(Courtesy of Rob Brezsny)
Monthly Archives: November 2023
Tarot Card for November 29: The Eight of Disks
The Eight of Disks
The Lord of Prudence is not quite as austere a card as it first sounds. It’s another of those Disks that works on more than one level. In the purely material and mundane sphere it indicates a period where financial resources must be carefully managed.
So long as it does not appear with cards like the Ten of Swords or the Five of Disks, there will not normally be any grave material problem. But there is a warning here that there may be unexpected expense, and good money management will enable us to fund whatever arises.
At the next level, the Eight of Disks can apply to a period where you enter into additional training in order to enhance your career projects. In this case look for cards like the Three of Disks, or the Ace, to indicate some new area of study. Then look for cards like the Universe, or the Sun to indicate the successful outcome of your efforts.
Finally in the spiritual area, when the Lord of Prudence comes up with cards like the Priestess, Death, the Moon, or the Hierophant, you’re approaching a period of rapid spiritual development – almost an initiation. In this case, this card is warning you to be alert for opportunities, ready to deal with stress and pressure, and to manage your energies thoughtfully and carefully. You can perhaps see the correlation which exists with regard to energy management between the material and spiritual definitions of the card – in either case energy must be regulated and respected in order for life to go smoothly and for you to get the best out of your experiences.
(via angelpaths.com and Alan Blackman)
Thomas Jefferson on ignorance
“If ignorance is bliss, why aren’t more people happy?”
–attributed to Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He was the primary author of the Declaration of Independence. Wikipedia
Opinion: Why recognizing Palestine is the key to ending the war in Gaza
By Daoud Kuttab
November 27, 2023 at 1:18 p.m. EST (WashingtonPost.com)
Daoud Kuttab, a Palestinian journalist, is a columnist with Al-Monitor and a former Ferris professor of journalism at Princeton University.
President Biden recently declared his desire to see a “revitalized” Palestinian government that could bring together Gaza and the West Bank under “a single governance structure.” That is a worthy aim, and Biden certainly deserves points for declaring it.
But Palestinians can be forgiven for wondering: Was the U.S. president really serious about this statement? If so, there’s one step that he can take right now toward achieving his goal: Recognize Palestine as a member state in the United Nations.
In 2012, the U.N. General Assembly recognized Palestine as a nonmember observer state. By now, 139 countries have recognized the state of Palestine within the borders of June 4, 1967. The United States and most European countries have repeatedly called for a two-state solution but have refused to recognize Palestinian statehood. The Biden administration even refused to recognize Palestine’s status as a state under occupation. Over the past decade or so, senior Israeli officials, understanding these signals from Washington, have refused to engage with the Palestinian leadership.
Washington’s refusal to recognize a Palestinian state deprives Israel of any reason to take the Palestinians seriously. It is this egregious lack of political imagination on the Americans’ part that has helped bring us to the catastrophe that is now engulfing the region.
Recognizing Palestine as a full member state would have a number of positive effects. It would demonstrate that Biden is truly serious about his professed aim of a two-state solution. And it would undermine the positions of radicals on both sides — the Palestinian extremists who refuse to recognize Israel, as well as those on Israel’s far right, who want to annex all the Palestinian territory west of the River Jordan.
Biden is right to say Palestinians urgently need a “revitalized” political structure — presumably based on the will of the Palestinian people as expressed through free elections. But such elections will be almost impossible to conduct unless Palestinian voters can be sure that their votes will bring them closer to freedom from occupation and endless violence. In this sense, recognition and new elections are two indispensable components of the same strategy.
Parallel to U.S. recognition of Palestine, the international community should supervise elections for a new Palestinian leadership that will negotiate with Israel on all issues that would need to be agreed upon by the two neighboring states. Here, too, Biden and current Palestinian leaders can start by acknowledging the mistakes they’ve made in this respect.
In 2021, the Palestinian authorities announced the dates for parliamentary and presidential elections. The prospect of a free vote produced a genuine sense of excitement in the West Bank and Gaza, where Palestinians had spent 15 years without a chance to pick their leaders.
But Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, got cold feet, fearing competition from a new generation of younger and more popular figures, such as the imprisoned leader Marwan Barghouti. Abbas canceled the elections — and Biden did not object. In July 2022, during a visit to Bethlehem in the West Bank, Biden told Abbas that the time was “not ripe” for peace talks.
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With Abbas unable to produce results even as Israel was increasing its pressure on the Palestinians, the military wing of Hamas argued that Israel and the world understood only force. Given the circumstances, many Palestinians found it hard to disagree. In light of everything that has happened since, it should be clear that the United States missed a huge opportunity to undermine the extremists. Now, Washington must demonstrate that it is serious about giving Palestinians a chance to determine their own future.
The prospect of negotiations toward the establishment of a Palestinian state might seem far-fetched in the wake of the brutal Hamas attacks on Oct. 7 and Israel’s horrific retaliation in Gaza. But just as diplomacy has shown success on the hostage issue, Biden’s recognition of Palestine — which he could achieve simply by directing his U.N. ambassador not to veto a Security Council resolution — could be a game changer. Last week, Spain said it might recognize Palestine on its own if the European Union fails to do so. While such gestures by individual countries are welcome, a Security Council vote affirming Palestinian statehood, which is binding in international law, would send a powerful message to all parties about the seriousness of the international community.
Such a step would offer Palestinians hope that they can still achieve freedom from occupation and would reinforce the cease-fire process by providing a clear political road map.
Domestically, recognizing Palestine would also help Biden reestablish his credentials with the young Americans, progressives, Muslim Americans and Arab Americans in his party who are deeply disillusioned by the one-sidedness of his Israel policies.
Any serious effort to find an end to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict needs to dispense with the piecemeal solutions that have been tried so far. The strategic aim should be the creation of an independent and democratic Palestinian state. Once this goal has been firmly established, Palestinians and Israelis can then work to fill out the details regarding borders, Jerusalem, refugees, settlers, security and future Israel-Palestine relations.
This is the only path that offers a viable way out of the current crisis. This opportunity should not be missed.
washingtonpost.com © 1996-2023 The Washington Post
Schizophrenia in the Neoliberal Age
A Heideggerian and Hanian Perspective
Published in deterritorialization
5 days ago (Medium.com)
Martin Heidegger’s concept of Dasein, translated from German as “being-there,” provides a critical lens for examining the subjective experience of schizophrenia. Dasein is not merely about physical existence; it encompasses the entirety of one’s experiential reality — thoughts, emotions, perceptions, and relationships with others and the world. In the realm of schizophrenia, this existential framework becomes particularly significant. Schizophrenia does more than alter a person’s thought processes and perceptions; it fundamentally changes their mode of being in the world.
For individuals with schizophrenia, the world is often experienced in a profoundly different way. Their perceptions and cognitive processes do not align with the conventional or accepted norms. Hallucinations and delusions, for instance, are not just symptoms to be clinically managed; they represent a different way of experiencing reality. This shift in perception and cognition challenges Heidegger’s notion of the ‘average everydayness’ that characterises most human experience. In schizophrenia, the ‘everydayness’ is disrupted, leading to an existence that is markedly distinct from the normative experiences.
Heidegger’s notion of the historicality of existence — the idea that our understanding of being is shaped by historical and cultural contexts — is critical in analysing schizophrenia. Historically, societies with a mystical or spiritual orientation might have interpreted the experiences of those with schizophrenia differently, possibly as a form of spiritual insight or connection with the divine. In contrast, modern, scientifically-oriented societies often view these same experiences as pathological, needing medical intervention.
Heidegger’s Dasein also involves an individual’s relationship with their own existence — a concept he refers to as “Being-towards-death.” This existential awareness takes on a unique form in schizophrenia. The altered state of consciousness that characterises the condition can lead to a profound existential angst, a deep-seated fear or confusion about one’s place in the world. This is often overlooked in traditional psychiatric treatments, which focus primarily on symptom management.
Heidegger’s emphasis on authenticity — living a life that is true to one’s own self — becomes complex in the context of modern society and schizophrenia. The condition challenges the very notion of a singular, coherent self. This raises significant questions about authenticity: Can one be authentic if their experience of reality is fundamentally different? How does one navigate the concept of ‘self’ in the midst of schizophrenia’s altering effects?
Byung-Chul Han’s critical analysis of neoliberalism offers a revealing perspective on contemporary societal attitudes towards mental health, especially in the context of schizophrenia. Neoliberalism, with its core values of productivity, efficiency, and self-optimisation, significantly influences how mental health conditions are perceived and managed. This value system, deeply ingrained in the fabric of modern society, often leads to the marginalisation of individuals who do not conform to these ideals, which is particularly evident in the case of schizophrenia.
In a neoliberal society, the worth of an individual is frequently measured by their productivity and ability to contribute economically. Schizophrenia, characterised by symptoms that can hinder conventional forms of productivity, is often viewed through this reductive lens. This societal framework tends to pathologize the condition, framing it as a deviation from the norm that needs to be corrected or managed. This approach can lead to an oversimplified understanding of schizophrenia, focusing on symptom suppression and the restoration of ‘normal’ functioning as the primary treatment goals.
Individuals with schizophrenia often face significant societal stigma, which is exacerbated by neoliberal values. This stigma is not just social but also internalised, affecting the self-perception and self-worth of those with the condition. The pressure to conform to societal standards of normalcy and productivity can lead to additional psychological stress, further complicating the experience of living with schizophrenia.
The neoliberal emphasis on individual responsibility for health and well-being can lead to a neglect of the broader social and environmental factors that contribute to mental health conditions. This perspective often overlooks the complex interplay of biological, psychological, and social factors in the development and experience of schizophrenia. As a result, treatment approaches may become narrowly focused on pharmacological interventions, with less attention given to psychosocial support, community integration, and addressing broader societal issues that impact mental health.
The medicalisation of schizophrenia, where the condition is primarily approached as a set of symptoms to be managed with medication, is a significant aspect of modern psychiatric practice. This approach reflects a broader trend in healthcare, where pharmaceutical interventions often become the primary mode of treatment, sometimes at the expense of a more comprehensive understanding of the patient’s condition. The role of pharmaceutical companies in promoting this medication-centric approach, and its alignment with Byung-Chul Han’s concept of “psychopolitics,” is critical to this discussion.
Pharmaceutical companies have a substantial influence on the healthcare system, and their focus on developing and marketing medications for schizophrenia plays a key role in shaping treatment protocols. This influence can lead to a scenario where medication becomes the default response to schizophrenia, rather than one component of a multifaceted treatment plan. Han’s notion of psychopolitics is relevant here; it suggests that the neoliberal focus on efficiency and productivity extends into mental health, with medication serving as a tool to quickly ‘normalise’ individuals so they can function within societal norms.
While antipsychotic medications can be effective in managing certain symptoms like hallucinations and delusions, they often come with significant side effects that can impact the patient’s quality of life. Furthermore, the effectiveness of these medications can vary greatly among individuals, and long-term reliance on them can lead to issues like medication dependence and a diminished response over time.
The overemphasis on medication also overlooks the importance of psychosocial interventions in schizophrenia treatment. Therapies that focus on social skills, coping mechanisms, and community support can be crucial in helping individuals manage their condition and improve their quality of life. However, these approaches often receive less attention and funding compared to pharmacological treatments.
The concept of alienation is pivotal in understanding schizophrenia within the context of modern society. Alienation, as discussed in philosophical and sociological literature, refers to the estrangement individuals feel from themselves, others, and the world around them. In the case of schizophrenia, this sense of alienation is not only a symptom of the condition but is also exacerbated by societal responses to it.
In modern society, where there is a strong emphasis on conformity, rationality, and productivity, individuals with schizophrenia often find themselves on the periphery. Their experiences and perceptions, which might deviate significantly from societal norms, can lead to a profound sense of isolation. This isolation is further reinforced by the stigma and misunderstanding associated with the condition. The societal tendency to view schizophrenia as something to be hidden or fixed can deepen the sense of alienation felt by those living with it.
Individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia commonly report significant feelings of social isolation and an absence of substantial connections with others. This phenomenon extends beyond the direct symptoms of the disorder and is frequently exacerbated by prevailing societal attitudes, as well as the deficiency of robust support mechanisms. In historical contexts, individuals who might today be diagnosed with schizophrenia, such as prophets and seers, occupied pivotal societal roles. Their experiences, often akin to symptoms associated with modern understandings of schizophrenia, were interpreted differently, reflecting the varied socio-cultural perceptions of mental health across time.
The impact of alienation in schizophrenia in modern society is profound. It affects not just the social and emotional well-being of individuals but also their ability to engage with treatment and recovery processes. The feeling of being misunderstood and marginalised can lead to a distrust of healthcare providers and a reluctance to seek help, exacerbating the challenges of managing the condition.
For individuals with schizophrenia, the altered perceptions and experiences can make the pursuit of an authentic life challenging. The condition can disrupt one’s sense of self and reality, making it difficult to ascertain what constitutes a genuine expression of one’s identity. This challenge is further complicated by the societal pressures to conform to norms of behaviour and thought.
The neoliberal emphasis on self-optimisation, as critiqued by Han, can be particularly problematic for those with schizophrenia. The societal expectation to be constantly productive and self-regulating does not account for the complexities of living with a mental health condition. This can lead to a situation where individuals with schizophrenia feel compelled to suppress their experiences and conform to societal expectations, further alienating them from their authentic selves.
Heidegger’s and Han’s philosophies provide a framework to understand the experience of the modern individual, particularly in the context of mental health conditions like schizophrenia. Heidegger’s focus on existential authenticity and being-in-the-world offers a lens to view the internal struggles faced by individuals with schizophrenia. Han’s critique of neoliberalism and its impacts on individual psychology complements this by highlighting the external societal pressures that influence these internal experiences.
The intersection of these philosophical perspectives sheds light on the complex dynamics at play in the lives of individuals with schizophrenia. It underscores the importance of considering both the internal existential challenges and the external societal pressures in understanding and addressing the condition.
The exploration of schizophrenia through the philosophical lenses of Heidegger and Han, integrated with contemporary scientific insights, offers a comprehensive understanding of the condition in the context of modern society. This approach highlights the need for a shift in both societal attitudes and healthcare practices, moving towards a more empathetic and holistic approach to mental health.
It emphasises the importance of understanding schizophrenia not just as a medical condition but as a part of the broader human experience, influenced by both internal existential factors and external societal dynamics. By acknowledging and addressing these complexities, we can work towards a more inclusive and understanding society that supports the well-being of all individuals, regardless of their mental health status.
References
[1] Heidegger, M. (1927). Being and Time. [Trans. J. Macquarrie & E. Robinson]. Harper & Row, 1962.
[2] Han, B.-C. (2015). The Burnout Society. Stanford University Press.
[3] Han, B.-C. (2017). Psychopolitics: Neoliberalism and New Technologies of Power. [Trans. E. Butler]. Verso Books.
Written by Pills for thoughts
·Writer for deterritorialization
A dose to rethink modern society.
To Tap Your Full Potential, Heal Your Shame Wounds
It’s the hidden barrier to success
Published in On The Couch
1 day ago (Medium.com)
You’re determined to get to the top.
You are bursting with ideas. You have the talent, the drive, the work ethic — you are committed and persistent.
There is literally no reason for you not to reach the highest level in your field.
Except this. It’s the one that rears its beastly head over and over in therapy; it’s the hidden barrier to success, it’s the saboteur of a thousand dreams.
It’s the one you absolutely have to stare down if you want to hit your straps — if you’re ever going to fulfil your potential.
Shame.
What’s a shame wound?
Shame wounds frequently show up in therapy.
No-one signs on with the intention of addressing their shame wounds — at least they don’t frame it that way.
But when we start to dig down into their core beliefs, thought patterns and behaviours, we’ll often find an old wound, one that’s been papered over by time but has never fully healed.
Shame wounds are the emotional scars caused by early experiences or messages that make us feel humiliated or ashamed of ourselves.
Sometimes, those scars have their origins in traumatic childhood or youthful events; sometimes those early messages came with maliciousness or a hefty dose of sarcasm by people who were supposed to love us.
But sometimes the words or actions weren’t meant to offend — it’s just that the timing meant they struck a sensitive chord. They pierce our emotional skins — and stay with us.
Think about it like this:
Perhaps someone laughed at your drawings, told you that you weren’t co-ordinated or bad at maths or reminded you that your sister was the writer in the family (not you)? Or perhaps you were never picked for a sports team or told to forget whatever you loved to do because you could never make a living out of it?
And it started to bed itself into your psyche.
The power of healing
“Shame corrodes the very part of us that believes we are capable of change.” ― Brené Brown
Most of us probably have some early experience of feeling ashamed, embarrassed or inadequate. For the luckier ones, it was fleeting and largely forgotten. For others, it was repeat behaviour that led to a festering internal belief that they were inadequate, flawed or unworthy.
Recovery relies on recognising that those wounds don’t have to be carried forward. Because it’s a tragedy if they get in the way of future success, whether that be in sport, work, relationships or life.
Okay, I confess a blog post is a fairly poor substitute for therapy. But, in a nutshell, here are the steps to take.
Identify the pain point
It can be painful to revisit your shame story, but it’s helpful to go there. If you hide from it, or avoid it, it will grow bigger in your mind. So trawl back through your history until you find the pain point (or period in your life when it happened) and sit with those feelings for a little while. There is power in knowing WHY and also in knowing that you are no longer the person you were when shame first burned in. You no longer need to be controlled by it.
Shame and guilt are not twins.
Shame is a feeling — a deeply painful one. Researcher and bestselling author Brené Brown describes shame as the “intensely painful feeling or experience of believing we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging.” Ouch. No wonder we keep it buried.
It’s common to bind guilt and shame together, which makes us feel even worse. So think of it like this: guilt relates to your “bad behaviour”, shame says you’re a “bad person”.
We all behave or perform poorly at times, but that doesn’t mean we are bad or lowly people. Not at all. So keep the things you’ve done wrong in the “guilt” bucket and tell yourself bad behaviour is permissible as long as you take steps to redeem it. AND you don’t keep repeating it.
Step into the arena (with baby steps)
Shame hurts so we tend to avoid possible triggers for it. That’s a mistake because it makes it seem even bigger, and more scary. And it makes us feel smaller.
So put yourself in situations where you could potentially feel a flicker of shame at your performance. You’ll realise it’s only a feeling and, as such, it can’t hurt you. The more you get used to it, the more it will shrink in size and threat. The more you’ll realise the shame is YOUR feeling so you will feel it at full intensity. Others will barely notice.
What you do is only part of who you are
Shame wounds hurt more when you attach your self-worth to external achievement rather than your value as a person. So begin with the person you are. Focus on being kind, decent and loving. Try to behave in ways that reflect your values. Ultimately that’s what you — all of us — will be judged for.
Act, anyway
There are plenty of reasons to put your dreams on ice, or even give up on them. Our life circumstances often get in the way.
But shame-related anxiety shouldn’t be one of those reasons. If it is, the echo of that regret will sit on your shoulder for a long time.
So be honest about what’s holding you back.
As playwright August Wilson put it:
Your willingness to wrestle with your demons will cause your angels to sing.”
Each fortnight I send out a free newsletter offering practical psychology tips and tools for personal growth and performance. Come join us!
Written by Karen Nimmo
Editor for On The Couch
Clinical psychologist, author of 4 books. Editor of On the Couch: Practical psychology for health and happiness. karen@onthecouch.co.nz
René Girard’s ‘Mimetic Desire’: A Theory That Explains Everything
mimesis: imitation
Nov 19, 2023 (Medium.com)
René Girard, in response to critics who called his theory an idée fixe, agreed, claiming that he does indeed see evidence of his theory in almost everything:
Send any masterpiece you like my way, literary, cultural or religious, and it will be quite a miracle if I do not come back to you, a month or a year later, with my mimetic desire , my sacrificial crisis and above all — give the Devil his due — that bloody atrocity with which I am infatuated, the primordial, founding act of violence: the collective murder of the deity.
The question is: to what extent is this warranted? Is Girard’s system, as he has asserted, ‘more comprehensive and universal than anything discovered by Marx and Freud’? In this post, we’ll go through it and decide for ourselves…
Mimetic Desire
According to Girard, ‘all desire is a desire for being’, meaning, unlike need (which makes itself felt in our bodies ‘without any help from third parties’), desire is socially determined:
Behind our desires lurks a mediator or model who most often goes unrecognized by others, including the person doing the imitating. As a general rule, we desire what those around us desire. Our models can be real or imaginary, collective or individual. We imitate the desires of those we admire. We want to ‘become like them’, to spirit away their very being.
One of Girard’s best examples of this is the story of Salome, who, after dancing for King Herod, is granted one wish, but, unsure of what to choose, asks her mother Herodias, who says she should request the head of John the Baptist. According to Girard, this scene in Mark 6: 21 reveals imitation to be the ‘essence of desire’. Contrary to what we often assume, ‘there is no preordained object of desire’, we have to be told, like Salome, what we want:
It is difficult to imagine a sequence better suited to reveal the mimetic genesis of desire than the passage just quoted: first the girl’s silence in response to the overwhelming offer of the king, then the question to the mother, then the mother’s response, and finally the girl’s espousal of her mother’s desire. The child asks the adult, not to fulfill some desire that would be hers, but to provide her with the desire she lacks.
By its very nature, imitative desire creates ‘mimetic rivalries’, in which desire converges on a single object. Herodias, for instance, has a grudge against John the Baptist for pointing out that Herod stole Herodias from his brother Philip. Thus, according to Girard:
When I imitate the desire of my brother, I desire that which he desires. We prevent one another from satisfying our common desire. The more the resistance increases on both sides, the more desire is reinforced; the more the model is made the obstacle, the more the obstacle is made the model, so that in the last analysis, desire is attracted only when it is thwarted. It focuses on obstacles only.
This is the underlying theme of A Midsummer’s Night Dream, another of Girard’s great examples. Within the play, everyone ‘chooses love by another’s eyes’. Helena, for instance, wishes to be Hermia because that is who Demetrious loves. However, Demetrious himself is hardly mentioned:
Desire speaks here, and it is the desire for another’s being. Helena would like to be translated, metamorphosed into Hermia, because Hermia enjoys the love of Demetrius. Demetrius, however, is hardly mentioned. The desire for him appears less pressing than the desire for Hermia’s being.
The chaos that ensues (as each character pursues their imitative desire) is what Girard calls a mimetic crisis, which occurs when mimetic rivalries ‘become so intense and contagious that not only do they lead to murder but they also spread, mimetically, to entire communities’ — which leads us to next part of Girard’s theory.
The Scapegoat
Girard’s concept of the scapegoat begins with a destructive crisis. This crisis may take many forms (a plague, an invasion, etc.), but at a certain point it becomes a Hobbesian ‘war of all against all’, meaning, ‘explosions of rivalry intense enough to destroy communities’. In these situations:
The thirst for revenge is concentrated on an increasingly small number of individuals. In the end, the community is united against one, the one I call the scapegoat. The group reconciles around this one victim, at a cost that seems miraculously low.
According to Girard, this entire process occurs below the level of consciousness, hence Jesus on the Cross saying: ‘Father, forgive them, they know not what they do’. This sentence, according to Girard, must be interpreted literally. ‘For if the myths recognized the facts, the innocence of the scapegoat would become visible, and violence would lose its cathartic efficacy’.
As unfortunate as this may seem, our survival may have been contingent upon such innocent sacrifice. ‘The unanimous mimetic contagion transforms the disastrous violence of all against all into the healing violence of all against one. The community is reconciled at the cost of one victim only’.
Again, it was not the discovery of an authentic criminal that reconciled archaic communities, but ‘the illusion of such a discovery’. Thus, Girard may be the first of a thousand critics to point out that Oedipus (in Sophocles’ play) is not the person who killed his father and married his mother, but rather, the person who is accused of killing his father and marrying his mother. His enucleation and later exile were not carefully thought through (how could patricide and incest cause a plague?), but they did end a mimetic crisis which could have, and has, destroyed the communities in the past.
The Collective Murder of the Deity
After the scapegoat has been killed, there is tendency to memorialise (or even deify) the victim (as both the source and the solution to the crisis). Freud describes something similar in Totem and Taboo in the killing of the ‘primal father’. But as Girard points out, something changes with Christianity:
Whereas in myth the victims are believed to have committed the crimes of which they are accused, in biblical and Christian tradition this verdict is often overturned. Many Bible stories condemn the crowd and rehabilitate the victim.
Through this reversal, we have inherited a distrust of mobocracy, which does not mean that we are not susceptible to scapegoating, but that we can no longer do so in complete ignorance. This is what is alluded to in the ‘Curse Against the Pharisees’. The mobs that attacked the Hebrew prophets were no different from those who attacked Jesus himself:
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous, And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets. Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets. Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers (Matthew 23: 29–32).
An important point that Girard makes in reference to this passage is that ‘when anti-pharisaism is used as a device to crush the Pharisees, it becomes another and more vicious form of pharisaism’. Thus, mimetic escalation — which reminds me of something Judith Shklar says in The Faces of Injustice (something I think is relevant to recent events in the Middle East):
One of our political actualities is that the victims of political torture and injustice are often no better than their tormentors. They are only waiting to change places with the latter […] even at the cost of misanthropy, one cannot afford to pretend that victimhood improves anyone in any way. If we do not remember that anyone can be a victim, and if we allow hatred for torture, or pity for pain, to blind us, we will unwittingly aid the torturers of tomorrow by overrating the victims of today. One may be too easily tempted to think of all victims as equally innocent because there cannot, by definition, be a voluntary victim. That may have the consequence of promoting an endless exchange of cruelties between alternating tormentors and victims.
Girard’s theory of mimetic desire and sacrificial crisis is visible throughout human history. Although many of his examples are literary, it doesn’t take a genius to see these mechanisms at work in, for instance, witch hunts and pogroms — and, to a lesser extent, cancel culture. In fact, the internet (which has facilitated a ‘meme’ industry) provides an unprecedented scale to imitative desire, and thus, to mimetic crises.
Social media teaches us what to desire, from luxury (largely unattainable) lifestyles to specific virtues, which we parade as proof of our righteousness. Often, an individual is singled out as ‘problematic’, and their ‘cancellation’ (their exile) is insisted upon. You can be cancelled at any time, from anywhere. It takes just one or two voices to start, and then there’s a cascade of accusations from people desperate to distance themselves from the accused.
One could argue that cancel culture is different in that it is justified. But this is precisely what all scapegoating groups assume. Girard himself said, ‘you will see the success of my theories when you recognize yourself as a persecutor’. No one is exempt. Awareness of this propensity may be our greatest defence against its execution.
Written by Eddie Ejjbair
‘Gradually it’s become clear to me what every great philosophy has been: a personal confession of its author and a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir’
James Tunney on The Governance of Spiritual Intelligence
Interviews fro • Aug 25, 2023 James Tunney (The Governance of Spiritual Intelligence) James Tunney left a successful academic career in law to focus on spiritual and artistic development. He has published numerous academic articles and reports, consulted internationally, and presented talks on various aspects of globalisation in many countries around the world. Nowadays, however, he writes about Mysticism and Scientism. He has also been painting from his studio in Sweden and exhibited in several countries for over a decade. Check out James Tunney here: https://www.jamestunney.com/https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/…
Asian Guy Successfully Assimilates Into White Culture By Appropriating Black Culture
Published Yesterday (TheOnion.com)
NEW YORK—Saying he had finally completed his years-long struggle for acceptance in the eyes of his fellow citizens, sources reported Tuesday that first-generation Asian American Hoang Ngo, 20, had successfully assimilated into white culture by appropriating Black culture. “He’s always talking about how he loves hip-hop, basketball, and Jordan sneakers, and that’s more than enough for us,” said Kendall Smith, a white friend of Ngo, who immigrated from Vietnam as a fifth-grader and quickly learned to discard his native accent, but only recently realized how much better he would fit in with white people if he adopted Black fashions and mimicked African American Vernacular English. “It must have been hard on him, as a kid, always coming across as such an outsider. But what he’s doing now totally makes sense to us. He should definitely put that hair in a durag, though.” At press time, the man had reportedly been given an opportunity to star in a movie with Awkwafina.
Tarot Card for November 28: The Hermit
The Hermit
The Hermit (or sometimes Lord of Time) is numbered nine and is usually depicted as an old man, carrying a lamp or staff. He picks his way carefully through the terrain. The Lamp of Knowledge he carries is a magical receptacle for all the knowledge and wisdom he has acquired through many years of study and meditation. The staff represents the weight of his experience, upon which he leans for support.
The Hermit lacks human company, as the teaching/learning process is often one of aloneness and solitude. He is an adept, someone who knows the inner mysteries of life. He has reached the point in his journey where nobody else can help – he must rely on inner resources, previous experiences and sheer faith in the light which leads him.
When we walk the path of the Hermit we travel deep inside our soul. Here we discover the name of the god or goddess residing within us and bring back the keys to self-knowledge and mastery. After this, we live from the centre of our self and become content with our essential aloneness. And perhaps, after this, we will be ready to teach others what we have discovered.
(via angelpaths.com and Alan Blackman)