trying to close
it down.

Our governements are preparing for a future without work, and that
includes the petty criminals. Leisure societies lie ahead of us like
those you see on this coast. People will still work - or rather, some
people will still work, but only for a decade of their lives. They
will retire in their late thirties, with fifty years of idleness in
front of them.

A billion balconies facing the sun; still, it means a final goodbye
to wars and ideologies. But how do you energize people, give them
some sense of community? A world lying on it's back is vulnerable to
any cunning predator.

Politics are a pastime for a professional cast and fail to excite the
rest of us. Religious belief demands a vast effort of imaginative and
emotional commitment, difficult to muster if you're still groggy from
last night's sleeping pill.

Only one thing is left which can rouse people, threaten them directly
and force them to act together: Crime? Crime and transgressive
behaviour. By which I mean all activities which aren't necessarily
illegal, but provoke us and tap our need for strong emotion, quicken
the nervous system and jump the synapses, deadened by leisure and
inaction."



The book takes place in a gated community, also an echo of the idea
of a sort of gated self, which is propogated by the entertainment
culture. The entertainment culture sells increasingly virtualized,
isolated experiences, rather more cheaply than the real estate
involved in the gated community, much more widely available, and you
end up with, you know, the gated community of me.

Absolutely. I think you know, it's a return to the self in a way, and
an awareness, a rather terrifying awareness that... that self is
probably without meaning. That's the fearful prospect a little
further down the road, that people will accept that their lives are
meaningless and that everything else is a fiction designed to
assuage, you know, the sort of desperate anxiety of a meaningless
world.

That's a frightening terminus to disembark onto.

Jim Ballard, thank you very much.

[This article originally appeared on the webpage
www.terminal1.demon.co.uk/JGBallard.htm which has been subsequently
deleted]




    www.jgballard.com

http://www.victorshepherd.on.ca/Sermons/Psychopaths.htm




You Asked For A Sermon on Psychopaths: Are They Responsible Or Have
They Consciously Chosen Evil?





[1] When the fifteen year-old boy rode his bicycle across a corner of
the man's lawn, the man pulled the youngster off the bicycle and
broke his leg. When a golfer disagreed with the man over a golf-
score, the man dropped his club on the spot and punched his fellow-
golfer in the face.

But the man wasn't always this aggressive. He knew when a frontal
assault would get him what he wanted and when a frontal assault
wouldn't. When a frontal assault wouldn't he became charming. He
could charm anyone into anything at all. Not surprisingly, he charmed
a few emotionally needy, vulnerable women into doing what would have
been better left undone. His charm, of course, was only one aspect of
his cunning manipulation. One instrument of his manipulation was
lying; bald-faced lying. Another instrument was contrived weeping;
tears could be turned on and off, tap-like. In fact, when he was
finally caught and publicly exposed he wept buckets and thumbed his
bible and pleaded to be given a second chance to preach the gospel.

I was secretary of the denominational committee formed to assess the
man's fitness for ministry. I came to a quick conclusion: psychopath.
Could anyone doubt that the man was an out-and-out psychopath?

Yes. Several church-folk on the committee thought he should be
reinstated. They told me I was harsh. "After all", they told me, "no
one is beyond God's grace. Furthermore, since you are always talking
about mercy, why don't you show him some mercy?" Carefully I
replied, "I have never suggested that he's beyond God's grace; I have
never said that he's a greater sinner than the rest of us; I have
never said he can't be a beneficiary of God's mercy. But I am going
to insist that the man is a psychopath. He's dangerous; he's
exploitative; he's conscienceless. And he ought never again to be
entrusted with a congregation."

Since my opinion was so manifestly amateurish, a psychiatric
consultation was arranged. The psychiatrist wrote a two-page letter
that wandered here and there, and then in the last two lines said it
all: "This man cannot be trusted; this man ought never to be
readmitted to the ministry." I thought that everyone would get the
point now. Not so. One person exclaimed, "If only he would repent we
could find another congregation for him!"



[2] What is psychopathy? Psychopathy is one instance of what
psychiatrists call personality disorders. People with a personality
disorder have a huge "kink" at the core of their personality. In this
case (psychopathy) the personality disorder is blatantly anti-social.

Psychopaths display many characteristics. They are impulsive; i.e.,
they have diminished impulse-control. They are poor at delaying
gratification; i.e., whatever they desire they insist on having
immediately. They crave greater and greater stimulation; i.e., it
takes a huge amount of stimulation to get them minimally excited.
(Think of Paul Bernardo. He abducted a woman from a church parking-
lot in broad daylight, and then violated her unspeakably, all in the
interests of increasing his excitement.) Psychopaths lack empathy
with other people; someone else's suffering leaves them entire
unaffected. They have no concern at all for the wellbeing or the
happiness of others. They are superficially charming. They are
manipulative. They are conscienceless. They have no feelings of
guilt, and no feelings of remorse.

And they are dangerous. The worst psychopaths are incarcerated in
Penetanguishene in super-maximum security wards. They are incurable.



How did they get this way? Are they helpless victims of an evil that
overtook them, or are they self-victimized through their own sin?

It would be easy if we could find evidence to suggest that they are
helpless victims of brain-disease. But there is no evidence to
suggest this. To be sure, there are physical correlates (not causes,
correlates) found in psychopaths. For instance, they exhibit
diminished electro-dermal reactions. (In other words, where our
involuntary responses would find us failing lie-detector tests, they
sial through such tests as innocent-seeming as new-born babes.) They
exhibit diminished autonomic nerve-reactions. That is, where you or I
will blush when accused or find our heart beating more quickly or
grow pale or gasp for breath, they exhibit none of these involuntary
traits.

Then are there any environmental factors common to psychopathy? One
of the best predictors of adult psychopathy is having a father who is
himself psychopathic, alcoholic or anti-social. As parents (anxious
parents) you and I react swiftly and energetically to situations
where we think our developing children (adolescents) might be heading
down the wrong road. If our thirteen year-old comes home at 2:00
a.m.; or comes home intoxicated; or comes home with a twenty-year old
woman draped around his neck; in any of these situations we "go into
orbit." The psychopath, however, characteristically comes from a home
where his parents didn't react at all. His parents were blase about
everything connected with the youngster. He said he was going to quit
school? How important is school, anyway? He brought home a thousand-
dollar stereo when only last week he complained of having no money?
Where he got the money is his business, isn't it? He impregnated a
fourteen year-old girl? Boys will be boys.

It's plain that in such an environment there is nothing to encourage
moral discrimination, moral formation. Then it should not surprise
that nothing becomes formed. "But is there not still a residual,
inalienable moral `sense' and therefore an inalienable moral
responsibility in every individual?" To ask this questions is simply
to ask, "Is the psychopath a victim of an evil that overtook him, or
is he self-victimized through his own persistent sin?" I'm not going
to answer that question for you.



[3] Instead I'm going to tell you what my friend Bob Guiliano
mentioned to me one day. Before Bob came to minister at Erindale
United Church (1982--85) he was a prison-chaplain for ten years. He
told me that when he began his work in the jails he found 10% of the
convicts with serious personality disorders, and about 40% with mild-
to-moderate personality disorders. When he left prison-work (ten
years later) he found 30% of the convicts with serious personality
disorders, and 70% with mild-to-moderate. He felt this shift
indicated that our society as a whole was losing its moral sense; our
society was sliding into consciencelessness. He felt that the slide
reflected a shift in our society: no longer concerned with what is
true and what is right, children from infancy absorbed one thing --
  "How does one survive?"

I should like to discuss this matter with schoolteachers and police
officers and probation workers. When Maureen and I were newly married
and living in Toronto, Maureen came home one afternoon from her
teaching-job and noticed that the offering from her Explorer meeting
the night before was missing. Then she noticed a nine year old girl's
grade four speller on the kitchen table. The girl's name and phone
number were on the speller. Maureen phoned the girl's mother and told
her two things: (i) "Your daughter's speller was left on my kitchen
table", (ii) "You will find, I think, that your daughter has stolen
church money." Whereupon the girl's mother exclaimed, "Can you
imagine my daughter being so stupid as to leave her speller behind?"
There was a mother (not a father this time) who did not respond
appropriately. Would anyone be surprised if the daughter grew up with
inappropriate responses (non-responses) that could only be
labelled "anti-social" or "psychopathic"?



[4] Let's examine more closely the matter of conscience and the
formation of conscience. The first thing we note is startling: there
is no word for conscience in the Hebrew bible. There is no one Hebrew
word that translates the English word "conscience".

Because where we 20th century westerners speak of conscience as
the "moral governor" of human beings (a moral governor independent of
God), the ancient Hebrew people knew only God's immediate voice,
God's immediate address; they knew only the living voice of the
living God. This "word", the writer of Deuteronomy hears God
say, "this word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your
heart, so that you can do it." (Deut. 30:14) Our Hebrew foreparents
didn't understand human beings to be equipped with an independent
moral governor; they understood us to be within hearing of the living
God himself. His word is "living and active, sharper than any two-
edged sword." (Hebrews 4:12)

Now while there is no Hebrew word for conscience, the phenomenon of
conscience (a bad conscience, a troubled conscience) is found
everywhere. When Joseph's brothers finally grasp the enormity of the
cruelty they visited upon Joseph they cry out, "Therefore is this
distress come upon us!" (Gen. 4:21) When David finally grasps the
enormity of his sin against Bathsheba (adultery) and Uriah (murder)
he cries out, "Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me
from my sin....Create in me a clean heart, and put a new and right
spirit within me." (Psalm 51:1-4)

Centuries later the word "conscience" entered the Christian
vocabulary, no doubt because by this time Christians were speaking
Greek and the Greek language had a word for conscience: suneidesis.
Even so, Greek-speaking Christians didn't equate conscience with the
voice of God. They didn't pretend, "Whenever conscience speaks it's
God speaking"; neither did they pretend, "Whenever God speaks
conscience is aroused." Conscience cannot simply be equated with the
voice of God. The apostle Paul knew that his conscience could be
unaroused and he himself still be doing what is wrong. For this
reason he wrote, "My conscience is clear. But that doesn't make me
innocent. It is the Lord who judges me." (1 Cor. 4:4 NIV) The fact
that Paul's conscience is clear doesn't make him innocent. At the
same time, if his conscience were troubled he wouldn't necessarily be
guilty. Neurotic people have a troubled conscience (i.e., they feel
guilty) when they are not guilty at all. On the other hand,
insensitive peopled don't have a troubled conscience when they are
guilty. Then how do we come to have a right conscience? How do we
come to have a conscience that is neither neurotic nor insensitive?
How do we come to have a conscience that reflects the voice of God?
We must acquire what Paul calls "the mind of Christ". (1 Cor. 2:16)
Acquiring "the mind of Christ" is everything with respect to the
matter we are probing today.

The mind of Christ has to penetrate us, seep into us, saturate us,
root itself in us and bear fruit within us until we think with the
mind of Christ. Only then is our conscience formed rightly. Only at
this point is our conscience neither neurotically sensitive nor
frigidly insensitive.

The mind of Christ is not acquired overnight. It is acquired
gradually, through constant and consistent immersion in the written
gospels. I stress the written gospels in that it is here that we
learn the specific details of discipleship; it is here that we learn
what situations may befall us, how we are to react immediately, how
we are to respond subsequently, what we are supposed to do and think
and feel.

You must have noticed that most Christian preaching (outside of
S.U.C.!) arises from the epistles. The reason is simple. The epistles
contain brief, pithy (pithy but abstract) assertions that readily
supply the outline of a sermon. "Being justified by faith, we have
peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." (Rom. 5:1) The
structure of the text readily supplies the structure of the sermon --
abstract 'though the sermon is likely to be. "God was in Christ,
reconciling the world to himself." (2 Cor. 5:19) The statement is
true, glorious even. But it won't tell you how a reconciled person or
a justified person is to react, respond, do, think, feel. To learn
this we have to go to the written gospels where we see the mind of
Christ operating in the midst of all life's subtlety and turbulence.

Think, for instance, about evil. Christians are urged to resist evil.
Of course we are! After all, the purpose of Christ's coming,
according to John, is to destroy the works of the evil one. Then we
resist evil we must and we shall. Then why, Matthew 5, does Jesus
say, "Don't resist one who is evil"? The context of "Don't resist" is
a prohibition against an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. It's
possible for Christians to resist evil only to find that our
opposition to evil has subtly become a vendetta against an
individual; our right resistance to evil has become an unrighteous
occasion of hatred heaped on the evildoer; our tenacity in resisting
evil has become an excuse for revenge. If this happens, then our
right and proper resistance to evil has become the occasion of sin.
Furthermore, to become preoccupied with resisting evil is to lose
one's proper preoccupation with the kingdom of God. To become
preoccupied with evil is to end up according greater power and
persistence to the evil one than to Jesus Christ himself. Simply to
grasp all the dynamics concerning this one matter; simply to take
them all to heart is to acquire something of the mind of Christ.

Discipleship requires renunciation; membership in the kingdom of God
requires self-renunciation. Yet even as our Lord insists on our self-
renunciation he insists as well that we must never advertise it, let
alone boast of it. (Matt. 6:16-18) We must never create the
image, "Are you aware of what I have given up for the kingdom? Do you
know what sacrifice I have made?" Jesus says, "When you are making
that kingdom-renunciation which is required of all disciples, do it
cheerfully. Don't flaunt it. Don't look dismal doing it. Put on your
make-up (yes, our Lord said it: "Anoint your head"); put on your most
attractive outfit. Look as if you haven't made any renunciation at
all. Anything else means you are trying to exploit your so-called
sacrifice in the interests of religious superiority, and to do that
is to render yourself a spiritual phoney."

We 20th century westerners are careless about speech. We assume that
words are merely empty sounds. But Jesus, with a Hebrew mindset,
knows that a word is an event; an event which, once rendered
operative, can never be undone. Where we modern types use words very
carelessly, he insists, "On the day of judgement men and women will
render account for every careless word they utter, for by your words
you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned."
(Matt. 12:36-37)

And then there are the gospel-incidents that are just that: incidents
rather than teachings. Think about Jesus and the meals he eats, the
homes he enters, the people he eats with. Whom do we have in our
homes? Who eats with us? With whom do we want to eat? And what does
it all mean?

It is only as we immerse ourselves in the written gospels that we
learn the mind of Christ and acquire the mind of Christ. And it is
only as we acquire the mind of Christ that conscience is formed
aright.



[5] Unquestionably Christians are to have what Paul calls a "good
conscience". (1 Tim. 1:5-6) But a "good" conscience isn't merely an
untroubled conscience, a conscience that lets us sleep. A good
conscience is something more; a good conscience is one that moves us
not out of fear but out of love. A good conscience moves us to act
out of the love Christ has for us and the love we have for him and
the love we have for one another. You must have noticed that
virtually all secular discussions of conscience, virtually all
textbooks in Psychology 101, discuss conscience in terms of fear.
When Paul speaks of a good conscience he has more in mind than the
absence of self-condemnation; a good conscience is one that
recognizes and responds to love's obligation. Paul writes to Timothy
and speaks of "...love that issues from a pure heart and a good
conscience and sincere faith." Note how all the factors are related:
love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and sincere
faith. In his second letter to the congregation in Corinth Paul
exclaims, "Christ's love compels us". (2 Cor. 5:14 NIV) It isn't fear
that compels us; it's Christ's love -- which love evokes our love for
him and our love for one another.

In other words, Jesus Christ is the conscience of Christians; he
governs us from within as we come to recognize love's obligation.



[6] Then what about the formation of conscience? As our conscience
comes to be formed by the mind of Christ our conscience should never
be silenced or ignored. Neither should we fall silent publicly when
those who aren't Christians themselves violate a Christian
conscience. Greater diligence in our inner lives and outer lives
alike will do much to stall the creeping psychopathy of our society.



Victor Shepherd
February 1996

........................................................................
..
              LATEST NEWS HEADLINES FROM PSYCHIATRYMATTERS.MD
........................................................................
..



Concerns over high psychiatric comorbidity rates
Researchers explore the prevalence of comorbid psychiatric disorders in
the general population.
http://www.psychiatrymatters.md/index.asp?sec=news_story&story_id=6464&u
sedate=04/05/02&ealert=1

Maternal smoking and drinking heightens child's ADHD risk
Researchers examine the effect of prenatal exposure to maternal smoking
and drinking on a child's ADHD risk.
http://www.psychiatrymatters.md/index.asp?sec=news_story&story_id=6465&u
sedate=04/05/02&ealert=1

Bipolar connection found for alcohol abuse among SP patients
A study explores the relationship between bipolar II disorder and
alcohol use comorbidity in patients with social phobia.
http://www.psychiatrymatters.md/index.asp?sec=news_story&story_id=6466&u
sedate=04/05/02&ealert=1

Fathers' antisocial problems affect child's psychopathology
The impact of paternal substance dependence and antisocial personality
disorder on family functioning and the psychopathology of the child.
http://www.psychiatrymatters.md/index.asp?sec=news_story&story_id=6484&u
sedate=04/05/02&ealert=1

Combined SSRI and noradrenergic therapy resolves depression in OCD
Effect of augmentation of SSRI and noradrenergics in the treatment of
comorbid OCD and MDD.
http://www.psychiatrymatters.md/index.asp?sec=news_story&story_id=6486&u
sedate=04/05/02&ealert=1

Pathological, malignant, pernicious narcissism is the undiscovered
and most under-reported epidemic of our age.

Some (like Christopher Lasch) say that our whole civilization is
infected with narcissism.

Pathological narcissism may be at the root of many other personality
disorders.

Many (maybe the majority of) criminals and abusers are narcissists.

WHAT CAN YOU DO ABOUT IT?

1.  Ask your local library to buy books about narcissism (they can
contact me directly for help at palma@... )

2.  Ask your local bookstores to buy books about narcissism (they can
contact me directly for help at palma@... )

3.  Contact journalists, columnists, talk show hosts, and other
people in the media and tell them about narcissism (they can contact
me directly for help atpalma@... )

4.  Establish an online or offline reading group, perhaps in
collaboration with your local library or bookstore (contact me
directly for help at palma@... )

5.  Tell your psychologist, therapist, psychiatrist, or social worker
about narcissism (they can contact me directly for help at
palma@... )

6.  Open your OWN NARCISSISM WEB SITE!  Mirror (replicate) my web
site content FREE of charge - and let me help you, step by step, to
create your website!

HOW CAN I HELP YOU?

I can provide:

Annotated lists of recommended reading

Resources, links, reading group guides, and tutorials

Copies of my book and other materials

Background material and references

I am available for interviews and know of others who are

Any other assistance that may be needed

Help spread the word!

Why not open your OWN NARCISSISM WEB SITE?

Too much work?

Not if you copy (it is called to "mirror") or reprint MY web site!

Yes!

Now you can copy o reprint my ENTIRE WEB SITE - or PARTS thereof!

All this CONTENT - can be YOURS FOR FREE!

And I will even help you make it come true!

Here are some features NOT AVAILABLE on MY web site - which YOU can
make available on YOURS!

Don't concentrate on NPD's.  Narcissists never admit that they have a
problem.  Narcissists are highly unlikely to visit your web site.

Concentrate instead on the spouse, colleague, friend, co-worker,
therapist, children of narcissists, neighbours - concentrate on their
victims.

- Directory of therapists (with expertise in PDs)

- Directory of Divorce Lawyers (with expertise in PDs)

- A serious NPD-related bookstore (I can send you ready made lists,
already linked to Amazon and you can turn a profit on these lists by
becoming an AmazonAffiliate!)

- An NPD search engine (covering the major web sites, categories in
directories, archives of discussion groups, etc.)

- Narcissism in art, mythology, film, and literature

- Excerpts from great or classic texts about NPD (with permission
from the publishers, of course)

- NPD psychological tests

- NPD compatibility tests (are you compatible with a narcissist)

- Discussion board just for CHILDREN of narcissists

- Journals of narcissists and their victims (weblogger technology)

Why don't you establish a PAY AREA of the Web Site.  Only subscribers
will be able to access this area.

It will offer PREMIUM content by experts, therapists, etc.  PLUS
bookstore with discounts, Ask the Doc area, phone consultations,
tutorships, and more (I haveideas).

And MUCH MORE besides!

*************************

HOW TO DO IT

If you do NOT already have your own web site ---

Click on this link:
http://www.tripod.com

This is the best free hosting service around - 50 Mb free space, free
e-mail account, your own, succinct and memorable address and many web
construction tools.

Open an account with them and follow the instructions.

Make sure you browse their web site extensively and get acquainted
with everything they offer!

WHAT NEXT?

"Mirroring" (=copying, replicating) or reprinting my web site is real
easy:

You do NOT have to mirror (copy) or reprint ALL my content.

You can pick and choose which parts you wish to mirror or reprint.

You can mirror the WHOLE web site, only the FAQs, only the Essay,
only the Narcissism List Excerpts, only my journals, the
philosophical essays, the international affairs or economics essays,
my poetry, or any combination thereof.

A full listing of all the main parts of the web site is here:

http://samvak.tripod.com/

(Text in blue colour signifies links to web pages)

Having chosen which parts of my web site you want to mirror or
reprint in your web site, you have to use your own template (your own
page design).

The design of your pages can be simple and basic, no need for
anything fancy (you can use Tripod's templates).

1.  You tell me which web pages (which parts ) of my web site you
wish to replicate (mirror or reprint).

2.  I send you all the files you have selected in a single ZIP file.

3.  You copy the content from each and every file, paste it to YOUR
page template (design) and add this text at the bottom of each and
every page:

4.  You upload the files to your server.

I can also send you ready made lists of recommended reading already
linked to Amazon.

You just have to register as an affillliate and insert your
affilliate code to be eligible for your commission.

Let me know if I can be of further assistance!

BONUS

(Some of the addresses are very long and tend to break in
transmission.

Please copy the complete address and paste it to your browser
window).

Special bonus packages for listmembers:

Books and e-books about relationships with abusive narcissists and
the Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

Write to me (at palma@... or vaknin@...)

To get your FREE COPY of "The Narcissism Book of Quotes"

By e-mail (as a file attachment) - no strings attached!

PACKAGE ONE

Buy "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" - the PRINT BOOK
from the Publisher (pay through CCNow)

And get IMMEDIATELY (by e-mail, as a file attachment):

1. A FREE a copy of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" -
the E-BOOK!
2. Or, a FREE copy of "Pathological Narcissism FAQs" - the E-BOOK!
3. Or, a FREE copy of "The World of the Narcissist" - the E-BOOK!
4. Or, a FREE copy of "Excerpts from the Narcissism List and other
Q&A's"

PACKAGE TWO

Buy "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" - the E-BOOK - from
the Publisher (pay through CCNow)

And get IMMEDIATELY (by e-mail, as a file attachment):

1. Your FREE copy of "Pathological Narcissism FAQs" - the E-BOOK!
2. Or, a FREE copy of "The World of the Narcissist" - the E-BOOK!
3. Or, a FREE copy of "Excerpts from the Narcissism List and other
Q&A's"

HOW TO PURCHASE...

THE PRINT EDITION

To purchase "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" - the PRINT
BOOK -
Click on this link (to go directly to CCNow) -
http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?
vaksam_MSL_http://samvak.tripod.com/thebook.html
Or, click on this link -
http://samvak.tripod.com/thebook.html
Or click on this link:
http://thebook.cjb.net

And use the CCNow form on that page to pay with your credit card.

To be eligible to the bonus package, be sure to mention "I am a list
member" in the comments area!

THE E-BOOK EDITION

To purchase "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" - the E-
BOOK -
Click on this link -
http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_MSL-
EBOOK_http://samvak.tripod.com/thebook.html
Or, click on this link -
http://samvak.tripod.com/thebook.html
Or click on this link:
http://thebook.cjb.net

And use the CCNow form on that page to pay with your credit card.

To be eligible to the bonus package, be sure to mention "I am a list
member" in the comments area!

Thank you for a great learning and support group!

Sam

Sam Vaknin, Ph.D.
E-mail : palma@... OR (as backup) vaknin@...
http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/thebook.html
(Buy "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited")
http://ceeandbalkan.tripod.com/after.html
(Buy "After the Rain - How the West Lost the East")
http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/
(Narcissistic Personality Disorder)
http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/npd
(Relationships with Abusive Narcissists)
http://ceeandbalkan.tripod.com/
(The Politics and Economies of Countries in Transition)
http://www.balkanlands.com
(World in Conflict and Transition)
http://www.trendsiters.com
(Internet Matters and Business on the Web)
http://philosophos.tripod.com/
(Philosophical Musings)
http://www.ce-
review.org/authorarchives/vaknin_archive/vaknin_main.html
(Author Archive of Political Columns in "Central Europe Review")

http://www.globalwarfare.org.ph/contents1x/warfront_update/wu_081901/w
u_071201_p2/wu_071201_p2.html

July 11, 2001

NPD*
* Narcissistic Personality Disorder

We thank Eddie deVeaux Jr. for the information and links to NPD
sites. We believe that this information is beneficial for  NPD
victims and their families, warriors, intercessors and ministers. To
have sufficient knowledge on how demons intrude and incite NPD on
people is vital for victory in spiritual warfare. Our tactics and
strategies in overcoming the perpetrators must come from the Lord. By
hearing his voice, we shall know what to do in the battle field.
Eddie wrote:

I would like to share with you my personal experience with loving and
living with someone who has both bi-polar disease and narcissistic
personality disorder.

I don't know how much your prayer partners are aware of these
insidious maladies, but, if there is a real devil, I truly believe he
is accomplishing the majority of his demonic work through people who
have these afflictions.

People with these diseases will harm anyone they come in  contact
with (this includes their entire families - this is one of the main
ways  that the mental contagion is spread). The most notable aspect
of these maladies is that the person having it is totally lacking
empathy during and after harming  their "victims", even a family
member (this includes children of any age).

The primary cause of how this is created, according to what I have
read, is sexual, physical, and emotional abuse which starts very
early in life against the person who is later diagnosed with these
afflictions. Through their negative interactions with others, the
disease is spread. It is even worse when it affects any children they
may have.

Getting them to accept and obey  the word of God seems impossible,
even when the individual claims to believe in  God (pathological
lying is prevalent with persons diagnosed with, or having  these
diseases). It took me years of hearbreak and heartache before I
finally  understood why none of my efforts to love, reassure, and set
a Godly example for my wife helped to  improve our marriage.

More information needs to be made available to everyone about this. I
believe this problem is at the front line of our spiritual war
against the devil and people afflicted with demonic thoughts and
actions.

I am sure that these mental states have a correlation to many
physical ills. You can click on any of the links below for more
info:

http://www.halcyon.com/jmashmun/npd/index.html

Narcissistic Personality Disorder
online conference transcript

I am still in the midst of my trial in dealing with this problem. It
has caused me to stumble many, many times, but thanks to the grace
and goodness of God and Prayer Warriors. I am still standing and
looking forward to the day when my joy,  happiness and the
fullfillment of God's promises are returned to me.

Thanks for your time and I hope this will help someone. God Bless you
for the good work you are doing.

Sincerely,


Eddie deVeaux  Jr.

http://tnt.turner.com/specials/wasjusticedenied/monroe/victim.html




Perhaps the only thing that's certain about Roger de la Burde is that
the 60-year-old died on March 4, 1992 at Windsor, his 220-acre estate
outside of Richmond, Virginia, with a bullet from his own revolver in
his head.

Though "Was it suicide or was it homicide?" is the most important
question to surface in the wake of his death, it is far from the only
one.

Though de la Burde long claimed he was descended from Polish royalty,
evidence argues otherwise. Like his own origins, de la Burde
misrepresented a number of pieces in his vast collection of African
art. Further questions remain regarding his career — was he cheated
out of justly deserved rewards from Philip Morris, or threatening the
company with revealing trade secrets? His personal life is similarly
murky — was he going to leave his longtime companion, Beverly Monroe,
for a younger woman who was carrying his child?

Testimony from those who knew him shows that de la Burde was prone to
multiple dalliances during his relationship with Monroe, which, prior
to his retirement some five years before his death, included numerous
co-workers and the married biochemist, Krystyna Drewnowska, who was
carrying his child. He had become obsessed, friends say, with the
idea of producing a male heir. His three daughters, he told others,
hadn't lived up to his expectations. He'd written one daughter out of
his will completely, unless she began to associate with people "of
her own upbringing and class." To another daughter he'd left a note
titled "In the dust of Crumbled Prayers and Dreams Lies Your Future
and Your Happiness, Corinna."

Aside from knowing that Roger de la Burde was a real estate
speculator, an art collector and a former tobacco research scientist,
his friends claim they didn't know much about him. "I've known him 30
years, and I really don't know who he is," one friend told a Richmond
magazine. Other friends said he offered them inducements to learn
German and French, he worshipped a Nigerian deity known as Eshu and
he encouraged them to take advantage of other rich people. A former
coworker told a reporter that Roger "was totally untrustworthy. If he
told you, 'Now it's daytime,' I'd start looking to see if it was
night." Jack Lewis, the Powhatan District Attorney, described Roger
as a "scumbag" known for unethical business dealings — not the least
of which was trading in art forgeries.

In fact, several months before de la Burde's death, his suspicious
art dealings had been reported to the police. At least one of the
sculptures he'd recently donated to Radford University was a fraud.
Had that information gotten out, says one of de la Burde's friends,
Dr. Herbert Weisinger, "It would have ruined his reputation for
sure." A reputation — among the high society art patrons in Richmond —
  he had worked so hard to build.

Beverly Monroe and her children say that even before the threat of
this disclosure unhinged Roger, several months before his death, he
was depressed. Beverly recalls that on the last night she saw
Roger, "he was in a terrible place...He was just terrified."

At the time of his death, de la Burde was a 60-year-old divorced
Caucasian male, living alone and fighting poor health. According to a
psychological profile completed posthumously by Monroe's defense,
Roger suffered from both depression and a narcissistic personality
disorder. Both his personality and his situation in life, the
psychiatrist concluded, made Roger a very high risk to commit
suicide.

In the early stages of the investigation into de la Burde's death,
investigators assumed he had indeed committed suicide. Only later did
they believe the forensic evidence proved a homicide, at which time
they focused upon his longtime lover, Beverly Monroe.










----------------------------------------------------------------------
----------
© 2000 Turner Network Television. A Time Warner Company.
All Rights Reserved. Terms of Use.

http://www.purgatory.net/merits/personality.htm


Personality disorders are long standing patterns of maladaptive
behavior. 4 The personality disorders are when a person uses improper
and immature ways to deal with problems or situations. People with
this type of disorder do not feel like they are doing anything wrong
and therefore do nto want to change thier behavior like people with
anxiety disorders. There are 11 major personality disorders defined
by the DSM-III. Some of these include: Antisocial Personality
Disorder, Avoidant Personality Disorder, Borderline Personality
Disorder, Dependent Personality Disorder, Histrionic Personality
Disorder, Narcissistic Personality Disorder, Obsessive- Compulsive
Personality Disorder, Paranoid Personality Disorder, Schizoid
Personality Disorde, and Schizotypal Personality Disorder.



Antisocial Personality Disorder
This disorder is characterized by the careless disregard for the
rights of others. It can be recognized by several symptoms. Someone
with an antisocial personality is usually decietful and is
remorseless. Other symptoms include the reckless disregard of saftey-
both of him/herself and of others, a large irritability and
aggressiveness coupled with impulsivness. Most antisocial
personalities also fail to conform to social norms.



Avoidant Personality Disorder
Individuals with this disorder feel inadequate, have great
sensitivity to what others think and say about them, and are socially
impotent. This disorder is characterized by someone who is terribly
reluctant to take personal risks or try new things because they may
be embarrassed. Avoidant personalities don't like to get involved in
intimate relationships, constantly think about being criticized or
rejected, and see themselves as socially inept and inferior.



Borderline Personality Disorder
Sufferers of this disorder have highly unstable interpersonal
relationships. The cause of this instability is closely related to
the person's self image and also thier early social interactions.
Symptoms include an unstable self image, rapid mood changes, a need
to avoid feelings of abandonment whether real or imagined. The person
also may have difficulty controling thier anger and have recuring
feelings of emptiness. Suicide attempts and self mutilation are also
among the recognized symptoms.



Dependent Personality Disorder
This disorder is characterized by a need to be taken care of an a
fear of being abandoned. Suffers of it are very clingy and usually
have the following symptoms: helpless when alone because of
exagerated sense of not being able to care for self, when one close
relationship ends the person immediately tries to find another,
problems initiating projects or ideas because of a lack of self
esteem, difficulty dissagreeing with others, needs other to take
responsibility for him/her, cannot make decisions with out advice
from others.



Histrionic Personality Disorder
People with this disorder excessively seek emotion and attention for
themselves. This disorder can be recognized by these symptoms: the
person is uncomfertable when he/she is not the center of attention,
easily suggestible, uses physical appearence to draw attention,
emotions are rapidly changing and shallow, speech very
impressionistic and lacks detail, thinks that relationships are more
intimiate than they really are, exagerated expression of emotion, and
interaction with others is usually caracterized by innapropriate
sexual behavior.



Narcissistic Personality Disorder
Individuals who are excessively grandios, have a need for admiration,
and lack empathy are usually considered to be a narcissistic
personality. They can only truly be shown to have the disorder if the
person has five of the following symptoms: extreme arrogance and
haugtiness, envious of others or believes that they are envious of
him, doesn't recognize the feelings of others, exploits other persons
for his/her own aims, requires admiration, has fantasies of success
and power, has a sense of entitlement and believes that he/she is
special.



Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder
An obsessive-compulsive personality has a preoccupation with
orderliness, perfection, as well as mental and interpersonal control.
However this usually comes at the cost of flexibility, efficiancy,
and openness. Four of the following are used to determine if someone
has this disorder: miserly attitude- wants to save money for a future
disaster, very rigid and stubborn, doesn't like to delegate unless
the person will do it exactly the way the sufferer would, pack rat-
unable to discard things, preoccupied with details, perfectionism
interferes with ability to finish tasks, escessively devoted to work,
and inflexible in matters of moarlity, ethics, or values.



Paranoid Personality Disorder
Often misunderstood as malevolent because paranoid personality
disorder suffers are distrustful and suspicious of others. Only four
of the following are needed to indicate paranoid personality
disorder: individual suspects, with no cause, that others are out to
get him; is reluctant to confide in others; is suspicous, without
cause, that significant other is being unfaithful; doesn't forgive
grudges; has doubts about the loyalty of friends and relations; reads
hidden threatening messages into benign statments or situations.



Schizoid Personality Disorder
A person who has a detatchment from social relationships and a
restricted range of emotional expression in interpersonal situations
is considered a schizoid personality. This can be verified by four
out of seven symptoms. These symptoms are: a loner-always chooses
solitary activities, doesn't want or enjoy any close relationships-
including family, has very little interest in having sexual
experiences with another person, has no close friends except for
immidiate family, demonstrates emotional coldness and detatchment,
takes enjoyment in very few activities, and appears indifferent to
what others think of him/her.



Schizotypal Personality Disorder
Schizotypal personality disorder is characterized by people who have
discomfort with, and a reduced capactiy for, close relationships,
cognitive or perceptual distortions, and eccentricities of behavior.
There are nine symptoms but only five are needed to confirm that
someone is schizotypal. These symptoms are: the person has ideas of
reference, has odd beliefs or thinking that doesn't agree with
subcultural norms(ie belief in clairvoyance), odd speech patterns,
strange perceptual experiences, a lack of close friends other than
immidiate family, extreme social anxiety, strange behavior or
appearance, suspicious or paranoid ideas, and inapproptiate or
constricted affect.







Article © 1999 John Garvey
HTML © 1999 Katrina Spoor

Appeared in "The Compulsive Reader":

http://www.compulsivereader.com/article1190.html


Additional film reviews here:

http://samvak.tripod.com/film.html

1. Exposition

In the movie "Shattered" (1991), Dan Merrick survives an accident and
develops total amnesia regarding his past. His battered face is
reconstructed by plastic surgeons and, with the help of his loving
wife, he gradually recovers his will to live. But he never develops a
proper sense of identity. It is as though he is constantly ill at
ease in his own body. As the plot unravels, Dan is led to believe
that he may have murdered his wife's lover, Jack. This thriller
offers additional twists and turns but, throughout it all, we face
this question:

Dan has no recollection of being Dan. Dan does not remember murdering
Jack. It seems as though Dan's very identity has been erased. Yet,
Dan is in sound mind and can tell right from wrong. Should Dan be
held (morally and, as a result, perhaps legally as well) accountable
for Jack's murder?

Would the answer to this question still be the same had Dan erased
from his memory ONLY the crime -but recalled everything else (in an
act of selective dissociation)? Do our moral and legal accountability
and responsibility spring from the integrity of our memories? If Dan
were to be punished for a crime he doesn't have the faintest
recollection of committing - wouldn't he feel horribly wronged?
Wouldn't he be justified in feeling so?

There are many states of consciousness that involve dissociation and
selective amnesia: hypnosis, trance and possession, hallucination,
illusion, memory disorders (like organic, or functional amnesia),
depersonalization disorder, dissociative fugue, dreaming, psychosis,
post traumatic stress disorder, and drug-induced psychotomimetic
states.

Consider this, for instance:

What if Dan were the victim of a Multiple Personality Disorder (now
known as "Dissociative Identity Disorder")? What if one of
his "alters" (i.e., one of the multitude of "identities" sharing
Dan's mind and body) committed the crime? Should Dan still be held
responsible? What if the alter "John" committed the crime and
then "vanished", leaving behind another alter (let us say, "Joseph")
in control? Should "Joseph" be held responsible for the crime "John"
committed? What if "John" were to reappear 10 years after
he "vanished"? What if he were to reappear 50 years after
he "vanished"? What if he were to reappear for a period of 90 days -
only to "vanish" again? And what is Dan's role in all this? Who,
exactly, then, is Dan?

II. Who is Dan?

Buddhism compares Man to a river. Both retain their identity despite
the fact that their individual composition is different at different
moments. The possession of a body as the foundation of a self-
identity is a dubious proposition. Bodies change drastically in time
(consider a baby compared to an adult). Almost all the cells in a
human body are replaced every few years. Changing one's brain (by
transplantation) - also changes one's identity, even if the rest of
the body remains the same.

Thus, the only thing that binds a "person" together (i.e., gives him
a self and an identity) is time, or, more precisely, memory.
By "memory" I also mean: personality, skills, habits, retrospected
emotions - in short: all long term imprints and behavioural patterns.
The body is not an accidental and insignificant container, of course.
It constitutes an important part of one's self-image, self-esteem,
sense of self-worth, and sense of existence (spatial, temporal, and
social). But one can easily imagine a brain in vitro as having the
same identity as when it resided in a body. One cannot imagine a body
without a brain (or with a different brain) as having the same
identity it had before the brain was removed or replaced.

What if the brain in vitro (in the above example) could not
communicate with us at all? Would we still think it is possessed of a
self? The biological functions of people in coma are maintained. But
do they have an identity, a self? If yes, why do we "pull the plug"
on them so often?

It would seem (as it did to Locke) that we accept that someone has a
self-identity if: (a) He has the same hardware as we do (notably, a
brain) and (b) He communicates his humanly recognizable and
comprehensible inner world to us and manipulates his environment. We
accept that he has a given (i.e., the same continuous) self-identity
if (c) He shows consistent intentional (i.e., willed) patterns
("memory") in doing (b) for a long period of time.

It seems that we accept that we have a self-identity (i.e., we are
self-conscious) if (a) We discern (usually through introspection)
long term consistent intentional (i.e., willed) patterns ("memory")
in our manipulation ("relating to") of our environment and (b) Others
accept that we have a self-identity (Herbert Mead, Feuerbach).

Dan (probably) has the same hardware as we do (a brain). He
communicates his (humanly recognizable and comprehensible) inner
world to us (which is how he manipulates us and his environment).
Thus, Dan clearly has a self-identity. But he is inconsistent. His
intentional (willed) patterns, his memory, are incompatible with
those demonstrated by Dan before the accident. Though he clearly is
possessed of a self-identity, we cannot say that he has the SAME self-
identity he possessed before the crash. In other words, we cannot say
that he, indeed, is Dan.

Dan himself does not feel that he has a self-identity at all. He
discerns intentional (willed) patterns in his manipulation of his
environment but, due to his amnesia, he cannot tell if these are
consistent, or long term. In other words, Dan has no memory.
Moreover, others do not accept him as Dan (or have their doubts)
because they have no memory of Dan as he is now.

Interim conclusion:

Having a memory is a necessary and sufficient condition for
possessing a self-identity.

III. Repression

Yet, resorting to memory to define identity may appear to be a
circular (even tautological) argument. When we postulate memory -
don't we already presuppose the existence of a "remembering agent"
with an established self-identity?

Moreover, we keep talking about "discerning", "intentional",
or "willed" patterns. But isn't a big part of our self (in the form
of the unconscious, full of repressed memories) unavailable to us?
Don't we develop defence mechanisms against repressed memories and
fantasies, against unconscious content incongruent with our self-
image? Even worse, this hidden, inaccessible, dynamically active part
of our self is thought responsible for our recurrent discernible
patterns of behaviour. The phenomenon of posthypnotic suggestion
seems to indicate that this may be the case. The existence of a self-
identity is, therefore, determined through introspection (by oneself)
and observation (by others) of merely the conscious part of the self.

But the unconscious is as much a part of one's self-identity as one's
conscious. What if, due to a mishap, the roles were reversed? What if
Dan's conscious part were to become his unconscious and his
unconscious part - his conscious? What if all his conscious memories,
drives, fears, wishes, fantasies, and hopes - were to become
unconscious while his repressed memories, drives, etc. - were to
become conscious? Would we still say that it is "the same" Dan and
that he retains his self-identity? Not very likely. And yet, one's
(unremembered) unconscious - for instance, the conflict between id
and ego - determines one's personality and self-identity.

The main contribution of psychoanalysis and later psychodynamic
schools is the understanding that self-identity is a dynamic,
evolving, ever-changing construct - and not a static, inertial, and
passive entity. It casts doubt over the meaningfulness of the
question with which we ended the exposition: "Who, exactly, then, is
Dan?" Dan is different at different stages of his life (Erikson) and
he constantly evolves in accordance with his innate nature (Jung),
past history (Adler), drives (Freud), cultural milieu (Horney),
upbringing (Klein, Winnicott), needs (Murray), or the interplay with
his genetic makeup. Dan is not a thing - he is a process. Even Dan's
personality traits and cognitive style, which may well be stable, are
often influenced by Dan's social setting and by his social
interactions.

It would seem that having a memory is a necessary but insufficient
condition for possessing a self-identity. One cannot remember one's
unconscious states (though one can remember their outcomes). One
often forgets events, names, and other information even if it was
conscious at a given time in one's past. Yet, one's (unremembered)
unconscious is an integral and important part of one's identity and
one's self. The remembered as well as the unremembered constitute
one's self-identity.

IV. The Memory Link

Hume said that to be considered in possession of a mind, a creature
needs to have a few states of consciousness linked by memory in a
kind of narrative or personal mythology. Can this conjecture be
equally applied to unconscious mental states (e.g. subliminal
perceptions, beliefs, drives, emotions, desires, etc.)?

In other words, can we rephrase Hume and say that to be considered in
possession of a mind, a creature needs to have a few states of
consciousness and a few states of the unconscious - all linked by
memory into a personal narrative? Isn't it a contradiction in terms
to remember the unconscious?

The unconscious and the subliminal are instance of the general
category of mental phenomena which are not states of consciousness
(i.e., are not conscious). Sleep and hypnosis are two others. But so
are "background mental phenomena" - e.g., one holds onto one's
beliefs and knowledge even when one is not aware (conscious) of them
at every given moment. We know that an apple will fall towards the
earth, we know how to drive a car ("automatically"), and we believe
that the sun will rise tomorrow, even though we do not spend every
second of our waking life consciously thinking about falling apples,
driving cars, or the position of the sun.

Yet, the fact that knowledge and beliefs and other background mental
phenomena are not constantly conscious - does not mean that they
cannot be remembered. They can be remembered either by an act of
will, or in (sometimes an involuntary) response to changes in the
environment. The same applies to all other unconscious content.
Unconscious content can be recalled. Psychoanalysis, for instance, is
about re-introducing repressed unconscious content to the patient's
conscious memory and thus making it "remembered".

In fact, one's self-identity may be such a background mental
phenomenon (always there, not always conscious, not always
remembered). The acts of will which bring it to the surface are what
we call "memory" and "introspection".

This would seem to imply that having a self-identity is independent
of having a memory (or the ability to introspect). Memory is just the
mechanism by which one becomes aware of one's background, "always-
on", and omnipresent (all-pervasive) self-identity. Self-identity is
the object and predicate of memory and introspection. It is as though
self-identity were an emergent extensive parameter of the complex
human system - measurable by the dual techniques of memory and
introspection.

We, therefore, have to modify our previous conclusions:

Having a memory is not a necessary nor a sufficient condition for
possessing a self-identity.

We are back to square one. The poor souls in Oliver Sacks' tome, "The
Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat" are unable to create and retain
memories. They occupy an eternal present, with no past. They are thus
unable to access (or invoke) their self-identity by remembering it.
Their self-identity is unavailable to them (though it is available to
those who observe them over many years) - but it exists for sure.
Therapy often succeeds in restoring pre-amnesiac memories and self-
identity.

V. The Incorrigible Self

Self-identity is not only always-on and all-pervasive - but also
incorrigible. In other words, no one - neither an observer, nor the
person himself - can "disprove" the existence of his self-identity.
No one can prove that a report about the existence of his (or
another's) self-identity is mistaken.

Is it equally safe to say that no one - neither an observer, nor the
person himself - can prove (or disprove) the non-existence of his
self-identity? Would it be correct to say that no one can prove that
a report about the non-existence of his (or another's) self-identity
is true or false?

Dan's criminal responsibility crucially depends on the answers to
these questions. Dan cannot be held responsible for Jack's murder if
he can prove that he is ignorant of the facts of his action (i.e., if
he can prove the non-existence of his self-identity). If he has no
access to his (former) self-identity - he can hardly be expected to
be aware and cognizant of these facts.

What is in question is not Dan's mens rea, nor the application of the
McNaghten tests (did Dan know the nature and quality of his act or
could he tell right from wrong) to determine whether Dan was insane
when he committed the crime. A much broader issue is at stake: is it
the same person? Is the murderous Dan the same person as the current
Dan? Even though Dan seems to own the same body and brain and is
manifestly sane - he patently has no access to his (former) self-
identity. He has changed so drastically that it is arguable whether
he is still the same person - he has been "replaced".

Finally, we can try to unite all the strands of our discourse into
this double definition:

It would seem that we accept that someone has a self-identity if: (a)
He has the same hardware as we do (notably, a brain) and, by
implication, the same software as we do (an all-pervasive,
omnipresent self-identity) and (b) He communicates his humanly
recognizable and comprehensible inner world to us and manipulates his
environment. We accept that he has a specific (i.e., the same
continuous) self-identity if (c) He shows consistent intentional
(i.e., willed) patterns ("memory") in doing (b) for a long period of
time.

It seems that we accept that we have a specific self-identity (i.e.,
we are self-conscious of a specific identity) if (a) We discern
(usually through memory and introspection) long term consistent
intentional (i.e., willed) patterns ("memory") in our manipulation
("relating to") of our environment and (b) Others accept that we have
a specific self-identity.

In conclusion: Dan undoubtedly has a self-identity (being human and,
thus, endowed with a brain). Equally undoubtedly, this self-identity
is not Dan's (but a new, unfamiliar, one).

Such is the stuff of our nightmares - body snatching, demonic
possession, waking up in a strange place, not knowing who we are.
Without a continuous personal history - we are not. It is what binds
our various bodies, states of mind, memories, skills, emotions, and
cognitions - into a coherent bundle of identity. Dan speaks, drinks,
dances, talks, and makes love - but throughout that time, he is not
present because he does not remember Dan and how it is to be Dan. He
may have murdered Jake - but, by all philosophical and ethical
criteria, it was most definitely not his fault.

http://www.sanecrazy.com/qa/articles/Divorce/2900.html




Date: 2/9/00

Question:

My ex-wife and I have been going through the divorce proceedings for
the last three years.I was given "temporary sole custody"of our three
girls. We were both psychiatrically evaluated and she was diagnosed
as "borderline personality disorder"and I was diagnosed
as"narcissistic personality disorder".Am I detrimental to my children
and would the fact that I lied on several questions on the
personality test,to look like the "perfect parent"for fear of losing
the girls,have lead the psychologist to this conclusion?The reason I
did was my attorney told me I had 60%to 70%odds against me just being
MALE! Please HELP!!

Roger

Answer:

Dear Roger,

Simply, telling the truth is better than telling tales, even if your
motivation is a good one. If in doubt, ask your attorney about
telling the tester or the courts about the lies. It might even help
your case as it shows that you are such a concerned parent that you
will do anything to keep your children. Of course, I don't know what
the lies were about nor how serious the tall tales.

Narcissic personality disorder is not a devastating diagnosis. It
suggests that you can be very self absorbed and self involved. To be
an even better parent, you might want to get help learning how to pay
attention to other's needs and how be more aware of your
surroundings. I like that you are concerned about yourself and
curious about your diagnosis. I have a chapter in my upcoming book,
Getting Sane Without Going Crazy that deals with when a diagnosis is
detrimental and when it can be used well. The book is scheduled for
publication in May and I will announce when it is out on the site.

There is a movement in the courts to try and give custody to the best
parent, and that no longer automatically means the woman, so you
should have a fair shot at keeping your children.

Good Luck and feel free to come to On the Couch with additional
questions if you have them.

Life is too hard to do alone,
DR.D

http://www.apa.org/pubinfo/anger.html

  Controlling Anger -- Before It Controls You


----------------------------------------------------------------------
----------
TOPICS:

What Is Anger?

Anger Management

Strategies To Keep Anger At Bay?

Do You Need Counseling?
  We all know what anger is, and we've all felt it: whether as a
fleeting annoyance or as full-fledged rage.

Anger is a completely normal, usually healthy, human emotion. But
when it gets out of control and turns destructive, it can lead to
problems—problems at work, in your personal relationships, and in the
overall quality of your life. And it can make you feel as though
you're at the mercy of an unpredictable and powerful emotion. This
brochure is meant to help you understand and control anger.

What is Anger?

The Nature of Anger

Anger is "an emotional state that varies in intensity from mild
irritation to intense fury and rage," according to Charles
Spielberger, PhD, a psychologist who specializes in the study of
anger. Like other emotions, it is accompanied by physiological and
biological changes; when you get angry, your heart rate and blood
pressure go up, as do the levels of your energy hormones, adrenaline,
and noradrenaline.

Anger can be caused by both external and internal events. You could
be angry at a specific person (Such as a coworker or supervisor) or
event (a traffic jam, a canceled flight), or your anger could be
caused by worrying or brooding about your personal problems. Memories
of traumatic or enraging events can also trigger angry feelings.

Expressing Anger

The instinctive, natural way to express anger is to respond
aggressively. Anger is a natural, adaptive response to threats; it
inspires powerful, often aggressive, feelings and behaviors, which
allow us to fight and to defend ourselves when we are attacked. A
certain amount of anger, therefore, is necessary to our survival.

On the other hand, we can't physically lash out at every person or
object that irritates or annoys us; laws, social norms, and common
sense place limits on how far our anger can take us.

People use a variety of both conscious and unconscious processes to
deal with their angry feelings. The three main approaches are
expressing, suppressing, and calming. Expressing your angry feelings
in an assertive—not aggressive—manner is the healthiest way to
express anger. To do this, you have to learn how to make clear what
your needs are, and how to get them met, without hurting others.
Being assertive doesn't mean being pushy or demanding; it means being
respectful of yourself and others.

Anger can be suppressed, and then converted or redirected. This
happens when you hold in your anger, stop thinking about it, and
focus on something positive. The aim is to inhibit or suppress your
anger and convert it into more constructive behavior. The danger in
this type of response is that if it isn't allowed outward expression,
your anger can turn inward—on yourself. Anger turned inward may cause
hypertension, high blood pressure, or depression.

Unexpressed anger can create other problems. It can lead to
pathological expressions of anger, such as passive-aggressive
behavior (getting back at people indirectly, without telling them
why, rather than confronting them head-on) or a personality that
seems perpetually cynical and hostile. People who are constantly
putting others down, criticizing everything, and making cynical
comments haven't learned how to constructively express their anger.
Not surprisingly, they aren't likely to have many successful
relationships.

Finally, you can calm down inside. This means not just controlling
your outward behavior, but also controlling your internal responses,
taking steps to lower your heart rate, calm yourself down, and let
the feelings subside.

As Dr. Spielberger notes, "when none of these three techniques work,
that's when someone—or something—is going to get hurt."

Anger Management

The goal of anger management is to reduce both your emotional
feelings and the physiological arousal that anger causes. You can't
get rid of, or avoid, the things or the people that enrage you, nor
can you change them, but you can learn to control your reactions.

Are You Too Angry?

There are psychological tests that measure the intensity of angry
feelings, how prone to anger you are, and how well you handle it. But
chances are good that if you do have a problem with anger, you
already know it. If you find yourself acting in ways that seem out of
control and frightening, you might need help finding better ways to
deal with this emotion.

Why Are Some People More Angry Than Others?

According to Jerry Deffenbacher, PhD, a psychologist who specializes
in anger management, some people really are more "hotheaded" than
others are; they get angry more easily and more intensely than the
average person does. There are also those who don't show their anger
in loud spectacular ways but are chronically irritable and grumpy.
Easily angered people don't always curse and throw things; sometimes
they withdraw socially, sulk, or get physically ill.

People who are easily angered generally have what some psychologists
call a low tolerance for frustration, meaning simply that they feel
that they should not have to be subjected to frustration,
inconvenience, or annoyance. They can't take things in stride, and
they're particularly infuriated if the situation seems somehow
unjust: for example, being corrected for a minor mistake.

What makes these people this way? A number of things. One cause may
be genetic or physiological: There is evidence that some children are
born irritable, touchy, and easily angered, and that these signs are
present from a very early age. Another may be sociocultural. Anger is
often regarded as negative; we're taught that it's all right to
express anxiety, depression, or other emotions but not to express
anger. As a result, we don't learn how to handle it or channel it
constructively.

Research has also found that family background plays a role.
Typically, people who are easily angered come from families that are
disruptive, chaotic, and not skilled at emotional communications.

Is It Good To "Let it All Hang Out?"

Psychologists now say that this is a dangerous myth. Some people use
this theory as a license to hurt others. Research has found
that "letting it rip" with anger actually escalates anger and
aggression and does nothing to help you (or the person you're angry
with) resolve the situation.

It's best to find out what it is that triggers your anger, and then
to develop strategies to keep those triggers from tipping you over
the edge.

Strategies To Keep Anger At Bay

Relaxation

Simple relaxation tools, such as deep breathing and relaxing imagery,
can help calm down angry feelings. There are books and courses that
can teach you relaxation techniques, and once you learn the
techniques, you can call upon them in any situation. If you are
involved in a relationship where both partners are hot-tempered, it
might be a good idea for both of you to learn these techniques.

Some simple steps you can try:

Breathe deeply, from your diaphragm; breathing from your chest won't
relax you. Picture your breath coming up from your "gut."

Slowly repeat a calm word or phrase such as "relax," "take it easy."
Repeat it to yourself while breathing deeply.

Use imagery; visualize a relaxing experience, from either your memory
or your imagination.

Nonstrenuous, slow yoga-like exercises can relax your muscles and
make you feel much calmer.
Practice these techniques daily. Learn to use them automatically when
you're in a tense situation.

Cognitive Restructuring

Simply put, this means changing the way you think. Angry people tend
to curse, swear, or speak in highly colorful terms that reflect their
inner thoughts. When you're angry, your thinking can get very
exaggerated and overly dramatic. Try replacing these thoughts with
more rational ones. For instance, instead of telling yourself, "oh,
it's awful, it's terrible, everything's ruined," tell yourself, "it's
frustrating, and it's understandable that I'm upset about it, but
it's not the end of the world and getting angry is not going to fix
it anyhow."

Be careful of words like "never" or "always" when talking about
yourself or someone else. "This !&*%@ machine never works,"
or "you're always forgetting things" are not just inaccurate, they
also serve to make you feel that your anger is justified and that
there's no way to solve the problem. They also alienate and humiliate
people who might otherwise be willing to work with you on a solution.

Remind yourself that getting angry is not going to fix anything, that
it won't make you feel better (and may actually make you feel worse).

Logic defeats anger, because anger, even when it's justified, can
quickly become irrational. So use cold hard logic on yourself. Remind
yourself that the world is "not out to get you," you're just
experiencing some of the rough spots of daily life. Do this each time
you feel anger getting the best of you, and it'll help you get a more
balanced perspective. Angry people tend to demand things: fairness,
appreciation, agreement, willingness to do things their way. Everyone
wants these things, and we are all hurt and disappointed when we
don't get them, but angry people demand them, and when their demands
aren't met, their disappointment becomes anger. As part of their
cognitive restructuring, angry people need to become aware of their
demanding nature and translate their expectations into desires. In
other words, saying, "I would like" something is healthier than
saying, "I demand" or "I must have" something. When you're unable to
get what you want, you will experience the normal reactions—
frustration, disappointment, hurt—but not anger. Some angry people
use this anger as a way to avoid feeling hurt, but that doesn't mean
the hurt goes away.

Problem Solving

Sometimes, our anger and frustration are caused by very real and
inescapable problems in our lives. Not all anger is misplaced, and
often it's a healthy, natural response to these difficulties. There
is also a cultural belief that every problem has a solution, and it
adds to our frustration to find out that this isn't always the case.
The best attitude to bring to such a situation, then, is not to focus
on finding the solution, but rather on how you handle and face the
problem.

Make a plan, and check your progress along the way. Resolve to give
it your best, but also not to punish yourself if an answer doesn't
come right away. If you can approach it with your best intentions and
efforts and make a serious attempt to face it head-on, you will be
less likely to lose patience and fall into all-or-nothing thinking,
even if the problem does not get solved right away.

Better Communication

Angry people tend to jump to—and act on—conclusions, and some of
those conclusions can be very inaccurate. The first thing to do if
you're in a heated discussion is slow down and think through your
responses. Don't say the first thing that comes into your head, but
slow down and think carefully about what you want to say. At the same
time, listen carefully to what the other person is saying and take
your time before answering.

Listen, too, to what is underlying the anger. For instance, you like
a certain amount of freedom and personal space, and your "significant
other" wants more connection and closeness. If he or she starts
complaining about your activities, don't retaliate by painting your
partner as a jailer, a warden, or an albatross around your neck.

It's natural to get defensive when you're criticized, but don't fight
back. Instead, listen to what's underlying the words: the message
that this person might feel neglected and unloved. It may take a lot
of patient questioning on your part, and it may require some
breathing space, but don't let your anger—or a partner's—let a
discussion spin out of control. Keeping your cool can keep the
situation from becoming a disastrous one.

Using Humor

"Silly humor" can help defuse rage in a number of ways. For one
thing, it can help you get a more balanced perspective. When you get
angry and call someone a name or refer to them in some imaginative
phrase, stop and picture what that word would literally look like. If
you're at work and you think of a coworker as a "dirtbag" or
a "single-cell life form," for example, picture a large bag full of
dirt (or an amoeba) sitting at your colleague's desk, talking on the
phone, going to meetings. Do this whenever a name comes into your
head about another person. If you can, draw a picture of what the
actual thing might look like. This will take a lot of the edge off
your fury; and humor can always be relied on to help unknot a tense
situation.

The underlying message of highly angry people, Dr. Deffenbacher says,
is "things oughta go my way!" Angry people tend to feel that they are
morally right, that any blocking or changing of their plans is an
unbearable indignity and that they should NOT have to suffer this
way. Maybe other people do, but not them!

When you feel that urge, he suggests, picture yourself as a god or
goddess, a supreme ruler, who owns the streets and stores and office
space, striding alone and having your way in all situations while
others defer to you. The more detail you can get into your imaginary
scenes, the more chances you have to realize that maybe you are being
unreasonable; you'll also realize how unimportant the things you're
angry about really are. There are two cautions in using humor. First,
don't try to just "laugh off" your problems; rather, use humor to
help yourself face them more constructively. Second, don't give in to
harsh, sarcastic humor; that's just another form of unhealthy anger
expression.

What these techniques have in common is a refusal to take yourself
too seriously. Anger is a serious emotion, but it's often accompanied
by ideas that, if examined, can make you laugh.

Changing Your Environment

Sometimes it's our immediate surroundings that give us cause for
irritation and fury. Problems and responsibilities can weigh on you
and make you feel angry at the "trap" you seem to have fallen into
and all the people and things that form that trap.

Give yourself a break. Make sure you have some "personal time"
scheduled for times of the day that you know are particularly
stressful. One example is the working mother who has a standing rule
that when she comes home from work, for the first 15 minutes "nobody
talks to Mom unless the house is on fire." After this brief quiet
time, she feels better prepared to handle demands from her kids
without blowing up at them.

Some Other Tips for Easing Up on Yourself

Timing: If you and your spouse tend to fight when you discuss things
at night—perhaps you're tired, or distracted, or maybe it's just
habit—try changing the times when you talk about important matters so
these talks don't turn into arguments.

Avoidance: If your child's chaotic room makes you furious every time
you walk by it, shut the door. Don't make yourself look at what
infuriates you. Don't say, "well, my child should clean up the room
so I won't have to be angry!" That's not the point. The point is to
keep yourself calm.

Finding alternatives: If your daily commute through traffic leaves
you in a state of rage and frustration, give yourself a project—learn
or map out a different route, one that's less congested or more
scenic. Or find another alternative, such as a bus or commuter train.

Do You Need Counseling?

If you feel that your anger is really out of control, if it is having
an impact on your relationships and on important parts of your life,
you might consider counseling to learn how to handle it better. A
psychologist or other licensed mental health professional can work
with you in developing a range of techniques for changing your
thinking and your behavior.

When you talk to a prospective therapist, tell her or him that you
have problems with anger that you want to work on, and ask about his
or her approach to anger management. Make sure this isn't only a
course of action designed to "put you in touch with your feelings and
express them"—that may be precisely what your problem is. With
counseling, psychologists say, a highly angry person can move closer
to a middle range of anger in about 8 to 10 weeks, depending on the
circumstances and the techniques used.

What About Assertiveness Training?

It's true that angry people need to learn to become assertive (rather
than aggressive), but most books and courses on developing
assertiveness are aimed at people who don't feel enough anger. These
people are more passive and acquiescent than the average person; they
tend to let others walk all over them. That isn't something that most
angry people do. Still, these books can contain some useful tactics
to use in frustrating situations.

Remember, you can't eliminate anger—and it wouldn't be a good idea if
you could. In spite of all your efforts, things will happen that will
cause you anger; and sometimes it will be justifiable anger. Life
will be filled with frustration, pain, loss, and the unpredictable
actions of others. You can't change that; but you can change the way
you let such events affect you. Controlling your angry responses can
keep them from making you even more unhappy in the long run.
Back to Top







© PsycNET 2002 American Psychological Association

http://www.vix.com/menmag/pizzey.htm


http://www.vix.com/menmag/pizzey.htm

Working with Violent Women

Copyright © 1997 by Erin Pizzey



Erin Pizzey was the founder of a women's shelter in Chiswick,
England, the first modern battered women's shelter in the world. She
found that of the first 100 women who came to her shelter, 62 were as
or more violent than the partners they tried to escape from -- only
to return to their partners time and again because of their addiction
to pain and violence, violence that they persistently did their best
to bring about. Over a period of ten years, Erin Pizzey became
involved with about 5,000 women and their children who came through
her shelter. She has written a number of books on domestic violence,
one of which, Prone to Violence, addresses the issue of women's abuse
and violence.






The surprising thing is that the target of Erin Pizzey's fire is not
men, but women, and, more particularly, what she calls "that whole
coven of witches" -- the women's movement. She is convinced that the
debate on domestic violence has been hijacked by activists whose main
interests are political and financial.
      -- David Thomas, Men: Not Guilty



Books on Battered Men

  Those of us working in the field of domestic violence are confronted
daily by the difficult task of working with women in problematical
families. In my work with family violence, I have come to recognise
that there are women involved in emotionally and/or physically
violent relationships who express and enact disturbance beyond the
expected (and acceptable) scope of distress. Such individuals,
spurred on by deep feelings of vengefulness, vindictiveness, and
animosity, behave in a manner that is singularly destructive;
destructive to themselves as well as to some or all of the other
family members, making an already bad family situation worse. These
women I have found it useful to describe as 'family terrorists.' In
my experience, men also are capable of behaving as 'family
terrorists' but male violence tends to be more physical and
explosive. We have had thousands of international studies about male
violence but there is very little about why or how women are violent.
There seems to be a blanket of silence over the huge figures of
violence expressed by women. Because 'family terrorism' is a tactic
largely used by women and my work in the domestic violence field is
largely with women, I address this problem discussing only my work
with women.

The potential for terrorism may rest dormant for many years, emerging
in its full might only under certain circumstances. I found that in
many cases it is the dissolution, or threatened dissolution, of the
family that calls to the fore the terrorist's destructiveness. It is
essential to understand that prior to dissolution, the potential
terrorist plays a role in the family that is by no means passive. The
terrorist is the family member whose moods reign supreme in the
family, whose whims and actions determine the emotional climate of
the household. In this setting, the terrorist could be described as
the family tyrant, for within the family, this individual maintains
the control and power over the other members' emotions.

"There are as many violent women as men, but there's a lot of money
in hating men, particularly in the United States -- millions of
dollars. It isn't a politically good idea to threaten the huge
budgets for women's refuges by saying that some of the women who go
into them aren't total victims."
    -- Erin Pizzey, quoted in David Thomas, Men: Not Guilty.



Books on Battered Men

  The family well may be characterised as violent, incestuous,
dysfunctional, and unhappy, but it is the terrorist or tyrant who is
primarily responsible for initiating conflict, imposing histrionic
outbursts upon otherwise calm situations, or (more subtly and
invisibly) quietly manipulating other family members into uproar
through guilt, cunning taunts, and barely perceptive provocations.
(The quiet manipulative terrorist usually is the most undetected
terrorist. Through the subtle creation of perpetual turmoil, this
terrorist may virtually drive other family members to alcoholism, to
drug-addiction, to explosive behaviour, to suicide. The other family
members, therefore, are often misperceived as the 'family problem'
and the hidden terrorist as the saintly woman who 'puts up with it
all.')

While the family remains together, however miserable
that 'togetherness' might be, the terrorist maintains her power.
However, it is often the separation of the family that promises to
rend the terrorist's domain and consequently to lessen her power.
Family dissolution, therefore, often is the time when the terrorist
feels most threatened and most alone, and, because of that, most
dangerous.

In this position of fear, the family terrorist sets out to achieve a
specific goal. There are many possible goals for the terrorist,
including: reuniting the family once again, or ensuring that the
children (if there are children in the relationship) remain under the
terrorist's control, or actively destroying the terrorist's spouse
(or ex-spouse) emotionally, physically, and financially. When it was
evident to Adolph Hitler that winning the War was an absolute
impossibility, he ordered his remaining troops to destroy Berlin: If
he no longer could rule, then he felt it best for his empire to share
in his own personal destruction. Similarly, the family terrorist,
losing or having lost supremacy, may endeavour to bring about the
ruin (and, in some extreme cases, the death) of other family members.

The family terrorist, like the political terrorist, is motivated by
the pursuit of a goal. In attempting to 'disarm' the family
terrorist, it is vital that the practitioner begin intervention by
trying to recognise and understand the terrorist's goal.

In 1975, a study of 400 women who had visited the refuge ... found
that 300 ... had been participants in a mutually violent scenario.
Yet few could really accept what they had done.



Books on Battered Men

  The source of the terrorist's goal as in the case of the political
terrorist, usually can be understood to spring from some 'legitimate'
grievance. The grievance's legitimacy may be regarded in terms of
justified feeling of outrage in response to an actual injustice or
injury, or the legitimacy may exist solely in the mind of the
terrorist. Whether this legitimacy be real or imagined, the grievance
starts as the impetus for the terrorist's motivation. One hallmark of
an emotional terrorist is that this motivation tends to be
obsessional by nature.

"There was a woman we called Jaws because one night she got drunk and
got into an argument. The other woman started waving her finger at
her, so Jaws bit it off. The next day I said, "So now do we accept
that you are violent?"



Books on Battered Men

  Whence this obsession? Why this overwhelmingly powerful drive? In
many cases, that which the terrorist believes to be the grievance
against the spouse actually has very little to do with the spouse.
Although the terrorist may be consciously aware only of the spouse's
alleged offence, the pain of this offence (real or imagined) is
invariably an echo of the past, a mirrored recreation of some painful
situation in the terrorist's childhood.

I will not describe here in any detail the types of childhood that
tend to create the subsequent terrorist. I will say, however, that
invariably the terrorist's childhood, once understood, can be seen as
violent (emotionally and/or physically). Also invariably, the
terrorist can be regarded as a 'violence prone' individual. I define
a 'violence prone' woman as a woman who, while complaining that she
is the innocent victim of the malice and aggression of all other
relationships in her life, is in fact a victim of her own violence
and aggression. A violent and painful childhood tends to create in
the child an addiction to violence and to pain (an addiction on all
levels: the emotional, the physical, the intellectual, the
neurochemical), an addiction that then compels the individual to
recreate situations and relationships characterised by further
violence, further danger, further suffering, further pain. Thus, it
is primarily the residual pain from childhood - and only secondarily
the pain of the terrorist's current familial situation - that serves
as the terrorist's motivating impetus. There is something
pathological about the terrorist's motivation, for it is based not so
much on reality as on a twisting, a distortion, a reshaping of
reality.

Because the emotional terrorist is a violence-prone individual,
addicted to violence, the terrorist's actions must be understood as
the actions of an addict. When the family was together, the terrorist
found fulfilment for any number of unhealthy appetites and
addictions. When that family then dissolves, the terrorist behaves
with all the desperation, all the obsession, all the single-minded
determination of any addict facing or suffering withdrawal.

[Pizzy's book Prone to Violence] was greeted with extraordinary
hostility.







[The publisher] got a phone call saying that if he put the book out,
they'd smash the windows at the publisher's offices and they'd kill
him.







Her london hotel was picketed by 300 screaming, banner-waving
protesters. "I went downstairs and said to one of the policemen,'Why
don't you just get rid of them?' And he said "Because we're scared of
them." "









"I had to have a police escort everywhere I went because there were
threats on my life and bomb scares at my house."



Books on Battered Men

  The single-mindedness, the one-sidedness of feeling, is perhaps the
most important shibboleth of the emotional terrorist. Furthermore,
the extent of this one-sidedness is, for the practitioner, perhaps
the greatest measure and indicator of how extreme the terrorist's
actions are capable of becoming.

Any person suffering an unhappy family situation, or the dissolution
of a marriage or relationship, will feel some pain and desperation. A
relatively well-balanced person, however, will be not only aware of
their own distress but also sensitive, in some degree, to the
suffering of the other family members. (For example, reasonably well-
balanced parents, when facing divorce, will be most concerned with
their children's emotional well-being, even beyond their own grief.)
Not so the emotional terrorist.

To the family terrorist, there is only one wronged, one sufferer,
only one person in pain, and this person is the terrorist herself.
The terrorist has no empathy and feels only her own pain. In this
manner, the terrorist's capacity for feeling is narcissistic,
solipsistic, and in fact pathological.

Again, I will not attempt here to detail the factors in childhood
that lead to the creation of an emotional terrorist. What is,
however, evident, in the terrorist's limited or non- existent ability
to recognise other people's feelings, is that the terrorist's
emotions and awareness, at crucial stages of childhood development,
were stunted from reaching beyond the boundaries of self, due to a
multiplicity of reasons. Later, the adult terrorist went on to make a
relationship that was, on some level, no true relationship, but a re-
enactment of childhood pains, scenarios, situations, and 'scripts.'
Throughout the relationship, the solipsistic terrorist did not behave
genuinely in response to the emotions of other family members but
self-servingly used them as props for the recreation of the
terrorist's program. And when that relationship finally faces
dissolution, the terrorist is aware only of her own pain and outrage
and, feeling no empathy for other family members, will proceed single-
mindedly in pursuit of her goal, whether that goal is reunion, ruin,
or revenge. The terrorist's perspective is tempered by little or no
objectivity. Instead the terrorist lives in a self-contained world of
purely subjective pain and anger.

Because conscience consists so largely of the awareness of other
people's feelings as well as of one's own, the emotional terrorist's
behaviour often can be described to be virtually without conscience.
In this lack of conscience lies the dangerous potential of the true
terrorist, and again the degree of conscience in evidence is a useful
measure in my work to anticipate the terrorist's destructiveness.

An additional factor, making the terrorist so dangerous, is the fact
that the terrorist, while in positively monomaniacal pursuit of her
goal, feels fueled by a sense of omnipotence. Perhaps it is true that
one imagines oneself omnipotent when, in truth, one is in a position
of impotence (as in the case of losing one's familial control through
dissolution). Whatever the source of the sensation of omnipotence,
the terrorist believes herself to be unstoppable, and unbound by the
constraints or conscience or empathy, believes that no cost (cost,
either to the terrorist or to other family members) is too great to
pay toward the achievement of the goal.

The terrorist, and the terrorist's actions, know no bounds. (The
estimation of the extent of the terrorist's 'boundlessness' presents
the greatest challenge to my work). Intent only to achieve the goal
(perhaps 'hell-bent' is the most accurate descriptive phrase) the
terrorist will take such measures as: stalking a spouse or ex-spouse,
physically assaulting the spouse or the spouse's new partners,
telephoning all mutual friends and business associates of the spouse
in an effort to ruin the spouse's reputation, pressing fabricated
criminal charges against the spouse (including alleged battery and
child molestation), staging intentionally unsuccessful suicide
attempts for the purpose of manipulation, snatching children from the
spouse's care and custody, vandalising the spouse's property,
murdering the spouse and/or the children as an act of revenge.

In my experience both men and women are equally guilty of the above
behaviour, but on the whole, because it is men's dysfunctional
behaviour that is studied and reported upon, people do not realise
that to the same extent women are equally guilty of this type of
violent behaviour.

My working definition, then, of a 'family terrorist' or an 'emotional
terrorist' is: a woman or a man (but for the purposes of this work, I
refer only to women) who, pathologically motivated (by unresolved
tendencies from a problematical childhood), and pathologically
insensitive to the feelings of other family members, obsessionally
seeks through unbounded action to achieve a destructive (and,
therefore, pathological) goal with regard to other family members.

Of course, this defining profile pertains to individuals in differing
degrees. Many people, unhappy within a relationship or made unhappy
by the dissolution of a relationship, may lapse into periods
of 'irrational' behaviour. What characterises the terrorist, however,
is that the vindictive and destructive behaviours are consistent; the
moments of calm and periods of lucidity are the lapses, temporary
lulls in the storm.

Also, there are women who, suffering chagrin and misery during or
after the life-span of a relationship, appear far more self-
destructive than destructive to anyone else. For the other partner,
contemplating leaving this kind of individual, the very thought of
leaving such a person is made difficult and untenable by such
frequently uttered protestations as 'I cannot live without you,'
and 'Without you, I might as well be dead.' To be sure, many women
exist, extremely dependent within their relationships, who, probably
having suffered severe emotional betrayal during their childhood,
genuinely feel that their life outside a relationship would be so
lonely as to be unbearable. It is difficult to leave such a woman,
and the man attempting to leave may well feel that, by leaving, he
would be responsible for delivering a mortal blow to an already
pathetic wretch. Men also, are often kept in their relationships,
which can only be likened to 'personal concentration camps,' by the
fact that they feel a genuine feeling of 'chivalry' towards their
partner. Women tend to put so much more of themselves into their
relationships and therefore suffer when these relationships fall
apart.

There is a valid question as to whether or not this sort of
suicidally-inclined individual may be deemed a terrorist. (To many
minds, this kind of individual, no doubt, would seem to fall more
within the category of 'emotional black-mailer.') I believe that,
sadly, there are people, deeply damaged by their childhood, who
genuinely cannot face life by themselves. When dealing with such
potential cases, however, I try to make the leaving partner
understand that the suicidal inclinations predate the relationship by
many years, and that, however tragic the situation, one person simply
cannot be held responsible for keeping another person alive.

In some individuals, the authentic (though unhealthy) longing for
death is a longing planted within them since early childhood, and
there is very little a partner can do to alter the apparently
inevitable course of that longing.

Among true terrorists, however, threats of suicide can be seen to
serve a largely manipulative role. In short, the terrorist says, 'If
you can't do as I tell you, I will kill myself.' Whether suicide
remains only a threat or is realised, the true terrorist uses suicide
not so much as an expression of desperate grief but as a weapon to be
wielded against others.

In working with clients struggling either in relationships or with
the dissolution of a relationship, I am faced with many questions,
all relevant to gauging the woman's terrorist potential: 'Will the
woman persevere in her efforts to financially ruin her partner?' 'Is
she sincere when she promises to kill her partner, or have him
killed, should he ever become involved in a new relationship? Are the
threats of suicide genuine or manipulative?' 'Will she carry out the
promises of using the law to 'kidnap' the children in order to hurt
the ex-partner?' 'Will she brain-wash the children to such an extent
that her ex-partner dare not form a new relationship?'

Emotional terrorism is by no means confined to the family context.

I know an extremely successful woman in the world of fine arts. This
woman has been haunted by a former assistant who, vicariously
imagining herself to the writer herself, dresses like her, stalks
her, and issues public statements that it was she, not the writer,
who created the works of art for which the writer is internationally
famous. If the writer is to ensure her own safety, then very definite
steps must be taken.

In situations of emotional and family terrorism, there are two areas
of work to be done: practical measures of protection ('strategies for
survival') on the part of family members, and therapeutic work with
the terrorist himself or herself. I must reiterate at this stage,
that both men and women are capable of terrorist tactics but men tend
to behave in a more physically violent manner within the family.
Women, as I have shown use far more subtle tactics ie. that of the
terrorist as opposed to outright war.

The first step, on the part of other family members, toward limiting
the terrorist's destructive potential is to understand the terrorist
to be a terrorist. In a recent case, a Mr. Roberts described to me
how, during his marriage, he and his children faced a daily onslaught
of verbal abuse from his wife. Mrs. Roberts was also physically
violent to the children. Now that he has asked for a divorce, she is
making use of every weapon in her arsenal. In the children's
presence, she has used drugs and drunk alcohol to the point of
extreme intoxication. She has staged several unsuccessful suicide
attempts in front of the children, threatened over the telephone
to 'do something stupid,' promised to kill Mr. Roberts new partner,
and assured Mr. Roberts that when she has finished with him he will
not have a penny to his name. To Mr. Roberts, all of this behaviour
seemed perfectly usual.

After all, he had witnessed this sort of commotion for thirteen years
of their marriage. When I suggested to him, 'What you endured is
emotional terrorism, he suddenly and for the first time was able to
see his situation clearly. Now, he realised, his wife's behaviour was
neither appropriate nor acceptable. No, this was not the treatment
that every man should expect from his wife, either in or out of
marriage. No, he does not want his children to be subjected to such
extreme behaviour any longer. The fact of recognising a terrorist is
the essential first step.

Then, because a terrorist is fuelled by a feeling of omnipotence and
is prepared to behave without bounds, (usually encouraged by feminist
therapists who insist that their clients suffer from 'low self
esteem'), pragmatic measures must be taken to define clearly the
boundaries of behaviour. It is unfortunate that the legal situation
which many divorce agreements mandate is open-ended. Certainly, when
both parties to a divorce are reasonably well-balanced, it is
entirely fitting for the settlement to be flexible enough to
incorporate changing financial circumstances, child-care
capabilities, and visitation rights. When, however, one party to the
divorce is an emotional terrorist, then both the confrontational
divorce procedure and the resultant open-ended divorce settlement
provide infinite opportunity for the courts, lawyers, and the entire
battery of psychologists called in for evaluations, to be used a the
terrorist's weapons. In these cases, the court and the divorce
procedure provide no boundaries for the terrorist; instead they allow
the terrorist to continue to behave boundlessly.

For this reason, when dealing with a terrorist, it is best for the
divorce procedure and final decree to be as swift, as final, as
absolute, as unequivocal as possible. Every practitioner or attorney
handling divorces is familiar with clients described as 'litigious.'
Only when 'litigiousness' is seen as a manifestation of terrorism can
the course to swift and precise legal settlement be steered.

To limit the terrorist's feelings of omnipotence, there are many
effective measures. The guiding principle, as in the handling of
political terrorists, must be 'There is no negotiating with
terrorists.' Endless telephone calls, conversations, confrontation,
trial 'get-back-togethers,' correspondence, visitations, gestures of
appeasement, and efforts to placate the terrorist's demands, all
serve to reinforce the terrorist's belief that she is accomplishing
something. Only determined resolution in the face of terrorism shows
the terrorist that her power is limited.

Furthermore, for anyone dealing directly with the terrorist,
reassurances, 'ego boosts,' 'positive strokes,' and consolations are
lamentably counter- productive. Mrs Roberts soon found for herself a
feminist therapist staunchly supporting the erroneous belief 'All
feelings (and therefore behaviours) are valid.' Mrs Roberts is told
by this therapist that she has a right to feel and to behave in any
manner she chooses, in callous disregard for the devastation
inflicted upon the children. Such reassurances serve only to fortify
the terrorist's already pathological, solipsistic, and eternally self-
justifying perspective.

If wishing to undertake the second sphere of disarming a terrorist -
personal intervention with the terrorist herself - the therapist must
be prepared to be straight, honest and very direct. In my own
dealings with women as terrorists, I have found on occasion that one
quite simply can point out to the terrorist, 'You are behaving like a
terrorist. This is what you are doing. This is how you are being
destructive. This is the destruction you are heading towards,' and
the terrorist, seeing themselves clearly for the first time, might be
encouraged to reconsider their behaviour. More commonly, however,
extremely deep therapy is required. For the terrorist's behaviour to
change, there must first be a solid and fundamental change within the
terrorist's physiological constitution.

Usually it is only by an in-depth excavation and resolution of early
childhood pain that the terrorist can begin to gain a real, true, and
level-headed perception of her own current situation.

Direct intervention with a terrorist - like all forms of therapeutic
intervention - can hope to achieve change only if the individual
concerned wishes to change and possesses that vital yet ineffable
quality: the will to health. When the will to health is lacking,
there can be no change. If the terrorist cannot or will not change,
one can only help the other family members to be resolute, be strong,
and, whenever possible, be distant.






Related stories:

Battered Husbands. One reason that domestic violence against men
keeps happening is that men don't speak out. And when they do, all
too frequently, nobody listens. Our Battered Husbands section has
feature articles from the Detroit Times and Orlando Sentinal that
speak to the seriousness of the problem.

Facts about Domestic Violence. Information provided by the Men's
Health Network to raise the public's awareness of the danger men and
children face when living with a violent spouse or mother.
Many "facts" about domestic violence are published in the media. Are
they true? Domestic Violence Factoids is an assessment by Dr. Richard
Gelles, one of the best-known, and perhaps most controversial,
researchers in the area of domestic violence against men and women.

Women who sexually abuse children and teens. In Britain, a segment of
the BBC1 show Panorama focused on woman who sexually abuse children.
Here are a summary and full transcript from that broadcast.




Related: Dealing with Anger

  John Lee on Anger: An Interview, by Bert H. Hoff.

  Facing the Fire, a review of the book Facing the Fire: Experiencing
and Expressing Anger Appropriately.

A lot of anger is directed at ex-wives, especially just after the
break-up of a marriage. You might also want to check out our section
Men, Love and Betrayal, which explores dealing with the grief, anger
and loneliness at breakup, and whether it's possible to trust and
love again.

MIND LIKE WATER MONTHLY
Dedicated to helping the ebook community.
Issue #2: April 8, 2002
Publisher: Mind Like Water, Inc.
http://www.mindlikewater.com
mailto:newsletter@...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Welcome to the *Mind Like Water Monthly*. We had a wonderful
response to last month's issue. If you missed it, our archive is
available at <http://www.mindlikewater.com/newsletter.html>.

I had three terrific interviews with authors. I'm including two
this month and one next month. Please email me if you would
like to be interviewed about your experiences as an ebook
author, publisher or reader.

Best regards,

Michael Williams
Co-President
mailto:geoguy@...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Table of Contents
1. Feature Article: Connecting Readers With Authors
2. eBook Author Interviews:
    a. Sam Vaknin, *Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited*
    b. Terry Dawson, *The Jennifer Triology*
3. Tip of the Month
4. Questions and Answers

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Feature Article: Connecting Readers With Authors
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Based upon feedback from our survey last month, I've discovered
what I believe is the missing link in the ebook revolution:
connecting ebook authors with ebook readers. I have to be honest
here - I don't have all the answers. But in this issue and the
next few, I'd like to tell you what I've learned as a publisher
about marketing ebooks on the Internet, and what I've experienced
as an ebook reader. And I hope to hear from you as well.

Today I'm going to address how search engines can help readers
and authors find each other.

Readers, use search engines to find ebooks. If you want to start
off by just browsing, search for ebook directories. I'm a little
biased, but a great place to start is Mind Like Water's directory
(<http://www.mindlikewater.com>). Find out who is publishing
ebooks by searching for ebookstores or epublishers. On their web
sites, you'll often find additional information such as author
bio's, ebook reviews, and sample chapters to help you make your
selection. If you are looking for specific ebook topics, include
the word "ebook" in the description when searching on standard
search engines like Google (<http://www.google.com>). If you want
a book on baby names, for example, try typing "baby name ebooks"
rather than just "baby names." Be very specific. Finally, there
are many web sites that offer free ebooks for downloading. Just
type "free ebooks" when doing a search, and you are on your way.

Authors, really think about what your ebook is about and what
potential readers are likely to search for to find it. Come up
with a list of at least 10 potential keywords or phrases, and
make sure that either you or your publisher creates web pages
that are optimized for them. Visit Overture, 7Search or Word
Tracker and find out what kind of traffic these keywords are
getting.

Test out your new keywords and sales pages using one of the
pay-per-click search engines like Overture, Google Adwords,
7Search or FindWhat.  Pay-per-click search engines allow you to
only pay for the traffic that visits your site, but you must make
sure that you sell enough ebooks to justify the cost.  We use the
1 percent rule and assume that only 1 out a 100 visitors will
purchase our product. This means that if you are selling a $10
ebook, you cannot pay more than about 10 cents per click just to
break even.

Recent research has shown that the number 1 position on a pay-
per-click search engine is probably not the best. The number 1
position is often overpriced and most web surfers like to view at
least a few listings before making a decision to purchase. The
number 1 position usually gets a lot of indiscriminate traffic,
making your cost per sale too high. A little trial and error is
always necessary. Each ebook, along with its respective audience,
is unique.

Authors, be sure to balance traffic potential with keywords that
will make the sale. Readers will only spend a few seconds
evaluating the listing on a search engine.  Spend some time
coming up with a compelling headline and supporting text for the
listing. Make it as short as possible. Of course, once you have a
potential customer, make sure your sales message and site are
enticing to the reader.

Next month, I'll talk about establishing trust using an open
business philosopy and ebook tools so that both authors and
readers have a positive experience doing business online.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
SPONSOR!
If you would like to advertise here or on our ebook directory,
contact me at <mailto:geoguy@...>.

*Supercharge Your eBook Profits!*
Learn how to drive traffic to your site and make the sales.
Discover new untapped ebook markets.
Learn how to optimize keywords and use pay-per-click search
engines.
<http://www.mindlikewater.com/ebooks/supercharge_ebooks/index.html>

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
eBook Author Interview: Sam Vaknin, *Malignant Self Love -
Narcissism Revisited*
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Michael: What is your background and why did you write about
narcissism? Please define narcissism for those who are unfamiliar
with the term.

Sam: Narcissism is a pattern of traits and behaviours signifying
infatuation and obsession with one's self to the exclusion of all
others, and the egotistic and ruthless pursuit of one's
gratification, dominance and ambition.

The book *Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited* was written
in jail (at least in outline). It was an unflinching attempt to
understand what went wrong, what brought me hither, and where I
was likely to go from there. The book deals with a pernicious and
devastating mental health issue - the Narcissistic Personality
Disorder (NPD) with which I am afflicted. What made it a hit I
think is its relentless straightforwardness, its uncompromising
gaze and its willingness to venture where others feared to tread.

The narcissist is often also a sadist, a stalker, a masochist, a
sex pervert, and an abuser. The book is a manual intended to help
the narcissist's exhausted and traumatized victims extricate
themselves from the nightmare of being near or with a narcissist.

Michael: How do we encourage kids or adults to have high self-
esteem, but yet avoid becoming narcissistic?

Sam: One cannot "teach" self-esteem or "encourage" it. Self-
esteem is a derivative of one's sense of self-worth. Optimally,
both do not fluctuate too wildly. They are both rooted in one's
upbringing (mainly in early childhood), although one's self-
esteem and sense of self-worth are affected by one's environment
later in life.

A healthy and stable self-esteem is the result of predictable and
just caregiving, of a recognition of the child's boundaries and
his or her existence as a separate entity, of nurturing but not
overbearing compassionate and empathic care, of respect coupled
with rational discipline, and of teaching by example. Self-esteem
grows in response to all these and is osmotically "absorbed" in
the right milieu.

Michael: Tell me about your book *After the Rain.* Why should I
care about the Balkans?

Sam: If you don't mind the Balkans - the Balkans will mind you.
This is the greatest lesson of September 11th: the world is
everywhere. There is nowhere to hide and isolationism is futile.
America has millions of immigrants from the Balkans - a direct
result of the conflicts there. Knowing Balkan history is knowing
the history of your fellow Americans.

It is in the Balkans that the psychodynamics of humanity - the
tectonic clash between Rome and Byzantium, Judeo-Christianity and
Islam, West and East - are still easily discernible. It is here
that all ethnic distinctions fail and it is here that they
prevail anachronistically and atavistically. Contradiction and
change are the only two fixtures of this tormented region.

Michael: What is your most popular book?

Sam: My most popular book is *Pathological Narcissism FAQs*
(<http://samvak.tripod.com/faq1.html>). It comprises dozens of
questions and answers regarding relationships with abusive
narcissists and the Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). The
content of this ebook is based on correspondence since 1996 with
hundreds of people suffering from NPD (narcissists), and with
thousands of their family members, friends, therapists, and
colleagues.

Michael: What do you see as the greatest challenge in selling
your ebooks?

Sam: Trust. Potential readers are not sure they will receive the
ebook they ordered. They hesitate to provide their credit card
data over the Internet, even through a safe server and to a
respectable fulfillment agent such as CCNow. The barriers to
publishing an ebook are very low, so the market is inundated by
vanity-type "books" and "monographs" authored by graphomaniacs.
People have learnt not to trust the quality of ebooks. Moreover,
many ebooks are overpriced. The reader applications are still
too complicated and mutually incompatible. You won't believe how
many technical problems we have even with simple Word or HTML
documents: backward incompatibility, Mac vs. PC, fonts - it is a
nightmare.

Michael: What advice can you give to other authors?

Sam: I thought that selling a book was a matter of mastering a
few basic principles. Fresh on the heels of the success of
"Malignant Self Love," I hubristically believed that I knew
everything there was to know about book promotion. The truth is
that every book is an entirely independent product. It has its
own, idiosyncratic, rules of promotion which one has to discover
anew.

Moreover, "eyeballs" (online readers) do not always translate to
offline cash. Books can rarely be promoted exclusively online.
And niche products are a lucrative proposition, providing the
niche is sufficiently large and accommodating. "Balkan studies"
proved to be a narrow and Procrustean market.

Be online. Be generous with your free online content - but not
TOO generous. The entire text of *Malignant Self Love* is
available online. While we had more than 700,000 visitors in the
last four years, we sold books only to a negligible fraction of
them.

To succeed, write about things you know well or that are close to
your heart. Write with conviction and passion, but do not hector
or judge. Just tell a story. Never forget the narrative. People
buy books either to escape from reality, or to grapple with it.
A good book provides both options and allows the reader to
smoothly switch between them.

Michael: Please leave us with your favorite philosophical musing.

Sam: I have seen the enemy - and it is I.

Sam Vaknin, Ph.D.
<mailto:palma@...> OR as backup <mailto:vaknin@...>
http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/thebook.html
(Buy *Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited*)
http://ceeandbalkan.tripod.com/after.html
(Buy *After the Rain - How the West Lost the East*)
http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
eBook Author Interview: Terry Dawson, *The Jennifer Triology*
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Michael: I think it's great that you took on the challenge of
writing a trilogy. Tell me briefly about *The Jennifer Triology.*

Terry: I had worked on the fringes of the property market for
several years and this, along with a degree of hi-tech
international sales and marketing experience, provided the
background on which much of the trilogy is based.

There's a second closely interlinked theme running through the
trilogy - the creation of a Charitable Foundation to provide
long-term funding, training and support to projects involving 16-
to 24-year-olds. This evolved from my wife's continuing work with
the area director of a major United Kingdom charity.

Genre-wise the trilogy is classified as a contemporary romance.
I've never been particularly happy with that and, for a long
time, *A Circle Squared* (the first part of the trilogy) had
the alternate title of *Cinderella Revisited*. To me it is a
contemporary fairytale set in today's world of international
business with a story line that pushes - but never breaks -
the envelope of credibility.

Michael: After a lifetime of technical writing and sales, what
inspired you to write a novel?

Terry: It began with an after-dinner discussion several years
ago. We'd spent the evening celebrating having secured a large
contract with a major multi-national; after a few drinks my
colleagues solemnly decided that my contribution, in writing
the original contract submission and the final presentation
material, had been critically important. It prompted one of
them to remark that, since I obviously had a knack with words,
I ought to try my hand at writing something serious - like a
novel.

Several years later, when I had a little more time, I remembered
that remark and began to sketch out a few ideas. *A Circle
Squared* evolved quite slowly at first but, before I really knew
what was happening, it had taken on an existence of its own. And
the trilogy was born!

Unfortunately (or do I mean fortunately?), I lost track of the
guy who made that original remark a long time ago!

Michael: You mention a lack of quality among some ebooks. Can you
describe what you mean? I often think that, where writing is
concerned, my perception of "quality" may be different than that
of other people.

Terry: To me quality is a complex mixture embracing plot
construction, standard of writing, characterisation, continuity,
depth of research and much, much more. Everything that happens in
the novel, however minor, must have a role to play; events that
occur late in the story must link smoothly to events that
happened in the first few chapters. The reader must never be left
confused and convinced he's slept through something important.
Here's an example from my personal list of horrors - an ebook
short listed in a major national competition. It reaches a
totally confusing finale in which good appears to have triumphed
over evil and the hero/heroine are pretty close to getting out of
bed and riding off into the sunset together.

I suspect the author realised the confusion but, instead of
editing the manuscript (a serious rewrite), chose to add a 20-
page epilogue explaining what had really happened, who some of
the characters actually were, and how they were related to the
hero/heroine.

Would I bother to buy another novel by that author? You guess...

Michael:  I'd like some candid thoughts from you about ebook
marketing. What has your experience been like?

Terry: My views are based on (or perhaps biased by?) little more
than 12 months of experience. It's very difficult to get
meaningful statistics, but I strongly doubt whether many ebook
authors (and publishers) achieve viable sales volumes - except
those writing in a certain "top-shelf" genre. I suspect there
are at least two reasons:

   a)Quality of writing - see my earlier comments about buying
     another of one author's novels.
   b)eBooks are a new medium - as time goes by this, and the cost
     of ebook readers, is becoming nothing more than an excuse.

Assuming our author can actually write, how should he/she
approach promoting the novel in this rather strange marketplace?

   a)Leave it to the publisher to list it on their website? Well,
     it doesn't cost anything...
   b)Employ a publicist? Lots of money involved and, since the end
     result is influenced by the quality of the author's writing,
     there's absolutely no guarantee of results.
   c)Set up his/her own website with the ability for anyone to
     order from it? Assumes, of course, that the prospective
     buyer can find the site.
   d)Get independent reviews and publicize them? Where? On the
     author's own website, assuming that the prospective buyer can
     find the site...
   e)Spend a lot of money trying to persuade the search engines to
     rank your ebook site amongst the top half-dozen? Who's
     kidding who?
   f)Get the novel listed on some of the free listing sites that
     link directly to your own site? Yes, that can definitely work.
   g)Get reviews like this one?

Ask me next year. At the moment the jury is still out!

Terry Dawson - Aare Publishing
Ash Lea Farm, Burrells, APPLEBY,
Cumbria, UK, CA16 6EG
Tel: +44 (0)17683 53055 Fax: +44 (0)17683 53709
Email: <mailto:terry@...>
Web site: <http://www.aare-publishing.co.uk/>

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tip of the Month
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
eBook authors/publishers: Customers love to hear from you. Make
sure that one of you sends a follow-up email to everyone who
orders your product. It's a fact that customers who have
purchased from you once are much more likely to purchase from you
again. Why? Because they trust you and like your product.

Save your contacts in a list or database, and you are on your way
to developing an opt-in email list.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Questions and Answers
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I didn't receive any response to last month's question, so I'm
going to open it up to your questions and my answers. Please
email your questions to:
<mailto:mlw_monthly@.../?subject=monthly_question>.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Issues of the *Mind Like Water Monthly* are archived at
<http://www.mindlikewater.com/newsletter.html>.

Mind Like Water does not support spamming. To subscribe or
unsubscribe to this newsletter, reply to this message (or
email <mailto:newsletter@...>) and include
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Copyright 2002, Mind Like Water, Inc., all rights reserved.
7419 Metcalf Ave., #321, Overland Park, KS 66204
Phone: 913-381-4520 / FAX: 240-368-5664
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http://www.mindlikewater.com

http://www.cafemo.com/mememe/otherwise.html





ME ME ME


The Narcissist's Thesaurus
Oh Look: You Unintentionally Ended Up Talking about Yourself
It Relates to Me Directly. Otherwise, I Wouldn't Give a Shit
"Do You Think I'm a Narcissist?"



[ m a i n ]


It Relates to Me Directly
(Otherwise I Wouldn't Give a Shit)
By Maggie Balistreri


  Compassion is the public display of self-reference.



  [Also see my poem on this subject.]




"Being a new parent myself, you can bet that I'm concerned about the
rising cost of education."

"I would never hurt a child, especially not my own child!"

"As a parent in this school district, I am outraged . . . ."

"Crimes against children are being committed every single day. I
should know. I lost my son to violent crime, and I've dedicated my
life to crime prevention."

"Your having a baby reminds me of myself in the first few days as a
father; it brought back all of the feelings again."

"As a Sri Lankan writer, I had a vested interest in the contents of
last month's India issue, and I consumed it from beginning to end."

"I urge you to consider giving the gift of life: Be an organ donor.
My son died waiting for a kidney."

"You should take a psychology class. It's amazing. I had the best
class today. The professor went around the room asking us if we were
the oldest, middle, or youngest kids, and then she analyzed the
personality types. It was fascinating! She told me all these things
about my personality. It's really a fascinating topic."

"I think you did your readers a great disservice by glossing over the
contribution Iranian filmmakers have made to the arts in the past few
years. As an Iranian . . . ."

"I would like to express my gratitude for your incisive report on
Williams's disease. As the parent of a child with this
disease . . . ."

"Thank you, thank you, thank you for your colorful report on the folk
music of Bulgaria. I was transported back to my family's homeland
through songs I remember learning as a young girl in Sofia."

"I love that movie. It was shot in my old neighborhood, you know."

"I have traveled here to implore you to reduce the maximum speed
limit so that another parent doesn't have to live through my anguish."

"When we lost our Melissa three years ago, we made a vow to God that
we would educate the public about the hidden dangers of this over-the-
counter medicine."

"Thank you so much for the article about your alternative school.
It's so unfair that you were judged so harshly at your old school.
People should be allowed to express themselves! I could really
relate; my parents freaked out when I dyed my hair and got a nose
ring."

"I always make sure to tip waiters and waitresses really well. I
sympathize with them; I was a waitress for seven years, and I have so
many horror stories of rude, miserable customers."

"When I was diagnosed with prostate cancer, I decided to devote my
life to educating the public about this devastating illness. I've
become the leading spokesperson for early detection and research
efforts."

"As a woman, I was offended!"

"As the child of Holocaust survivors, I was appalled by the recent
desecration of the synagogue."

"We heard about the tragedy and knew we had to get involved. Three
years ago, we lost our home in a similar disaster."

"You think that your health doesn't concern me? We're trying to have
to a baby, in case you've forgotten."

"I cried when I heard her story. I was in the same situation."

"As a doctor, I found your publication's suggestion that doctors are
skimping on preventive measures unsettling."

"As a tarot reader, I thought it was incredibly judgmental of you to
dismiss out of hand a branch of knowledge that you obviously know
nothing about. Ever heard of keeping an open mind?"

"That comedian is vile, and I for one think he ought to be off the
air. I thought he was funny when he first started out, but then I
heard him making fun of a woman for having a hump. My mother was
reduced to tears! I never watch him anymore. He doesn't know when to
draw the line."

"When I first learned of the deplorable conditions under which my
product line was manufactured, I knew I had to get involved. It is
unconscionable to employ people at slave wages, for long hours, in an
unsafe environment."

"I was a lifelong Republican, but three years ago, my husband was
killed and my son injured by a violent criminal.I realize now that we
need gun control in this country. I am now running for candidacy on
the Democratic ticket."





----------------------------------------------------------------------
----------



All material copyright © 1999, 2000 by the authors.

CafeMo welcomes comments and invites you to sign up for our e-mail
updates. mo@..., donna@..., christi@...,
daria@....
Or send mail to: Box 660 Cathedral Station, New York NY 10025-0660

http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12708


While Murderous Moms Shock, Homicidal Dads Ignored

Julie Ostrowski, Women's ENews March 26, 2002

The weekend after Andrea Yates was convicted of drowning her five
children in a bathtub and sentenced to life in prison, authorities
say at least two men killed or tried to kill their families of four
or more children.


These cases, however, garnered fleeting attention, underscoring the
difference in how the media treats mothers and fathers accused of
killing their children.


On Saturday, the same day the story on Yates' life sentence hit the
newspapers, two New York City tabloids ran articles about killer dads.


On page two of the New York Daily News, opposite the Yates story on
page three, was a piece headlined: "Dad's rage nearly fatal: Family
narrowly escapes fire sparked by tax woes." The story went on to
explain that a Brooklyn man, allegedly distraught over owing money to
the Internal Revenue Service, became intoxicated, barricaded his
front door, and tried to set his house on fire with his wife and four
children, ages 9,
8, 6, and 2, all inside.  Police arrived in time to save the family
after a call from the man's wife.


Buried on page 16 of the New York Post was a tiny, three-paragraph
Associated Press report out of Oregon under the headline: "Family of
six dead in murder-suicide." The first paragraph read: "A father
apparently shot his four children and wife to death in their
bedrooms, then used the rifle to kill himself, authorities said."


And while the Yates case was generating extensive coverage, the media
hardly noted the case of Adair Garcia, a 30-year-old father of six
living near Los Angeles, who was arrested on Feb.  21 for murdering
his five children, ages 2 to 10.  "Apparently despondent over marital
troubles," he "allegedly lighted a charcoal grill .  .  .  in the
living room of the family's home," the Los Angeles Times reported.
All of the children died from asphyxiation.  And, in contrast to the
nearly instantaneous decision by the district attorney in the Yates
case to seek the death penalty, the district attorney in the Garcia
case has not decided whether he will do so.


Women Who Kill Seen as 'Mad' or 'Bad'


These stories do not leave as indelible an impression as the story of
Yates, dubbed "Killer Mom" by FOX News, and "Tub Mom" on page one of
Saturday's Daily News, say experts who study women who kill.


"The press kept calling Yates 'mad' or 'bad.' That's because we have
certain expectations for men and women.  We don't expect women to
murder their children," said Cheryl L.  Meyer, co-author of "Mothers
Who Kill Their Children: Understanding the Acts of Moms From Susan
Smith to the 'Prom Mom.'"


While men kill more than women overall (men commit homicide roughly
eight times as often as women), they are punished less severely in
cases of child murders, said Meyer, whose research found that female
prisoners convicted of killing their children with the help of a male
partner received stiffer penalties than those men.


Meyer, an associate professor of psychology at Wright State
University, and her co-authors, interviewed 40 women in prisons
following their convictions for killing their children in the 1990s.
She said in approximately eight of those cases, mothers killed their
children with the assistance of a male partner, either the child's
father, stepfather or the mother's boyfriend.  In those cases, the
mothers received penalties equal to or harsher than those the men
received.  In one instance, Meyer said, one couple received the same
sentence even though the woman was at work at the time of the actual
murder, which took place at her home.


Still, women are not charged with capital crimes nearly as often as
men, and when they are charged, jurors are less likely to send women
to death row, said Annette M.  Lamoreaux, the East Texas Regional
Director of the American Civil Liberties Union.


Right now, there are 54 women on death row in the United States --
less than 2 percent of the total death-row population.  There are six
women on death row in Texas, two as a result of convictions in the
murders of their own children.  In the past 100 years, 47 women have
been executed in the United States.  Since 1976, eight women have
been executed nationwide.


"What's in store for Andrea is a tremendous amount of psychological
and probably even physical abuse from the other inmates --
unbelievable abuse," Meyer said, since no one, including prison
inmates, likes a mother who kills her kids.


Women, Men Respond Differently to Yates


Lamoreaux, however, believes women have responded sympathetically to
Yates.


"Men have a very strong reaction and women have a different one," she
said.


Men, Lamoreaux said, don't understand how Yates could kill her own
children.  "Men are like 'Oh my God.  If I was her husband and I came
home to that, then I would've killed her,'" she said one man told
her.  But many women identify with Yates: "They see her as someone
who could be a sister or a girlfriend."


The notion of a "maternal instinct" based on unconditional love is a
fallacy, argues anthropologist Sarah Blaffer Hrdy in her book "Mother
Nature: A History of Mothers, Infants, and Natural Selection." While
mothers have a stake in nurturing their children, Hrdy believes that
a mother's devotion is dictated, in part, by a long list of factors
including economic circumstances, gender roles and how much support
she receives from others.


"Because killing one's own infant is so abhorrent to us, even less
comprehensible to many people than is male brutality toward an
unrelated infant, there is a tendency to compartmentalize the
mother's actions as the intentional killing of the infant, and to
consider her behavior in isolation from her circumstances, even
though they are functionally related," Hrdy writes.


"When we treat infanticide as an aberration, and as a crime (which,
of course, in all modern societies, it is), we are likely to obscure
underlying motivations.  Many people snatch at implausible straws so
as to cling to the conviction that the emotional ambivalence many
mothers feel about investing in infants is 'unnatural,' and hence
very rare and completely separate from more common, or 'normal,'
maternal emotions,"
she writes.  "No connections are drawn between the ordinary
distancing of a new mother from her infant, on the one hand, and
these very extreme failures of maternal bonding that end in tragedy,
on the other.  Even those who accept that infanticide takes place --
among heathens, somewhere else -- are often reluctant to accept its
natural occurrence among civilized people or Christian people."


Insanity Law Mirrors View of Infanticide


Texas's insanity law, used as a defense by attorneys for Yates,
reflects the discrepancy Hrdy describes, and is faulty, said
Lamoreaux, a defense attorney who has worked on death-penalty cases
for 11 years.


She said the Texas law's requirement that to use insanity as a
defense, it must be proved that the defendant's could not distinguish
between right and wrong.  That legal standard "is a black and white
notion and it doesn't really comport with our modern notions of
mental illness," she said.  "The law is very narrow here."


Insanity-defense laws vary by state.  New York, for example, has an
added requirement in its law that defendants must be shown to lack
substantial capacity to know the nature or consequence of their
actions.


"The [life] sentence was entirely appropriate given the evidence of
her mental illness, but it is certainly difficult to be happy that
this woman has been sent to 40 years in prison and will most likely
die in prison," Lamoreaux said.


Julie Ostrowski is a freelance writer based in New York.

http://www.sageofasheville.com/primary_prevention.html
The Person-Centered Journal, Volume 4, Issue 1, 1997


Printed in the U.S.A. All rights reserved.

THE PRIMARY PREVENTION OF PSYCHOSOCIAL DISORDERS:
A PERSON/CLIENT-CENTERED PERSPECTIVE
C. H. Patterson
University of North Carolina at Greensboro

Suzanne C. Hidore
Greensboro, North Carolina

ABSTRACT: Psychotherapy is the treatment for psychosocial disorders
deriving from disturbed interpersonal relationships. The essence of
psychotherapy is love, or agape. It is argued that it follows that
love is the primary prevention of psychosocial disorders.
Unconditional love in infancy and early childhood is necessary for
the normal psychosocial development of all human beings. Steps to be
taken for proactive intervention are included. Published literature
is cited to support the thesis and conclusions.

"If we could raise one generation of children with unconditional
love, there would be no Hitlers."

Elizabeth Kubler-Ross (Phillips, 1991, p.11)

INTRODUCTION

The thesis of this paper derives from the conviction that the essence
of psychotherapy is a relationship characterized by empathy, respect
or compassion, and therapeutic genuineness (See Rogers, 1957). This
relationship is best characterized by agape, or love. The consistent
loving, caring relationship has long been identified with client-
centered therapy.

That the basis of psychotherapy is love has been recognized by many
writers. Gordon Allport (1950) nearly 50 years ago, wrote: "Love is
incomparably the greatest psychotherapeutic agent" (p. 80). Thirty
years ago Arthur Burton wrote: "After all research on psychotherapy
is accounted for, psychotherapy still resolves itself into a
relationship best subsumed by the word love" (Burton, 1967, pp. 102-
103). The object relations theorists Guntrip (1953) and Fairbairn
(1954) used the word agape to summarize the therapy
relationship: "This kind of parental love . . . agape . . . is the
kind of love the psycho-analyst and psychotherapist must give the
patient because he did not get it from his parents in sufficient
measure or in a satisfactory form" (Guntrip, 1953, p. 125). Patterson
(1970,1974) independently began using the term agape to summarize the
therapy relationship.

If the source of psychosocial emotional disorders is the absence or
lack of love, and if love is the cure for such disorders, then it
follows that the primary prevention of such disorders would be the
providing of unconditional love to all infants and children. The
conditions for successful psychotherapy are the conditions for normal
infant, and human development.

LOVE AND ITS DEPRIVATION IN INFANCY

While love is important throughout life for the well-being of the
individual, it is particularly important, indeed absolutely
necessary, for the survival of the infant, and for providing the
basis for the normal psychological development of the individual. The
presence of at least one caregiver providing unconditional love for
every infant (and young child) will prevent the occurrence of most
social-psychological pathology. References are cited later to support
this premise. Pathology deriving from neurological or biochemical
sources would not be included. Burton (1972), while discouraging the
search for a single overriding trauma causing emotional disturbance,
nevertheless states that "the basic pathogen is, for me, a disordered
maternal or caretaking environment rather than any specific trauma as
such" (p. 14). Disruptive behaviors related to the influence of peer
pressures would decrease and eventually disappear, since peers would
(1) be less likely to be disturbed and (2) their influence would be
reduced or eliminated since their peers would be secure and not
vulnerable to such pressure. Other than neurological and biochemical
disorders (some of which might be genetically based), such disruptive
behaviors as existed would derive from the deprivation of the
biological needs for existence; frustration of such needs could lead
to aggressive and antisocial behaviors. But in a society permeated by
love, such needs would be met - where there is love there will be
bread.

We define love as an attitude that is expressed through empathic
understanding, respect and compassion, acceptance, and therapeutic
genuineness, or honesty and openness toward others. In more personal -
  as distinguished from therapy - relationships, love may be defined
as "that which satisfies our need to receive and bestow affection and
nurturance; to give and be given assurance of value, respect,
acceptance, and appreciation; and to feel secure in our unity with,
and belonging to a particular family, as well as the human family"
(Walsh, 1991, p. 9).

EARLY RECOGNITION OF IMPORTANCE OF INFANT AND EARLY CHILDHOOD
INFLUENCES

A hundred years ago Freud emphasized the importance of infancy and
early childhood on later development and psychological disturbance.
Early on he attributed neuroses to the early trauma of being sexually
molested. But a few years later he changed his views, concluding that
it was not actual sexual experiences of seduction, but false memories
and fantasies that were the cause (the Oedipal complex). Attention to
the importance of real experiences of the infant and child was thus
deflected to unreal or imagined experiences.

The object relations school of psychotherapy emphasizes the
importance of the infant's and child's relationship with a primary
care person: "whatever a baby's genetic endowment, the mother's
ability or failure to 'relate' is the sine qua non of psychic help
for the infant. To find a good parent at the start is the basis of
psychic health" (Guntrip, 1975, p. 156).

During the 1940's several psychoanalytic therapists published reports
of the effects of real experiences on children. The term maternal
deprivation was applied to these experiences. In 1937 Levy (1937)
published a study of children separated from their mothers at an
early age. Lauretta Bender and Stella Chess, working in the child
psychiatric service at Belleview Hospital in New York reported on
children who experienced emotional deprivation during their early
years (Karen, 1994; Bender and Yarnell, 1941).

Children in hospitals, even for brief periods of separation from
their mothers, and children in institutions were found to be
psychologically disturbed (Bakwin, 1942; Bowlby, 1959, 1973). In 1945
Rene Spitz (1945, 1946) reported on his experience with children in a
foundling home, comparing them with children in the nursery of a
penal institution. The physical conditions in the foundling home were
better then those in the penal institution, but the illness and death
rates were higher. Although developmentally the foundling home
infants were superior, after a year of institutionalization they were
inferior to those in the prison setting. Within two years, 37 percent
of the foundling home children were dead; all the prison children
were alive five years later. The difference between the two settings
was that in the prison the children's mothers cared for them, while
in the foundling home the children were cared for by professional
nurses.

John Bowlby became interested in the influence of the early
environment in children in the late 1930's, and published his first
paper in 1940 (Bowlby, 1940). In 1944 he published a paper reporting
on 44 children, ages six to sixteen who were young thieves (Bowlby,
1944). The mothers of these children were described by social workers
as "immoral, violent and nagging," "extremely anxious, fussing,
critical," " drunken and cruel," "did not want the child," "unstable
and jealous," etc. One common objective factor was prolonged early
separations of the child and mother, separations where the child had
never developed a true attachment, and after separation had no
opportunity to develop a true attachment.

In a study conducted for the World Health Organization, Bowlby (1951)
surveyed the field and earlier studies. This survey included the work
of Dorothy Burlingham and Anna Freud (1944) with children evacuated
from London during the war whose behavior deteriorated in the absence
of their mothers. Bowlby's survey showed that the behaviors and
psychological disturbances of children subject to maternal
depravation and separation were many and varied. In addition to the
thievery observed by Bowlby, these disturbances included:
indifference, incorrigibility, hostility, lack of any feeling or
empathy for others - affectionless and detached (characteristic of a
psychopathic personality).

The conditions leading to such behaviors, in addition to early, even
brief, and later, longer separation from the mother, include lack of
or early loss of mother-love, and the emotional quality of the home,
even before the child's birth. Bowlsby referred to the British style
of parenting - cold, impatient, demanding. But such an atmosphere of
child rearing was not limited to Britain. For much of the first half
of this century child rearing in the United States followed Watson's
(1928) approach:

Treat them as though they were young adults. Dress them, bathe them
with care and circumspection. Let your behavior always be objective
and kindly firm. Never hug and kiss them, never let them sit on your
lap. If you must, kiss them once on the forehead when they say
goodnight. Shake hands with them in the morning. Give them a pat on
the head if they have made an extraordinary good job of a difficult
task (pp. 81-82).

Of course not all, or even most, mothers and fathers followed the
British and Watson precepts - fortunately so, considering the effects
of such a program. The need for love in the normal development of
infants and children would appear to be obvious.

The human infant is helpless and obviously unable to meet its needs
for food, clothing, and shelter. In addition to the meeting of these
needs, the infant needs more. It needs a nurturing, caring,
compassionate caretaker who provides love. For the infant, love is
communicated primarily through touch - stroking, cuddling, massaging,
kissing. Walsh (1991) notes that "even the behaviorist John Watson
believed that love was an innate human emotional need that is fed by
the tactile stimulation an infant receives as it snuggles in its
mother's arms" (p. 12). This care is "neurologically critical during
the sensitive period in which the neural pathways are being laid
down" (Walsh, 1991, p. 44). Somatosensory deprivation - lack of
touch, movement, massage, etc. - appears to be a basic cause of many
physical and psychological disturbances.

Barry Stevens (Rogers and Stevens, 1967) writes about an incident
when her husband was in charge of a pediatric ward in a New York
hospital in the twenties. "There was an infant whom none of the
doctors could find anything wrong with, but all of them agreed the
infant was dying. My husband spoke privately to a young nurse who
loved babies. He swore her to secrecy before telling her what he
wanted her to do. The secret was, 'Take care of this baby as if it
were your own. Just love it.' At that time love was nonsense even to
psychologists . . . .The baby took hold. All the doctors agreed on
that" (p. 31).

Recently a number of hospitals have been conducting experiments with
hospitalized infants. Walsh (1991) refers to an AP news story
(Associated Press, 1988) that reported on a volunteer program at St.
Lukes'-Roosevelt Medical Center in New York, that takes abandoned,
neglected infants and those born drug-addicted or with AIDS. Although
given good physical care, they received no touching or stimulation,
lying listless, and in time not even reacting to sound. But, when
volunteers held them, stroked, and cuddled them they became alert,
smiling, cooing, and reacting to stimuli.

At the University of Miami Medical School, psychologist Tiffany Field
conducted an extensive study of premature infants (Ackerman, 1990).
The infants were stroked and massaged by nurses and volunteers three
times daily. The massaged infants gained weight faster, became more
active and alert, were more responsive to stimuli, and were
discharged from the hospital sooner than nonmassaged infants. Follow-
up found that the massaged infants were larger and had fewer physical
problems. They also did better in tests of mental and motor ability.
Touch is a powerful expression of caring. Deprivation of this caring
results in retarded physical and psychological development.

Walsh (1991) writes that there is a growing momentum among
anthropologists, endocrinologists, physiologists, psychiatrists,
psychologists, neuropsychologists, and others, to recognize the role
of mothers in "the critical task of humanizing the species . . .
modern neurophysiology is reaffirming Freud's belief in the
centrality of the mother's role in making us human . . . .love . . .
is a biological and psychological necessity" (p. 37).

It is important to note that unloving behavior such as aggressive
physical and verbal behavior toward children is disruptive of healthy
development (Cohen & Brook, 1995). Hitting, slapping, beating, and
yelling even when justified as punishment have a causal effect on the
development of delinquency through modeling coercive and aggressive
behavior (McCord, 1995). Children learn the very interpersonal
behaviors which the punishment is usually designed to supress (Cohen
and Brook, 1995). Caretaker behavior need not be extreme to cause
behavior disorders. According to Maughan, Pickles, and Ouinton
(1995) "Harsh and coercive parenting, even when it falls short of
overt abuse, can have serious negative effects" (p. 34). The use of
sarcasm ("I'm gonna break your legs if you don't settle down."),
scare tactics ("Stop that or I will lock you in the attic with the
ghosts."), belittling the child ("You're so stupid."), or labeling
and rejecting the entire child for one act ("You are a bad boy for
running across the street.") can have detrimental effects on the
healthy development of children (Cochrane and Myers, 1980). Baumrind
(1980), evaluating the research, concludes that "caretakers play a
determining role in the ways their children develop . . . .caretakers
can have a determining effect on children's intelligence, character,
and competence" (p. 640).

Ainsworth (1979) who with Bowlsby spent much of her life studying
mother-infant attachment, notes that while "it is an essential part
of the growth plan of the human species - as well as that of many
other species - for an infant to become attached to a mother figure,
this figure need not be the natural mother but can be anyone who
plays the role of principal caregiver" (p. 932).

Baumrind (1980) states that "there is no evidence of a biological
need for an exclusive primary bond, and certainly not a bond to a
particular person because she happens to be the child's biological
mother" (p. 145). But "a primary commitment cannot be shared,
although the care itself can and should be. Someone must, when no one
else will, provide the attention, stimulation, and continuous
personal relationship without which a child is consigned to
psychosis, psychopathy, or marasmus" (p. 145). And fathers, men, can
be principal caregivers, especially if they are socialized to give
appropriate nurturing behaviors.

CONSEQUENCES OF LOVE DEPRIVATION

The effects of being deprived of love are harmful to adults and
devastating to children. "Individuals deprived of love become
emotionally barren as they plod through dark lives" (Walsh, 1991, p.
8). "Without love there can be no healthy growth or development"
(Montagu, 1981, p. 93).

Walsh (1991) opens his discussion of the effects of absence of a
loving infant and early childhood environment with a general
statement: "The human infant can be molded and cultivated into a
decent and caring adult, or its development can be distorted horribly
in a way no nonhuman animal can have its nature altered by
experiences that occur within its species" (p. 8). He then proceeds
to document this statement. The innate potentials of the infant or
child, the inherent drive towards the actualization of these
potentials in a process of self-actualization, can be inhibited and
distorted by the absence of a nurturing environment of unconditional
love. Furthermore, these human potentials can be nearly or totally
destroyed by abuse of the caretaking relationship.

The Neuroses

The various neuroses originate in some form of emotional deprivation,
resulting in a lack of satisfaction of the basic human needs for
affection, security, respect, and self-esteem. The child's need for
love has been thwarted by parents who are emotionally cold,
controlling, and unloving. The neurotic engages in attempts to meet
his or her needs for love and respect in ways that often turn other
people off. Neurotics are unable to offer the love and respect which
would lead to reciprocation by others. Henderson (1982) studied the
neurotic person's difficulty of forming attachments. Though they
desperately desire such attachments, and engage in care-eliciting
behavior, involving crying (in children), attempts to draw sympathy
and "please love me" appeals, this behavior is not successful. Walsh
(1991) relates this to Maslow's deficit love, an abnormal craving for
love.

Depression and Suicide

One of the symptoms of depression is thoughts of suicide. However,
depression itself is an amorphous category of emotional disturbance.
What has been called marasmus in infants is probably similar to
depression in older persons. While there appears to be an increasing
awareness of biochemical, and even genetic factors in depression, it
is still the case that depression is usually precipitated by
environmental events, particularly the loss of a loved one. And it is
possible that biochemical abnormalities are the result of
psychosocial experiences. Akiskal and McKinney (1975), for example,
suggest that rejection, lovelessness, and lack of relatedness leads
to reduced brain catecholines resulting in the behavioral
disturbances characteristic of depression. Certainly, there are
depressions that are the result of psychosocial factors rather than
biochemical or genetic factors, though a genetic predisposition may
be present in some cases. The evidence, at this time, is not
consistent or absolutely definitive.

Suicide appears to be clearly related to psychosocial factors.
Durkheim (1951), a French sociologist, noted the relation between
social anomie and suicide. Suicide is higher in urban areas, among
the unmarried and divorced, and among those living isolated lives.
Among children, those who attempt suicide are more likely to have
experienced abuse and neglect (Rosenthal and Rosenthal, 1984).
Adolescents who attempt suicide are usually isolated from their
friends and family. Walsh (1991) reports a study in which he and a
colleague found suicide attempts among juvenile delinquents related
to love-deprivation.

Schizophrenia

As in the case of depression, there is evidence of brain
malfunctioning and genetic factors in many of those diagnosed as
schizophrenic. But there are wide differences among those with this
diagnosis. While the concept of schizophrenogenic mother is no longer
accepted, there are psychosocial factors present; it is difficult,
however, to discern cause-effect relationships, even though PET and
CAT scans show brain abnormalities. Drugs (chlorpromazine and
recently clozapine) relieve or remove the symptoms in many
schizophrenics.

Seymour Kety (See Walsh, 1991), a researcher on the genetics of
schizophrenia, points out that we cannot dismiss environmental
factors which can precipitate, intensify, or ameliorate symptoms.
Love deprivation is viewed by many as an environmental factor, that
may operate by affecting chemical factors in the brain. Walsh (1991)
cites studies by Robert Heath on Harlow's love-deprived monkeys that
found brain disturbances. Walsh concludes that "schizophrenia may
very well be the result of the effects of early childhood experiences
on the mechanisms of neurotransmitter metabolism for individuals with
a schizophrenic predisposition" (p. 124). Lack of care and parental
love, experienced as coldness and rejection, lead to passivity,
isolation and suspicion (Buss, 1966). Studies of the onset of
schizophrenia find this isolation and lack of responsiveness prior to
the onset. Walsh (1991) points out that genetic factors in parents
may influence parenting behavior. In addition, the authors note that
some attention should be given to historical psychosocial factors in
parental behavior. What quality of caretaking experience did the
parents have themselves as children and how did that experience
influence the parents' ability to love their children? The
interactions of genetics, brain chemistry and environmental factors
are complex, but in the trend toward biologizing schizophrenia,
environmental factors cannot be ignored.

Sociopathy and Criminality

Statements reminding us of the importance of early love in antisocial
behavior abound. A Public Broadcasting System radio program recently
quoted a former Los Angeles gang member as saying: "Kids aren't born
bad. Kids are bad because they can't find love." Anthropologist
Ashley Montague (1970) writes: "Show me a murderer, a hardened
criminal, a juvenile delinquent, a psychopath, or a 'cold fish' and
in almost every case I will show you a tragedy that has resulted from
not being properly loved during childhood" (p. 46). Research cited by
McCord (1995) point to aggresive parental behaviors such as hitting,
slapping, and beating as contributors to the development of juvenile
delinquency. Lance Morrow (1992), in a Time magazine essay came to
the conclusion that "it is usually the want of love that makes
children vicious and sends them out of control" (p. 68).

Not all criminal behavior is the result of lack of love, of course.
Walsh (1991) estimates that about ten percent of habitual criminals
are psychopaths, or sociopaths. They come from loveless homes,
characterized by neglect, rejection, and abuse. Not having
experienced love for themselves, they may have difficulty feeling
love for others. In some cases, children have had to alienate
themselves from their own hurt at being unloved, from their feelings
of unworthiness and eventually self-rejection. To protect themselves
from the those negative feelings, they have alienated themselves to
some degree from all feelings. Thus they have a diminished capacity
to feel sympathy or empathy for others, and are able to engage in
cruelty toward others without personally feeling consequences. They
have little or no capacity for empathy.

Empathic development always occurs through interaction with others.
Hoffman (1982) outlined developmental progression of empathic
awareness beginning at birth with a reactive cry. This is a response
when newborn babies hear the cry of other babies. The ability to take
the role of another, according to Hoffman, begins around the age of 2
or 3 when a child can understand that others have feelings which
differ from his/her own. Another step toward empathic potential comes
with the development of language. Although there is probably no one
critical window of time for development of empathy, it would be
reasonable to predict that a child who does not experience being
loved would have few experiences for positive identification of self
and others, and would be less likely to develop the capacity for
empathy. Aggression, violence and cruelty may be committed without
limits when there is no development of empathic understanding with
others.

Walsh (1991, pp. 141-146) presents evidence that deprivation of love
affects the functioning of emotional centers of the brain, leading to
disruptive behaviors. "In fact, the physiological line of thought
reasons that socialization and the development of conscience (the
internalized control of behavior) are largely a function of autonomic
conditioning in childhood" (Walsh, 1991, p. 147). That early
experiences can affect brain structure as well as function is
becoming clear. Weil (1985) notes "that experiences induce
neurophysiological structuring is increasingly recognized" (p. 336;
see also Rourke, Bakker, Fiske, and Strang, 1983). Whatever the
interrelationships and relative weights of genetic, neurological, and
psychological factors, sociopathic criminals appear to share some
abnormalities in all these areas; genetic factors contribute
susceptibility to the influence of other factors.

Not all parents are good nurturers, or to use Winnicott's (1965)
term "good enough mothers." Not all parents can or will love their
infants. But it is not possible to remove infants or children from
such parents, unless and until there is evidence of abuse. Early
intervention, beginning before the birth of the child can have
positive effects with some of these parents. Intervention later to
repair the effects of neglect and abuse has not been highly effective
(Parens and Kramer, 1993). It is possible that there is a critical
period for the bonding of the necessary relationship with a
caretaker.

WHAT CAN BE DONE?

Ideally, every infant and young child should have at least one
principal caretaker who can and will provide the unconditional love
necessary for normal physical and psychological development. This is
clearly a tremendous task, and society is probably not yet ready , or
able, to provide such care. Yet while it may be impossible in our
world society to assure a loving caregiver for every infant and
child, the desirability, indeed the necessity, of doing so must be
recognized, and steps taken toward its achievement. Walsh (1991)
notes that while there are agencies charged with assuring a minimal
level of food and shelter (though not successfully doing this for all
citizens), "there are no similar institutions monitoring the nation's
love needs, nor is there likely to be any time soon" (p. 52).

Steps that can, and should be taken include the following:

Ratification by the United States of the United Nations Convention on
the Rights of the Child (United Nations General Assembly, 1989). This
convention was adopted by the159 Member States of the UN General
Assembly on November 20, 1989, and has been ratified by 54 nations,
but not by the United States. This convention includes the right of
the child to affection, love, and understanding in a family, unless
it is in the best interests of the child to remove the child from the
parents.
Prenatal care, including preventing malnutrition in mothers, and
education in infant needs and care can be increased. Here, the United
States is behind some other countries.
Modification of hospital practices and extension of the programs to
provide infant stimulation through massaging and other contacts by
touch, by the mother/father and by other hospital personnel.
Providing maternal - and paternal - leave from employment on, and for
a period following, the birth of a child. Desirably this should be
paid leave, so that those with low incomes could afford it. The
United States has lagged behind other countries. Over 100 countries
provided this, before the United States, even though the United
States was a signatory to the United Nations Convention in the
Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women that
includes an agreement "to introduce maternity leave with pay or
comparable social benefits without loss of former employment" (Walsh,
1991, p. 53). In 1993, the United States finally joined the other
developed countries when the family leave legislation was passed by
the Congress and signed by President Clinton.
Provide person-centered theory based education to parents and
potential parents about effective parenting behavior and the
provision of love.
Provide education to the public concerning the devastation of abuse.
Part of the problem of abuse is that the issue has been avoided. From
the time when Sigmund Freud bowed to the pressure of professional
shunning to our own times when abuse is still denied as fantasy,
human abuse reminds us too poignantly of our own fears. In avoiding
our own sorrow we have allowed children to live the terror of abuse
and to pass their inheritance to the following generations.
Encourage the awareness of the media (television/video programming,
print and internet) as influences on interpersonal behavior,
especially on modeling effective behavior for parenting roles,
conflict resolution, and the provision of love.
CONCLUSION

This paper presents just a sampling of the voluminous evidence that
the level of love in infancy and early childhood is the source of
much, if not most, psychosocial disturbance and disorder Love is a
powerful prophylactic. The logical solution of the problem is
startlingly simple: The provision of a safe and loving caregiver for
every infant and child. The actual implementation of this solution is
admittedly difficult. It requires focus and intent. Educational
models built on client-centered/person-centered theory can contribute
to healthy social roles and behaviors which promote more effective
love of children. Therapists can facilitate person-centered theory
based education through school and college classes, organizational
presentations, and community discussions. There are isolated efforts
being made toward the goal of creating more loving environments for
children, and thus there is some hope that with recognition of its
importance, more will be done.

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facilitating environment. New York. International Universities Press.


----------------------------------------------------------------------
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Author Note: Chapter adapted from Successful Psychotherapy: A Loving,
Caring Relationship (1997). C. H. Patterson & S. C. Hidore, New York:
Jason-Aronson.

http://www.americanvalues.org/html/adulthood___its_discontents.shtml


    Wednesday, April 10, 2002


Adulthood and its Discontents
Keynote address to the Institute Annual Symposium, delivered by David
Gutmann on May 27, 1998

The Necessary Adult | Versions of Adulthood | Adulthood and the
Transformations of Narcissism | Identity: Discovering the Ideal Self
Beyond the Self | Intimacy: From "I" to "We" | Generativity: Entering
the Life-Cycle | Adulthood: The Down Side | The Return of Adulthood

The Necessary Adult

In order for a society to persist over the generations, it must
continuously recruit from its ranks a special elite, individuals who
are prepared to live by and pass on its defining values, fight its
wars, take responsibility for its governance, and do its routine but
necessary work - all this while turning out enough physically and
mentally healthy children to keep the whole enterprise going across
the generations. Each society has its own name for this vital cohort;
in the English-speaking world we call them "adults". By contrast to
mature men and women, children and seniors are either pre-productive
or post-productive; as a consequence, their families and larger
societies allow children and seniors a great deal of freedom: They
are permitted to indulge themselves, and even to play at being anti-
social. Those who are big enough and smart enough to produce,
reproduce, and govern, are not given such latitude: It is expected
that they will accept the disciplines of work, the sacrifices
required by parenthood, the obligations of citizenship, and that they
will raise up kids who will later - and even with some pleasure -take
their own adult place in the social brigades. The 20 restrictions
that society puts on the adult guarantee the playfulness of the
child, and the ease of the senior. As the Hindus put it, the
householder, though not at the highest stage of growth in the moral
sense, nevertheless supports all the other asramas, all the stages
that precede it as well as those that follow.

But there has been for some time a pervasive unease in our land - a
sense that Americans who are big enough, old enough, and smart enough
to be adults are not responding the summons. Their class is being
called, but many do not muster at the usual assembly points. Or, of
those who do mobilize, too many quickly desert: too many are crippled
by addictions and significant mental illness; in too many the
capacity for commitment to either love or work is stunted; and far
too many attempt marriage, but defect to divorce when the early
passions cool down. Beyond that, as Judith Martin (Ms. Manners) has
documented, it is no longer the state of adulthood that is celebrated
in our popular culture, but the larval and pupal stages - childhood
and adolescence - that precede it. If the state of adulthood is the
pivot and center of our social architecture, then it begins to appear
that this center may not hold.

Clearly, the physical maturation of the body, its reproductive organs
and even its brain is not sufficient to bring about, in young
individuals, their psychological and social maturation, as true
adults.

What has gone wrong? Why does the developmental process in regard to
adulthood get stalled at the pupal or even the larval stages? Why is
this crucial developmental process churning out so many aborted and
immature forms? Based on their critical studies of degenerative
changes in American family and cultural life, some keen observers and
social critics have come up with important clues. Thus, David
Blankenhorn has documented the deconstruction of American fatherhood
and the damage wrought on children by life without father. Barbara
Whitehead has shown that too often marriage is only a prelude to
membership in the divorce culture; and Dr. Judith Wallerstein has
revealed the grim clinical consequences, for children, of their
parent's rush to the divorce court. These sightings were all made
from within our society, and involve comparisons between clinical and
non-clinical populations, between the fathered and the fatherless,
between the children of divorce and the children of intact families.
Other investigative strategies lead us outside of our own society, to
look at the varieties of adulthood crafted by other humans, at other
times and in other places. Beyond the local narrative of adulthood
there is a more universal, species narrative; paradoxically, a
careful reading of this species text can help us to better understand
our own local narrative of adulthood, and our own troubles with this
crucial stage.

Versions of Adulthood

The data that best reveals the usually overlooked species narrative
comes from those societies that maintain formal age - grade systems,
clear role and status hierarchies that are chronologically arranged.

The age-grade systems of major Sub-Saharan tribes are typical of many
others. Thus, Spencer found that Samburu males are divided into age -
sets, composed of peers that move together through the sequential age
grades which define their powers, their rights, their duties, and
even their attitudes. The most important distinction is cut between
the Moran, the age set of young, unmarried warriors, flamboyant
predators of other men's herds and wives, and the moderate bourgeois
householder. The Moran may liven up the neighborhood and attract
tourists; but unlike the settled adult householders, they also make
trouble. The raunchy young Moran have to be kept in line by the most
advanced age grades, those who can not match them in physical
strength, but who can deploy potent curses against them.

Older men across the same range of research sites are not so
concentrated on the physical welfare of their family or village; they
are more "liberated," more concerned about their own or their
community's relationship to God. The consuming interest in family
well-being is restricted to the younger, house-holding adult.

In studying the life course of younger and older adult men of the
Druze, Mayan, and Navajo societies, I was similarly impressed by the
importance that the younger Paterfamilias give - across this wide
range of societies - to domestic responsibilities and pleasures. In
response to my standard question, "what is it that makes you feel
good?", the younger men in the age range 35 through 55 would
routinely give some version of this basic response: "When my family
is fed, and there is peace in the village."

Generally speaking, the various ethnographic accounts from around the
globe vary in their details, but they add up to a generic and
predictable human story: young un-married men are apt to be wild,
predatory within their community as well as outside of it,
exhibitionistic, and not much good for anything besides hunting and
warfare. The restrained householder is clearly less dramatic, but his
adult maintenance activities are clearly more important to the social
welfare. The adult Samburu has already been proved himself as a
reckless Moran; he has sown his wild oats and won his chosen woman;
now he can afford to be square - and even to enjoy it.

Adulthood and the Transformations of Narcissism

How should we think about the tectonic developmental shift that
transforms the scrappy, self-indulging post-adolescent into the
sober, reliable and caring adult house-holder? Sociologists and
cultural anthropologists would answer that these males take their
direction from society: their behavior is choreographed for them by
the societal software - the role prescriptions that are appropriate
to their age grade. The sociologists and anthropologists put all the
dynamism of development outside of the individual, and into the
socializing organs of the community.

But interpretations of this sort fly in the face of what we know
about human development as a self-initiated internal process, moving
according to its own time table, and in some independence of cultural
scripts. In order to understand the great transformations into
adulthood, we have to consider the ways that the species imperatives
manifest themselves within persons, and within the intimate dyads
formed by co-developing partners.

Many theories can be called on. For reasons that should become clear,
as we consider the pathways to adulthood I mean to emphasize the
human capacity for awe, worship and idealization. Admittedly, dogs
can adore their masters; but in its more complex displays this
appetite for the ideal is unique to our species: it is only we humans
who endow heroes, idols, gods, political leaders, nations, systems of
thought - and our own children - with unordinary qualities, pledging
to them our loyalty, our service, and even our lives. Like most
powerful human propensities - love for example, and aggression - the
drive to idealize has both its introversive (self-directed) and its
extroversive (outward-directed) expressions. When this drive is
turned outward, it takes the form of worship and fidelity to some
expression of the ideal, whether in the social, natural, or
supernatural domains. In its introversive mode, turned inwardly, it
leads to a reflexive idealization of the self by the self: its own
qualities, its own projects and products, its illusory perfections,
its own appetites and their objects, and even its crochets. It takes
the form that the psychoanalysts term "narcissism" - or, depending on
the severity of consequences - "pathological narcissism".

Reviewing the species narrative, we soon realize that the transition
to adulthood is based on a profound redirection of the idealizing
tendency: from being introversive and reflexive - fixed, that is on
the self - to being focused on some worthy version of otherness. For
both men and women, we can say that adulthood has been achieved when
narcissism is transmuted - and thereby detoxified - into strong,
lasting idealizations and into healthy narcissism. In Pathological
narcissism the claims of the individual trump all others; and the
personality is mobilized to defend, justify and achieve these self
priorities. The self-esteem of the NPD (Narcissistic personality
Disorder) is likely to be founded in illusion, in a refusal to
recognize his own imperfections. Self-entitled, he gives primacy to
his own claims over any competition - even including the blunt claims
of the Reality Principle. The pathologically narcissistic individual
is noxious to others, and ultimately to himself: nature finally
punishes those who are not humble before its rules. Instead of
himself, the true adult venerates ideal versions of his community,
his vocation and his family; and he serves the institutions that
maintain the legendary virtues. He concedes his self-worship to
something larger, he becomes enlisted in that larger whole, and
thereby - now as part of some worthy enterprise - he acquires
transmuted, de-toxified "Healthy Narcissism": a new basis for self
esteem that enhances the projects of the other as well as the self.

But adulthood, so defined, is not attained in one big jump. The full
adult transition requires a series of renunciations, wherein
narcissism is turned outward, in a fixed order of conversions, to
invest and valorize entities that, while linked to the growing self,
lie beyond its immediate reach. The psychoanalyst Erik Erikson laid
out one ground plan of the necessary transitions. In a natural
sequence, These build towards the essential components of the adult
person: ego identity, intimacy and generativity - the capacities to
work, to love, and to nurture that which is new and fragile but also
promising.

Identity: Discovering the Ideal Self Beyond the Self

Tracking this sequence, let us first consider "Identity" -
(incidentally, one of the most over-used and misunderstood terms in
current psychology). On the one hand, the identity construction
within the youthful head provides a new platform and new rationales
for internal regulation; on the other hand, it provides a new basis
for social participation. Joseph Adelson's cross-national research on
Political Socialization reveals the developmental precursors of the
adolescent transition towards ego identity, and a more expanded
social engagement. He and his colleagues found that, at around age
sixteen (and regardless of gender, intelligence level, ethnicity or
national origin) adolescents attain a new, more complex sense of the
social order. On the one hand, Society is seen to be supra-personal,
persisting independently of its component individuals; nevertheless,
this same social order, despite being abstract and remote, becomes as
real to these young people as any solid, familiar individual. The
identity quest begins in earnest when adolescents try to work out
where they stand, as individuals, vis-a-vis this newly apprehended,
supra-individual reality.

The social has acquired for them a kind of person-hood; now their job
is to make the personal become social. Recognizing this development,
and its consequences for personal and social health, Erikson began to
study the shared metaphors that made for an Identity - perceivable to
individuals - between the social and the personal domains. Long
before it entered the vocabulary of Psychobabble, "Identity" was a
term in logic, signifying an equivalence between two terms or
entities that may appear to be superficially dissimilar, but that are
strongly linked in some more abstract, logical sense. But most of
those who now use the term disregard its connective meanings; they
fail to see or refuse to see that "identity" refers to more than one
entity; that it implies - as suggested by Adelson's work - a merging
of the experienced self with some more abstract social imago. Thus,
Erikson himself was understandably impatient with students and
theorists who think of "identity" as another form of self-absorption,
an answer to the self-absorbed question, "who am I?" By contrast,
Erikson insisted that identity is a register of what you stand for;
It is your potential self writ large, restated in an idiom that
derives from cultural exemplars. Thus, identity is attained when the
young individual discovers an equivalence between his own - usually
inchoate - origin myth, and the founding legend of some worthy group,
vocation, profession, religion or nation. Once this union is
experienced, the unstated legend of the self is given definition, and
made communicable to responsive others. At this developmental
juncture, what had once been the rhetoric of "the grown-ups," now
becomes the language through which the individual is known to himself
and presented to the world.

As a new adjunct to inner controls, this new identity "organ" takes
over the regulatory functions of the superego, and moves them to a
more advanced level. The Superego is a primitive control agent; it
memorializes the child's naive view of the omnipotent parent and his
powers. In effect, the superego preserves the archaic and essentially
masochistic route to totemic powers that is coded into rites de
passage around the world: the candidate for adult potencies "stoops
to conquer" - he acquires title to power by first enduring, in a
posture of abasement, the lash of those powers against his own skin
(The Prince is trained in the stables, with the men that he will
someday lead). The Superego moves this ancient sado-masochistic dance
inside the head: By submitting to the now internal voice of the
parental lawgiver the child gains security, but also access to the
powers that he conceded to the parent. As long as he lives by the
parental commandments - however idiosyncratic and arbitrary they may
be - as long as "he does not go behind his father's saying," he can
speak and act powerfully, in the name of the law. But with the
attainment of identity, the young person chooses the collective
discipline that he will submit to and represent. And that discipline,
being couched in terms of revered principles rather than arbitrary,
specific rules can be shaped to changing circumstances and
opportunities. Under the sign of Identity, principles, rather than
representing the dead hand of the past, can become the sponsors of
innovation and creativity. The Superego serves congealed tradition
and orthodoxy; Identity, while preserving necessary personal and
social controls, opens the person and the society to the future. The
Superego imposes sanctified rules; but Identity introduces
individuals to coherent, crafted Disciplines that have meaning, that
make sense as routes to an ideal way of being. Erikson once remarked
that deprivation is not, in itself, psychologically damaging; it is
only deprivation without meaning that is psychologically destructive.
Viewed thus, we see that identity gives rich significance to the
risks and renunciations that are called for by the professional,
marital and parental choices of a full adult life. The disciplines
that they mandate become tolerable - and even desirable. What appears
from the outside to be passive conformity is from the inside
experienced as a kind of ritual and even worship. Thus, identity
entails a new relation to society, to controls, and - perhaps most
importantly - to the tide of narcissism. When the metaphors of self
are discovered in a larger, collective scheme, and when the traces of
that scheme are likewise encountered within the self, then narcissism
moves away from the self, and crosses the bridge formed by that
identity. What was personal narcissism comes to invest the larger,
social entities that are congruent with the self. The grandiosity and
self-regard that was once conserved for the private self is
automatically transferred to some grander political, religious or
aesthetic scheme in human affairs. Via the attainment of identity,
potentially destructive narcissism is converted into shared ideology,
shared discipline and shared purpose. Potentially pathological
narcissism is transformed, detoxified, in healthy narcissism. All
this is not to say that the endowment of identity brings selfless
sainthood: healthy narcissism is still narcissism. Even within this
matured posture, one may still continue to strive for personal glory
and to humble the competition. But now the definition of success
calls for the larger enterprise to be enhanced, along with the greedy
self: in crushing his rivals the chess champion also discovers new
gambits that enrich the game for all serious players; the great
surgeon outdoes his competitors, but only by adding to the healing
art that they all revere.

Intimacy: From "I" to "WE"

The sense of identity is based on the allegiance to some fixed
certainty, one ratified by revelation and the unordinary deeds of
extraordinary agents; folding ourselves into their enduring truth, we
gain a sense of permanence and continuity that cannot be lost. With
this guarantee in place, we can accept the existential challenge that
is built into the condition of Intimacy. By definition, our intimates
are chosen and loved because they are unique, remarkable, one of a
kind. They represent worthy qualities that we can only know through
sharing their life. There is, however, an inescapable down side to
Intimacy: this unique other is by definition irreplaceable; once
lost, our intimates can never - save in dreams - be held again.
Identity, which cannot be lost so long as the central nervous system
remains intact, allows us to accept the existential dangers of
intimacy, which is always at risk. Mingling self and other, the
condition of intimacy creates a new bridge for further conversions of
narcissism: The personal story of conjugal partners is about "us"
and "we", rather than "me". Identity guarantees a special yet stable
self; Intimacy underwrites the Eros of a lasting conjugality.

Generativity: Entering the Life-Cycle

  As the girls used to sing when I was a kid, "First there's love, and
then there's marriage, then here comes Barbie with a baby carriage."
Once the intimate and trustworthy "we" has formed, the conjugal
couple can risk the next adventure. Men and women are now as smart,
strong and passionate as they will ever be; and if adult development
is to continue, it must proceed via third parties - through the child
that mingles the blood and the genetic legacy of the conjugal couple.
That couple enters the stage of Generativity, usually (though not
necessarily) enacted in the parental role. Emboldening each other,
they can face the daunting challenge of becoming in the fullest sense
like their own fathers and mothers. Our species narrative holds that,
when the couple takes on the powers and responsibilities of their own
parents, then they have - by definition - reached the very summit of
adulthood. Indeed, contemporary American society is one of the few in
which a major attempt has been made (outside of monastic orders) to
define adulthood as separate from parenthood.

Parenthood deserves its top billing on the scale of adulthood: It
routinely brings about what is probably the greatest renunciation of
narcissism in the entire life cycle. Before the onset of what I have
called the "chronic emergency of parenthood" young men and women are
still allowed a good deal of freedom to strive towards the
narcissistic goals of omnipotentiality and omniconsumption. They can
hold on to all possible potentials and options, no matter how
mutually exclusive these might be. Before the entry into parenthood
the care and tending of the self 3/4 its development and expansion,
its priorities, and its pleasures 3/4 still retains (despite the
competing claims of identity and intimacy) a fairly high priority.
But the main message that I got from adult men in various peasant
societies was that marriage, and particularly parenthood, ended the
fun and games of young manhood, and that these pleasures were largely
unregretted. Predictably, in unstable as well as stable societies,
men told me that they had been wild "Moran" in their youth but that
marriage had shifted their character dramatically, toward greater
responsibility, selflessness, and moderation: "When I was a young man
I used to hell around; I didn't care for myself or anybody else." ("I
see that you are different now. What happened?") "Well, you know how
it is: I got married I had kids."

Psychoanalytic theory is mainly concerned with the earliest
transformations of narcissism - those which contribute to the
formation of the primitive self. But our naturalistic review shows
that narcissism represents more than emergency psychic rations for
the starved, immature ego. Like any central theme in the human
species narrative, narcissism as an evolved adaptation serves species
and social goals, as well as individual needs. On the individual
level, narcissism does sustain the vulnerable self; on the social
level it manifests in the idealism that sustains our vulnerable
societies; and on the species level, it protects our vulnerable
children. Thus, once extended to the child, Parental narcissism
reveals what may be its most central purpose: to provide essential
protection to the fragile, demanding human infant. Thus, under
species-normal conditions, the narcissism of new parents naturally
gravitates outward, away from themselves, and reveals itself in a new
form: as the virtual deification of their baby. Unlike earlier
conversions of narcissism, the parental transformation is not aimed
at securing and elevating the parental couple; instead, it is
dedicated to bringing about the individuality, the sturdy self-hood
of this wondrous child.

The womb is a biological organ specially crafted to sponsor the
physical growth, from fertilized ovum to neonate, of the human
infant; likewise, the conjugal, parenting family is in effect an
extra-uterine extension of the womb, shaped by evolution to sponsor
the psychological and social - as well as the physical - growth of
the still partially decorticate, still incompletely human neonate. In
order to bring this new familial "womb" into being, both parents must
re-deploy the remaining figments of their narcissism and together
devote themselves to the completion of this generative
family "organ." Surrendering many of their personal goals in favor of
larger family system goals, the new parents become complementary and
coacting components - protective rind or nurturing core - of the
family structure. Thus, both parents give up the illusion that they
can be at the same time both masculine and feminine and instead split
their sexual natures between the conjugal pair, giving over to their
partner the gendered qualities that would interfere with their
particular parental assignment. Men concede their "feminine" side -
the softness that might conflict with their protective role - to the
wife; while forming the protective rind on the family's periphery,
they live out their gentler nature vicariously, through
identification with the maternal, nurturing core of the family. In
their turn, wives concede the aggressive potentials that could
terrify their vulnerable kids (or drive away their mate) to the
husband. In order to form the mothering core, wives in effect export
their own aggression out of the house with their man, leaving the
home as a relatively benign and demilitarized zone.

Finally, both parents concede to the baby prince or princess the most
stubborn narcissistic illusion of all - that of personal immortality.
Now it is the child rather than the parent who is omnipotential; it
is the child who can be all things and will never die. Parents still
fear death, but now they fear not their own demise, but the obscene
possibility that their child will predecease them. These various
concessions of personal narcissism towards celebration of the child,
lead to the routine, daily heroism of fathers and mothers (a virtue,
by the way, that is only rarely acknowledged or studied by
contemporary social scientists). Nevertheless, when parental self-
centeredness does not convert into child-centeredness, then infants
are put at risk, victimized by their parent's unconcern and too often
by their rage. A central meaning of adulthood is that - as a
condition built on restraints, deep attachments, and successive
renunciations of narcissism - this state protects children from the
potential selfishness, rivalry and ferocity of their own parents.

Adulthood: The Down Side

Thus far, I have sketched a rosy, even ideal picture of human
development. We now turn to the state of affairs in our own nation.
If a major function of adulthood is to protect children during their
season of protracted vulnerability, then current events force us to
recognize that we North Americans are in a drawn out and worsening
adulthood drought. I do not have to spell out the crises of
childhood, adolescence and youth in contemporary America - they have
been thickly documented and tragically demonstrated in unbelievably
bloody ways. But our question concerns people who are bigger than
children and older than adolescents: what, we ask, has happened to
adulthood? The constructs introduced earlier - Identity, Intimacy,
and Generativity - should give better focus and precision to our
thinking on this question.

Let us look first at the pathways to identity in post-modern America.
Bear in mind that national cultures, as well as sub-cultures within
them have as their moral foundations the values, traditions,
institutions and disciplines bequeathed by unordinary founders.
Founded on great legends, vital cultures provide the seed-beds of
individual identity. But In every enlightened society, including our
own, the national cultures and sub-cultures - the major seed-beds of
identity - are opposed by the high culture: of creative literature,
experimental theater, academic criticism, and the social sciences.
The high culture makes its agenda and its living out of provoking
culture wars: questioning established certainties, exploding hallowed
myths, ridiculing conformity or piety, and exposing the flawed nature
of revered figures. Thus, we are reliably informed that Thomas
Jefferson cohabited with his slaves; Abe Lincoln was a manic-
depressive, a closet racist, and perhaps a closeted homosexual;
George Washington may have cheated on Martha. But the high culture
goes way beyond such gossip-y nihilism; it is revolutionary against
the national culture. While degrading the founding legends of its own
society, it idealizes and elevates the legends of the enemy. Thus,
the wardens of high culture have trashed not only our founding
figures, but our founding myths of Democratic statehood. As depicted
by them, America does not stand for a singular goodness, a redeeming
idea of freedom in the world, but for a singular evil: it is a
monster among the nations, born in the genocide of the Indians, the
enslavement of the Blacks, the expropriation of the Hispanics. In
more recent times it is not celebrated as the nation that gave the
coup de grace to Hitler and Tojo; instead, it is condemned as the
butcher of Hiroshima, the instigator of the Cold War, the Amerika of
Vietnam, and the homeland of McCarthyism. Thus In our American case,
the high culture typically reverses the moral polarities: it grants
privileged, even mythic status to the various racial or sexual
minorities that can plausibly claim to be victims of oppression by
the majority culture. In Charles Krauthammer's terms, deviancy is
defined upwards: the dope-head may be exonerated as a victim, or even
praised as a heroic rebel against middle-class stodginess, while the
responsible but undramatic bourgeoisie are accused of driving him to
self-destruction.

When the high culture is ascendant, it leads to hectic excitement, a-
historic secularism, a multitude of foundation grants, an appetite
for novelty, life-ways experimentation, and patronizing irony - "one-
upsmanship" as a personal style. But the high culture does not
provide even its stars with lasting psychological comfort, it does
not engender identity, and it turns out offspring who typically write
books detailing the neuroses of their celebrity parents.
Nevertheless, in contemporary American society the high culture is
increasingly triumphant: it dictates the style and interests of much
of the media, of increasingly illiberal education, even the content
of religious ritual and the sermons of church men. The shrill
grievances of its victims are enshrined in myths that drive out the
founding myths of America. While we cannot lay all the blame for the
deconstruction of identities on our high culture, it does lead the
attack. Along with materialism, urbanism and the degradation of
family life, it is a prime mover in the deculturation of America.

But whatever the culprits, instead of clear identities the new
generations increasingly show the stigmata of identity failure and
breakdown, plus attempts at remedy which lead to further social and
personal pathology. Identity failure increasingly takes the negative
form that Erikson characterized as "Ego Diffusion" - the syndrome
that appears when youthful candidates for identity refuse the
essential jump. Convinced that critical decisions will limit their
options, they will not make the decisive choices - to include and to
exclude - that are essential to identity formation. By refusing to
choose, they can hold on to the illusion that they are all-including,
capable of being anything and everything. Many become existential
dilettantes - consumers of all possible life - styles, no matter how
mutually exclusive these may be. Much like our current president,
they try to be, all at once, lechers and feminists, masculine and
feminine, hetero- and homo, sybarites and socialists, Dope-heads and
revolutionaries, yogis and commissars. Alternatively, they become
addicted to those psychedelic substances that confirm the user's
hectic fantasies of being everything and having everything. Ego
diffusion can sponsor happy times for affluent youth - until they
discover, too late, that not choosing has all the consequences of a
disastrous and by now irrevocable choice. In no way is it a way-
station to adulthood.

Identity Diffusion has a more ominous fall-out: now we get the
appropriately named "Identity Politics", centered on the
prefabricated pseudo-identities sponsored by the swollen rhetoric of
victimhood. Erikson wrote of the "synthetic" identities - usually
taking the form of extreme nationalism - adopted as an emergency
measure by youths in danger of psychic fragmentation. What we are
seeing now is the emergence of equally pseudo - identities based on
deculturation, on social rather than psychic fragmentation. In
societies which provide armatures for true identity development,
young adults declare themselves through their special skills and
powers - through the callings that they have chosen, and that have
chosen them. But In identity-absent cultures like our own, young
individuals discover themselves in the special foods, the strange
sex, or the lurid oppressions that have been imposed on them by fate
or their appetites. What was once seen as addiction or pathology is
redeemed; converted, via victimhood, into the stuff of off-the-shelf
identities.

There are psychological bonuses to be found under the sign of the
victim, experiences which temporarily satisfy the hunger for
identity. Thus, the self-baptized victim does inherit a shared legend
of historic injustice; clear allies as well as clear enemies; a
comprehensive, all-explaining dogma, and a sense of shared purpose
with one's fellow sufferers. But here the resemblance to true
identity ends: victimhood leads also to a Manichean world view, to
easily justified rage, to reliance on violence as a political tactic,
and to the dedicated collection of injustices. True identity binds
its holder to serve the laws of a discipline; the victim identity
gives one the facile justification - "now Gods stand up for
bastards" - to evade discipline, to indulge yourself outside the law,
and at the expense of the law.

As we are continually reminded, "the victims of racism are powerless;
they cannot themselves be racists" - no matter how hard they may try,
victims can do no wrong. But under that generous dispensation, it
turns out that they can do plenty of wrong. True identity serves the
law that it chooses to serve; but the wearers of victimhood too often
indulge themselves in lawlessness. They represent the sadistic route
to power. But identified victims can harm themselves, and their
cause, more than they damage others. Addicted to his own sense of
grievance, the victim must act so as to maintain the condition of
oppression that his self-esteem requires; the victim's narrative
often becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy of chronic, self-inflicted
grief.

The victim identity is not good for kids, and it is not good for
representative government. True identity at the individual level
underwrites Democracy at the social level. The bearer of genuine
identity requires teachers and mentors, but he has no use for
princes. But Adolph Hitler, that Messiah of German victimhood, who
released a Furor Teutonicus that tore the whole world apart, showed
us how much the dedicated victim requires demagogues to collect
injustices for him, and how easily he can be manipulated by
these "advocates", to become the storm trooper of Fascism - Left or
Right.

Those who have not made the stern choices required by identity will
find it hard to make the risky commitments required by intimacy. The
marriage ceremony used to contain the phrase, "til death do you
part," thereby reminding the couple at the outset of their life
together that one of them would probably witness the death of the
other. Perhaps in order to avoid that grim prospect, there is a
flight by the young to sexual consumerism, where one avoids whole,
unique - and mortal - persons in favor of a standard, interchangeable
set of limbs, organs and orifices. Finally, in our time, Intimacy is
too often called on to substitute for Identity, such that individuals
of fragile identity put very heavy demands on their burdened
partners. They insist that the partner provide an unshakeable
security - an assurance that finally comes only from the well-founded
self. Our intimates are only human; they cannot be perfect, nor can
they be guaranteed against loss. When illusion wears off, and these
limitations are revealed, the affair or marriage usually ends, and
the weary search for the "Good relationship" starts up again.

Any latent difficulties around identity and intimacy are exacerbated
by the prospect of, or the entry into, the parental condition. It is
at this point that defections from adulthood have their most grievous
effects. The parent who conserves narcissism for himself instead of
conceding it to his child will show the stigmata of Generativity's
dark side, which is self-absorption. Such a "parent" in effect
conserves the prerogatives of childhood for himself, and incidentally
withholds them from his kids. Precious to himself, he fusses over the
details of his own care and feeding - his career, his work-outs, his
special veggie diets, the development of his own pecs, abs,
and "inner consciousness". He takes care of himself in the same way
that true parents take care of and indulge their kids. In brief,
parents who cannot be adult raise kids who cannot be children. They
rear the kind of kids who are becoming the scourge, not only of the
target-rich schoolyard, but of the "grown-up's" world as well.
Ultimately, as regards the fate of American Democracy, today's
Lumpen - parents may be rearing up militias for the Lord of the Flies.

The Return of Adulthood?

If sexual repression was the particular burden of Freud's time, then
unbuffered, unmitigated narcissism is becoming the scourge of ours.
We have even reached the point where individuals demand the right to
terminate themselves - usually via "assisted suicide" - because their
bodies are no longer perfect. But despite their special
vulnerabilities to the temptations of decadence, democracies do have
great recuperative powers. Given our strong traditions of free
discourse and the orderly transfer of powers, democratic societies
can - without provoking holy wars - produce counter-cultures against
decadence, and seemingly unstoppable social pathologies can generate
their own anti-bodies. And we do see hopeful signs that our national
slide down the slippery slope of deculturation is being braked and
slowed. Violent crime is down, as are out-of-wedlock births. Some
cities are being rescued. Perhaps most important, while many children
of divorce avoid marriage, many others strive to create, for their
own kids, the kinds of homes that their own parents should have
provided for them. Via identification with their own well-nurtured
kids, they re-parent themselves - and earn a second chance to be good
adults.

Robinson Jeffers once wrote, "When the cities lie at the monster's
feet, there are yet the mountains." And indeed, significant
constituencies are to be found out there, generated, paradoxically,
by the very conditions that we deplore. Perhaps a worthy task for the
politically incorrect is to help these mavericks coin their refusals,
their opposition to decadence and deculturation, into new and
trustworthy identities.

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Institute for American Values
1841 Broadway, Suite 211
New York, NY 10023
Tel: (212) 246-3942
Fax: (212) 541-6665
Email: info@...


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