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When we find ourselves crying at movies or when reading books and stories, it’s often at happy endings, not during the parts that are objectively sad.  The reason, it turns out, is that the unconscious mind regulates when and how we express and experience painful affects, and it does so according to its assessments of danger and safety.  When we arrive at a “happy ending”—for example, the endangered hero is rescued or redeemed—our minds allow us to experience feelings that were present before this ‘resolution,” but were too threatening to fully experience.  Examples from film, from stories of PTSD, and even politics are cited and explored.

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The concept of “gaslighting” seems to be increasingly appearing in the media and public life.  In this webcast I discuss The meaning of gaslight and explain how exactly it works.  Gaslighting is a particular way in which someone is driven crazy because of being presented with conflicting views of reality, a sort of “confusion of tongues” that is made worse nowadays because of all the ways that the MAGA Right have undermined the authority of institutions that people normally rely on to adjudicate truth claims, institutions like science, government, religious institutions, and the judiciary.  Gaslighting was first described as a form of child abuse but is now considered, tragically, the way things are and the way they’re supposed to be.

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I offer some thoughts and, hopefully, understanding of a problem that some might think of as a “First World Problem”– namely, the frequency with which things break down in our everyday life and our inability to get the proper and prompt help we need to fix them. This happens primarily in the digital world, including our devices, website functionality, internet connectivity, and –the elephant in the room—our inability to get direct human help from anyone to fix problems or breakdowns in any of these arenas. The result is a toxic feeling of helplessness which is, perhaps, the most toxic of all human emotions. People react to and defend themselves against helplessness in only three ways: 1) they become depressed, 2) they get angry, or 3) they somehow go about making other people feel helpless. I argue that the blame for these breakdowns and for the absence of adequate support and help in our digital world lies with the corporations, the companies, the institutions that seek to save money by reducing funding for Customer or Technical Support.

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In this episode, I analyze how victimhood works, psychologically and politically.   When someone experiences him or herself as a victim, it gives that persona a kind of  get-out-of-jail free card to retaliate, strike back, and hurt the person or group that they have come to believe is responsible for their victimization.  The political Right capitalizes on this dynamic by repeatedly telling its followers that they have been abused, cheated, and victimized by the liberal elites. As a result, these constituencies would have no moral compunction about harming, imprisoning, or deporting immigrants, just as they had no compunction morally about attacking the Capitol to reverse what they thought was a stolen election. Holding oneself up as a victim gives one a sense of moral righteousness which then can then morally permit violent retaliatory and cruel action. This is what we see on the Right today.