Category: Psychology

According to the Columbus Dispatch “More men killing their families.”

As tragic and horrific as this is, it is not unexpected or surprising from the perspective of this masculist.

Men are under increasing social and economic pressure, while simultaneously expressions of frustration at said pressure is also increasingly viewed as “emo” and in other ways shameful.

Women overwhelmingly get custody and sizable, in terms of either raw dollars or percentages, fiscal considerations upon divorce.

Facing the prospect of being socially shamed as well as losing access to their children as well as any hope of financial freedom, all on top of impending loneliness as well as the shame that all men feel upon rejection. It’s not shocking that some men decide in these instances that death for all involved is a better choice.

Indeed, in many ways being divorced can be just like being married in terms of obligations, but with none of the rewards.

We routinely use the language of death to express love. “I can’t live without you” or “you are my life.” Well, some men clearly mean this literally.

It should be noted that this is typically (mistakenly?) considered romantic until someone follows the logic to the extreme worst case scenario.

As horrible as this is, it’s an unavoidable side effect of enforced monogamy, state controlled marriage, and various other social and legal institutions we use to shape how the family unit is structured.

Our society is saturated with instructions for the male that routinely alternate between expected fanatical and often violent devotion to family, and direct military or otherwise tactical solutions.

How many songs, movies, and television shows are at their core a story about a man killing someone to prove his love for a woman and or his family?

A great many.

We need to rethink a few things we take as given. Important things. Such as the nature of love, the reality of sexism against men, and the separation of church and state with regard to the institution of marriage.

You should check out Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television by Jerry Mander or the TED talk “Dan Ariely asks, Are we in control of our own decisions?”

The fact is TV is not a function of culture but the creator of it, and that culture is one of exploitation and brutality.

TV provides context control and defaulting* standards which in turn shape what you think of as your own decision making power.

I’m not saying don’t watch shows, I’m saying don’t watch shows with commercials, or just passivity let the TV run in the background.

While shows themselves are often manipulative in and of themselves they at least have an indirect agenda, not one that is openly exploitative and deceptive.

The idea that you can “just ignore” the commercials is dangerous ignorance. :/

Based on Dan Ariely’s demonstration that the default is typically chosen when the chooser is confused, and that context defines the default, then i use the word “defaulting” as a verb to indicate the manipulating of the default for purposes of influence.

Generally this is in response to the claim that because we pad sharp corners, children are therefor weak and uncool. As if playing Russian roulette makes you a better person somehow, and not merely a suicidal moron.

I was asked…

What in the world does wishing to be young and not fat have to do with the military?

Nothing. What I said was that making it seem like potential injury is somehow cool, on the assumption that it’s merely a risk, is the same logic used to make uniformed idiots feel safe despite being shot at.

The fact is someone usually will be shot in war, and someone will eventually break their neck on the playground. Safety innovations are not something to be made fun of, especially if it is your child that has to live out his life in a chair as a result of some guys rosy nostalgia, and cavalier attitude towards life.

I don’t need to actually have experienced the horror of having my neck broken to have compassion for my fellow man.

Today we live in a world were kids are becoming more and more obese, why?

Probably the presence of HFCS, hydrogenated oils, and other industrial toxins in the diet, along with the general social apathy of the populace, which I might add is contributed to by the cavalier attitude regarding health issues coupled with the culture of sex fear which simultaneously imprisons children, sky rockets teen pregnancy, and destroys health.

Look at diabetes rates, it’s not merely lack of exercise. The opinion that if we just forced children to go outside instead of playing games reading or communicating, everything would be all better, is simplistic and incorrect.

They’re eating mcdonalds all the time and sitting around playing video games. Playgrounds are built to encourage physical activity which is healthy.

They eat McDonald’s because it’s cheap and parents don’t have time to fix real meals because the economy is so bad that both parents have to work full time, on top of the fact that we demand so much of our children via school that they have almost no down time. When they do get down time they are exhausted and would rather not run laps.

We don’t let them go anywhere unless it’s to wear a short skirt and wave pom poms for the pleasure of balding middle age coaches, or beat each other up at some mindless ball tossing ritual based on sexual tension.

People typically know nothing of our society, because they are too close to the problem. Some are as blind and indoctrinated as can be imagined. Our children won’t be. They’ll get one too many passes with the metal wand on the way to history class and start asking the dangerous questions. Like, what does football have to do with math, what does patriotism have to do with chemistry, and what happens if we all say no more all at once?

Its not some sort of indirect way of recruiting kids into the military or something crazy like that.

Then what is the purpose of education in industrialized societies? What part of pledging allegiance to a flag and mandatory attendance being superfluous to knowledge acquisition is hard to grasp? Very clearly school is an indoctrination system. Even educators will admit this, though of course they won’t use such clear terminology . They will speak of teaching character traits and social skills, both of which are merely euphemism for obedience to the social order.

Limiting the ways kids CAN excerisize [sic] during recess or whatever (some schools actually tried eliminating recess) will only increase the amount of fat, lazy, obese people who do nothing but sit in front of the TV all day being indoctrinated by TV programming.

Putting children on human hamster wheels is no less mentally demeaning than plopping them in front of the propaganda box. Laziness is not a bad thing, laziness is simply the desire to get he most product for the least effort, which is otherwise known as efficiency. You may want to live in an Amish work addicted culture, but I do not.

For two fat is largely a dietary and genetic issue which stems directly from public tolerance of social abuses, such as toxins in the food supply, and the ultra high cost of non-toxic foods. We’re sheep because school trains us to be that way, and when we grow up we line up for our feed no matter what’s in it.

The real danger is when safety becomes a tool to oppress and exploit. The clearest most common example of this is the behavior of modern father’s towards their daughters. I find it repulsive that fathers are encouraged to act for all the world like jealous puritanical lovers.

Another grand example is when a government takes away from a populace all ability to defend itself and then sets about stepping on every basic human right under the guise of protection. It is no coincidence that the most surveiled city in the world is in the middle of a country that allows no guns.

Further it’s very easy to talk shit about someone else’s need to experience pain and risk from a position of comfort and safety.

So I was watching Criminal Minds, pretty sweet show, and there was an off hand reference to Oppositional Defiant Disorder, and I noted it mentally as an error as I do with TV shows and media if I am aware of them, and as I am in the habit of checking up on the things I believe, I Wikied this ‘ODD’ expecting to find an elaboration on its false roots, when to my shock and amazement, I discovered that it’s real.

From the Wiki..,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oppositional_defiant_disorder

Diagnostic Criteria

1. A pattern of negativistic, hostile, and defiant behavior lasting at least 6 months, during which four (or more) of the following are present:

Note: Consider a criterion met only if the behavior occurs more frequently than is typically observed in individuals of comparable age and developmental level.
1. often loses temper
2. often argues with adults
3. often actively defies or refuses to comply with adults’ requests or rules
4. often deliberately annoys people
5. often blames others for his or her mistakes or misbehavior
6. is often touchy or easily annoyed by others
7. is often angry and resentful
8. is often spiteful or vindictive

2. The disturbance in behavior causes clinically significant impairment in social, academic, or occupational functioning.

3. The behaviors do not occur exclusively during the course of a Psychotic or Mood disorder.

4. Criteria are not met for Conduct Disorder, and, if the individual is age 18 years or older, criteria are not met for Antisocial personality disorder.

So there is a mental illness, ironically called odd, that makes you defiant.

Let me just sum up how I feel about that real quick and then I’ll go into how I came to this conclusion.

This is absolutely odious. As in, worthy of hate and disgust. I have trouble articulating the seething rage I feel at the very idea of this “condition” existing.

Never has it been so clear that the psychological community is being turned to unethical purpose by those who wish above all else to remain in power.

First lets look at the definitions.

The first question one would have is “How is this a disease again?” I mean if opposing things, and defying things, makes one crazy… well then I’m pretty sure we all are.

Their solution?

Consider a criterion met only if the behavior occurs more frequently than is typically observed in individuals of comparable age and developmental level.

So, if they are defiant to a normal degree, then it isn’t ODD. Heh.

This is my first problem. The word normal means acceptable. Acceptable defiance is a contradiction in terms. If the behavior is accepted then it is not defiant. The whole point of defiance is doing the unacceptable.

They must be talking about false defiance, like the cliché goth kid image, hanging up Manson posters but still showing up to choir practice. Buying a pair of pants covered in safety pins from hot topic with your allowance, is not defiance, yet for the purposes of this diagnostic, it would be considered “normal” defiance. The type of behavior that is normally called a “phase.”

Since this type of thing strongly reminds of pseudoscience used to halt social evolution, I’m going to shape my analogy based on race. In honor of all those dimwit doctors who tried to tell us that blacks were measurably and objectively inferior.

I’m going to show how a typical black child growing up under civil oppression would have squarely qualified for this disorder.

Let’s begin.

I’m going to write in defense, and from the perspective of, this child. His name is Malcolm, for obvious reasons.

1. A pattern of negativistic, hostile, and defiant behavior lasting at least 6 months, during which four (or more) of the following are present:

Yes I have a negative attitude, I’m tired of being told by word and deed that I am somehow a lesser organism by virtue of my birth. Yes I’m hostile, hostility towards oppression is not only natural but a hallowed aspect of our national identity. The English didn’t leave politely. Yes I’m defiant, I feel it is my ethical duty to reject social constraints that are clearly oppressive. These behaviors and attitudes will persist so long as the situation calls for them.

Consider a criterion met only if the behavior occurs more frequently than is typically observed in individuals of comparable age and developmental level.

Well the other kids have meekly accepted their secondary roles having folded under various forms of oppressive mechanisms ranging from shaming and despair to physical assault. But for some reason, I was born a fighter, and the fear of punishment and pain will not dissuade me.

1. often loses temper

I’m a child, not a sociologist or a psychologist or an economist, or an historian. I don’t have the context or the raw data needed to understand why I’m being treated like an animal. The historical and racial dynamics escape me for the time being, and when faced with the absurd and exploitive bigotry around me I as a result of my inability to understand am often frustrated past the point of quiet endurance.

I routinely end up yelling at bus drivers and police and store clerks and managers and anyone else in a position to enforce these bogus social restrictions, and who profit from the same.

2. often argues with adults

Well of course I argue with them, they say absurd and insulting things. They then use their position in lieu of evidence or debate, telling me to be quiet and sit down or this is not the time or place, and when I explain that this is unacceptable as a rebuttal, I am sanctioned.

3. often actively defies or refuses to comply with adults’ requests or rules

The water fountain I am expected to use is neglected, and were it in perfect working order I would still refuse to use it on principal. Nor do I feel like walking all the way to the back of the bus when there are so many empty seats readily available near the front. I will not obey a rule that is pointlessly inefficient or unethical.

4. often deliberately annoys people

I won’t deny a certain amount of satisfaction in bringing some of the frustration I feel to those around me. I do not consider this any more pathological than a police officer taking pleasure in arresting a child abuser, and as a result preferring to work on cases where child abuse is at issue.

Seeking to annoy can be quite natural.

Sometimes annoying an enemy even provides a tactical advantage. By forcing them to show their true nature. An excellent example of this is sit-ins, work stoppages, and other forms of non violent protest.

5. often blames others for his or her mistakes or misbehavior

Considering that my ‘mistakes’ and ‘misbehaviors’ include actions explained above, and as I said before I will continue these behaviors so long as the situations that call for them persist, I cannot help but blame others for creating or bolstering those situations and conditions.

For example, if I consistently am placed in detention by the principal for breaking his water fountain segregation rules, am I truly to blame?

6. is often touchy or easily annoyed by others

Slurs and racist implications have a profound effect on me, and it is very easy to work a slur into a sentence. Since the society around me takes it as a given that I should be content with my lot, I often appear touchy or easily offended. Why don’t I just go sit at the back of the bus? Because I shouldn’t have to.

7. is often angry and resentful

I do resent being treated like a second class citizen for no good reason, I am angry about that treatment and I think rightfully so.

8. is often spiteful or vindictive

Sometimes examples must be made. Sometimes a single person can typify a given behavior or position. Sometimes the unethical behavior pushes a person past the limits of equitable response, but in the end how does one determine what is equitable?

2. The disturbance in behavior causes clinically significant impairment in social, academic, or occupational functioning.

My refusal to accept my socially imposed niche has gotten me suspended from school time and again and I expect it to interfere with employment or socializing being that all three demand acceptance of rules which I feel are unjust.

3. The behaviors do not occur exclusively during the course of a Psychotic or Mood disorder.

I don’t have fits, and while I may have good days and bad days, I’m upset about racism all day, because racism exists, all day.

4. Criteria are not met for Conduct Disorder, and, if the individual is age 18 years or older, criteria are not met for Antisocial personality disorder.

No, I have a conscience. I don’t throw kittens into rivers or the like. In fact if they would just treat me like an equal citizen I’m sure I would be quite successful and well liked.

End of analogy.

You see my point?

This Bullshit “condition” can be used to drug or incarcerate budding civil rights leaders, and that’s its primary purpose. To weed out the free thinkers, ASAP.

Going against society is not a mental condition when society is wrong. And society never admits to being wrong until after it has been corrected.

I grow VERY weary of the ageist assumption that children are ALWAYS wrong. Or that they must wait until later to speak up, or demand rights.

Respect does not mean obedience.

Adults often ask unethical or outright stupid things of children.

This analogy can be extended to virtually any instance of a child responding quite naturally to an absurd setting. Imagine an atheist child in a religious home and private school, or vice versa. Debate and rebellion are required for a society to avoid death by stagnation.

Imagine how you would react if you were told that you needed to keep silent and do as you are told until you are ten years older. Imagine if the only reasoning given for this boiled down to or was explicitly, “because I’m ten years older.”

Imagine how the world would look if every 30 year old was required to obey every 50 year old on pain of medication and incarceration.

Society as a whole and our country in particular has evolved by leaps and bounds because of the rebelliousness of our children. Rebellion is the very soul of our country and to put a ceiling on it and to try and drug it or “cure” it is simply reprehensible.

Treating our children like property, pets, employees, and now psychotics, shames us all.

In short, maybe it’s not a disease, maybe the kid just has a point.

Reputable ethical psychologists would do well to voice their opinion on this subject, as should sociologists.

“The first principal of nonviolent action is that of noncooperation with everything humiliating.”

Cesar Chavez