There's many ways to victimize people. The most insidious is to convince them that they're victims.
-- Tom Robbins
The more you look, the more ways you find this is being done.
"Have you had an accident in the past two years, Sir? Please look at this brochure."
"Poor you, he is treating you evil."
If the media used as much ink educating the public as they use to pamper to their victim-culture, much would be different.
Mister, you're just a big meanie, you are! You want to deprive me of my main pleasure in life, which is complaining and feeling sorry on myself.
ReplyDeleteI'm SO telling my mommy. Just you wait, Professor Higgins!
"If the media used as much ink educating the public as they use to pamper to their victim-culture, much would be different."
Oh ya, they might start thinking, reading good material, and wanna learn to do other stuff good too, like wonder what's wrong with their country's leaders and policies. We sure can't have that now, can we?
It's not just the media. Whole parts of the world function on that principle. Such distractions can work for whole centuries! But... the illusions are becoming fragile these days, because it's harder and harder to hide such obvious truths as the iraqi fiasco, or Russia getting even for the Kosovo affair by supporting Iran. Some lies are getting too big to simply sit on them.
But forgive me, here I go feeling optimistic again. A moment of distraction, it won't happen again...
Lucid Twilight said :
"Who am I to rise above in this world?"
...once said the seagull among the crabs. His name was Jonathan Livingston.
"Yet there is no glory in shrinking so others remain secure in your presence."
What, and give up the immense joys brought by systematic mediocrity? You're bonkers, hombre!
"It would give them permission to break their own bonds."
There you go again with the masochistophobic rhetoric. I love to hate you. ;-)
I love to hate you. ;-) (Pascal joked)
ReplyDeleteMy boss feels the same way towards me. It gives him reason to rise each morning.
In our world (at the shop) good is bad and bad is good. Ah well, a day of reckoning shall befall us all.
because it's harder and harder to hide such obvious truths as the iraqi fiasco, (Pascal said)
ReplyDeleteTrue, but nobody will hold Bush's feet to the fire with Impeachment.
"Who's afraid of Georgie Bush Jr? Everybody it seems........")
So many crimes, so much inhumanity, the blantant lies, manipulations........yet little dictator goes on and on like the energizer bunny rabbit.
"True, but nobody will hold Bush's feet to the fire with Impeachment."
ReplyDeleteWell, hey, it's not like he's done something truly abominable, like playing hanky-panky with a consenting adult woman while excellently managing his country! :-P
There's many ways to victimize people. The most insidious is to convince them that they're victims.
ReplyDelete-- Tom Robbins
Silly man. He's only looking at half the picture. What about the poor misguided person who has been a victim of abuse or something else and denies themselves justification?
So it's alright to let them believe they are not a victim? (It's okay honey, keep letting your boyfriend or husband beat the hell out of you because you deserve it.)
I know this Robbins guy is merely speaking about accidents and so forth, but this quote isn't relevant to all.
Of course. We are only talking here about the popular trend of seeing victims everywhere and weeping about every little setback.
ReplyDeleteThere's a great difference between enduring something really destructive, and being encouraged to whine and accuse if you spill your coffe and burn your stupid self!
But then, people who have been abused come out of it when they understand they're not simply victims. They're also individuals, who can react, and one day move on with their lives, no matter the scars. The greatest danger is defining yourself as a victim and only a victim. Then you cannot IMAGINE yourself changing the way things are.
This is what Tom Robbins probably meant by "insidious". This is why oppressive regimes coax the media into constantly lying : to maintain a false perception of helplessness among the people. To convince them that they DON'T hold the true power if they choose to really try and change things.
This is why you cannot ignore a revolution, and all tyrants fear it. The truth has the power of a tidal wave.
I've had my fair share of injustices (and not much more than that, luckily) happening to me. Starting with growing up in a country at war, which stole away my childhood. But I cannot change the past. I must act in the present. I repair what I have endured vicariously, by giving happiness to children around me today. (And not only children.) I get even with a mean world by changing it so it'll cease being mean. And it brings me true peace.
Wrongdoers deserve to face justice. And mainly, to be stopped from further harming others, ASAP. But when I see somebody like Pinochet making his final escape in death, I calmly consider that now it is only God's place to judge and punish him, while I am among the living and have a destiny of my own to pursue. Keeping fruitless hate in your heart only makes it heavy.
Justice? Hell yeah! Vengeance for the sake of it? Unh-unh, not worth it, ever. Wisdom is discerning the difference through the curtain of your emotions.
Peace and goodwill to all mankind.
(Excuse me if I'm a bit early!)
I am reading an excellent diatribe on the psychology industry entitled, "Manufacturing Victims."
ReplyDeletea brilliant book.
The psychology industry, like the pharmaceutical industry, I am convinced, live off the concept of "victimhood." I.e. "we can help you not be a victim anymore."
The victim/victimizer pull is extremely attractive to the separated out ego. It is one of its favorite games.
No, wives being beaten need to leave. It is always a two-way dance for the parties. Neither are to blame, but both are responsible for the outcome.
ReplyDeleteeven if we've been victims as children, eventually, spiritually, we give up identity with all that old suffering. We find ourselves no longer saying, "I grew up in a dysfunctional family." We drop that whole story. Loving ourselves and creating our new identity in love is so much more powerful.
We find ourselves no longer saying, "I grew up in a dysfunctional family." We drop that whole story.
ReplyDeleteNo, not always. That is not correct. Many still echoe those sentiments today and cannot press forward no matter what.
I'd give some examples but this is a blog and no place for certain ugliness that has taken place in some peoples lives. I'm not arguing with you either. Just stating a truth.
Victimhood is easier to sell than dollars for 98 cents. That has given rise to racial racketeering. Two well-known practitioners are Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.
ReplyDeleteThey learned the scam at the master's knee: Martin Luther King, Jr.
"we can help you not be a victim anymore."
ReplyDelete"...but first, we need you to be a victim of course." :-P
-Many still echoe those sentiments today and cannot press forward no matter what.
-It's not a matter of can't, it's a matter of whether they will or they won't.
Sometimes it can be extremely difficult, yes. But I believe it is always possible to heal, even if you keep scars. (The past always leaves a mark, but it doesn't NEED to leave a gaping hole.) The hidden powers of the human psyche are in fact amazing, much more than we imagine. I've seen proof in Med School. Children, especially, can survive things that any adult would expect to be destroyed by. (I said survive, not brush off.) They hide incredible courage and maturity potential. Anything that doesn't completely destroy you can possibly be overcome.
Still, there is this very interesting theory, that one essential element is whether you've received "your fill of love" as a child. Usually, those who haven't spend their lives seeking for false compensations. Unless they manage to be smart enough and look at themselves with no complacency to see the problem. No inner issue ever resolved itself by denying its existence hoping it'll just go away. I see most people who are "stuck" in their issues as refusing to admit they have some. So yes, the truth can set you free. If YOU find it and accept it.
It's not easy at all, I know. But possible it is. It's just a matter of how much difficulty you start considering insurmountable, I guess.