Välgörenhet och tacksamhet…

Max Weber.

Göran Greider i ledaren ”Byråkratens kyliga blick” idag:

”Under veckan har radions P1 sänt en rad program om funktionshindrade.
Reportrar har följt med rullstolsbundna genom kommunerna som inte kunnat komma in i offentliga byggnader. Funktionshindrade unga kvinnor har berättat om sexuella övergrepp och mobbing och om subtila våldshandlingar från omgivningen./…/

För mig kommer det inte som överraskning. Under nittiotalet jobbade jag en del med olika handikapporganisationer. Då, för femton år sedan, började de gamla välgörenhetstankarna komma tillbaka: istället för sociala rättigheter – återigen förlitan på ideella krafter och anhöriga. Sedan sextiotalet hade många handikapporganisationer ändå lyckats kasta av sig mycket av det där välgörenhetsoket. Nu var dessa landvinningar på väg att rullas tillbaka. Och problemet gick djupare än så: Även den offentliga välfärden var – och är – på djupet präglad av nedärvda välgörenhetstankar, dvs synen att den som tar emot stöd ska känna sig tacksam och helst inte bråka när gåvorna faller över dem. I kärnan av den filantropiska tanken fanns och finns en mycket hård tanke: De som behöver hjälp måste göra rätt för sig och just visa sin tacksamhet, annars är de inte värdiga hjälp./…/

Nu hårdnar synen på fattiga, arbetslösa och alla slags utsatta människor. Socialstyrelsen och Försäkringskassan går hand i hand med nykonservativa socialpolitiker och dessa aktörer bildar mer och mer av en elit som svävar ovanför problemen och alltid tror sig veta bäst vilka behov människor har./…/

Det går inte att på byråkratisk nivå exakt reglera vilken hjälp en funktionshindrad person behöver: bara att plocka fram mat ur kyl och skåp kan vara ett oöverstigligt hinder. Vardagslivet, de allra mest banala saker, ter sig helt olika beroende på hur ens armar, ögon eller öron fungerar.

Jag tror att det är så att Försäkringskassan inte behöver tolka lagen så som man nu gör – men myndigheten väljer att göra det. Varför? Det är knappast av ren ondsinthet. Snarare är det den alltmer självklara blicken uppifrån som gör att människor som har det svårt inte längre ses som individer. Ledningen för Försäkringskassan har visat förut – och märk väl: det är ledningen jag kritiserar – att den blivit en del av det maktetablissemang som inte förstår sig på problemen som finns längre ner i samhället än de själva befinner sig.

Byråkratens kyliga blick riktas mot samhället. Vi måste möta den blicken och inte väja.”

Det fanns också en insändare som jag också vill citera:

”Låter otäckt.

Högeralliansens Reinfeldt har svåra att vinna människors hjärta.

Det kanske är så att svenska folket måste göra som Maud Olofsson sa.

Skilj hjärta från hjärna. Usch det låter otäckt.”

Christina Doctare skrev i sin bok ”Hjärnstress – kan det drabba mig?” på sidan 138:

”Framtidens ledarskap, på alla samhällsnivåer, kommer att handla om människor som har välintegrerade hjärnhalvor med rejäla bredband däremellan. Personer som har både IQ, EQ och en andlig dimension. Det säger sig själv att det kräver en viss mognad [ett understatement?] och ett stort mått av integritet och civilkurage./.../

Ledarskap handlar om att se både makt och befogenheter som medel för att uppnå gemensamt formulerade och uppsatta mål, inte som mål i sig, eller som redskap för sitt eget självförhärligande och näring för ett uppblåst ego.”

Hon skriver också om att genom sitt sätt att vara, utgöra ett föredöme för andra. I valet 2006 kandiderade hon för kristdemokraterna i riksdagsvalet dock... Och kristdemokraterna är moralist- och hycklarpartiet för mig... :-)

Ja, psykohistoriker pratar om ”efterblivna psykoklasser.” De människor som har fler (psykologiska) försvar attraheras mer av politisk makt menar de.

Vilka som gnäller egentligen...

John Stuart Mill.

Några bra kommentarer på en annan blogg (mina kursiveringar):

"Kommentator 1:

Nyliberal [som i en kommentar skrivit följande]: 'Däremot på vänsterkanten blir det ett ramaskri så snart något bidrag eller någon socialförsäkring ändras minsta lilla.'

Jag bor själv ute i Danderyd och är aktiv i olika föreningar i min närmiljö.

Nyliberal, om det är några som klagar i detta land så är det moderater och välbetalda. Man behöver inte tala längre än någon minut med dessa så har de flesta lyckats peta in något om de allt för höga skatterna [himla sant!!!?? För alltför många av dessa? Man kanske dock inte ska dra alla över en kam? För ett antal år sedan hade jag en kvinna närmare 60 år som ville lära sig spela piano, hon kom hit till Sverige som krigsbarn under andra världskriget eller efter det, under uppbyggnaden av Tyskland efter kriget? Tll en familj med en dotter i hennes ålder. Senare återvände hon och förälskade sig i mannen i familjen, som var 35-40 år äldre. De gifte sig. Dottern hade gift sig och flyttat till ett lågskatteland nere på kontinenten. Denne man var företagare i trakten, väl ansedd (av patrontyp?? Dock kanske snäll och gemytlig), och hade gott om pengar. Mannen dog i början av 90-talet i mycket hög ålder. Och kvinnan ärvde en massa pengar, skog, fastigheter. Bland annat ett fritidshus ett par mil utanför den stad vi bor i. I samma veva som vi hade kontakt var kvinnan tvungen att betala för sophämtning från detta fritidshus och hon hade haft ett brevledes utbyte med kommunen om detta. Om att få avgiften reducerad. Tja, hennes pengar är kanske bundna? Hon har inga barn, så inga som ska ärva efter henne annat än syskon med barn i Tyskland. Tja, jag reagerade... Antagligen skulle jag ha betalat denna sopavgift om jag haft fritidhus och ekonomi för att ha ett sådant... Att hon var moderat var ingen henlighet, kanske trodde hon jag var det också, eller röstade på annat blått parti, med den bakgrund jag har? Vilket jag inte gjorde eller inte gör idag heller, mindre än någonsin].

Jag bodde tidigare i Örebrotrakten. Men efter några år i Danderyd placerar jag numera det 'svenska gnällbältet' till Stockholms norra höginkomsttagarkommuner.

Kommentator 1: Att så många moderatministrar visat sig vara 'fuskare' förvånar mig inte alls.

Låg betalningsvilja.
Girighet.
Dubbelmoral.
Nedlåtande attityd till andra som av olika skäl har det svårt [sant!!!].
Kverulans över egna 'lyxbekymmer [sant!!!! 'Lyxbekymmer' var rätta ordet!].
Ovilja att ställa upp i olika föreningar.
Allt som kan stämplas som 'typiskt svenskt' är dåligt [men själva är de inte sällan ganska konservativa??? Och okulturella alt. snobbiga!? Hmmm, höga tankar jag har!?].
Blåögd syn på USA.

Se där några kännetecken som jag, av egna erfarenheter, allt mer börjat förknippa med dessa människor. De nya människorna i de nya moderaternas nya Sverige?

Kommentator 2 (vänsterliberal): På tal om liberalism och frihet. Det är stor skillnad på JS Mill [se också här om Mill] och Ayn Rand för att ta ett exempel.

För en nyliberal innebär frihet en maximerad egoistisk frihet d.v.s. JAG har rätt att göra precis vad JAG vill och använda precis vilka medel JAG vill för att nå dit JAG vill. Och allt som hindrar, står i vägen kallas tvång [vilken sorts erfarenheter bakom detta??].

För en socialliberal handlar det mer om frihet som delas lika, d.v.s.: MIN frihet tar slut där DIN frihet tar vid.

Frihet anses som något viktigt och vackert och bör komma till så många människor till del, som möjligt. Största möjliga lycka till största möjliga antal.
Denna frihet bör då även gälla alla levande varelser inklusive djur. Det var socialliberaler som startade djurrättsrörelsen, feminismen, etc. Detta är för mig en betydligt större frihetstanke än den nyliberaler förespråkar som bara går ut på frihet enbart till dem som de tycker förtjänar den.

Nya moderater sällar sig den senare klassen där sjuka/arbetslösa ska tas ifrån så mycket självbestämmande/frihet som möjligt så att alla de andra ska få mer."

Ja, vilka är det egentligen som gnäller? Gnäller mest? De som har det kärvast? Eller de som kanske har det minst kärvt??

Vissa ska hålla tyst, lyda och arbeta som bävrar och skämmas ögonen ur sig om de inte gör det eller kan det!!?? Medan andra slår sig för bröstet i all sin egen förträfflighet??

Som en tanke: Kerstin Berminge har skrivit ett intressant blogginlägg om ”Liberalismen à la Johan Norberg”, där hon bland annat skriver om ”fanatiska utopister”! :-)

Och avslutar sitt inlägg med:

"Egentligen skulle jag vilja hävda att precis sådant sönderslående av 'småfolkets' samarbete sysslar dagens nyliberala regering med, när den, under lögnaktiga påståenden om motsatsen, går till attack på och river möjligheterna för samverkan inom facken."

Ja, folk ska polariseras och splittras?? Smart!!?? Och de som inte trivs i detta...? Och söker hjälp... De anpassas och om inte det hjälper stoppar man ett piller i dem!?? Och så tjänar läkemedelsindustrin på detta... Pust!!

---

This blogposting was about: Who are complaining actually? The wealthy or the poorest? Ironically wondered.

The "small-people" shall be held down everywhere in society? Starting in school with discipline, learning to obey and be quiet? I dislike this from deep in my soul! Ugh!!! As I have written about before.

And what are children acting out, for instance at school? I think I see things in my work, because with the smallest pupils the parents are present at the lessons... And I sometimes (or now and then) wonder about pupils that are older and comes alone.

Is it something in me that influences the parents? Of course one can wonder!?

Yes, who is spoiled actually?

Is therapy actually pedagogy - should it be…

[Updated November 27 and 28 in the end]. Something I read yesterday evening in another forum, in a reply to a posting, swiftly before I go for a walk in the snow before lunch and meetings at work and pupils in the afternoon (my italics in the texts below). I am fairly critical to a lot of phenomena in psychotherapy and psychiatry, thinking it is manipulative...

What they are doing are too often "more of the same"?? Strengthening defenses instead of the opposite I have a feeling from my autodidact view. And the former blogpost: brain-tests like these are also a result or manifestation of the phenomenon to intellectualize, to be honest? My feelings are fairly mixed to this...

The commentator put the finger on something I have tried to find words for I think (the mail came; my salary/wage has been raised, I think I got rewarded for my work. Hmmm, the clever... Both glad and with mixed feelings. A bit tired being so clever and hardworking and loyal. But I am interested and cares a lot about the ones I work with).

And should we teachers be therapists?

By the way see this readers' letter at Miller's web. Where Miller answers for instance:

“I was distressed to the core when I read your letter for which I thank you wholeheartedly. At the same time, I felt a sort of gratefulness for the fate that helped the lively, brave and bright little girl not only to survive the terrible jail of her horrific parents but also to remain sound to keep the full clarity and the unusual courage in order TO SEE and TO ACCUSE, without ‘buts,’ without illusions, without self-betrayal. This stance is only very rarely encountered, and your letter will certainly help others to recognize their own situation and to forgo the ‘buts.’ /…/…here, the child has the strength to also speak for countless other children who are forced to bear the more or less visible delusion of their parents for years and to experience it as NORMAL. Formed by this ignorance, they often remain blind for the suffering of children during their whole lives and still recommend physical punishment. They work for senseless ‘research,’ for the pharmaceutical industry, organize wars, produce cruel movies and don’t know at all that they still ‘live’ in the prison of their sick parents because they never had the courage to see through the delusion and thus continue to poison the world with the toxin that they had to swallow as children.”

Here the exchange I wrote about in the beginning of this blogpost:

Subscriber:”I had, a psychologist, [who] said after a while: ‘Haven't we spoken enough of childhood now?’”

Commentator:“No doubt you realized this really means the therapist didn't want to speak more about it.”

And why not? Was he afraid of doing this? Of personal reasons (even if he wasn’t aware of these reasons)?

Commentator: “But she/he used the dishonest word ‘we’.”

Yes, that’s true! Couldn’t he have said

“I (in my opinion I) think we have spoken enough about childhood!”

Commentator: “As if it was a joint realization. What is the point of a psychologist becoming a therapist if she doesn't understand that a client may need to explore unfinished business from childhood -- until her client feels that all the necessary connections have been made.”

So true, needing to explore unfinished business! Processing things with another person, not doing it on her/himself… Even processing unconscious things.

Commentator: “I don't know what your psychologist wanted to do instead.”

No, what? But an idea comes later, see below.

Commentator: “If a psychologist is not actually a healer, but a pedagogue, she/he may believe that her job is to ‘teach’ coping strategies [believe that he/she actually is a pedagogue!]. That's a symptom of misguided assumptions underlying many schools of psychotherapy. I think it's dishonest or deluded to claim that teaching 'strategies' is something other than 'skills training'. That's teaching, not psychotherapy. It shouldn't be advertised as 'therapy'. The practitioners should be honest and call themselves 'coping skills trainers'. The word 'psychotherapy' becomes devalued if they use it for skills training. /.../ Dictionary publishers should add a caveat to definitions of the word to warn the public that it's often misused by 'skills trainers'.”

Yes, that’s so true!! They (most of them in fact) are skill trainers? Training the already good girls and boys to become even better! The best of the best!!?? Because who seek/search therapists? Isn’t it the ones that are aware that there is something that ought to be done!? And the ones that don’t, don’t think they need to change or work on anything? The ones that maybe most would need therapy are the ones that avoid all this "stuff", digging in the soul!? I think John Cleese and his therapist Robin Skynner wrote something about this!? That it’s the “healthiest” that seek therapists…

Commentator: “It just turns the search for a therapist who cares about your feelings into a difficult task.”

Yes, true! And genuinely cares, and isn’t talking about emotions and feelings intellectually only! As if these feelings were objects or how I shall describe it, objectifying feelings and emotions in fact. But this probably puts high demands on the therapist!? His/her own unprocessed things (which probably exists, otherwise he/she wouldn't have thought of this work) might be triggered then? And these things are probably extremely painful (and much more common than we usually believes)...

Commentator: “If skills training actually [my italics, because do they actually or automatically lead to improvements, and why not?] improves coping abilities and interpersonal relationships, it should be taught in schools -- for the benefit of society as a whole.”

Yes, why not?? Much more than we do!

And I came to think of what the Dutch therapist Ingeborg Bosch writes about Daniel Goleman and his emotionally intelligent individual, and I think is very interesting and so true:

“The reader should be aware that many of the ideas on emotional development put forward in Mr. Golemans book are contrary to PRI [Past Reality Integration therapy] ideas. In PRI it is not considered as desirable for young children to control their ‘socially undesired’ emotions or feelings such as fear and anger. When this sort of behaviour is desired by adults of children PRI regards it as poisonous pedagogy /…/ Also, many of the behaviors that are considered by Mr. Goleman to be essential elements of ‘emotional intelligence’, are considered by PRI to be defenses [False Hope and False Power Denial of Needs] employed in order to avoid feeling pain. The general profile of Golemans ‘emotionally intelligent’ person fits the PRI idea of someone who is quite defensive, albeit in a socially desirable way. This might therefore lead to social success, while simultaneously sacrificing contact with the True Self and inner autonomy.”

And is this actually “healing”?

And Jennifer Freyd writes at page 195 in her book:

“For a child dependent on abusive caregivers, lack of internal connection can help maintain some sort of external connection to necessary others. But I disagree with those such as Daniel Goleman (1985), who suggest that while truth is generally a good thing, some times even privileged members of our society are best served by living with ‘vital lies’ in which the truth is best kept from oneself and one’s intimate partners.”

Addition November 27:

An article in a Norwegian newspaper “My life in half an hour” (not worth more!?? And today reduced to just a few minutes!):

“Psychiatry-critics. I dropped their pills, so they dropped me. Psychiatry isn’t different from the rest of the society; they want obedient and humble victims *, living up to the role with /…/ repentance and submission **. And at last – adjustment.”

Pills are the solution. Doctors’ time for the patients is very limited. They don’t take a deep going anamnesis, one doctor sat with his back towards the patient during the whole session. The patient meets new doctors each time…

The Norwegian physician Anna Lise Kirkengen thinks physicians (General Practitioners for instance) should take up even the childhood story when they are taking up the anamnesis...

In one of our newspapers here it stood work environment, about the Swedish Work Environment Authority that they are going to get fewer recourses to their work, and the consequences of that... It stood that it would be better with prevention, to avoid things...

I get so tired. And I don't like what is being done... Things should be done right from the first beginning a man said. Yes, that about prevention...

Yes, we shall keep quiet, be obedient, work like beavers. More about working like beavers... And if we don't thrive in this existence we are given a pill, yes, silenced with a pill!!?? Too many psychiatrists, psychologists - and physicians contribute to this!? Walking in the power's leading-strings!? Maybe with too much to do they too, so it is easier to prescribe pills than doing anything else? They don't have the strength to really hear what people have to say? Noone has that strength, all working like beavers. The exceptions are few!?? Putting ourselves and the society in a trap??

* At the same time people are accused for being unable to quit the victim-role!!! For playing victims!! In therapy too!! Jenson has written about this. Maybe more about that later.
** Should apologize for their whole existence, all nuisance they cause for all and everyone!!?? For not having anything to contribute with, and for not having had anything to contribute with ever!! Be ashamed!!! Go away! Don't show up again!! (where did we meet this first in life?).

"Repentance" means "ånger" in Swedish.

Tillägg 28 november: En tredje kommentator kommenterade utbytet ovan om terapi som svar till ”subscriber”:

Commentator 2: ”What you write about your psychologists/psychiatrists, I agree with x [the first commentator]. They were the ones being manipulative and being scared. And these are not exceptions in the world of therapy, but rather standard procedure. But they feel confident by what they believe because they have that diploma from years of schooling, and never had time to question anything.

Therapists are parent-defenders. Otherwise they would have the parents on the chair and not their victims.”

Dvs. något i stil med:

”Jag håller med x [kommentator 1] om det du skriver om psykologer/psykiatriker. De var de som var manipulativa och rädda. Och de är inga undantag i terapins värld, utan snarare standardproceduren. Men de känner sig trygga/självsäkra/säkra med det de tror på därför att de har sina diplom från åratal av utbildning/skola och har aldrig haft tid att ifrågasätta någonting.

Terapeuter är föräldraförsvarare. I annat fall skulle de ha haft föräldrarna i stolen [som patienter] och inte deras offer.”

Jo, han har rätt? Detta är power-abuse? Och i extremfall går man verkligen maktens ärenden... Även terapeuter (och kanske inte minst psykiatriker, genom att droga ner patienter***) gör det, men kanske inte alltid genom att vara medvetna om det? Skulden läggs på individen... Och individer ska anpassas? Utan att de uttryckligen bett om det...

Tror de trots allt att individer är födda till självdestruktivitet och/eller destruktivitet?
Se bland annat vad Jonatan Pincus funnit (i bland annat denna artikel) i sin forskning om seriemördare och de allra värsta brottslingarna.

*** Så vi inte tvingas lyssna på vad de försöker säga och ge uttryck åt??

IQ and EQ...

photo on the Swedish physician Christina Doctare.

photo on the Swedish psychologist Bodil Wennberg.

photo on the American neuorologist Jonathan H. Pincus.

The Swedish physician Christina Doctare (her homesite in Swedish and in English) wrote in her book "Brain-stress" (a book I like and can recommend, but I think she has developed in a way I react against, becoming more cynical?) that she thought the future leaders in the world, on all levels I assume, need to have both IQ and EQ and proper broad-bands between these!! I think that metaphor is great! (I who had thought of fixing up here and practice piano, and now I am sitting writing again).

There are many things that make me think – and feel… Yesterday evening after I had watched the American series "Without a Trace" ("Brottskod försvunnen" in Swedish) I got stuck at the TV, and after this series it came another American (?) series "Out of Practice" (in English) about three men, a father I think and his two sons (I haven't seen it before at all, now just jumped into it). They were all about to date women, and discussed all their problems with this…

The father should now meet Crystal, but he felt a bit unsure about her. He had namely given her another name, Julie (the wife he had recently divorced from?) if I remember right, when they were about to get to sleep at another occasion, and of course that started a discussion between those two. This he mentioned to his two sons. And they joked about it. Laughing things away...

I felt more and more uncomfortable watching this.

The youngest son was “dating” his mother, which looked as a bigger sister…

I didn’t finish the watching, went to bed still feeling very uncomfortable… They joked about their shortcomings, and… It was no real warmth in this?? I couldn’t even laugh at it… Maybe I smiled, but it was a painful smile… As if people are merchandise… Masks, and not grown up really??

I wonder over phenomena in society, and react over them…

And even the series “Without a Trace” makes me feel uncomfortable many times too of some reason… It’s something creepy in it. And yesterday evening it was a bit more cruel than usual. A woman harming Jack Malone extremely cruel… Money was involved in the whole…

Jenson writes in her book that the healthier mentally the less you need power; you don’t need to exercise power, and not the power that money or material wealth gives either…

And the opposite Miller has written about; how much appreciation, money, power etc. a human being gets that is harmed, the hole will never be filled. Ever. Until he/she processes things. But it isn't especially likely the outermost harmed do (she means and many with her, Pincus too for instance, it can come to a point when an individual is so extremely harmed so it isn't possible, but then they must be very harmed?). Miller writes in “Paths of Life” that Hitler “didn’t stop in time”. He couldn’t get enough… And he was surrounded by a lot of "followers" and "Yes-sayers"...

Pincus also writes about “Hitler and Hatred”, here in English about this, and in Swedish (but he is not referring to Miller in his footnotes or references, so he is writing independently of Miller!!?? Or referring to Miller isn't "opportune" in many scientific circles??).

Thinking over empathy and its connections to intelligence… One (more or less) admires people who have high educations? Think they “know better”, are more trustworthy in a way, just because of their ability to think, imagine? For instance doctors are put high…

I also happened to read in Millers “Paths of Life” (the Swedish version) where she writes (in the chapter about how hate comes about, where it comes from and is "created" in her view, in the end of the book) about an interview in a newspaper with a German professor which was asked to express an opinion about the fact that most college-teachers after WWII had kept quiet about their connections to the Nazi-regime. The one that was asked had himself been a member of SS during his youth and even got distinctions (or honors) for what he did at the Eastern Front. He thought this silence was a sign of shame (shame in the meaning pudeur, blygsel in Swedish). Many events had been so horrible so it was best forget them and not speak about them. Yes, the best would be to forget them and not even try to understand them, not try to understand something that isn’t even possible to understand.

Miller writes that you can leave the question if it really was about shame or opportunism. To distance oneself from the past in this way is in Miller’s view highly problematic, because here is risk of repetition of pure ignorance (okunnighet in Swedish).

She thinks it is important that we try to understand how these horrible events could occur. Why so many intellectuals unreservedly (and openly and frankly) assented to (??) and supported the Nazis and why they refused to understand, to seek and honestly explore what happened to or befell them. Why it all happened to them.

I am thinking of politicians (not least Swedish, but also foreign, and even many ministers in our current government, which I don't like and didn't vote for) seem to be in total lack of feelings, emotions, empathy. Here you can really talk about empathy deficits I think in many of them (hasn't someone written about this: politicians and why they become politicians and not something else?). This probably also occurs among politicians in other parties, and both to the right and left…

Fundamentalism, orthodoxy… Secterism, gurus, father-figures… Are words that come for me (and I probably also have gurus?).

I am also thinking of something I read:

“The subject of Watson came up a few years ago when I was talking to some academics. They all murmured, 'Wonderful man, great man.' I said, 'No, he's not and you know it.' At once they agreed and a torrent [ström, störtflod in Swedish, a water tap that was opened?] of Watson horror stories emerged.”

And so it often is, the worse situations are, whether it’s about a work-place situation or in “higher” circumstances!? Noone dare to say (and many times not even see?) how things actually are?? People join "the praising choir"!?

Sounds like the Emperors new cloths! All are seeing that the Emperor is naked, but noone dare to say it, all join the game. And many even refuse to see the truth? They can’t even see it? Because it triggers something in their past?

Does this sound very hopeless and pessimistic?? What can one do? But it is as Naomi Klein says: "Information is Shock resistance"!!?? (I am, by the way, emotionally reacting at things around!).

Yes, there are mad and evil people in this world, and many of that sort in power-positions of all kinds!? Can they exercise their power even more than before? On a lager scale?

And this only "favors" the most egoistic in the current world (see about Ayn Rand, objectivism, egoism, altruism, and neoliberalism again)? Many resort to feelings of help- and powerlessness, and think it’s no idea to try to influence, or not even to go voting in elections. A vicious circle!?

But from where does these feelings of power- and helplessness stems? Triggered in the present situation, by what and how? (I wonder if these people are resorting to a psychological defence? What Bosch and Jenson calls the Primary Defence? Feeling power- and helpless without not actually being power- or helpless, even if this feeing feels very real, and even if they are convinced they have no influence or power at all. What Bosch and Jenson calls "the child's consciousness").

With amazement I watch what happens here where I live… I am thinking of a special politician (which is father of a former pupil, a girl that must be grown up now), his wife is psychologist… I can’t understand that he supports and actively joins what’s happening…

Yes, have politicians lost all contact with the grass-roots and being caught by a sort of mania (yes, can one in some cases even speak of megalomania I wonder with horror and amazement?)?? Are they entirely blind for what they are doing and the possible consequences of this? Giving power away it feels, by what they do. But by doing so they make sure that other parties won’t come back in power!!?? They will gain more themselves on this (or d they act self-destructively? And destructively too?? Is what they do beneficial for them either, or the possible results of their political decisions beneficial for them themselves or for anyone else, except for maybe a small minority?)? Solidarity – what’s that??

Yes, it’s true as it stands at the “front-page” of "Breaking Down Walls of Silence”:

“Till now, society has protected the adult and blamed the victim. It has been abetted in its blindness by theories, still in keeping with the pedagogical principles of our great-grandparents, according to which children are viewed as crafty creatures, dominated by wicked drives, who invent stories and attack their innocent parents or desire them sexually. In reality, children tend to blame themselves for their parents' cruelty and to absolve the parents, whom they invariably love, of all responsibility.

For some years now, it has been possible to prove, through new therapeutic methods, that repressed traumatic experiences of childhood are stored up in the body and, though unconscious, exert an influence even in adulthood. In addition, electronic testing of the fetus has revealed a fact previously unknown to most adults—that a child responds to and learns both tenderness and cruelty from the very beginning.

In the light of this new knowledge, even the most absurd behavior reveals its formerly hidden logic once the traumatic experiences of childhood need no longer remain shrouded in darkness.

Alice Miller

Our ordinary frame of reference for understanding the world should be ourselves. But if we don't have ourselves, don't have access to our feelings, we lose our personal frame of reference and then have to rely on outsiders, gurus, therapists, and so on. Until we have access, their judgement and perceptions become ours. They can download their ideas into our frontal cortex and their feelings into our limbic system. We lose the ability to see if what they say feels right because we have lost access to that limbic system. We then go by the words and not the feelings.
When we don't have access to our feelings, we tend to choose the wrong partner based only on their external behavior and not what lies underneath. We cannot sense nor see what people are really like. Words and behavior, the front, become all important. Arthur Janov”

And as Miller writes here (in Swedish) about reducing oneself to being a mask!!

About IQ and EQ. A site about EQ (in Swedish) and here Maslow’s hierarchy occurs again (I don’t really like the Swedish psychologist Bodil Wennberg). And see again what Bosch writes about Daniel Goleman and his EQ-concept (in English).

About Jonathan H. Pincus. Pincus on "The Crime of Non-Diagnosis" (I think psychiatric diseases comes, almost entirely, from mistreatment early in life, Pincus hasn't shaken off all poisonous pedagogy, but a lot, which is amazing though after such a long work in this field, he could change his mind to that degree as I get an impression he has).

Thinking about not having self-confidence or self-esteem... That it was taken from the small child once - and what are the results of this?? Can we imagine? Do we want to imagine?

Don't parents actually play perpetrators in hand?? Playing their own children in hands of perpetrators (if they don't make them perpetrators)?? Beating all self-confidence out of he child, treating it as it was noone and nothing...

And later, is it only to start liking oneself?? On the request and demand of others, because these others can't stand a person putting herself so low (they don't want to know why she is, because they have themselves experienced similar things, which is contempt for weakness)?