Category: Social Psychology

Sarah Schulman on oppression, power, and punishment

Cantalloc subterranean aqueducts, Nazca, Peru. Source: Diego Delso. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

“Just as unresolved, formerly subordinated or traumatized individuals can collude with or identify with bullies, so can unresolved, formerly subordinated or traumatized groups of people identify with the supremacy of the state. In both cases, the lack of recognition that the past is not the present leads to the newly acquired power to punish rather than to the self-transformation necessary to resolve conflict and produce justice.”

— from Schulman, S. (2016). Conflict is not abuse: Overstating harm, community responsibility, and the duty of repair. Arsenal Pulp Press.

Jonathan Haidt on the Impact of “Enhanced Virality” of Social Media

The Tower of Babel (Gen. 11:1-9), Doré’s English Bible, 1866. Gustave Doré.

A democracy cannot survive if its public squares are places where people fear speaking up and where no stable consensus can be reached. Social media’s empowerment of the far left, the far right, domestic trolls, and foreign agents is creating a system that looks less like democracy and more like rule by the most aggressive.

from Haidt, J. (2022, April 11). Why the past 10 years of American life have been uniquely stupid. The Atlantic.

“This Jungian Life” Podcast on the Archetype of War

Photo of a mural tribute to the lost community members of the civil war in Nuevo Gualcho, El Salvador. (Mural tree reads, "Names to never forget...") Credit: Amelia Hunt. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
A tribute to the lost community members of the civil war in Nuevo Gualcho, El Salvador. (Mural tree reads, “Names to never forget…”) Credit: Amelia Hunt. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

The people can always be brought to do the bidding of the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.

Hermann Wilhelm Göring, German politician, military leader and convicted war criminal

Episode synopsis: “Recent events in Afghanistan have again put war at the forefront of collective consciousness. War’s destruction belongs to the mythic realm. Mars, the Roman god of war, was a primordial force whose altars were placed outside city gates. Although acknowledged, he was not accepted. His paramour, Venus, is warfare’s seductress, offering spectacle, pageantry, and glory.”

“Like all the gods of Mt. Olympus, Mars and Venus live in us as opposing forces of aggression and eros. We are charged with holding the tension of these impassioned opposites and making them conscious, lest we project shadow onto designated enemies or wage war internally as neurosis. We can stand in the complexity of conflict, suspend action, and allow the gods a place inside our psychic city gates.”

— from Stewart, D., Marchiano, L., & Lee, J. (2021, September 2). Episode 179 – The Archetype of WAR