In a discussion on elderly care in Sweden last night a professor in Social Gerontology Mats Thorslund said that the question “What care without dignity is” wasn’t interesting in the commission of inquiry concerning what care with dignity is. He had tried to raise this question with no response (whatsoever?) from the others in the committee (except from one person?).
Someone also spoke about that by redefining the needs (in this case the needs of elderly people) the politicians can get around the laws.
Is the solution to go back to old time’s class differences? Should we rethink everything in the society? Is this with elderly care a symptom on something in the society and the whole world?
Anja on the blog Do nothing day wrote that she almost got tears in her eyes when she heard a young (Swedish) former politician, Alexander Chamberlain, on the radio, who has left the Green party, for instance because the party has become too mainstream and forgotten its radical molding of public opinion.
In the radio programme he spoke about when he was trained for media. For instance concerning what clothes to wear. Clothes that don't put out too much. She became so glad to hear what he had to say, because she is so heartily sick of media trained politicians.
In this way we only get sellers, not human beings representing other people in a representative democracy she writes. How well said!
The whole idea of democracy is hollowed out by the seller strategy and the seller idea.
Anja thinks politicians apart from representing the people, also ought to challenge and inspire people – to thinking “political thoughts.” Politicians ought to be good pedagogues who explain their train of thoughts in an honest and sincere manner, consequently the very opposite to the political slogans we are mostly served today. And the best way to be a good pedagogue is to live as one learns. To try and strive doing that.
That those media/spin doctors governing the politicians and thus the politics today have a normative basic outlook (how it ought to be, i.e. an ideal standard or model) is nothing to become surprised over she thinks.
If we try to make a deep analysis of the thoughts underlying media training we discover that they are deeply conservative (we shall remain with things as they have always been). And shall movements that actually aren't conservative really make use of conservative forces to help promoting their messages she wonders? Yes, you can really wonder!
The way you are thinking when you try to sell:
If you are a clever seller you can sell everything under what circumstances whatsoever, but why start in a uphill slope? Give yourself the best prerequisites to get your message through as you can.
And what are those prerequisites? Yes, one of them is looking as “normal” as possible and behave as “normally” as possible, but also (as a politician) be a hetero-man, white, talk without accent etc.
Things we CAN'T have an influence on how mediocre clothes we even wear.
Is this fair? NO! Anja thinks.
And continues asking: If we don't challenge peoples' images or pictures on whom that is “allowed” to be politician, and who we on the whole shall listen to, this will never change!!
And if we deepen the analysis even more we discover that the reason for media trainers/spin doctors wanting normal, white hetero-men without accents in the telescreen when talk is needed for five minutes, is that it is these groups whom are watching these programme. And why is that? The reason is because these programme addresses this group!
Anja is sure that if Alexander wore a lot of necklaces and pink clothes what he has to say would be heard by those who want to hear what he says.
Unfortunately it's not those that are looking at the news, because those sorts of programmes have already alienated these categories!! How well said! So you see! A perfect circle reasoning. We can't change anything in the society because nothing has changed! It's fantastic!
If the only motive (propelling) force is money what society, workplaces etc. does this create? Are we making a better job with this motive force (something power and career people "firmly" believe is a drive for all people)? I wonder if (all) people are only driven by money as the main motive force? But all people need and are entitled to live a decent life.
What happens when people realize that they have been striving for something that will probably never occur? That they are trapped in a life where they have to work till they fall dead down? Is this freedom or slavery (serfdom)? A modern form of serfdom and slavery?
How will they react if and when they realize that other people at the same time retire at an early age (in their fifties for instance) with a much higher material standard?
How do they react when they realize that if you land in different life circumstances it hasn’t with competence to do? Or does it have with competence to do?
Is the society encouraging sound drives in people I also wonder?
And the people in power are loyal to each other (networking).
If one generalizes: loyalty, solidarity is something women devote themselves to and are interested in, men compete instead. But I don’t think we are born this way.
The grassroots are caught by helplessness and resignedness (but from where do those feelings originate? So would it be possible doing something about them?).
What would sound drives be?
Society is encouraging unsound forces in people I would assert. And this leads to the kind of inequality we see all over the world. Leads to the enormous cleavages between people.
“Wanja Lundby-Wedin is made scapegoat for dissatisfaction, anxiety and indignant feelings that have become ripped open in the paths of the financial crisis. What has she done?
She has as a member of the board for AMF [insurance company, administering retirement money] approved of a ‘juicy’ retirement agreement to a former CEO.
A fact that has been available for reading in the company’s annual report for many years – as a Sverker Sörlin pointed to in Dagens Nyheter [a big newspaper here] but something nobody have breathed about earlier. It has been possible for all those capable of reading from the book to acquaint themselves with these facts [they haven’t been hidden. But I wonder, where have the press and media been? And why haven’t they reported about this? Because they take on the power’s businesses?].
But now, when people are losing their jobs and greedy CEOs are allowed to wind (fawn) and pretend that they are giving up their giant bonuses, then one go for Wanja, who as the chairwomen for Swedish Trade and Union Confederation ought to know better [and yes, in a way she ought to??]. Where all other people have been blind she should have seen. She hasn’t grabbed anything for her own sake, she has only, as all other up there, failed to adjust to a slower speed in a bolting capitalism. For this she is hated and has to become removed while the overpaid capital and trade and industry elite remain sitting biding their time.
Financial crisis, losing ones job and bonuses isn’t Wanja’s fault. Our society’s mentality isn’t her fault. My thought is the more the man on the street shuts him/herself off from the public affairs, from the local politics and doesn’t engage her/himself –in the school and care, in how people are living, jobs and the distribution from the fruits of the society – the distance to those in power, who are power professionals will increase and that’s why we are getting all those things such as bonuses and fantasy agreements.
I think our society is suffering from a political but also trade and union lack of interest and a lack of engagement from the general public.
When people leave walk-over to the power we have gotten a societal climate where the cream of those in power believe they can do whatever they like, because they don’t get any feedback from reality until it’s too late [this was pretty kindly said, quite ironically. Do they care about the man on the street, generally? Of course I think there can be and are exceptions]. And not until fantasy pensions and bonus agreements are known to people, in the gloomy light of a financial crisis, one gets upset and start to tell people off in letters to the press and voting on the net.”
Yes, the power is networking, but what are we, the men and women on the street, doing?
And why?
It has been shown that the social mobility has been greater in the Scandinavian countries (with a strong welfare state) than in countries like Great Britain and USA. See here, here and here (the first two texts are in Swedish, but maybe possible to translate and the third is in English, from New York Times).
My blogpostings have been looking very strange for a long time. But I haven't had time figuring out what it has been about. It looked much better when I started blogging. This has been really disturbing, because actually I care how my blogs are looking. I get the message that my HTML-code isn't accepted... But I have been capable of posting anyway.
Mary Poppins: [Spoken] In ev'ry job that must be done There is an element of fun You find the fun and snap! The job's a game
[Sung] And ev'ry task you undertake Becomes a piece of cake A lark! A spree! It's very clear to see that
A Spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down The medicine go down-wown The medicine go down Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down In a most delightful way
A robin feathering his nest Has very little time to rest While gathering his bits of twine and twig Though quite intent in his pursuit He has a merry tune to toot He knows a song will move the job along - for
A Spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down The medicine go down-wown The medicine go down Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down In a most delightful way
[Interlude]
The honey bee that fetch the nectar From the flowers to the comb Never tire of ever buzzing to and fro Because they take a little nip From ev'ry flower that they sip And hence (And hence), They find (They find) Their task is not a grind.
Ah-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h ah!
A Spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down The medicine go down-wown The medicine go down Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down In a most delightful way
Where you can read that the trend with harder grips against children in our society has got an against-reaction. The [Swedish] professors Mats Ekholm,Hans-Åke Scherp and Bengt-Erik Andersson have reacted strongly in a petition against super nanny methods like expelling, taking no notice of, and putting children in the corner - and against the government’s policy with harder grips in the school.
That psychical abuse or mistreatment of children is sent as entertainment in TV and that the methods are taught on different courses, of course influences how we think and react the editor thinks [this was one of his better contributions, because I haven't been so fond of this newspaper and its tame and lame views, colored by this editor??]. The school and teachers are influenced by this too.
During the former century the Swedish society made a journey from an undemocratic society to a democratic. From an undemocratic school where the students were disciplined with violence to a school with a democratic and humane outlook on mankind.
This journey has been very positive for both students and society. Swedish students are frank, open and creative and they dare to call things in question they think are wrong. Swedish students don’t do their school tasks because they fear their teachers, but because they have an inherent lust to learn. This is an outlook on students and a school we shall take care of.
Do we really need sugar to help the medicine go down???
From the petition in my a little free translation:
“The former century’s big catchword – the child’s century [see pictures here from a series in Swedish TV on The Child's Century] – quickly disappeared from those in power and moulders of public opinion. The media producers use to send psychic abuse of children as entertainment. From the ideal of the Super nanny parents are taught to expel and ignore their child when it needs nearness and warmth. Standing in the corner is reintroduced but is called time-out. Education programs are brought about for school and child care where the personnel are trained to discipline with authoritarian shutting off (suspension) and humiliating treatment. Instead of teaching children to respect themselves and other people it is raised to staking on own profits (gains): what can I loose or win doing as the grown ups want? The government is walking at the head of a hardened fashion in meeting children and young people. In its rhetoric knowledge is honored. It would be valuable if the government uses systematic knowledge also in the education area [They ought use the knowledge that they say they honor - quite ironically!!]. Contrary to scientific findings punishment is advocated as a raising method, for example in form of detention./…/ Young people grow when they are put demands on and when they meet challenges in safe contexts, where it is allowed and desirable that they are learning by mistakes as well as ‘successful tricks’. Young people are growing best in circumstances when they are accepted/recognized and when their way of thinking and feeling is met with respect. We urge ministers/secretaries and other moulders of opinions ceasing to treat children and young people as less worth. Show them respect instead. Use science and well-tried experiences when initiatives are taken so that young people are allowed to develop from desires, joy and engagement in secure circumstances. Meet children and young people as we want them to be – responsible taking, enterprising, creative and critically reflecting.”
From a review of "The Culture of the New Capitalism"by Richard Sennett and a paper for a university degree by Kristina Finnholm here in Sweden (see my earlier blogposting in Swedish about this review here, here is my amateur-translation from Swedish to English of parts of this earlier posting):
“…the new capitalism’s culture creates non-free people.”
Contrary to what we are told.
“…it was long since the state and the capitalism created a common security/safety with long-term relations./…/
…when the big institutions have become fragmented peoples’ lives have become fragmented too.
…Sweden and Norway [can be stressed] as good societal experiments. The social democrat welfare model showed that stable societies aren’t economically stationary or stagnant.
Here a successful combination of relative stability and growth was combined (or shown). On top we had managed to combine a more fair distribution of the welfare and a generally seen higher standard of living, internationally seen, than USA and England.”
I think this is true. And possible to create in other countries too.
“The physical work environment has in many ways improved, but not the psychosocial work environment. A new human being is about to become created. A person that rejects his/her history and lets go of her/his past. A human being living in short-sightedness.”
This felt so good to read, because I think it’s sound, psychologically, to have contact with ones history and past, ad thus confirmed feelings I have. It feels so good realizing one isn't alone in those feelings.
“The market has become the superior norm beyond dispute forming human beings.”
No, we haven't been and still aren’t really allowed to question the market as superior norm beyond dispute!
“However, the sociological research has for a long time shown that most human beings don’t function in this way. We need a constantly continuing life-narrative containing a confirmation that we are clever craftsmen/women (or workmen/women) at the same time as we are glad for the experiences we have gotten [during our lives, both as private people and in working life, glad and proud over them when there are reasons for this. But when we aren't: why is that??].
The new ideal in working life more resemble the dream about the consumer glad for buying. The one whom is prepared to reject everything that is old and replace it with new things - even if these old things are fully functional.”
And we treat human beings in this way too! Replacing old people, throwing them away... But of course you can wonder why? Do they deserve it?
”In those days there are no margins or social considerations among the employers any more/…/
…increased economical growth doesn’t automatically lead to more jobs. This mantra – economical growth – stands out like a fundamentalist religion. A sort of natural law you definitely can’t call in question. Many have lost their jobs even when companies have shown record profits.
…many companies ignore their employees./…/
There is also a blind faith in consults. Many industrial managements have no self-confidence and put their trust to this consult whose business concept in fact is both about being salesman and adviser. How many are capable of examining the consults suggestions and recommendations?
In praxis it is exactly those consults that are governing the companies at the market. All are frightened to silence and the treadmill [ekorrhjul] is spinning more and more violently.
Nobody dare to protest. All are exchangeable. The stress is increasing as the social maladjustment. The one not managing the pressure has nothing at work to do. The problem is your own, nobody else’s [that about blaming the victim]. Is this the sort of working life we shall have? Is this sort of working life, and world, a natural law? How far shall the market powers govern? The four-part-alliance closed The National Institute for Working Life here in Sweden. The work environment at Swedish working places didn’t improve by this.”
There's a wave of neoconservatism and moralizing over the whole (western) world is it? Ideas that weren't really opportune twenty years ago you express openly today with no shame at all!
Loud thinking around and about things I have read recently, I don’t have any real solutions to these things though, am just wondering, thinking, reflecting over things:
“…September 11 became the starting shot for a medial idealization of the housewife, the family, childbirth and the man as provider.”
She compares what Faludi writes concerning USA with the state of things in Sweden; calling it the building of the home (isn’t it a form of regression we see, regression in an insecure world? People are seeking comfort in idealizing the family, because that early family had “flaws” and they can't admit to that, when this image is triggered we people regress. The more flaws the family had and the person hasn’t processed this or come to terms with it, the more he/she regresses to earlier stages? And this also occurs on societal levels, when a whole society is in crisis, then many become more conservative for instance, we can see a neoconservatism and a new moralizing? Sometimes harsh?):
“With the renovation, the weekend cottage summerhouse and the upkeep of the private house, the parent generation’s traditional gender role division is maintained. Dad cuts the grass and does the joinery; mom works hard, potters about and decorates [see the Swedish painter Carl Larsson whose wife, Karin, also was painter originally, she let her artistic talents and interests out in the family, in the shadow/shade of her husband]. The common prison is decorated with Italian glazed tiles. The dream wasn’t to spend all free time renovating. The dream wasn’t either to look after the kids when the husband was renovating.
The perfection which, as soon as the putty has dried, is completed, seem to be the explosive paste which transforms the love relation to bloody rags and bitter wars, about leases on the place to live and the weekend cottage summerhouse.
All which shall manifest our selves in the home [instead of our true selves??]/.../
Ironically enough it is the same homes that shall manifest the middle class status and the
successful self [being good enough!?] which threatens to become transformed into a prison.
You have to pay money for interests each month and this demands a high and steady income./…/
Hopefully we can start to talk about all peoples’ rights to a decent living instead of fancy and cool kitchens and the right making a good bargain on ones living.”
Yeah, we have to have perfect homes, be perfect, look perfect, express ourselves perfectly (if you don’t you can keep quite) and have perfect lives… Being perfect partners, lovers, workers... So those having problems with perfectionism gets problems too in such a society, problems which had been smaller in another society?? No wonder burnouts, exhaustions – and broken relations!??)
“Dead marriages create a milieu without dynamics and beliefs in the future. It makes me crazy thinking of how other people ave answers on how our lives are. Don’t let outer pressure and moral rule. Follow your heart; allow yourself a rich sex life.”
The journalist asks her:
“Do you think more people would divorce if they could afford it?”
Cecilia G. answers:
“Yes, I know from my surrounding that people having it damn [economically] well have to change living area or even to one with a lower status. They are cowards and don’t dare to break up from old patterns and ideals [on top it's great shame not succeeding - or maybe even being left]. The society has to be there and see so people aren’t forced to stay in marriages. We have to prevent so the right [right wing people] doesn’t let our moral govern our lives once again, so the marriages aren’t strengthened in the society.”
We ought to wonder what healthy and sound relations are, and how to create them?? Because even if we are entirely independent we need other people!! Even autonomous people need other peoples in their lives. And a truly autonomous person doesn’t even think or reflect over this, but just has other people around, in healthier relations than many other people have?? And if they don't have people around they don't blame themselves, as if this is their fault?? And shouldnt't become blamed...
A sound, autonomous person can admit to her/his needs, wishes, and desires?
A man, Marcus Birro, has a different view on if it is too easy to divorce.
“Of course there are people feeling very lonely in a relation, but it is nevertheless a defeat with a divorce [yes, something to grieve!?]. Giving up is a loss [yes, and you have to grieve a loss].
The love is stronger than the self-centered cynicism that is rewarded in the society. The ultimate proof of this is that people can marry four times and really believe that it shall function each time, despite that all knows that it can go to hell.”
But he also wonders:
“Is it better being stuck in an emotional desert just because you want to continue driving a golf-car during the weekends?”
Yes, there has been a lot of hypocrisy, and selfishness… How it looks on the surface…
People stayed together earlier who should have divorced!?? Or who should have worked their problems through and gotten help with it too. But because of the moral and taboos people couldn’t talk openly about their problems, maybe at all! And many also became scorned:
"Oh yeah, now you are coming here and complaining! You should have listened to me/us in the first place!"
Or something. So instead of helping people solving mistakes, people became punished, and many times didn't really work anything out. Didn't work things ot that could have been worked out, or in the worst cases didn't work a divorce through for all involved parts best... Or was stuck in a bad relation.
I think it was like this not more far away than in my parent’s generation, where nobody is divorced… Were/are their marriages better and established on better grounds?
Are we dealing with the most painful things here though? I.e. our relations with our parents from the first beginning? Betrayals, disappointments, making our lives more difficult than they had to be, maybe far more difficult and painful than they ought to be??
And people don't get proper help dealing with this from their therapists, counselors, helpers! Because it isn't only about understanding those things on an intellectual level! But understanding it on an emotional - to some degree...
What is the eager glorification of the family about? How are the actual experiences of the early family actually for the biggest promoters of the family? Because they are promoting it in a quite moralizing way? How sound are those people?
And that about power, the needs for it and leaders again... See earlier posting with the label "backward psycho classes" and the essay "Leaders" by Bob Scharf, that the more defended psycho classes tend to lead!!! Yes,so it is!? This is what we see in the society and world!!?? With some (few) exceptions!?
A third posting on the American neurologist Jonathan H. Pincus’ findings. He writes at page 214-215 in “Appendix: Tools of Diagnosis, History, Physical Examination and the Role of Tests” that:
”Conventional wisdom among prosecutors and society at large holds that the fabrication of stories of abuse occurs often. But in twenty-five years of seeing the most violent people in America, I have only once encountered an inmate whose claim of abuse was reliably refuted by other family members. In my experience, falsification has weighed heavily in the other direction. I have seen many murderers whose claim not to have been abused was contradicted by independent evidence.
Many condemned prisoners would literally go to their deaths rather than consciously and publicly describe their abuse by their parents[abuse with really dire consequences].Many families of the condemned would much rather see their relative executed than reveal the story of abuse that implicates them as either perpetrator or fellow victim.”
“Konventionell visdom bland kärande (åklagare?) och samhället i stort menar att påhitt om övergrepp ofta förekommer. Men under de tjugofem år som jag sett de mest våldsamma människorna i Amerika så har jag bara mött en intern vars anspråk på övergrepp var pålitligt vederlagda (motsagda) av andra familjemedlemmar. Enligt min erfarenhet så har förfalskning vägt tungt i den andra riktningen. Jag har sett många mördare vars anspråk på att inte ha blivit misshandlade har blivit motsagda av oberoende bevis.
Många dömda fångar skulle bokstavligen hellre gå i döden än att medvetet och offentligt beskriva misshandeln av sina föräldrar [man skyddar dem alltså snarare än berättar hur det verkligen var, med de ödesdigra konsekvenser det får. Och det är antagligen oerhört många i samhället oerhört tacksamma för att slippa höra!! Med de konsekvenser DET kan få! Hellre stoppar vi alla våra huvuden i sanden!?]. Många familjer till dömda skulle mycket hellre se sin släkting avrättad än att avslöja övergreppshistorien, vilken [samtidigt] skulle låta förstå att de antingen är förövare eller medoffer [också].”
I am for instance thinking of what we see in politics too. What sort of politicians and politics we (seem to) have today. Ideas opportune today. What society approves of today and what this can lead to?
Yes, the psycho-historian Bob Scharf is right when he writes in the essay “Leaders”for instance that:
“…the more defended psychoclasses tend to lead.”
I am not sure I agree with ALL he writes in his particular essay though… (psycho-historians seem to be influenced by psychoanalysis still? So brainwashed by it, not capable of shaking its influences off really? I don't believe in and don't like that language really, it's manipulative I think and more covering than relieving and liberating. But I wonder if thinking like this isn't like "swearing in the church"?) Rather see what Ingeborg writes about False power - anger defence and what Miller writes on anger, the justified anger, and scapegoats (anger directed at other targets than the factual perpetrators), I believe more in their ideas. And what these serial killers show is the extremes of this anger, their need for power and control??
I will write another posting later today I think about WHAT sorts of abuse Pincus actually has found and how the victims minimize and belittle the abuse. Probably the more the more horrible it is/was.
Yes, all these things: denial, belittling, minimizing can get dire consequences, because if you deny what you were exposed to you are a great risk of abusing other people as soon as you get that opportunity. From own children to committing murders etc.
The horrible thing is that the more serious the abuse the more difficult it is to admit that it was done… We should speak about these things much more? Even the abuse we (maybe) less harmed was exposed to. Making us more or less blind and more or less insensitive. And pone to voting for quite authoritarian and not so sound politicians and leaders for instance.
See the lasts postings on Pincus and this theme here and here.
In this blog I want to explore the effects of childhood experiences on individual lives, the health (not only the emotional/psychological, but also, and not least, the bodily/somatic), the society, why people seek themselves to power positions, the effect of childhood on politics.
With the ideas that imbue Alice Miller's work and writing.
And sometimes just share things I have read and come across and I agree with and couldn't have said better myself.
I work full time with young people since many years, as teacher in music (piano pedagogue), and am interested in these things, both privately/personally and professionally.
But my time is limited to write and blog, even if it probably doesn't look so.
I will devote myself to loud thinking a lot here I think. And this blog is also a way for me to collect texts, facts, links, sites I want to save for further use maybe.
Makt avslöjar en persons grundläggande moral …
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Crisis
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I suppose some people might wonder why I'm not completely hysterical. Why
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Påskuppropet mot sjukförsäkringar
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Idag var det manifestation. Mycket bra. Jag var där. Mycket bra.
Men någonting gnagde mig på vägen hem. För stämningen var mer uppgiven än
arg, och det ä...
Arbeidet med ny side er i gang!
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Nå har arbeidet med domeneregistrering og nytt design startet og jeg gleder
meg til jeg kan vise dere resultatet! Det skal bli bra å få Psykiskbloggen
over...
Click on the picture to go to Astrid Lindgren site.
Books I am referring to on this blog:
Bosch, Ingeborg: "Rediscovering the True Self"
Freyd, Jennifer J.: "Betrayal Trauma - The Logic of Forgetting Childhood Abuse" ISBN 0-647-06806-8
Jenson, Jean: "Reclaiming Your Life" ISBN 91-46-17409-5
Kirkengen, Anna Luise: "Hvordan krenkede barn blir syke voksne" ISBN 82-15-00713-9 ("How Abused Children Become Unhealthy Adults")
Kirkengen, Anna Luise: "Inscribed bodies - Health Impact of Childhood Sexual Abuse" ISBN 0-7923-7019-8
Lewis Herman, Judith: "Trauma and Recovery - From Domestic Violence to Political Terror" ISBN 086358430-6 (svensk översättning finns: ”Trauma och tillfrisknande” ISBN10: 9197263133, ISBN13: 9789197263139, Förlag: Göteborgs Psykoterapi Institut)
Miller, Alice: "Den dolda nyckeln" ISBN 91-46-15747-6 (The Untouched Key)
Miller, Alice: "Det självutplånande barnet och sökandet efter en äkta identitet" ISBN 91-7643-559-8 (The Drama of the Gifted Child)
Miller, Alice: "Du skall icke märka - variationer över paradistemat" ISBN 91-46-14374-2 (Thou Shalt Not Be Aware)
Miller, Alice: "Riv tigandets mur - sanning byggd på fakta" ISBN 91-46-16022-1 (Breaking Down the Wall of Silence)
Miller, Alice: "The Body Never Lies - The Lingering Effects of Cruel Parenting" ISBN 0-393-06065-9
Miller, Alice: "The Truth Will Set You Free - Overcoming Emotional Blindness and Finding Your True Adult Self" ISBN 0-465-04585-5
Miller, Alice: "Vägar i livet - sju berättelser" ISBN 91-46-17414-1 (Paths of Life - Seven Scenarios)
Pincus, Jonathan H.: "Base Instincts - What Makes Killers Kill?" ISBN 0-393-32323-4
Children baking...
Look, the joy in the children?? Enjoying what they are doing? (illustration from one of the books by Astrid Lindgren, click on the picture to go to her site).
"...of all the many forms of child abuse, emotional abuse may be the cruelest and longest-lasting of all.” "Emotional abuse is the systematic diminishment of another. It may be intentional or subconscious (or both), but it is always a course of conduct, not a single event. It is designed to reduce a child's self-concept to the point where the victim considers himself unworthy—unworthy of respect, unworthy of friendship, unworthy of the natural birthright of all children: love and protection." (Andrew Vachss)
"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom." -- "Common Sense", Thomas Paine, January 10, 1776
"Modern education is competitive, nationalistic and separative. It has trained the child to regard material values as of major importance, to believe that his nation is also of major importance and superior to other nations and peoples. The general level of world information is high but usually biased, influenced by national prejudices, serving to make us citizens of our nation but not of the world." (Albert Einstein)
"Normal men have killed perhaps 100,000,000 of their fellow men in the last fifty years... Given these and other conditions of contemporary civilization, how can one claim that the ‘normal’ man is sane?" (R.D. Laing, 1967)
"Organizations take on characteristics of the people running them./.../ There's always pressure within groups to conform, anyway. The top monkey exerts the most pressure." (Steve Thomas)
"Yet many psychiatrists and psychologists refuse to entertain the idea that society as a whole may be lacking in sanity. They hold that the problem of mental health in a society is only that of the number of 'unadjusted' individuals, and not of a possible unadjustment of the culture itself." (Erich Fromm in The Sane Society, 1955)
When a big kid hits a little kid, we call it bullying. When an adult hits another adult, we call it assault. When the adults in a family hit each other we call it battering or domestic violence. When an adult hits a child we call it discipline..
“Blindness and lack of connectedness whether truly needed or not, are ultimately tragic solutions to life. These adaptations keep us from knowing ourselves and others fully. We end up fragmented both internally and externally – impoverished spiritually and socially /…/ it seriously constrains our human potential /…/ Survivors of childhood sexual abuse and betrayal blindness have learned to cope by being disconnected internally so as to manage a minimal kind of external connection. But with adult freedom and responsibility come the potential to break silence, to use voice and language to promote internal integration, deeper external connection, and a social transformation, Through communication – integration within ourselves and connection between individuals – we can become whole; embodied, aware, vital, powerful”(Jennifer Freyd in the chapter “Removing Blinders, Becoming Connected” in her book “Betrayal Trauma…”).
“If you are very strong you have to be very kind” (Pippi Longstocking)
“In psychiatry, too, what a person says and writes can’t be divorced from who he is and how he lives.” (Thomas Szasz).
“The method of Marshall Rosenberg is very nice and may be helpful to people who have not be[been??] severely mistreated in childhood. The latter ones however must find their pent up, LEGITIMATE rage and free themselves from the lies of our moral system. As long as they don't do this, their body will continue to scream for the truth with the help of symptoms" (Alice Miller)
“To desire and strive to be of some service to the world, to aim at doing something which shall really increase the happiness and welfare and virtue of mankind - this is a choice which is possible for all of us; and surely it is a good haven to sail for" (Henry van Dyke)
“‘I have never met a man,’ said Grandma Georgina, ‘who talks so much absolute nonsense!’ ‘A little nonsense now and then, is relished by the wisest men,’ Mr Wonka said.” (Roald Dahl)
Look at his facial expression! Angrily carving… The stubborn, disobedient child... Or? How does he feel there in his joiner's workshop? (click on the picture to go to Astrid Lindgren site).
About the ACE-study:
"It's not just water under the bridge."
ACEs are surprisingly common among people of all social strata, and have far-reaching consequences. For many people, it's not possible to "just get over it".
What's an ACE (Adverse Childhood Experience i.e. "skadlig barndomserfarenhet")? Adverse Childhood Experience is growing up experiencing any of the following conditions in the household prior to age 18:
1. Recurrent physical abuse
2. Recurrent emotional abuse
3. Contact sexual abuse
4. An alcohol and/or drug abuser in the household
5. An incarcerated household member
6. Someone who is chronically depressed, mentally ill, institutionalized, or suicidal
I don't like being photographed, and don't have many photos of myself but here are some, though fairly old! Click on the picture to see two more pictures.
I was born in Umeå in Västerbotten, Sweden, and moved during childhood stepwise to Skåne in the south, and at last back to just below the middle of Sweden where I still live.
I am educated both as piano-pedagogue and church-musician and have a full time employment as piano-pedagogue. Church-music is side work.
I am interested in a lot of things and will blog about things I read, psychology, society, history, nature, my work too hopefully, and my everyday life… And both in Swedish and English.
This is a blog, with my (sometimes very) personal - and loud reflections on what I read, see, hear, react on, feel for - and not feel for and want to explore. I don't work in this field at all, but I have my reflections and thoughts nevertheless and have read fairly a lot I think, and here I reflect upon all this. I am searching myself forward. I link sites for information, if one want to know more about what I am talking/writing about and what is mentioned in the texts I am citing and referring to. And I link sites not least for my own sake. So it isn’t sure I agree with all that is linked on this blog, that's not why I link sites. I can agree with parts of what is linked, bigger or smaller, from almost everything to almost nothing.
I hope those who perhaps find my blog are reading everything here critically - including what stands in what I link.
And when it comes to therapy and all (self)help-concepts I think one shall be very careful. Maybe as a friend said it:
“Meaningful critical thinking.
Psychotherapists have been claiming that they have invented better treatment methods since Sigmund Freud in 1897. The amount of psychological distress in the world hasn’t become less. There’s money to be made from attracting more clients, whether the therapy works or not.
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