Breathing problems...

Avishai Margalit.

I read about Irritable Bowel Syndrome in a text, and wondered if Anna-Luise Kirkengen hasn't written about this in her books. However, I didn't find this...But a lot of other things in her books.

In the chapter "Unfolding the Impact of Sexual Violations" in her book "Inscribed Bodies" she writes about Judith. At page 126 for instance:

"For Judith it is sufficient to see what would feel like something flowing over 'my mouth if I were this person' [if she sees someone in he shower for instance, with water running over her/his face; eyes, nose, mouth]. The sight evokes the sensation of semen running over her mouth. Still. She is rendered breathless instantly by anxiety and by the sensory perception of being strangled and feeling fear of suffocating because of something in her mouth, the literal and concrete plugging of it.

Simultaneously, her wording mirrors how she adapted to this concrete threat implicit in the actual abuse situations: 'Not like somebody breathing quickly... I stop, very silently....' which might imply 'leaving.' Undoubtedly, this description reflects a situation of complete powerlessness, in which the very survival of the individual is close to being at risk.

When the mouth, the passageway for the breath, is not only alienated by means of an act of abuse but literally obstructed in the course of that act, the result is the terror of being suffocated or strangled. The means by which her breath was stopped establishes a 'perceptive synonymy' wherein suffocation equals panic equals nausea [sick feelings]. In Judith's corporeality these states of being have the character of different modalities of the same associative field.

They merge as a consequence of bodily logic, since the mouth is the passageway for the breath and the passageway for food, representing the most central of means for physical nourishment and biological survival. Based on the intrinsic logic of Judith's idiosyncratic embodiment, a narrative about eating and food ought to be expected. It does come, and is comprised of various modalities in the relationship between food, taste, and consistency. Initially, Judith characterizes her way of eating as, 'binge eating.'

When using a medical term with an implicit judgment of a deviance from a suggested norm she is applying to herself an outer gaze informed by medicine's focus on pathology. Then, in the next sentence she talks again from inside herself, where eating means comfort and pleasure, forgetting and help against... what is not immediately easy to spot or easy to say but looks like this: 'That's perhaps to get rid ... not taste... but perhaps ... when I eat, I comfort myself ... (etc., see quotation above).'

The narrative is a reflection about what is good, and tastes good, and what tastes distinct and strong enough. Tasty is what tastes different from the taste in her mouth. Then the nausea disappears. Therefore she has to eat continually in order to keep away the taste in her mouth which equals nausea - yet another 'perceptive synonymy.'"

The consequences are long-lasting and can cause serious problems... This is so awful, and definitely nothing to diminish or belittle... She also writes about power abuse (early abused are abused again, both here and there; in private life, in society, in medicine, psychiatry etc. And some, many or all, abused are abusing those that are weaker than themselves in a lot of ways, to get the feeling of being "the upper", strong, not help/powerless!!? And never the two meet??) at page 13 in this book, where the Hebrew philosopher Avishai Margalit is mentioned...

The weak, insecure ones are shown contempt by the "strong" ones!!? The strong ones who manages things, have worked their things through...

The "weak, insecure" ones aren't worth understand, compassion, empathy, a listening ear, but contempt and disregard, disrespect... That about sitting on high horses...

See the posting on "Made sick by silence..."

See all postings under the label the hebrew philosopher Avishai Margalit.

Book review...

I had to write, despite all I have to do...

In the book reviews this morning at TV they spoke about the Swedish book "Alexandramannen" ("The Alexandra-man") by the journalist Katia Wagner.

A man, then in his twenties (now he is 31), called himself "Alexandra" on sites young people visit (chat-rooms etc.?). He contacted young girls and spoke about careers as models.

The reviewer Yukiko Duke referred to sites where you can publish photos on yourself and where how you look is scored. If you publish an ordinary photo you can get the judgment "pretty". But if you show a little more you get higher scores, and if you show even more even higher scores. And if you are naked the highest.

When this man had got the young girls confidence, he said they could earn even more money on selling sex (than on being models).

What was shown among his victims is that they came from all social environments (not only at the bottom of society). A common factor for all his victims was that they had bad adult-relations. And were concerned with if they were seen as pretty (snygga)? Popular? "Good enough" to earn love and attention?

The youngest victim was 12 years old.

Oh, it's so awful this... Difficult to write about...

Young people exploited because of their injuries probably? Injuries of all different kinds? I think of this phenomenon in general... Where the story about Helga is one example!!?? How peoples injuries can be used in therapy and so called help too! To fill the perpetrators (more or less perverse) needs??

And this probably occurs both here and there in society without us being aware of it (in different forms)??

I think Miller is right; she writes somewhere that perversions can become accepted in society, because we want to look as we are liberal, free and not judging (or how she expresses this?)... But then these perversions take other forms.

I got two tips about the 75-year old counsel for the defense (???) Tor Erling Staff again (and about abuse of children in general), who has gone out in Norwegian media claiming he wanted to have sex with older men as 12-year old see here. Also see Miller on Wilhelm Reich (the first half of this posting, with references, is in Swedish, the second in English)!

The author had interviewed the perpetrator too, got his confidence to that degree. He meant that sexual maturity has "gone down" in age, to 12-years. Today all young people are so enlightened about all those things. And referred to our youth centers (ungdomsmottagningar, the link is in English) where young people can get birth control information/help at an early age. So he thought they were mature enough, and that he had done no wrong...

Yes, and the violations are justified with all different things, "explanations", justifications etc.?

Yes, that about exploiting both young (even small) and adult peoples injuries... because that's what it is about?? And this is done more or less scrupulously!?

And when I searched on this I found a blogposting ("To be the most good-looking saps") about the Swedish "pop"-singer Charlotte Perelli who seems to have said that her dress in the Melody-festival on TV was SO tight so she could hardly breathe and had to lean on a desk, because she couldn't sit down in it really... Phew!

"Vill man vara fin får man lida pin"

is a say here. I am not sure how one would translate this, but the meaning is that if you want to be good-looking you have to suffer torments (sometimes even enormous torments?? Plastic surgeries, you are training extremely hard etc. Jane Fonda was bulimic, and cut off from her family she says now, as if it was an invisible wall between her and her husband and children and friends, when she all the time thought of and was occupied with how she should be able to sneak into a bathroom, and where the bathroom was located. Noone knew about her eating disturbances, not even in her nearest family, she thinks, and maybe it was so?).

How many aren't I wonder, to become good enough?? Trying in all possible ways?? Some by being extremely clever and good girls/boys (if they have no other options, or apparently no other options)?? This is so sad... Oh, I would like to draw a blanket over me, and disappear... Into nowhere. Not being reachable or accessible... Living my life in nowhere... With and in the nature...

Yes, Stettbacher talks about "perverted needs", and that's what it is about?

A general reflection over our says (in Swedish).

Further reflections in the shower: injuries made to injured by injured!!??

And I think there is violence that is legalized and legitimized in society too!?? Violence and violations we maybe don't even notice or see?? Which we are blind to? (made blind to??) Things we don't even regard as violations, which actually are violations??

And abuse goes on and on and on!!! And we are standing there nonplussed (handfallna) and help/powerless!?? The whole society is nonplussed!!?? Why is that?

Addition in the evening: see this reader' letter at Miller's web about "Unwanted children?"
Where it for instance stands:

"From my perspective...the truth about parents that continue to justify the virtues of beating their own children, is that they never wanted the child in the first place.

The child is seen as a burden, a mouth to feed. The adult either consciously or more often unconsciously hates the child. The adult takes personally every tantrum or misbehavior that the child expresses.

The adult has neither the intelligence nor maturity to look beyond the moment and see the child's frustration or acting out as a need for love and guidance. Instead the child is shown violence which further alienates and distresses the child."

Miller's replies for instance:

"You are right, unwanted children are usually mistreated. But there exist as a rule also a huge amount of people who were 'wanted' indeed, but only for playing the role of the victims that their parents needed to be able to take revenge on.

They were wanted to give their parents what the parents never had gotten from their own parents: love, adoration, attention and so many other things. Otherwise, why would so many people have five or more children when they have no time for them? Why do they adopt children if their body refuses to give them what they apparently 'want?'"

Hat...

from music-video recording February 2007 (balancing the content below!?).

About hatred and its origins, and targets for this hatred... Inspired by "Paths of Life" from the last chapter "Reflections". Also see "Adolf Hitler: How Could a Monster Succeed in Blinding a Nation? by Alice Miller."

---

[Uppdaterad i slutet 23 och 24 februari]. Inspirerad av Miller i kapitet "Hur uppstår hat?" i boken "Vägar i livet":

De destruktiva följderna av våld mot barn kan manifestera sig redan i ungdomen, till exempel i tyrannisk behandling av yngre syskon, i våldsdåd eller rentav mord. Så därför räcker det inte bara att i en terapi att fördöma ett äldre (eller yngre??) syskons handlingar (vilket kan vara nog så viktigt), utan gå vidare också och fördöma de vuxna som inte skyddade mot dessa saker!? Men jag har en känsla av att ganska många (kanske de flesta) terapeuter inte klarar detta!??? Att anklaga ett syskon är inte fullt lika livsfarligt som att anklaga och ifrågasätta föräldrar!?? Så detta förra går "relativt" lätt?? För trots allt ganska få terapeuter har på allvar ifrågasatt sina egna föräldrar? Möjligen har de gjort detta på en ganska ytlig och kanske enbart intellektuell nivå? De har bara tänkt och resonerat sig till "upplysning"?? Men om det är så kan de inte heller förstå sina klienter riktigt (eller i värsta fall ganska litet)?

Det är detta Miller beskriver i "Deception Kills Love". I en artikel som handlar om en dansk författare och dennes bok om sina upplevelser av sexuella övergrepp av en pedofil. Bearbetandet av dessa övergrepp i vuxen ålder, därför att han börjat må dåligt (övergrepp som han blev utsatt för under några år runt inträdet i tonåren), räckte dock inte för att befria honom från ångesten.

Miller menar (i min tolkning?) att förklaringen till detta är att författaren inte fick hjälp att gå vidare i terapin, till att ifrågasätta sina föräldrar, som anförtrodde sin son till denne man, sättet de gjorde detta på. Sveket att de inte såg och inte förmådde skydda honom?

Miller beskriver förbudet att ifrågasätta sina egna föräldrar och den påföljande ångesten över detta, att kroppen sa en sak som var strängt förbjuden att dra upp i ljuset?? Förstärkt av terapeutens (omedvetna) rädsla, med medföljande förbud att artikulera detta; ifrågasätta färldrarnas oförmåga, handlande och få tillåtelse att fördöma detta??

Och för att återgå till ursprungsämnet: den vuxne har tyvärr ytterligare medel till sitt förfogande för att föra detta förnekade våld vidare. Bland annat kan han/hon ideologisera våldet så raffinerat och utöva våldet så subtilt att han/hon till och med kan framställa det som något gott, som

”för den andres bästa”.

och på det viset liksom rättfärdiga det.

Och ju mindre beredd han/hon är att revidera sitt bedrägeri och självbedrägeri, desto tyngre blir konsekvenserna av hans handlande för andra.

Dvs. i den mån man är beredd att ifrågasätta desto mindre skada åstadkommer man, desto mindre blir konsekvenserna av ens handlingar/handlande. Så allt arbete man gör, alla insikter man skaffar sig (känslomässigt och intellektuellt) är av godo och skyddar en från att skada andra alltför illa (liksom skyddar en förhoppningsvis mot att skada en själv)!?

De barn som har turen att träffa ett hjälpande vittne (även ett omedvetet hjälpande, omedvetet men ändå vetande vittne) kan hjälpa barnet att litet mer aktivt se den lidna oförrätten (hjälpa barnet att ifrågasätta det som skett och betrakta som fel och i bästa fall helt fördöma det som skedde. Viulket oftast är förbjudet, för man ska ju förstå föräldrarna och deras situation och att de själva blivit skadade!!) och bearbeta det som hänt i mer eller mindre grad. Dessa barn blir inte våldsverkare senare kanske i någon grad trots att de kanske blivit misshandlade psykiskt och fysiskt och kanske även sexuellt och i vissa fall även grovt misshandlade. Detta menar Miller är förklaringen till att inte alla misshandlade barn själva blir grova förövare (och jag tror att Miller har rätt här, jag tror inte vi är födda med så dåliga gener eller drifter. Naturligtvis kan jag ha fel här, men varför inte utgå från denna hypotes? Och prova den?? Skulle detta skada någon? I så fall hur? För det är klart att man kanske inte ska ägna sig åt något som riskerar att orsaka skada!?).

Miller skriver på sidan 181 i "Vägar i livet":

"I detta sammanhang skulle man visserligen kunna resonera som Sigmund Freud gjorde på det sexuella området och säga: Om de flesta människor som barn har blivit misshandlade eller emotionellt försummade kan det inte vara någon patogen faktor vid uppkomsten av brottslighet, för i så fall hade de flesta utvecklats till mördare. Men detta resonemang bortser från själva det faktum att det inte är traumat i sig som direkt leder till att det bildas neuroser och till kriminella levnadsbanor, utan sättet på vilket de bearbetas."

Ja, antag att ganska många av oss, kanske väldigt många, varit utsatta för diverse "mildare" och subtilare saker... Och att omgivningen i många fall kanske inte var totalt konsekvent eller genomauktoritär... Kanske har många (fler än vi vill tro) varit utsatta för saker och det finns en anledning att kollektivt förneka detta, att minimera och bagatellisera en massa saker: otillbörlig beröring, nyp, daskar, utskällningar m.m.

Och kanske riktar de/vi detta istället "bara" mot sig/oss själva, i självdestruktivitet, självanklagelser osv.? Och/eller mot svagare...

Och när det gäller sexuella övergrepp så menar Miller att förövarna inte kommer ihåg vad de själva fick utstå, dvs. att de själva varit utsatta. Om en terapi är möjlig visar det sig att det är sin egen historia de har iscensatt i åratal, om och om igen.

Men rent allmänt så är inte vetande automatiskt något skydd, dvs. att man vet att man blev slagen, utskälld, och kanske inte heller att man blev sexuellt utnyttjad!? Man måste ha bearbetat det hela på ett någorlunda djupt plan. Dvs. ha fått ifrågasätta det och betrakta det som fel. Se t.ex. pappan som reagerade på sin egen pappa, som ör länge sedan förödmjukade sin son genom att skälla ut honom inför andra. Denna pappautsatte sina egna barn för samma saker, trots att han visste vad han själv varit utsatt för.

Jo, man behöver även ha integrerat det hela på någon känslomässig nivå? Vetande, minnesbild o.d. är inte tillräcklig!

Ett medvetet vetande är omöjligt för barnet utan ett hjälpande vittne. Barnet måste tränga bort eller förneka delar eller hela traumat. Och synen på VAD som är traumatiskt har också utvecklats?? Att kränkningar inte bara är av fysisk och sexuell natur, utan också handlar om känslomässiga kränkningar (vilka kanske är ÄNNU vanligare?). Men samhällets förnekande kan plötsligt liksom slå till igen. Ja, det kollektiva förnekandet kan slå till igen. Och man börjar bagatellisera och minimera betydelsen och allvaret i diverse kränkningar (se om Reich senare).

Miller skriver på sidan 168 i ”Vägar i livet”:

”Först när man inser den egentliga orsaken och förstår den naturliga reaktionen på oförrätter kan det blinda, på oskyldiga projicerade hatet upplösas. Dess funktion, att dölja sanningen, blir hädanefter överflödigt.”

Kom att tänka på mitt i skrivandet att man kan anse det vara berättigat att liksom "uppfostra" andra och tala om sanningar för dem... Och då kan det handla om ett försvar mot att inse sina egna sanningar, med den åtföljande smärtan, det försvar Bosch kallar för falsk makt-vrede? Ja, det svåra att inse vad som faktiskt ÄR berättigat och vad som INTE ÄR berättigat?? Där vi tyvärr ofta blivit förvirradgjorda?? Vissa tror att de förtjänar den behandling de får (första eller ursprungligt försvar) och andra anser att andra förtjänar den behandling de utsätter dem för!??? Och ofta "dras" dessa till varandra!??

Tillägg 23 februari: Miller skriver på sidan 170 i "Vägar i livet" om dagens terrorister som dödar och torterar främmande människor som inte har gjort dem något ont:

"...men varken deras aningslöshet idag eller deras en gång undertryckta och nu förnekade vrede rättfärdigar på något sätt deras extrema destruktivitet eller kan göra anspråk på vårt medlidande."

Och detta gäller andra våldsverkare också (även på politisk nivå och på en massa andra nivåer och i en massa andra sammanhang också)!! Och på sidan 171 om Hitler:

"Därmed kunde han också ursäkta faderns övergrepp, för fadern var ju bara ett offer för den onde och allsmäktige juden."

Och slutligen på sidan 187 om det misshandlade barnet:

"Det har ju lärt sig att den starkare har rätt att bruka sin makt godtyckligt./.../

...[han kommer] att böja sig för auktoriteter och spela herre över de svagare, enligt det despotiska mönster han som barn erfarit av sina uppfostrare."

Men fortfarande är en taskig barndom (vare sig medveten eller omedveten) ingen ursäkt för att den senare vuxne begår övergrepp av kanske något slag, vare sig stort eller smått?? Det befriar en inte heller från ansvar. Jag tycker Miller uttrycker detta ganska bra.

Se också om en anna sorts övergrepp (och om man så vill våld) i inlägget "Kön, genus och lojalitet." Ytterligare ett inlägg som jag måst gå och grunna på, men som är så suveränt! I all dess ilska!!! :-)

Tillägg 24 februari: En dansk man, född 1956, har skrivit en bok om sin far. En far som slog honom och som missbrukade hans syster sexuellt. Denne man säger sig forfarande älska sin far - och förstå honom (varför han gjorde som han gjorde mot sina barn). Dvs. han har förlåtit honom?

Se här, här, här och här om denna bok.

Jag tänker på det Miller skrivit om Hitler (se ovan). Om att Hitler riktade sitt hat mot syndabockar, genom att på "något sätt" ursäkta faderns övergrepp, för han (fadern) var ju ett offer för den onde juden... Och hur många fäder (och också mödrar) har inte barn måst förstå?? Men att vuxna fortsätter att göra detta...

Och återigen tänker jag på det Miller skriver om Wilhelm Reich. Miller skriver på sidan 162-163 om Wilhelm Reich:

"...föreställningen om den infantila sexualiteten, som Reich övertog från Freud och senare har vidareutvecklat, har jag aldrig kunnat dela med honom. I min bok 'Den bannlysta vetskapen' företrädde jag den åsikten att Freud med konceptet infantil sexualitet hade lagt locket på ifråga om de svåra följderna av övergrepp mot barn. Jag skrev: 'Något liknande gjorde senare också Wilhelm Reich. Han utvecklade en teori som skulle hjälpa honom att avvärja smärtan hos den tidigt och ständigt utnyttjade pojke som han en gång var. Istället för att känna hur ont det gör när man blir bedragen av de vuxna som man litar på och är försvarlös inför övergreppen, har Wilhelm Reich i hela sitt liv /.../ påstått: jag ville det själv, jag behövde det, alla barn behöver det!'[och vad har dessa båda auktoriteters privata och 'yrkesmässiga' förnekande inneburit för en oerhörd mängd människor?]

Denna utsaga bygger på Myron Sharafs Reichbiografi, enligt vilken Reich ska ha berättat att han redan vid fyra års ålder kände till det sexuella livets alla hemligheter, och detta tack vare husjungfrun som brukade ta honom till sig i sin säng och undervisa honom i sexuella lekar./.../ Förnekandet av barndomens smärta har /.../ vittgående följder, som inte begränsar sig till det privata familjeområdet utan till och med kan leda till politiska omvälvningar [förföljelse av vissa grupper, till och med mord och utrotning av människor osv., förutom övergrepp inom familjen...]."

I wikipedia står det om Reich:

”Reich attributed his later interest in the study of sex and the biological basis of the emotions to his upbringing on the farm where, as he later put it, the 'natural life functions' were never hidden from him. Reich also spoke of witnessing the family's maid having intercourse with her boyfriend, and apparently later asking if he could 'play' the part of the lover. He said that, by the time he was four years old, there were no secrets about sex for him.

He was taught at home until he was 12, when his mother committed suicide after being discovered having an affair with Reich's tutor, who lived with the family. In a report supposedly about a patient, Reich wrote about how deeply the affair had affected him, that the ‘joy of life shattered, torn apart from my inmost being for the rest of my life!’

Her death was particularly brutal because of the method she chose; she drank a common household cleaner, which left her in great pain for days before she died. The tutor was sent away, and Reich was left without his mother or his teacher, and with a powerful sense of guilt.

He was sent to the all-male Czernowitz gymnasium, excelling at Latin, Greek, and the natural sciences. It appears to have been during this period that a skin condition developed that plagued him for the rest of his life. It was diagnosed as psoriasis; Reich was given medication that contained arsenic, now known to make psoriasis worse.

Reich's father was ‘completely broken’ by his wife's suicide. In or around 1914, he took out a life insurance policy, then stood for hours in a cold pond, apparently fishing, but in fact intending to commit slow suicide, according to Reich and his brother Robert. He contracted pneumonia and then tuberculosis, and died in 1914 as a result of his illness; despite his insurance policy, no money was forthcoming.

Reich managed the farm and continued with his studies, graduating in 1915 mit Stimmeneinhelligkeit (unanimous approval). In the summer of 1915, the Russians invaded Bukovina and the Reich brothers fled to Vienna, losing everything. In his Passion of Youth, Reich wrote: ‘I never saw either my homeland or my possessions again. Of a well-to-do past, nothing was left.’

‘I had read somewhere that lovers get rid of any intruder, so with wild fantasies in my brain I slipped back to my bed, my joy of life shattered, torn apart in my inmost being for my whole life!’ — Wilhelm Reich.”

Och det där om barndomsskildringar och att skratta bort saker:

"Alice Miller on Frank McCourt in her book “The Truth Will Set You Free – Overcoming Emotional Blindness and Finding Your True Self” ISBN 0-465-04585-5 pages 100-103:

“Protection and respect for the needs of a child – this is surely something we ought to be able to take for granted. But we live in a world full of people who have grown up deprived of their rights, deprived of respect /…/

Also, there is less of a tendency today to idealize and romanticize childhood; the misery frequently comes across in all its starkness. But in most autobiographies I have read the authors still maintain an emotional distance from the suffering they went through as children. Little empathy and an astounding absence of rebellion are the rule. There is no inquiry into the whys and wherefores behind the injustice, the emotional blindness and the resulting cruelty displayed by the adults, whether teachers or parents. Description is all. On every page of the brilliant book Angela’s Ashes, for example, Frank McCourt describes such cruelties in gruesome detail. But even as he recalls his childhood, he never rises up against his tormentors, attempting instead to remain living and tolerance and seeking salvation in humor.

And it is for this humor that he has been celebrated by millions of readers the world over [!!!].

But how are we to stand up for children in our society and improve their situation if we laugh at and tolerate cruelty, arrogance, and dangerous stupidity? /…/

Humor saved Frank McCourt’s life and enabled him to write his book. His readers are grateful to him for it. Many of them have shared the same fate and they want nothing more dearly than to be able to laugh it off. Laughter is good for you, so they say, and it certainly helps you survive. But laughter can also entice you to be blind. You may be able to laugh at the fact that someone has forbidden you to eat of the tree of knowledge, but that laughter will not really wake you up from the sleep. You must learn to understand the difference between good end evil if you want to understand yourself and change anything in the world as it is [yes, what is good and what is evil? What is love and what is not love? What are expressions for love and what is not? What is in fact cruel and unfair? What should we question? And what are we usually questioning and not in fact and why? What are we protecting and what not actually? What produces evilness and what would not produce evilness?].

Laughter is good for you, but only when there is reason to laugh [and then we are of course entitled to laugh, from the bottom of our stomach, body, heart, with glittering eyes]. Laughing away one’s own suffering is a form of fending off, a response that can prevent us from seeing and tapping the sources of understanding around us [but the helpless and totally dependent child, with all what mean, had to laugh it off and use a lot of other strategies to survive. And those strategies cause the adult a whole range of problems, troubles and difficulties. And it is not only to intellectually understand this… And you can’t just cope with this with all different techniques and/or methods… Or just cognitively I think. If it was many of us would be cured long ago… In a way we must realize emotionally how harmful things are and were I think].

If biographers were better informed about the details and consequences of what some indifferently call as a normal strict upbringing, they could provide us with precious material for better understanding our world. But there are not many who try to figure out how such upbringing was experienced by their subject as child.”

Denial...

[Updated January 16]. I want to explore further what expressions the Denial takes, not only on a personal level... What the Denial for or in individuals results in in different respects and different areas, for and with people in the society on different levels.

---

In the evening: I came across a review on the book “Rag-Doll” ("Trasdocka" in Swedish) written by a woman, an Yvonne Domeij, who was sexually abused by a person supposed to help her and the family she grew up in when she was a young girl. This review was so strange, so I reacted.

And yesterday there was blogpost on a blog, about environmental pollution and the capitalism's role in this, with a quote from Karl Marx, which said something in the style (my amateur-translation from Swedish!):

“The capitalistic production can only develop the production-technique and the societal organization when it at the same time destroy all wealth’s fountain-head; the earth and the worker.”

The first commentator wrote a comment I reacted strongly against, another strong reaction. It stands something in the style:

“To ‘destroy’ the earth is unfortunately necessary for all human life. The fact is that you can’t light a fire, cook food or build a house without destroying anything. It is called creative destruction when you take something and make something else of it.”

I tried to post a very ironic reply saying something in the style that

"How convenient, then we don’t have to do anything, because we can’t do anything, we can just move on as we have always done"

but I didn’t succeed to get it posted…

Before I went to work I swiftly wrote, threw these words down:

"Not wanting to know any consequences..."

It felt as both these two things was an expression of Denial. The reviewer to the book couldn’t handle what she read? And thus she wrote her very strange review, and the commentator also reacted with Denial to truths HE (I interpreted it at as a he :-)) of some reason can’t handle, has to push away and push it away in the manner he did in my experience. And I think these reactions are expressions of things that are triggered in these two persons. They are examples of such reactions, reactions as we see now and then everywhere, i different circumstances and on different levels!?

Now to a description of the book and its content and a description of the review I read and reacted to: When the small Yvonne told about the abuse her family pushed her away. Four years ago she realized that the abuser even today denies the abuse and says they had a love-relation.

Yvonne Domeij says that what he calls a love relation is

“...countless rapes committed against a child in his power, through his work.”

When she heard what the abuser had said they suddenly gushed forth, all the things that had been enclosed as a hard lump of shame during all years. The anger over what he had done to her. That he had taken her body. And that he still loaded the guilt on her for what had occurred. She realized (then?) that it wasn’t she, the victim who should feel shame, but he, the abuser. Therefore she has spoken out (the book came fall 2006), and gone out in public with her name and identity. She encourages people to look in the archives what is documented about her case.

From this anger and fury she started to write as she says. By the writing, articulating and naming the abuse she rehabilitated herself. Restored herself.

The book contains three parts; the girl’s story, the grown up woman’s story, and at last the abusers story. She started to write the part which was seen from the abusers perspective. Domeij says that it was fun to write this book. It felt good to write about something noone had wanted to hear. My comment: Now noone could stop her!? Now she was grown up with a grown ups power!? But with all respect to other victims of abuse, which can’t speak up as Domeij does. It took three and a half year to write the book it stands.

It seems as the former wife of this man has contributed to this book too!? They write about a man, the social-physician, highly regarded by the environment, how the environment let the whole pass, because many knew. But noone did anything.

Domeij is born 1944, so this occurred in the next decade? The one when I was born. So I have weak memories of that time. Yes, about the hypocrisy, when the wives met to drink coffee, and everything sounded so fine…

Domeij grew up in a “complicated” family. Her parents married against their families’ will/wishes, got outcast and lived without real social networks. The hypocrisy… I get so angry.

When the father got sick there were neither any social nor economic networks for the family, so the six children went from one child- and foster-home to the next. They needed help and one of the helpers abused Yvonne…

In the review, “With the polluters/defilers eyes” in one of our biggest newspapers Svenska Dagbladet, the reviewer writes that

“With all respect to Domeij and her harrowing destiny, to me it doesn’t seem as Domeij has (ever?) been a rag-doll. Maybe it was Doctor Björks merit [a physician Yvonne met as very small?], which once took the four-year old girl on his lap and taped her name on the typewriter. When the word Yvonne clearly and plainly appeared on the paper the girl got aware of herself”

the reviewer writes.

“She was Yvonne. Therefore she would – despite the environments persistent endeavours in that way – never become an object, a thing, a contraption. The word was transformed into a talisman which, herself unknowingly, protected her against everything she later tell the reader about. But it never protected her against suffering, sorrow, agony, rape, loneliness, violations, emotional abuse and six years homelessness.”

She also minimizes the problems the family had, by "protesting" and saying that there are few children which have lived such a varying or alternating life as little Yvonne, meeting strangers…

And the review goes on in this style…

See texts in Swedish about the book, I have taken facts from and used above, here, here, here and here.photo on Yvonne Domeij.

PS. January 16: Of some reason I came to think about an earlier blogpost I had written, "Terapeut om ondska" or "Therapist on evilness", about the Danish author Kristian Ditlev Jensen which Miller mentions in the article "Deception Kills Love". Domeij says that she will never be really free from the abuse she suffered and Miller writes that:

"Despite years of therapy he [Kristian Ditlev Jensen] was unable to sleep, had difficulty in concentrating, suffered terrifying nightmares and was subject to frequent bouts of panic that he was unable to control."

And:

"As an adult, Kristian Jensen is free to see through Gustav’s manipulations. Accordingly he is hardly in danger of doing the same to others. But a child does not have this freedom. One cannot escape one’s own parents, so one cannot afford to see through them either. Blindness makes it possible to survive."

And (the processing in Jensen's therapy stopped with the acknowledgment of the sexual abuse Jensen suffered as a 9-12 year old boy, but what was underneath this, this wasn't really touched upon? Why Jensen still has/had problems despite many years of therapy? Because some perpetrators we are allowed to react at with disgust, with all rightfulness, but others are almost forbidden to question and/or react at!?):

"While the book reveals that the parents’ indifference was in fact the ground in which sexual abuse was able to take root and flourish, the author insists in his preface that today he loves his parents dearly and has forgiven them for absolutely everything.

It was this sentence that prompted me to react to this book. The point is that it illustrates the covert, but nonetheless virulently destructive power of the Fourth Commandment that has been a constant concern of mine. As a child Kristian was unable to free himself of Gustav’s pernicious influence because he believed that he could not live without him, without the intellectual joys he had introduced him to in the capital. If he were forced to return to the soul-destroying boredom of his parents’ provincial home, then he would surely die. Accordingly he submitted to his 'friend’s' brain-washing and chose to ignore the obvious abuse he was being subjected to. Today, as an adult, he can see things more realistically, he can see what harm was done to him, and for that reason he is no longer forced to love Gustav. But the ties that link him to his parents have lost none of their power. And this is what Kristian Jensen calls love.

Although Kristian’s account indicates very clearly how the first years of his life as a neglected child drilled into unquestioning obedience of his parents paved the way for the crimes perpetrated on him by this pedophile, he acquits his parents of any kind of responsibility for his dilemma. Emotionally, at least. The reader can sense the adults’ indignation at the behavior of his parents, who calmly entrusted him to the care of a criminal every week-end for a period of three years. But the child within cannot venture to express this indignation, the fear of his parents is still too overpowering. This may explain why Kristian still suffers from his symptoms. His rage at Gustav’s behavior is legitimate, the contempt for pedophiles is shared by society. But not the rage caused by his parents. This forbidden rage remains pent up in his body, it produces nightmares and other symptoms because it is not accessible to his adult consciousness. What remains is the longing for 'good' parents, and this longing sustains all the illusions he entertains about them.

Kristian Jensen is no exception. I constantly receive books by authors relating inconceivable cruelties perpetrated on them in their early years. On the very first pages of these books they assure the reader that they have forgiven their parents for everything done to them. All these cases are a sure indication of compulsive repetition, the compulsion to prolong the deception they were once subjected to. This compulsion manifests itself above all in the religious assertion that forgiveness has a salutary effect. This assertion is clearly contradicted by the facts. The compulsion to preach is never the product of a free spirit.

Am I saying that forgiveness for crimes done to a child is not only ineffective but actively harmful? Yes, that is precisely what I am saying. The body does not understand moral precepts. It fights against the denial of genuine emotions and for the admission of the truth to our conscious minds. This is something the child cannot afford to do, it has to deceive itself and turn a blind eye to the parents’ crimes in order to survive. Adults no longer need to do this, but if they do, the price they pay is high. Either they ruin their own health or they make others pay the price – their children, their patients, the people who work for them, etc.

A therapist who has forgiven his parents for the cruelty they showed him will frequently feel the urge to suggest this same course of action to his patients as a remedy for their ills. In so doing, he is exploiting their dependence and their trust. If he is no longer in touch with his own feelings, he may indeed be unaware that in this way he is doing to others what was once done to him. He is abusing others, confusing them, while rejecting any kind of responsibility for his actions because he is convinced that he is acting for their own good. Are not all religions unanimous in their conviction that forgiveness is the path to Heaven? Was not Job ultimately rewarded for the fact that he forgave God? No good can be expected of a therapist who identifies with the parents who once abused him. But adult patients have the choice. They can leave a therapist when they have seen through his deception and self-deception. They need not identify with him and repeat his acts all over again."

Not only Staff...

photos on Tor Erling Staff.

[Updated January 14 and 17 in the end]. Making my first real post on this new blog.

I got a tip from a friend this morning about an article about sexual abuse of children and a Norwegian man exposed to sexual abuse as 12-year old boy, the now retired Norwegian lawyer Tor Erling Staff (about him at wikipedia, though only in Norwegian), belittling and minimizing the damage he was caused.

His recent client is a pedophile, the so called "lommemannen", which has been sexually abusing several hundred small boys in Norway the last three decades, that has been caught in Norway recently, which was a big news in Sweden too.

See earlier blogposts about defences, because what this man is doing is defending himself against the truth to what he has been exposed to. He admits to the abuse he has suffered, he remembers it, but the feelings that would be adequate aren't connected to this. These he has suppressed? Probably immediately? And one can wonder what he has been exposed to even earlier in his life.

And the bad thing is that he goes out in public with this denial, he doesn't keep it for himself...

I came to think that Miller has actually written about Wilhelm Reich somewhere (maybe I come back to this) and his minimizing of the sexual abuse he was exposed to by a maiden in the family as only 4-year old, which she thinks is a protection against the utter pain the true realization would be. I think she is right.

Earlier blogposts about minimizing and belittling, and about Tor Erling Staff (both in English and Swedish).

I googled on him and in one article he says that the respect for the child is ruining, destroying the society. In another he says he has had sex with everything that can crawl or walk either it has two legs or four... Grew up in the upper middle-class? And seems to have been a very controversial lawyer in Norway... No wonder...

A female incest-victim in Norway had this man as defender, see here and here. She reacts over Staff's belittling and minimizing these issues! This woman killed her father 2000 as 38 years and Staff was the only lawyer she knew of and asked him. Her father had been abusing her sexually from she was a child up in teenage...

The article (in Norwegian):

"Ikke bare Staff.

Det er ingen grunn til å tro at hadde Tor Erling Staff vært uskadeliggjort, ville alt vært greit. Bagatellisering av overgrep mot barn skjer daglig, på mange fronter.

Tor Erling Staffs uttalelser om seksuelle overgrep mot barn opprører oss. Staff sier ting som er virkelig avskyelige. Han er helt på jordet når han legger skylden på politiet om smågutter blir traumatisert av å bli utsatt for orale overgrep fra voksne menn [Staff blames the police that boys gets traumatized by oral sexual abuse by men!!! It's the police's fault; if they didn't make this an issue there wouldn't be any damage he means?].

Hjelpeapparatet

Men bagatellisering av overgrep mot barn skjer mange steder. Blant annet i barnepsykiatrien, som ikke registrerer overgrepene blant de fleste av sine overgrepsutsatte pasienter. Da en undersøkelse av norsk barne- og ungdomspsykiatri ble offentliggjort for to år siden, kom det ingen reaksjon fra verken helseministeren, andre politikere, eller fra psykiatrien [investigations have shown that the psychiatry doesn't make any records over abuse their patients have been exposed to and dared to talk about? When this investigation actually was made public in Norway no ministers in the government reacted - of course!?].

Selv har jeg hørt en psykolog omskrive overgrep mot barn til Ødipus-komplekset (innlegg i Tidsskrift for psykisk helsearbeid 4/2006). Og jeg har opplevd at det har blitt brukt samme type uprofesjonell begrunnelse som Staff bruker, for å bagatellisere - i dette tilfellet fysiske - overgrep mot barn, ved at psykologen hevdet at han selv ikke hadde blitt skadet av å ha blitt utsatt for vold som barn [The author of this debate-article writes in a magazine for work on psychological health that a psychologist ascribed abuse the Oedipus-complex!!! And that a psychologist meant that he himself hadn't been damaged by violence he was exposed to as a child!! Very unprofessional from both Staff and the psychologist! I come to think of what the Norwegian physician Anna-Luise Kirkengen writes in the foreword to her book 'How Abused Children Becomes Unhealthy Adults' something about that her book is directed to all dealing with victims of abuse of all kinds and in all different circumstances, including that of lawyers! *see the bottom of this blogpost what Kirkengen writes, at the asterisk].

En prest som har tatt doktorgrad på seksualforbrytere og jobber som terapeut, mener at barneporno muligens kan brukes til noe positivt: som hjelp i det terapeutiske arbeidet. Barneporno er filmede eller fotograferte reelle overgrep mot barn. Hvorfor skrek ikke halve nasjonen opp etter en slik uttalelse? Jeg ble så sjokkert da jeg leste det at jeg skrev til vedkommendes biskop. Men det kom intet svar fra biskopen [a Norwegian priest/minister working as therapist with children exposed to sexual abuse means child-porno maybe can be used as something positive. Horrible.].

Eller hva med barnevernet? I rapporten Barnevernet og incestsaker fra Redd Barna og Støttesenter mot incest - Oslo leser vi:

- Fagfolk er redde for å gå inn i slike saker! Slik var det for noen år siden. Slik er det i dag, sier en saksbehandler. Mange barnevernsansatte opplever at de er alene på arbeidsplassen om å tro at det har skjedd overgrep [People are very lonely believing they are the one and only exposed to abuse because the silence around these issues.].

En fostermor var sikker på at fosterdatteren var misbrukt, men ble ikke hørt av barnevernet, som truet: - Hvis dere ikke slutter å være så opphengt i overgrep, vil vi vurdere å overlate barnet til noen andre.

Barneoppdragerne

Sammenhengen mellom fysisk og seksuell vold er fortsatt i liten grad erkjent i samfunnet. Selv om det kom mange og kraftige reaksjoner i høst da Carl I. Hagen, Aslam Ahsan med flere gikk ut i media og bagatelliserte fysisk avstraffelse av barn, forble dette et ikke-tema.

En avstemning VG gjorde, viste at hele 46,5 prosent godtok rising av barn. Det er åpenbart ikke bare Staff som ikke skjønner hva traumer hos barn er.

Oslos ordfører Fabian Stang, som selv er advokat, engasjerer seg nå mot Staffs uttalelser. Han sier Staff kan ha brutt Straffelovens § 140, der det heter at den som offentlig oppfordrer eller tilskynder til iverksettelsen av en straffbar handling eller forherliger en sådan, kan straffes med bøter eller med fengsel i inntil åtte år, eventuelt 2/3 av den høyeste straff for det aktuelle lovbruddet.

Men hvorfor reagerte ikke Stang etter Aslam Ahsans forsvar for vold mot barn? Oslo kommune har vært med og finansiert et senter for barn som Ahsan leder. Mener kommunen at de som forherliger vold er egnet til å arbeide med barn?

Mørkemennene

Så har vi enkelte kristenfundamentalisters bagatellisering av seksuelle overgrep mot barn, ved å likestille homofili og liberal seksualmoral med pedofili.

Stortingsrepresentant André Oktay Dahl (H) har fortalt at han får uhyggelige brev på grunn av sitt arbeid for felles ekteskapslov, homoplan og bedre homo-rettigheter. På nettstedet Gaysir kan vi lese utdrag av et, som påstår at 'homofile er like farlige overgripere mot barn og unge som de pedofile'.

Denne brevskriveren er ikke den eneste som ikke viker tilbake for å sammenlikne homofili med seksuelle overgrep mot barn. Espen Ottosen, informasjonsleder i Norsk Luthersk Misjonssamband, skrev i en kronikk i Aftenposten: "På det seksuelle området har relativismen fått en enorm innflytelse. Et tankevekkende utslag av denne relativismen var reaksjonene som kom til uttrykk da Tor Erling Staff ... fortalte at han som 12-åring hadde gode seksuelle opplevelser sammen med andre menn', og at 'få våget å hevde at tilfeldig sex som involverer et barn alltid er galt'.

Den gode kristne mann gjorde seg skyldig i brudd på det åttende bud. For Staff møtte motbør. Jeg var selv en, av flere, som hadde innlegg mot Staff da han gikk ut med dette i 2005.

Å kalle en tolvåring mann, og dermed ansvarliggjøre barn for sexmisbruk, er grovt. Å knytte en seksualmoral som er mer liberal enn mørkemannens til det å ha sex med barn, framstiller de aller fleste av oss voksne, heterofile eller homofile, som seksualovergripere.

At de mest skadelige overgrepene ofte skjer i den tradisjonelle, heterofile familien, tok ikke Ottosen seg bryet med å nevne. Men da er det jo heller ikke lenger snakk om 'tilfeldig sex', men ofte langvarige og systematiske krenkelser fra de nærmeste.

Folkeopplyserne

Staff bør ikke gjøres til den ene syndebukken, for å avlaste fellesskapet. Mye mer kan gjøres på dette feltet. Her har særlig fagfolk - fortrinnsvis de med kompetanse på traumer hos barn - en viktig oppgave.

I dag er noen av dem på banen og snakker om 'Lommemannens' antatte psyke. Men selv om den noe omstridte diagnosen dissosiativ lidelse skulle referere til et faktisk psykisk fenomen, der vedkommendes egne traumer fra barndommen er fraspaltet bevisstheten, så vet enhver voksen tenkende person at overgrep mot barn er galt og straffbart.

Burde ikke psykologer og andre profesjonelle bli flinkere enn de er i dag til å opplyse allmennheten om de alvorlige konsekvensene for mange ofre for overgrep, slik at potensielle overgripere der ute kunne velge å søke hjelp framfor å ødelegge barns liv?

Og vi andre kunne se litt på våre holdninger."

* Yes, Kirkengen in fact writes:

"I address this book about how personal integrity violations lead to illness to my colleagues who practice, do research, teach and write within the field of general and specialized medicine. I also address researchers and clinicians within health-related professions, such as nurses, psychologists, physiotherapists, midwives, pediatric nurses, and consultants in ergonomics. Furthermore, I address all professionals working with children, such as teachers, child care consultants, speech therapists, social workers, and special education teachers. I wish, moreover, to reach those in the legal professions. This includes the police because lawyers, judges and police personnel come in contact with people, old and young, who are being hurt or have been hurt in the past by other people's lack of respect for their personal integrity.

I also address politicians and lawmakers since they are in a position to translate knowledge regarding boundary violation into viable initiatives and laws. The initiatives must have as their goal the prevention of humiliation, violation, injury or abuse, particularly of people who are young and dependent. They must also aim to insure that all people, regardless of where they are or where they go, can trust that they will be valued and treated with respect. Laws must have as their aim that all people, especially those who are small and dependent, who have already been humiliated, violated, injured or abused receive the help they need, and in abundance. They must also aim to insure that all people who have been treated with disrespect or contempt can regain their sense of self-worth and self-respect.

First and foremost, however, I address this work to students within medicine and other health professions. My declared aim here is to point out in what ways a dualistic view of the human being and his body is untenable, how it leads both to a dualistic health system, one somatic and the other psychiatric, and to a dualistic conceptual world, divided into one classification system for somatic illnesses and another for mental illnesses. Medicine and related fields of study rest on this divided and dividing knowledge and students are trained to think those terms. I beg students not to allow this way of thinking to wipe out what they know about themselves, and, consequently, about other people as well: that they are unique individuals with mindful bodies.

In the hope that this book may also reach people outside the medical professions, I have chosen to use everyday language. Issues of integrity and violation are, in fact, themes all people share. We are all vulnerable, not just a few of us. In addition to our being mortal, what human beings have in common is the fact that we can all be humiliated."

Addition January 14: Silent reflection during a walk in the morning: Does Staff want the whole society to join his personal denial? Soon turning 75 years, with more and more weakening defenses? Maybe he even wants to convince himself that he wanted it, that it was good for him, that all children want this? As Wilhelm Reich did if I remember what Miller wrote right? Awful and so sad...

In the afternoon: Staff has the power and the position... He can allow himself to go out and say such things. And he is allowed too, even if I know people have reacted... I couldn't help wonder:think if Staff had been a woman. Could a woman do such a thing?

Addition January 17: more articles/opinions about Staff and what he has put forward recently here, here and here. People questioning and defending. Even a man charged for sexual abuse (of children?) is critical, even furious. Saying that what Staff has said legitimizes abuse, and of course the abusers

"...loves when something says it is ok to paw children."

Miller has written about successful therapy with men in prison for incest... If these men (and women) get an opportunity to question and view what they have endured themselves as (small, maybe even very small) children, they can realize what they ave done...