This summer is the nineteenth anniversary of my last summer before Reeducation. That entire year was really wonderful and I do not remember the weather in Louisiana being as good again until this year, whose winter and spring were fresh and luminous.
In honor of the repetition of that beautiful weather cycle I am learning to talk back.
*
Reeducation wanted one to realize one was not always right. Yet long before Reeducation I had been informed that when things people said hurt, when they seemed to slice you apart and then throw you in the gutter, it meant you were resisting a truth. You should not talk back, but take note and reform.
My turning point in Reeducation was when, in response to doubts expressed by me about reading (and attempting to take seriously) commercial self help manuals, the Reeducator called me an intellectual snob.
I said: you have spoken to me that way before. I will continue to listen and take you seriously, but if you are going to continue in this vein, you must get me drugs. After listening politely to you, and promising to consider seriously the disturbing things you have to say about my character, I will need some form of painkiller so that I will be able to walk out of your office erect and get safely to my house before falling down.
I duly got lots and lots of drugs. They came one after the other, although it was suggested to me I might do best taking several at the same time.
*
I could have told the Reeducator that I was not an intellectual snob; he just had an inferior mind. I could have reiterated that I had legitimate political and therapeutic reasons to doubt his recommendations, and professional reasons to wonder why a licensed person was departing so far from everything one could read, from any point of view, in a reputable journal.
Had I known then how to identify insults for what they are, and had I realized it was legitimate to object to them. I might have recognized that he was not making a serious comment but merely calling me an insulting name. I could have said so. I could, and should have left.
*
All of this took place a long time ago. It may not have changed me as a person, but it marked me deeply, and it changed my life very greatly. Because I then had to deal with the results of that, and because I had to do so in an emotionally and physically impaired condition, I did not have the leisure to deal with Reeducation itself until much later.
It has taken me this long to realize that the sentence referenced above — “you are an intellectual snob” — was not a serious comment but an abusive sally. And that I knew it and some level, and was indicating as much in my almost parodic response to it back then.
On that day I still thought this Reeducator was essentially friendly. I expected him to correct the unfairness of his statement once I demonstrated to him its effect. I suppose I was challenging him to correct his own self — because I did not realize I had the right to do so, or at the very least recognize what he was actually doing and to walk away.
I did not know then that few people take this kind of hint, and that abusive people do so least of all.
My rule for dealing with abusive people now is NOT to tell them what hurts. Uncle Remus makes a similar point. Telling them what they have achieved and how they have achieved it only gives them more knowledge, and hence more power.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
And — I thought I was doing so well, thought I had gotten beyond it all, but got an abusive phone call Monday night and have not recovered.
I have not recovered in part because I cannot turn off the voice that says, “you asked for it — you allowed it to happen — so the problem is you.”
I have not recovered in part because I cannot turn off the voice that says, “you asked for it — you allowed it to happen — so the problem is you.”
This is also because you have an old fashioned sense of self, which sees the nature of personhood as being a whole. But people are not responding to you as a whole, but to some image that relates to one aspect of you, if that.
It helps to realise the very limited nature of people’s vision, and how little they do in fact see, of you. You could do this by taking Reeducation’s quality of perspicacity as an approximation of the norm.
Learn from it, as you would learn the weakpoints that any enemy has, by having grappled with it.
It is a lesson worthwhile remembering from martial arts — when anybody attacks, they do two things: 1. Unless their technique is truly awesome they open themselves up somehow. You are able to see, and reach to, their vulnerable points.
2. They reveal their technique and what is lacking in it.
Reeducation has revealed it lowliness of mind. There is a lot that you can learn from that in terms of dealing with people who have a similar lowliness of mind. You know what it can see and what it can’t see? How it behaves…
Telling them what they have achieved and how they have achieved it only gives them more knowledge, and hence more power.
With one proviso: You can be free and open with information concerning what they have achieved and how, so long as you are not the same person anymore as the person who initially succumbed to the bullying technique.
Life changes and people do learn from experience. The bully — and his conceptualisations of life — remains static.
The proviso is good, as is the point about the whole self.
I’ve gotten over a lot of it now. Part of it is that my official role at work would normally be to protect this person or anyone in hir position. Add to that that ze claims to have many allies, and all of us are trying to be very discreet so it is hard to tell what is true. However it seems there is someone else having the same experience and ze doesn’t feel scared the way I do — just angry. Just knowing these things changes my inner panorama on the matter.
good.
Interestingly, this person (a macho Latin guy with a high level of mental health) initiated the discussion by talking about how he has been feeling it was all his fault for attracting the abuse … and then figured out that that was just another abusive idea designed to enable the perpetuation of abuse … it was funny he went through that thought process too!
We are all so highly compartmentalised as “individuals”, unable to see the wood for the trees, and taking responsibility for things that do not originate with us.
..that is, unless we are part of the billowing and undifferentiated mass of the “herd”, which, amoeba-like feels nothing, except its own urge for expansion.
Yet more evidence for why Reeducation is for the herd!
It is still interesting how one controls (or can control) both less and more than one thinks.
Key to exerting one’s power effectively is probably the Nietzschean idea of naturalness. I know, I know that ppl will not be attracted to this idea at all — it is too aristocratic for them to even recognise it as presented within his texts. Rather they will be attracted to the far more bourgeois notion of “effort”. But if one does what one is attracted to doing, one will control just as much as one is capable of controlling at the time. The rest is for others to work on, as best they can.
That is true. And on this, see Clio’s post on the contemporary narrative of “effort” – !
http://cliobluestockingtales.blogspot.com/2009/07/abolition-as-self-help-movement.html
Control and responsibility — I guess I also meant one is responsible for less than one believes, is less able to control circumstances and multiple influences and elements than one knows.
I’ll look at it. It is certainly true that one can control very little by adopting the correct moral posture/s for the occasion. That is an essential lie.
Re: Cleo’s critique of student essays: It’s breathtakingly awful. I do believe that many people really can’t see that there is any other lever in society than “effort” in response to certain pre-existing commands to jump through hoops.
—
One thing I notice about Marechera’s responses to his questions is the very carefully weighted responses he gives, in terms of avoiding misleading buzz words. So he astutely avoids having the term, “political”, applied to him, as he knows this will get him into trouble. (I do believe that in the Southern African cultural context, especially under white rule, claiming to be “political” was about the same as claiming to be “seditious”, since both had the same kind of emotional resonance. Black Zimbabwean society couldn’t have been much different from this.)
Yet, whilst at one point claiming not to be political, he then goes on to talk about “class society” and how abhorrent he found it, in any context, even when he was cast, in Oxford, as an “aristocrat”.
The other aspect I noticed was his identification with the international youth movement of the 60s and 70s, and his somewhat hippiesque/Jesus-esque pacifism of demeanour.
Yes, and there is a way, pace Jameson, in which politics are superficial. I mean, I think Jameson says what he says as an American — here the kneejerk reaction is to say politics are superficial, and people say this without realizing what politics actually are.
But. I am about to do an operation using spirit not morality or politics and it is a whole other deal.
an operation?
—
One other thing I remember from the CD is Marechera talking about his Cassandra complex.
He says, “Writers have these prophetic powers, but nobody believes them.”
–Once again, this can be linked to the shamanic trope of wakefulness.
—
It seems that in order to inscribe themselves upon
the heart of humanity with everlasting claims, all great things
have first to wander about the earth as enormous and awe-
inspiring caricatures: dogmatic philosophy has been a caricature
of this kind–for instance, the Vedanta doctrine in Asia, and
Platonism in Europe. Let us not be ungrateful to it, although it
must certainly be confessed that the worst, the most tiresome,
and the most dangerous of errors hitherto has been a dogmatist
error–namely, Plato’s invention of Pure Spirit and the Good in
Itself. But now when it has been surmounted, when Europe, rid of
this nightmare, can again draw breath freely and at least enjoy a
healthier–sleep, we, WHOSE DUTY IS WAKEFULNESS ITSELF, are the
heirs of all the strength which the struggle against this error
has fostered. It amounted to the very inversion of truth, and the
denial of the PERSPECTIVE–the fundamental condition–of life, to
speak of Spirit and the Good as Plato spoke of them; indeed one
might ask, as a physician: “How did such a malady attack that
finest product of antiquity, Plato? Had the wicked Socrates
really corrupted him? Was Socrates after all a corrupter of
youths, and deserved his hemlock?” But the struggle against
Plato, or–to speak plainer, and for the “people”–the struggle
against the ecclesiastical oppression of millenniums of
Christianity (FOR CHRISTIANITY IS PLATONISM FOR THE “PEOPLE”),
produced in Europe a magnificent tension of soul, such as had not
existed anywhere previously; with such a tensely strained bow one
can now aim at the furthest goals
Operation, get something done in the outside world by making a shift within, and having an intention.
Cassandra complex, yes.
Quotation, haven’t figured it all out yet — these 19th century people generalize so much and are or feign being terribly knowledgeable, I can never figure out whether they are super well informed or just blowing smoke — and it is so hot I cannot sleep, haven’t in days, am going into G’mo style sleep deprivation — but I get the wakefulness idea.
Jennifer, I’d honestly like to know more about the awfulness. Are you saying these students are hopeless? Because, as I write in the comments, I realize that I’m being pulled in two different directions. In one direction, I don’t want to show disrespect for the students’ beleif system. In the other direction, I really think that system is flawed and antithetical to education. I also think that I’m caught in that same belief system in that, if I work hard enough, I will succeed in teaching them something.
I’d be commenting on your post, Clio, if I weren’t so exhausted right now. I think it is possible to show them that it is a belief system without showing disrespect for it. And I do think the system is antithetical to education.
And yes, the idea that we will succeed in teaching them something if we just “work hard enough” is a problem!!!
Hi Clio
I have no idea if the students are, as you suggest, “hopeless”. I really wouldn’t be able to say. PZ seems to have a better idea of the matter, and speaks from experience, which I am in no position to do regarding US uni students.
That said, my experience with the ideologies of the current era (which are the ideologies reflected in your students’s writings) are that they have been embraced by ppl who will to stay ignorant. It has seemed to me, whenever I’ve encountered ppl who speak out of these ideologies, on the Internet, that they have been embraced by ppl who use them for really no other purpose than to erect a barrier against knowledge — for it is genuine knowledge that they fear.
From what I have seen, a great fear of knowledge has come to define the contemporary character structure, so that it is difficult to get through.
Those who try to impart a degree of knowledge to those who have an innate fear of it are inevitably attacked.
However, I am speaking about the Internet, and how that has worked — especially during the Bush era.
With regard to the quote above, I think it is a subtle distinction that is lost on most people (and it is true that Platonism is to blame).
We need to consider that “spirituality” ought not to be removed from physicality, in any deep sense. To realise this at least removes us from an animalistic interpretation of “will to power”. Neechy philosophy is NOT a simple inversion of Platonism — which is the way that most people on the Internet interpret his writings. Rather, let us link spirituality with the body, with its registers, and with shamanistic insight, and with the ninja capacity to be a warrior by risking oneself and changing form.
The other interpretation is mere monkey business.
It’s also not having been taught how to take bad news.
There is the question of discipline in childhood. “Please don’t pick the flowers because your grandmother would like them to stay in the flowerbed, they’re her decoration. Don’t they look nice? See, you can touch them, just be careful because they have delicate skin, a little like you.”
vs.
“Don’t pick the flowers because they aren’t yours and God will punish you.”
The first version develops an internal ethical sense, the second doesn’t.
Add to that the ability to accept bad news. The parent in version #1 probably also is better at letting the kids know about poverty, war, and so on, in non traumatizing and more or less age appropriate bits. Typically the people brought up with version #2 are also totally shielded from awareness of anything bad or difficult, if the parents can afford that at least — and/or they are taught that the true horror is in Cuba or somewhere else far away. Black and white thinking is what I am getting at in version #2.
Yes, it is linked to this, I think, too.
I think the people that are afraid of knowledge are also committed to their own moral perfection in a way, even in the process of turning a blind eye and in an odd and paradoxical way, even in the process of embracing ideologies of selfishness such as libertarian capitalism or Monkey Neechianism. Actually, they have very absolute self-ideals, which are deeply threatened by an slight suggestion, from any quarter, that they are less than perfect.
So any hint of criticism, such as “you are going about this the wrong way” makes them subject to huge superego condemnation. So they switch off.
But then you have to amplify your voice to make them hear you, especially if the knowledge you are giving them concerns something important, that also affects you.
The more you amplify your voice, the more they switch off.
Traumatised people make the most difficult ones to get through to.
That is why you have to get them to retell the story from the point of view of someone else. Preferably from that of a character they do not understand or do not like. They have to do it seriously, too — not have them just be silly or a psychopath or something.
Traumatized people — OK, then that was another presupposition of Reeducation, that one would be traumatized and impossible to get through to.
I think that when Nietzsche refers to some people as being “botched and bungled” he is really saying that they have been traumatised in a way that has affected their character structure. This prevents them from perceiving themselves and others clearly.
I think an ideology of competitive individualism (not individualism per se, which is rarer and much harder to attain) more or less ASSURES that many ppl will end up “botched and bungled”. After all, there is no space for rest or relaxation, not to mention none affordable for recuperation, if “your freedom is my unfreedom”. Rather, eternal vigilance, the state of mind of somebody with severe Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is almost, if not always, the precise requirement for mere survival. And this, in turn, leads to a greater degree of being “botched and bungled”.
…to the point where such a condition becomes the norm.
Also I don’t think telling people to view themselves from a distance really helps. The really stressed people — so stressed that they have lost their sense of balance with regards to ethics and morality — are really in need of first aid, and not injunctions to engage on journeys of mental visualisation. They’re more on the level of “fight or flight”.
Virtually assured PTSD, yes. Hm. And I wonder if this is not also why it took me so long to recover from Reeducation — the idea that I should not need recovery time.
First aid — this is probably true. I wonder if that is why Clio’s students protect themselves in the ways she describes. I wonder how one would go about administering first aid.
The reason that ppl are living in this way is at least as much the fault of social darwinistic ideology and its impossible burdens as it is due to the black and white thinking taught by Christianity, especially in its fundamentalist forms.
Imagine the system of genetic material and the material of self and fate — both unknown and actually unknowable. The resistance to being corrected is a resistance to having defective genes and having them pointed out. Anything less than perfection threatens the narrative that “I am one of those fit enough to survive.” This idea has to be preserved at any cost.
But ethical questions and questions of responsibility to self and others just seem like an impossible extra burden — a requirement that goes way beyond the responsibility of taking care of how one’s genes receive their public responses and recognition. The idea is rather, that until events start to unravel, one simply cannot know whether any particular person is one of the “survivors” or not. “And that,” the contemporary subject thinks, “includes me.” Negativity or criticism is a sign that “I do not deserve to survive as one of the fittest,” whereas praise is a sign that “I am one of the fittest after all! yay me! My genes are unravelling in a good way.”
But is must be all very, very stressful — this not knowing who or what one is, from one moment to the next, and relying upon the unfolding of events to teach one about oneself. No wonder knowledge is stressful and the path to it is resisted.
First aid would be teaching people that they are not their genes.
That’s interesting. I can see it about grades, skills, teaching. But about life in general, let me see … oh yes. Everyone must believe they are the best and they are in a Panglossian world … so they cannot learn any information which might counter that, I get it. 🙂
I guess you really are right on the social darwinism … I cannot get students to understand this Christian message: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4BYOJ1tc-k
The Youtube video dosen’t show it. It says that the url is malformed.
Fixed! –Z
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Yes — I think it’s really hard to unlearn the perspective of the me-centred world, where everything matters only in relation to me and my needs. Knowledge has no inroad if that’s the mode of thinking.
AHA. Fixed the link. It’s Joan Baez on “There but for fortune.” I wanted it by Phil Ochs but she is the Madonna (dona dona dona don) so it is fitting.
Lord — yes, people really are like that. It is amazing.
Yeah, people are like that — especially the younger generations. I would say that they are quite frankly unteachable, at least from my experience, but there may be contexts in which this isn’t so.
I sent you the CD yesterday.
Thank you!!! 🙂
My first encounter with people like that was in the late 80s at a private school. Self esteem all too high, but very insecure. Now even here there are a lot of people like that.
Unteachable, it is possible. But I find that the attitude isn’t universal.
The oldest people I know like this are in their 40s and had oppressive upbringings. Hmmm… that is just anecdotal.
What is it with ppl whose self esteems are high but are very insecure? They are very quick to defend themselves at all times, but slow to listen. I think the recent stint of right wing governments in power brought these ppl out of the woodwork.
Or maybe what I was seeing on the internets was the gradual strangulation and increased cynicism of the American (and secondarily, Australian) mind.
Right wing governments, yes, but also ideology in general of the Reagan Revolution…
Yes. But I do see light at the end of the tunnel. The patriarchy, at least, can be hoisted by its own petard, on the basis that its ideologues employ little effort in life, and are basically lazy.