Um...wait a minute...what's coming is worse than Ms not from this planet bluehair? Going through her website I was like, how can such profound mental illness still be functional? How does it not crash on the shoals of its unconsciousness and drown? And are we sure we are not in that late stage, considering the sacrificing of children to the jab and gender Moloch?
I watched the newer Dune movie the other night, and all of the elite military forces of the Emperor were mentioned as being eunuchs. I don’t recall that being in the book.
Speaking of doulas, the other day at the bar I met a middle-aged lesbian death doula. As I conversed with her I had a vision of her sanpaku eyes smiling at me as she compassionately ushered me across the threshold to the Other Side in a sterile hospital room.
I met an actor (female), who told me about three funerals for people who had died via assisted suicide. She described a lot of gender fluid, polyamorous, people throwing rainbow colored, sparkly confetti and dancing maniacally. It was horrifying and I was a captive audience.
Even worse, and you'll appreciate this Harrison, she was a "Simulated Patient." This title came to replace the Standardized Patient, trained for the National Chiropractic Examiners Boards. I believe they are trained by the College, and or their hired affiliates.
This same woman said some outrageous things to the questions from the young graduates in the "exam room." The young graduates did not skip a beat. It was all very disturbing.
In addition, we have to watch DIE videos for our training as Examiners. Last time we met and had to watch these videos, when they were over, I loudly stated that I was offended. I got a big laugh. One person came up to me later and said he appreciated what I said.
'...Last we’ll examine the eye itself to observe if the white sclera shows below the colored iris. Note how the mother’s top and bottom eyelids partially eclipse her blue iris. Mom’s white sclera shows only on the two sides of her iris.
The daughter’s hazel iris rides higher and is eclipsed only by her top eyelid. We see white on the remaining three cardinal directions. This is called sanpaku (a Japanese term meaning three whites) and typically reveals compromised vitality.
See 'Eyes Reflect Vitality' which includes a Before and After photo sequence showing how quickly sanpaku can improve in six-weeks.
The position of the iris reflects one’s kidney chi or life force
and is likened to the sun’s orb. Just as the sun rises over the horizon with space above, an infant’s eye shows white sclera above their iris. Their “three whites” suggest dawn and that they have vital energy to last a lifetime. However, white below the iris, as we see in the daughter, is associated with the setting sun or diminished energy.
Rx: Rebuild Core Energy
Not to panic if you see white sclera under your iris when looking straight ahead. It simply means that your core energy, or kidney qi, invites support. Here are general guidelines to accomplish just this. Reduce stress and eat well. Get adequate sleep and regular exercise (but do not exercise to the point of exhaustion). Reduce caffeine and alcohol and eliminate recreational drugs.'
🤯 A terrifying thought, and one which I would have thought unimaginable until quite recently, but after seeing the normalization of madness on such a grand scale these past few years, I don't know anymore.
I'd never thought of it either until writing that comment. But it's a logical progression. By the iron law of woke projection you can take the thing they accuse others of doing and applying it to what they really want to do. "Assigning gender at birth" sounds like something they'd be perfectly ok with. If toddlers can choose their gender, why not newborns? No one wants to be cis, anyways, right?
"How does it not crash on the shoals of its unconsciousness and drown?"
Because the fake reality that supports this abject insanity has been fully adopted by spiritually dead "people" who then aggressively demand that everyone be like them.
Imagine being in the audience of a junior high school play, where everyone in the play is a flipping lunatic, incorrectly reciting their lines and shouting at the audience while also flinging bodily fluids, and most of the audience is laughing hysterically as if it is quite entertaining, but you and like 3 other audience members are like, "Hell NO, crazy f**kers! I'm going home to order a 3-D printer and I'ma make me some g*ns and a*mo!"
If we're not living in "Idiocracy" right now, I don't know anything.
My ex-wife had a lot of borderline features (which is why she's my ex). Impulsive drinking, rages, suicide threats, etc. But she wasn't very charismatic.
It ran in her family, too. One of her cousins was similar and he engaged in all kinds of petty crime, with a stint in prison, before he died of a drug overdose. I would label him as a "mild" or sub-clinical ASPD, whereas my ex is likely sub-clinical BPD. Same biological root, though.
After the divorce, I went through a string of various women who were grab-bags of various Cluster B traits. None of them lasted very long because I got pretty good at spotting disordered behavior and ejecting quickly. Thankfully I eventually found one who has a decent personality and character and we've been married about a year.
Young men absolutely need to learn about these things beforehand so they don't have to do it the hard way. Young women too - but there are a lot more resources for them to get out of abusive relationships, and those are often misused to perpetrate abuse on men.
In a better world, kids would learn about this in school.
"In a better world, kids would learn about this in school."
Be careful what you wish for. Don't underestimate the capacity for teachers and administrators to turn what initially seems like a good idea into a dumbed-down and/or perverted version of whatever the initial idea was.
Important to keep in mind, but on the other hand, if we took this as the sole concern, teachers wouldn't teach anything. Basically we need a sane curriculum, and standards to be able to keep it on track, IMO.
"Basically we need a sane curriculum, and standards to be able to keep it on track, IMO."
Yes, indeed, and I would add (speaking as a retired teacher) that part of what constitutes a sane curriculum is being realistic about what we can shoehorn into a day or a semester or a school year. Of course, reasonable people will disagree to some degree about what are the essential skills and knowledge to be prioritized, but anyone who has taught (on any level) knows that time is limited and the accretion of subjects waters down content and depth.
In addition, subjects like psychology are theoretical and abstract to a degree that most middle and high school (the level at which I assume this would be taught) teachers are not trained or equipped to handle, not to mention the maturity level of the students, likely resulting in oversimplified, shallow and/or rigid treatment, likely veering off into ideologically driven dogma, as we see in much woke curriculum.
Oversimplifying subjects like math, grammar or even history does deny students access to depth and richness, and that's not good, but hopefully will be rectified in further education, formal or informal. When we are talking about a subject like psychology and negotiating intimate relationships, the damage is potentially more serious and harder to correct.
And yes, standards are absolutely important, but more and more often absent or honored in the breach, and I believe would be particularly hard to formulate and enforce with subject matter such as this.
Perhaps I'm overly pessimistic, although what we've seen going on in our schools and universities these days is not encouraging. I just suggest caution in advocating this.
Mar 7, 2023·edited Mar 7, 2023Liked by Harrison Koehli
This is so helpful and insightful. My brother is a diagnosed schitzoid and my mother portrays many narccisist traits. My father was a classic co-dependent being raised in an alcoholic home. My grandmother (mom's mother) was institutionalized as a diagnosed borderline. I was at risk for being cluster B myself, but being the scapegoat in the family I pulled away at an early age and spent all my time with neighbors and called my healthy friends mom's "mom". In other words, I dettached from my cluster B family and formed secure attachments to healthy others.
I entered therapy in my 20s and was diagnosed with PTSD and Generalized Anxiety Disorder. By my 30's I was no longer symptomatic of either. Now in my 40's I'm in a healthy 15-year marriage to a great guy with two healthy teenage daughters. My family's inter-generational trauma stops with me, although I sacrificed all contact with my mother and brother to do it.
I have worked in tech as a UX designer for the past 20 years and have witnessed the woke takeover of my profession. I often feel gaslit in similar ways to the way I felt growing up. The type of love / hate flipping and shame projection is all there in the woke. It's scary when you've lived through it and are healthy enough despite that to recognize it.
I have to psyche myself up to read your posts sometimes and take breaks halfway through and come back later. That's how dead on you are.
"By my 30's I was no longer symptomatic of either. Now in my 40's I'm in a healthy 15-year marriage to a great guy with two healthy teenage daughters."
That's awesome, Jennifer. Congrats on getting out of what for many would be a pretty hopeless situation. In a weird way, it might've helped being the scapegoat. Not to minimize what a horrible situation it is to be in that position, though.
"I have to psyche myself up to read your posts sometimes and take breaks halfway through and come back later. That's how dead on you are."
My apologies and my heartfelt thank-yous! ;)
If you don't mind, could you share some insights regarding your brother? I've never been close to anyone who's been diagnosed as schizoid, and am curious if you have any interesting or helpful observations in that regard. If not, no worries!
Mar 7, 2023·edited Mar 7, 2023Liked by Harrison Koehli
My brother was a pretty normal baby I guess. My mother doted on him. For mothers who are used to enmeshed parenting, early infancy is a golden period. You have a completely dedicated and adoring person who needs you and loves you completely. It's the reason a lot of cluster B's have kids.
The most important thing to remember in this story is that there is no real means for a kid to get their needs reliably met when you are the child of a cluster B damaged parent. You move closer to the parent for normal bonding needs and you are enmeshed and controlled. You recoil away from that you are abandoned, in our case emotionally but in more extreme cases also physically. This is the “disorganized” attachment model and it’s why these disorders run in families and why there is a love/hate dyad going on. Secure attachment and object constancy are hard to achieve in this dynamic.
The first signs of what would shape my brother’s disorder was around when he was a toddler. I am 9 years older than him so I remember it well. If you are wondering why a couple without monetary issues would space kids 9 years apart my hypothesis was that I resisted my mother's enmeshment early on, and since age 7 is the age of reason, it accelerated then and she decided she needed to try over. He would have horrible temper tantrums right around the time when heathy toddler separation/individuation would occur. She learned to put him in a bear hold and she just broke his spirit. He stopped resisting and then he became totally compliant. At the playground he stopped showing interest in other kids and just wanted to interact with her. She liked this.
Until adolescence her and my borderline grandmother doted on him and made him their own. He had very few friends. He liked what they liked. When asked why he had no friends he responded that he was better than them. As he reached adolescence, he retreated further into himself. He saw it as a badge of honor to not have friends, and when he did maybe have a person he wanted to hang out with, those friendships quickly ended because those persons weren’t paying enough attention to him. He stopped taking care of himself or caring what others thought. He got heavily into online gaming as his only social outlet. He was catfished regularly, with my mother’s approval. He grew increasingly misogynistic, calling all women whores. He became a Brony and then a Furry and then claimed he was asexual. He cut ties with my father and hated him. My father was oblivious to my mother’s involvement with this.
My father died when he was 22. My brother showed zero affect when this happened. We were in the hospital room when they took my father off life support and when my father took his last breath my brother asked “Can I go home now.” All attempts by the family to reach out were refuted, with hostility. He was “better than trite acts of normie grieving”.
At this time my brother started sharing a bed with my mother just “to comfort her” since my father wasn’t there. My mother was a victim of incest when she was a child and I wondered if this had moved from clear emotional incest to actual physical incest. This abruptly stopped when my mother took on a poor widower for a lover who desperately needed her money whom she abused. She put my brother up in an apartment down the street and he continued to work for her and have her as his only friend. His apartment caught fire one night and he barely got out with his life, and then he want to trauma counseling. He worked with a therapist for a few months and was diagnosed with Schitzoid Personaity Disorder. He seemed to maybe want to continue working with this therapist but my mother convinced him he was being victimized.
This is already too long and I’m leaving a lot out but I think the story of the origins are important. I haven’t spoken with my brother in years. Last I heard he started dating at 38 but after a few dates thinking the women he was going out with was a goddess he’d ghost her and call her a whore. (There’s that whiplash love/hate thing). He’d be 43 now.
The biggest sign of Schitzoid is flat affect and lack of social involvement. That’s my opinion. I think a lot of these SJW types are really more borderline in that they really, really want people to like them and see them as victims, but people like my brother just don’t care. They aren’t hysterical, they just… are. No happiness, no sadness, so sign of emotion. I remember at one point crying and telling him I loved him and I wanted him to let me in and he was just like, “Mom says you are dysregulated and your tears prove it. Can I go now.” I left the question mark at the end of that off on purpose. To ask a question is to query a reponse from another. It's an initiation of dialogue. It shows curiosity of the emotional state of the other. This was stated, not asked. Totally flat. No emotion.
Thank you, Jennifer, I really appreciate you writing all that. It's great to have some real-life examples to put everything in perspective. Your brother's story reminded me a bit of Ted Kaczynski's childhood. He seemed normal as a baby, but got a childhood disease and was hospitalized for an extended period of time. When he came back, he was changed - no affection or responses to the social cues from his parents. It seems like there are trigger events like this in cases of schizoidia.
Mar 7, 2023·edited Mar 7, 2023Liked by Harrison Koehli
I’m so glad for you that you found your way out of all the dysfunction and sorrow you were surrounded by. God bless you and your family, and may you be a bright light for future generations in your family tree.
Thank you. You know, being scapegoated was a blessing really. While I had to learn to trust again and heal my own feeling of inadequacy for not being properly loved, I became fiercely independant at a young age and reached out to others for meeting my needs, outside of my family. I was the kid that wanted to sleep over all the time at my healthy friend's houses and stayed too long. I am so grateful they saw the emotional dyanamics of my house as what they were, past the perfect white picket fence exterior and accepted me with open arms and hearts. I was damaged when I escaped at 18 but I wasn't personality disordered. I could heal. My brother never had a chance.
The cluster-B-ification of society is getting some attention. I treat patients with BPD, so here are a few thoughts, maybe relevant or not.
1) The borderline-like phenomena we're seeing on a social level is a feature of many mass movements. While it is on clear display these days, it is not unique to this movement or our time.
2) Those borderline dynamics come less from individuals with BPD in the movement and more to do with group dynamics generally.
3) The role of childhood trauma is controversial, and a sizable minority with BPD don't have clear trauma. Where there is trauma we should be careful to distinguish assigning a causal role in the development of BPD vs genetic effects inherited from abusive, unstable parents. Personality disorders run in families and the abusive parent may have passed those genes on to the child.
4) It is essential to distinguish "state" vs "trait" when talking about personality disorders. "Trait" meaning these are features of someone's personality, and "state" meaning the person appears kind of borderline but that is due to their particular circumstances, eg. spouse just had an affair and you lost your job and you're having a nervous breakdown and doing stupid impulsive things. I see this all the time and this plays a role in the overdiagnosis of BPD.
5) I would wager a lot that, in most cases of severe, honest to god borderline, narcissistic, and antisocial personalities, they are to a large extent born that way.
6) That said, diagnosis of BPD can be difficult for all kinds of reasons. Good clinicians know to take their time with diagnosis. One reason is that people with BPD are often misdiagnosed as depressed, bipolar, chronically psychotic, and more. Their reported symptoms can vary, and their relationship to the truth can at times be tenuous. They have a tendency to glob onto particular diagnoses that are trending at the moment. Schizophrenia in the 50's and 60's, eating disorders and multiple personalities in the 80's and 90's, various gender escapades today.
7) There are many useful ways to think about personality disorders in relation to more normal mental functioning. One of the most useful, in my opinion, is focusing on what particular psychological defenses ("defense mechanisms") are being used. Some defenses are mature, like sublimation and humor. Others are more primitive, like splitting, projection, projective identification, etc. We all engage in primitive defenses from time to time (who hasn't engaged in splitting before?), but those who are severely personality disordered are often unable to make use of the more mature defenses on a consistent basis, and that gets them into big trouble.
There is a ton to say about this, maybe I'll write a piece on this from the psychiatrist perspective some time.
For those interested, I highly recommend Nancy McWilliams' book Psychoanalytic Diagnoses, which is one of the best books on personality disorders around.
2) Mostly agreed. Lobaczewski would argue that the phenomena have their ultimate source within individuals (in this case BPD), but that that influence spreads among the members of the mass movement - perhaps to the point that most of the manifestation is from ordinary members, but he's fairly insistent that it doesn't start from "nowhere". There are definite vectors that begin the process.
3) Thanks for this perspective. I think you're right.
4) Good stuff. Tying in with number 2, Lobaczewski would argue that "trait" is the primary vector, inducing "states" among members of the mass movement.
5) Agreed.
6&7) More good stuff.
//There is a ton to say about this, maybe I'll write a piece on this from the psychiatrist perspective some time.//
Looking forward to it!
//For those interested, I highly recommend Nancy McWilliams' book Psychoanalytic Diagnoses, which is one of the best books on personality disorders around.//
The population mental health decline over the last few decades has been sstaggering. While the indoctrination and toxification are significant factors, the destruction of the family and secularism are at the heart of it. I won't associate with anyone that is not actively following a teleologic lifestyle anymore. It's just not worth it.
I agree. And people seem to just take the mental health abyss as normal, not as a sign that we've done something horribly wrong, which we have. There's a lot that needs fixing, and I think the best place to start is at the family level, and on the shared-lifestyle level. We need to reinvigorate communities on the local level (helped along via online communities, but it can't be limited to that, I think). Michael McConkey over at "Circulation of the Elites" has been writing about this too.
I skipped looking at this until now. I hope it is interesting to some people. I am sure there are those who don't even believe that personalities like this exist. They are very real.
I find a couple of your assertions quite "bold and self-defeating". Like when you say that "critical theory" and "feminism" are the product of "schizoids". (I mean, don't make it so obvious that you are catering for highly politicized American conservatives... not everyone reading this blog is American, and there's a whole universe outside of your culture). I don't now how you define critical theory, but a quick google search takes me to a wikipedia definition that goes like this: "A critical theory is any approach to social philosophy that focuses on society and culture to reveal, critique and challenge power structures". (how dare they, right?). An equally cursory google search for "feminism" takes you to: "the advocacy of women's rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes". (Again, how dare they, right??) I mean, challenging traditional power structures? You must be insane! Another thing that called my attention: not a single word about Depp's personality. No space? You should write about conservatism some day. I find that some people have a pathological need for rigid and traditional societal structures, otherwise they feel insecure and threatened, but then again, I'm not a psychologist.
//I find a couple of your assertions quite "bold and self-defeating". Like when you say that "critical theory" and "feminism" are the product of "schizoids". (I mean, don't make it so obvious that you are catering for highly politicized American conservatives... not everyone reading this blog is American, and there's a whole universe outside of your culture). //
I recommend reading Pluckrose and Lindsay's book "Cynical Theories." It will be pretty clear why I categorize those theories as schizoidal and doctrinaire (also search here for my articles on schizoidia and schizoidal philosophy, to see how and why I categorize them as I do).
//I don't now how you define critical theory, but a quick google search takes me to a wikipedia definition that goes like this: "A critical theory is any approach to social philosophy that focuses on society and culture to reveal, critique and challenge power structures". (how dare they, right?). An equally cursory google search for "feminism" takes you to: "the advocacy of women's rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes". (Again, how dare they, right??) I mean, challenging traditional power structures? You must be insane! //
"But antifascist means they're against fascism. It's right there in the definition! How dare they, right? I mean, who isn't against fascism?"
Read Cynical Theories first, then we can talk. Also, read the sections in Ponerology on schizoidal philosophy. Here are the page numbers to make it easier: pp. 105-109, 186-191.
//Another thing that called my attention: not a single word about Depp's personality. No space? //
This post is about borderline PD. Depp doesn't have BPD.
//You should write about conservatism some day. I find that some people have a pathological need for rigid and traditional societal structures, otherwise they feel insecure and threatened, but then again, I'm not a psychologist.//
Gotta add more more thing: "I find a couple of your assertions quite "bold and self-defeating"."
Perhaps unintentional, but this was a not so subtle way of tying "bold and self-defeating" assertions to the subject of the article, which was bold and self-defeating *decisions and life choices* - such as pooping on beds and instituting Lysenko-ist agricultural policies.
I'll admit to my statements being bold. As for self-defeating, we'll just have to wait and see.
So I glanced at your blog and was amused to see that you don't take Gates' philanthropy at face value (nor should you), yet somehow continue to take the self-presentation of the social justice lunatics at face value ('feminism is just what feminists say it is!' Just, lol). The woke are the ideological shock troops of the global system represented by the former. None of them are honest about their motivations.
It's furthermore worth pointing out that a mountain of research consistently reproduces the result that mental illness is extremely prevalent on the contemporary left, whereas on the right it is at normal levels. Most of that research is in an American context, I think, but my personal experiences in Europe strongly suggest that the same pattern is true there. Given that the focus of Harrison's blog is on the malign influence of mental pathology on politics, you might understand why he tends to focus on the left.
But feminism isn't just one thing either isn't it? There are many concepts of feminism. As in the case of "critical theory", I just quoted the most basic and at-hand meaning available. The woke culture, as in many other current "liberal" politics and trends, is just the result of the many handouts the powerful elites give to the masses so they will think of themselves as modern and well... liberal. Since the establishment is basically not going to allow any structural and meaningful political or economic change, they give this lgtb culture to the masses and make a lot of noise about it, trying to pass this as real change and progress. That's my point of view about the hypocrital woke culture.
Regarding the mountain of research about mental illness on the Left, I'd rather not consider the US Left as Left. For me, as for many people around the world, your Left is just center-right with an hypocritical discourse about gay rights and immigration. I mean, to call the psychopath Hillary Clinton, a Wall Street lackey and a warmongerer, a "leftist", is just mind-bending for most Latin Americans. Most liberals in Latin American politics are considered right or center-right, not left. Mostly because they are only liberal when it comes to economics and free market. Here, Left means anti-neoliberalism and anti-conservatism. or progressive in a more classical way (no in the sense of I support the lgtb agenda so I'm progressive). So HRC doesn't fit in the left part of the spectrum, being a corporate profit and private power enabler. She talks like a feminist? who cares about discourse? that's political strategy. Go tell the women of Libya or Syria about HRC feminism... Salvador Allende was a leftist.
"But feminism isn't just one thing either isn't it?"
I'd say academic feminism is pretty uniformly bad. And as with critical theory, when you look at the actual leaders of the movements, the people who write the central books and papers, you'll see typically schizoid portrayals of human nature.
As for the "other" feminisms and critical theories, I see those more in terms of the varied responses to schizoidal theories that Lobaczewski talks about. Many normal people will read such theorists, latch on to the bits that sound sane, and "critically correct" the pathological bits. And there's a lot of pathology in those founding texts.
Perhaps you can give me a few examples, or one example would be enough, of those schizoid portrayals of human nature you are talking about, so I can understand what you are reffering to. As I said earlier, woke culture is an elite handout to the masses, through their elite foundations and institutions, to produce in those masses the feeling of living in a liberal and progressive culture, lacking real and meaningful change, which of course is out of the question. Therefore, it would make sense that that particular academic world would be filled with hypocrites, perhaps even with pathological liars.
I think your analysis of ideology is a bit off. Woke culture isn't an "elite handout", per se. Yes, they do promote it, and I think they do it partially for the reasons you state. But they didn't create them. The ideologies were created by disaffected intellectuals - often anti-authority intellectuals. Those ideologies are simply useful to pathocrats, due to their inherent falsity and capacity for weaponization.
The feminists quotes... ok. Every ideology, religion or system of thought with enough adherents will see a number of them devolve into an insane and dangerous cult. You can make a list of lunatics and their hateful and insane thinking for every system of though, odeology or religion of some size.
I honestly don't care which part of the world you happen to be in. The left is a force for dyscivilizational destruction wherever it happens to be - Freire and Lula in Brazil, Rousseau and Robespierre in France, Trotsky and Stalin in Russia, Mao in China, Pol Pot in Cambodia. Your 'no true Scotsman' argument is adjacent to 'but that wasn't real communism/communism has never been tried'. It rings hollow.
As for feminism, yes, there are multiple strains of that memetic pathogen, all of them awful.
What John said. ;) I'm cool with many feminists. As long as they don't write books! lol (Though even there I may be willing to make an exception or two.)
Oh, but I do care about you not caring, I really do. About feminism, I really hope people would see themselves as human beings in the first place, and not as a male/female who feels so threatened about the other gender. Because there's a lot of that in the conservative right: fear and a threatened identity. The left (not your left, tho...) is a force for civilization. It was the redistributive politics of the left that saved the world from complete right wing tyranny under capitalism during the 20th century... I mean, the 8 hour work day, just one big example. And it was Communist Russia who saved the world from fascism, of course.
isn't pathocracies all we have? aren't we part of one right now? In any case, that pathocracy indeed destroyed the other one, or did the biggest part in its destruction.
Communist Russia would have gotten plowed under by Germany if it hadn't been for the bottomless economic support provided by the evil capitalist pigs in America. Which isn't to say the Russians didn't fight like devils, they did, and deserve credit for that victory. To give the credit to communism, however, is simply absurd. Russia fought off similar incursions under the Tsars. Furthermore, Stalin had to reverse some of his purges - the commies had sent too many competent officers to the gulags for being insufficiently enthusiastic about communism, and they paid the military price for that in the early days of the war.
Also funny how the Berlin Wall was built to keep the citizens of East Germany from escaping to West Germany. I guess they didn't know how well they had it, what with being liberated from the right wing tyranny of capitalism.
>The left (not your left, tho...) is a force for civilization.
Hey, man! Maybe when you're done typing out wikipedia definitions and telling everyone how awesome Marxism is, we could all go stand with Ukraine together or something! What are you doing to celebrate Women's History Month, by the way? I bet whatever it is, it's something really awesome that will, like, totally smash the patriarchy and stuff! Oh, gotta go. Rachel Maddow's on. TTYL!
You said it "I am not a clinician". I am and was trained in Dr. Colin Ross' Trauma Model. Many people have analyzed Amber Heard's behavior from media reports and a very sensationalized and highly biased trial and reports of. I contend that although there might be some facts and truth from these reports, these reports are not evidence or fact based. They have very little to do with what either Amber Heard or Johnny Depp are about. To me the reports are biased against women and in particular Ms. Heard. The Borderline Personality Disorder designation in the DSM -5 is particularly biased. It pathologizes female behavior. The psychological and psychiatric community is so heavily male in its orientation and power base and it just perpetuates myths about women's behavior and pathologizes women's voices and concerns. You have taken the mantle and run with it.
I tend to agree with Dr. Ross' opinion that most mental health diagnoses and etiologies are trauma based. I find your article on this very difficult to read because you are using the diagnosis which is biased in itself to pathologize and trash mostly women. I have unsubscribed because of this and other articles that I totally disagree with. Not at all helpful, with not a bit of compassion and extremely biased
The types of behavior that characterize BPD are not *female* behavior. That's like saying antisocial PD pathologizes *male* behavior. They more or less adequately capture *pathological* behavior. Toxic femininity and toxic masculinity.
"The psychological and psychiatric community is so heavily male in its orientation and power base and it just perpetuates myths about women's behavior and pathologizes women's voices and concerns."
All my female friends have used their voices to express concern to me about women like Amber Heard.
"Not at all helpful, with not a bit of compassion and extremely biased"
I wish women like Heard had a better childhood. I sympathize with everyone who suffered, and then goes on to cause suffering to others. I also sympathize with their victims.
I also have compassion for all those antisocial men. I also think they should be held accountable for their crimes.
I've certainly met my share of BD men and in each case, it was their mother that kept them from developing into healthy men. I always put them on to the book: The Invisible Presence by Michael Gurian, and they always appreciate it. And then I say goodbye for good, hoping they will be better men to their next woman.
I was a clinician and had many “BPD” clients over the years (or rather clients who demonstrated a constellation of symptoms that agreed with the DSM criteria - I’m not a DSM advocate, never labeled clients according to the DSM, but have found it useful to understand patterns of psychopathology) - all those clients were women and my mother demonstrated the same symptoms (needless to say my life was hell being brought up under such psychopathology - I guess you’d say I’m pathologizing my mum, but that’s only because she was/is psychopathological. And if you don’t have the lived experience of being under such insanity then it’s impossible to appreciate what a hell it is, and palming off the diagnosis as a biased error or misrepresentation of women annuls the actual experience of the suffering family members). I’m sure there are men who display the same symptoms but I did not personally encounter them - just as I had 3 obvious psychopaths who were all men but no women with those characteristics. So am I biased?
I agree that there is likely a biopsychosocial aetiology that most often has a early complex trauma component. I saw that in every one of these clients.
I think the characterization Harrison has written here is spot on.
Of course if the symptoms are not long standing and deeply dysfunctional it’s wrong to label a woman BPD because she has an emotional meltdown or acts irrationally. The label can be wielded as a weapon. But I know what a devastating condition this can be - whatever you want to call it, this attachment trauma, it’s very real and not a ploy to “trash women”.
Thanks, Winston. I'm the same re: DSM, it's helpful, but flawed too. Re: BPD in men, Josh Slocum talks about BPD in gay men. I think there may be a connection there.
I had a colleague, a female psychologist and mental health nurse in her 60s, tell me that the field is so male dominated and misogynistic that all women in the field are treated as “silly little girls”. She went on to tell me about her latest revelations on power inequalities, etc, etc (all the repackaged Marxist garbage). And she’s an educator… I despair.
I didn’t even bother to point her to the most basic statistics on gender in the field - she lives in a completely different reality.
Good for her! Statistics, data, empirical evidence, logic, contextual thinking, gestalt awareness, pattern recognition, and trend analysis are all tools of the patriarchy, don't you know.
I also had many family members who suffered under the BPD mother/wife/sister and life was as much hell for the family as it was for the BPD - a few cases I had, the family/husband/boyfriend had come from a female therapist who had tried to see and explain the family dynamics as if each member were equally responsible for the behavior - playing into the BPD hand and alienating the others. Needless to say this did nothing to help the situation.
This was a decade ago - I’ve not done clinical work for some time now. But I suspect that with the wave of wokeness sweeping through psychology I wouldn’t be surprised if this sort of thing is commonplace now.
Um...wait a minute...what's coming is worse than Ms not from this planet bluehair? Going through her website I was like, how can such profound mental illness still be functional? How does it not crash on the shoals of its unconsciousness and drown? And are we sure we are not in that late stage, considering the sacrificing of children to the jab and gender Moloch?
I'm a cynic and an optimist: it can always be worse! Just wait until they REALLY start "assigning gender at birth"--with the scalpel.
Is it just me or is closeted eugenics everywhere I look? So like, cock and balls are going to be a birth defect?
I forsee great opportunities for dulas and midwives....
That's what it looks like... especially after reading Rectenwald's latest book on the WEF...
I never until this moment imagined the stormtroopers of the Star Wars Empire as eunuchs.
"Ve must stop ze overpopulationz!"
I watched the newer Dune movie the other night, and all of the elite military forces of the Emperor were mentioned as being eunuchs. I don’t recall that being in the book.
Remember the super elite slave army in game of thrones who didn't have a penis? Pepperidge farm remembers ;)
Maybe that's why they were so clownishly inept in battle?
Speaking of doulas, the other day at the bar I met a middle-aged lesbian death doula. As I conversed with her I had a vision of her sanpaku eyes smiling at me as she compassionately ushered me across the threshold to the Other Side in a sterile hospital room.
So yeah. Death doulas are a thing in Canada now.
I met an actor (female), who told me about three funerals for people who had died via assisted suicide. She described a lot of gender fluid, polyamorous, people throwing rainbow colored, sparkly confetti and dancing maniacally. It was horrifying and I was a captive audience.
Even worse, and you'll appreciate this Harrison, she was a "Simulated Patient." This title came to replace the Standardized Patient, trained for the National Chiropractic Examiners Boards. I believe they are trained by the College, and or their hired affiliates.
This same woman said some outrageous things to the questions from the young graduates in the "exam room." The young graduates did not skip a beat. It was all very disturbing.
In addition, we have to watch DIE videos for our training as Examiners. Last time we met and had to watch these videos, when they were over, I loudly stated that I was offended. I got a big laugh. One person came up to me later and said he appreciated what I said.
who-knew-dept...once again, TCM has the 5k yr old answer... rebeccawood.com/face-reading/face-reading-mother-daughter-comparison/ ... 'Sanpaku Suggests Low Energy
'...Last we’ll examine the eye itself to observe if the white sclera shows below the colored iris. Note how the mother’s top and bottom eyelids partially eclipse her blue iris. Mom’s white sclera shows only on the two sides of her iris.
The daughter’s hazel iris rides higher and is eclipsed only by her top eyelid. We see white on the remaining three cardinal directions. This is called sanpaku (a Japanese term meaning three whites) and typically reveals compromised vitality.
See 'Eyes Reflect Vitality' which includes a Before and After photo sequence showing how quickly sanpaku can improve in six-weeks.
rebeccawood.com/face-reading/eyes-reflect-vitality-when-three-whites-sanpaku-can-be-a-red-flag/
The position of the iris reflects one’s kidney chi or life force
and is likened to the sun’s orb. Just as the sun rises over the horizon with space above, an infant’s eye shows white sclera above their iris. Their “three whites” suggest dawn and that they have vital energy to last a lifetime. However, white below the iris, as we see in the daughter, is associated with the setting sun or diminished energy.
Rx: Rebuild Core Energy
Not to panic if you see white sclera under your iris when looking straight ahead. It simply means that your core energy, or kidney qi, invites support. Here are general guidelines to accomplish just this. Reduce stress and eat well. Get adequate sleep and regular exercise (but do not exercise to the point of exhaustion). Reduce caffeine and alcohol and eliminate recreational drugs.'
🤯 A terrifying thought, and one which I would have thought unimaginable until quite recently, but after seeing the normalization of madness on such a grand scale these past few years, I don't know anymore.
I'd never thought of it either until writing that comment. But it's a logical progression. By the iron law of woke projection you can take the thing they accuse others of doing and applying it to what they really want to do. "Assigning gender at birth" sounds like something they'd be perfectly ok with. If toddlers can choose their gender, why not newborns? No one wants to be cis, anyways, right?
"How does it not crash on the shoals of its unconsciousness and drown?"
Because the fake reality that supports this abject insanity has been fully adopted by spiritually dead "people" who then aggressively demand that everyone be like them.
Imagine being in the audience of a junior high school play, where everyone in the play is a flipping lunatic, incorrectly reciting their lines and shouting at the audience while also flinging bodily fluids, and most of the audience is laughing hysterically as if it is quite entertaining, but you and like 3 other audience members are like, "Hell NO, crazy f**kers! I'm going home to order a 3-D printer and I'ma make me some g*ns and a*mo!"
If we're not living in "Idiocracy" right now, I don't know anything.
Her website is next level. I discovered her substack there, too, which is also ... intriguing.
Oh boy!
My ex-wife had a lot of borderline features (which is why she's my ex). Impulsive drinking, rages, suicide threats, etc. But she wasn't very charismatic.
It ran in her family, too. One of her cousins was similar and he engaged in all kinds of petty crime, with a stint in prison, before he died of a drug overdose. I would label him as a "mild" or sub-clinical ASPD, whereas my ex is likely sub-clinical BPD. Same biological root, though.
After the divorce, I went through a string of various women who were grab-bags of various Cluster B traits. None of them lasted very long because I got pretty good at spotting disordered behavior and ejecting quickly. Thankfully I eventually found one who has a decent personality and character and we've been married about a year.
Young men absolutely need to learn about these things beforehand so they don't have to do it the hard way. Young women too - but there are a lot more resources for them to get out of abusive relationships, and those are often misused to perpetrate abuse on men.
In a better world, kids would learn about this in school.
"In a better world, kids would learn about this in school."
Absolutely.
Yes, and in a better world we won't be dealing with the aftermath of vaccines and terrible mothers.
"In a better world, kids would learn about this in school."
Be careful what you wish for. Don't underestimate the capacity for teachers and administrators to turn what initially seems like a good idea into a dumbed-down and/or perverted version of whatever the initial idea was.
Important to keep in mind, but on the other hand, if we took this as the sole concern, teachers wouldn't teach anything. Basically we need a sane curriculum, and standards to be able to keep it on track, IMO.
"Basically we need a sane curriculum, and standards to be able to keep it on track, IMO."
Yes, indeed, and I would add (speaking as a retired teacher) that part of what constitutes a sane curriculum is being realistic about what we can shoehorn into a day or a semester or a school year. Of course, reasonable people will disagree to some degree about what are the essential skills and knowledge to be prioritized, but anyone who has taught (on any level) knows that time is limited and the accretion of subjects waters down content and depth.
In addition, subjects like psychology are theoretical and abstract to a degree that most middle and high school (the level at which I assume this would be taught) teachers are not trained or equipped to handle, not to mention the maturity level of the students, likely resulting in oversimplified, shallow and/or rigid treatment, likely veering off into ideologically driven dogma, as we see in much woke curriculum.
Oversimplifying subjects like math, grammar or even history does deny students access to depth and richness, and that's not good, but hopefully will be rectified in further education, formal or informal. When we are talking about a subject like psychology and negotiating intimate relationships, the damage is potentially more serious and harder to correct.
And yes, standards are absolutely important, but more and more often absent or honored in the breach, and I believe would be particularly hard to formulate and enforce with subject matter such as this.
Perhaps I'm overly pessimistic, although what we've seen going on in our schools and universities these days is not encouraging. I just suggest caution in advocating this.
This is so helpful and insightful. My brother is a diagnosed schitzoid and my mother portrays many narccisist traits. My father was a classic co-dependent being raised in an alcoholic home. My grandmother (mom's mother) was institutionalized as a diagnosed borderline. I was at risk for being cluster B myself, but being the scapegoat in the family I pulled away at an early age and spent all my time with neighbors and called my healthy friends mom's "mom". In other words, I dettached from my cluster B family and formed secure attachments to healthy others.
I entered therapy in my 20s and was diagnosed with PTSD and Generalized Anxiety Disorder. By my 30's I was no longer symptomatic of either. Now in my 40's I'm in a healthy 15-year marriage to a great guy with two healthy teenage daughters. My family's inter-generational trauma stops with me, although I sacrificed all contact with my mother and brother to do it.
I have worked in tech as a UX designer for the past 20 years and have witnessed the woke takeover of my profession. I often feel gaslit in similar ways to the way I felt growing up. The type of love / hate flipping and shame projection is all there in the woke. It's scary when you've lived through it and are healthy enough despite that to recognize it.
I have to psyche myself up to read your posts sometimes and take breaks halfway through and come back later. That's how dead on you are.
"By my 30's I was no longer symptomatic of either. Now in my 40's I'm in a healthy 15-year marriage to a great guy with two healthy teenage daughters."
That's awesome, Jennifer. Congrats on getting out of what for many would be a pretty hopeless situation. In a weird way, it might've helped being the scapegoat. Not to minimize what a horrible situation it is to be in that position, though.
"I have to psyche myself up to read your posts sometimes and take breaks halfway through and come back later. That's how dead on you are."
My apologies and my heartfelt thank-yous! ;)
If you don't mind, could you share some insights regarding your brother? I've never been close to anyone who's been diagnosed as schizoid, and am curious if you have any interesting or helpful observations in that regard. If not, no worries!
My brother was a pretty normal baby I guess. My mother doted on him. For mothers who are used to enmeshed parenting, early infancy is a golden period. You have a completely dedicated and adoring person who needs you and loves you completely. It's the reason a lot of cluster B's have kids.
The most important thing to remember in this story is that there is no real means for a kid to get their needs reliably met when you are the child of a cluster B damaged parent. You move closer to the parent for normal bonding needs and you are enmeshed and controlled. You recoil away from that you are abandoned, in our case emotionally but in more extreme cases also physically. This is the “disorganized” attachment model and it’s why these disorders run in families and why there is a love/hate dyad going on. Secure attachment and object constancy are hard to achieve in this dynamic.
The first signs of what would shape my brother’s disorder was around when he was a toddler. I am 9 years older than him so I remember it well. If you are wondering why a couple without monetary issues would space kids 9 years apart my hypothesis was that I resisted my mother's enmeshment early on, and since age 7 is the age of reason, it accelerated then and she decided she needed to try over. He would have horrible temper tantrums right around the time when heathy toddler separation/individuation would occur. She learned to put him in a bear hold and she just broke his spirit. He stopped resisting and then he became totally compliant. At the playground he stopped showing interest in other kids and just wanted to interact with her. She liked this.
Until adolescence her and my borderline grandmother doted on him and made him their own. He had very few friends. He liked what they liked. When asked why he had no friends he responded that he was better than them. As he reached adolescence, he retreated further into himself. He saw it as a badge of honor to not have friends, and when he did maybe have a person he wanted to hang out with, those friendships quickly ended because those persons weren’t paying enough attention to him. He stopped taking care of himself or caring what others thought. He got heavily into online gaming as his only social outlet. He was catfished regularly, with my mother’s approval. He grew increasingly misogynistic, calling all women whores. He became a Brony and then a Furry and then claimed he was asexual. He cut ties with my father and hated him. My father was oblivious to my mother’s involvement with this.
My father died when he was 22. My brother showed zero affect when this happened. We were in the hospital room when they took my father off life support and when my father took his last breath my brother asked “Can I go home now.” All attempts by the family to reach out were refuted, with hostility. He was “better than trite acts of normie grieving”.
At this time my brother started sharing a bed with my mother just “to comfort her” since my father wasn’t there. My mother was a victim of incest when she was a child and I wondered if this had moved from clear emotional incest to actual physical incest. This abruptly stopped when my mother took on a poor widower for a lover who desperately needed her money whom she abused. She put my brother up in an apartment down the street and he continued to work for her and have her as his only friend. His apartment caught fire one night and he barely got out with his life, and then he want to trauma counseling. He worked with a therapist for a few months and was diagnosed with Schitzoid Personaity Disorder. He seemed to maybe want to continue working with this therapist but my mother convinced him he was being victimized.
This is already too long and I’m leaving a lot out but I think the story of the origins are important. I haven’t spoken with my brother in years. Last I heard he started dating at 38 but after a few dates thinking the women he was going out with was a goddess he’d ghost her and call her a whore. (There’s that whiplash love/hate thing). He’d be 43 now.
The biggest sign of Schitzoid is flat affect and lack of social involvement. That’s my opinion. I think a lot of these SJW types are really more borderline in that they really, really want people to like them and see them as victims, but people like my brother just don’t care. They aren’t hysterical, they just… are. No happiness, no sadness, so sign of emotion. I remember at one point crying and telling him I loved him and I wanted him to let me in and he was just like, “Mom says you are dysregulated and your tears prove it. Can I go now.” I left the question mark at the end of that off on purpose. To ask a question is to query a reponse from another. It's an initiation of dialogue. It shows curiosity of the emotional state of the other. This was stated, not asked. Totally flat. No emotion.
Sorry for the long post.
Thank you, Jennifer, I really appreciate you writing all that. It's great to have some real-life examples to put everything in perspective. Your brother's story reminded me a bit of Ted Kaczynski's childhood. He seemed normal as a baby, but got a childhood disease and was hospitalized for an extended period of time. When he came back, he was changed - no affection or responses to the social cues from his parents. It seems like there are trigger events like this in cases of schizoidia.
Thanks for the reponse. I'm confused a bit by your answer, however. Do you see Schitzoid as a response from a disease or the environment?
I'm not sure. I think it's mostly genetic probably - just interesting that there may be environmental triggers.
I dont think my brother would have been this without the environment he was raised in, but there are always many views on this.
I’m so glad for you that you found your way out of all the dysfunction and sorrow you were surrounded by. God bless you and your family, and may you be a bright light for future generations in your family tree.
Thank you. You know, being scapegoated was a blessing really. While I had to learn to trust again and heal my own feeling of inadequacy for not being properly loved, I became fiercely independant at a young age and reached out to others for meeting my needs, outside of my family. I was the kid that wanted to sleep over all the time at my healthy friend's houses and stayed too long. I am so grateful they saw the emotional dyanamics of my house as what they were, past the perfect white picket fence exterior and accepted me with open arms and hearts. I was damaged when I escaped at 18 but I wasn't personality disordered. I could heal. My brother never had a chance.
I was the odd one out in my family too, and it drove me to figure out a better life for myself as well.
Bravo NanaW
Good work, Jennifer. I was the scapegoat and got out of that house as much as possible. I'm the healthiest of them all now but it was very hard work.
"Level playing field"
When the psychopaths come out to center stage.
People will finally notice the leaders are frauds.
The truth is going to destroy them.
The cluster-B-ification of society is getting some attention. I treat patients with BPD, so here are a few thoughts, maybe relevant or not.
1) The borderline-like phenomena we're seeing on a social level is a feature of many mass movements. While it is on clear display these days, it is not unique to this movement or our time.
2) Those borderline dynamics come less from individuals with BPD in the movement and more to do with group dynamics generally.
3) The role of childhood trauma is controversial, and a sizable minority with BPD don't have clear trauma. Where there is trauma we should be careful to distinguish assigning a causal role in the development of BPD vs genetic effects inherited from abusive, unstable parents. Personality disorders run in families and the abusive parent may have passed those genes on to the child.
4) It is essential to distinguish "state" vs "trait" when talking about personality disorders. "Trait" meaning these are features of someone's personality, and "state" meaning the person appears kind of borderline but that is due to their particular circumstances, eg. spouse just had an affair and you lost your job and you're having a nervous breakdown and doing stupid impulsive things. I see this all the time and this plays a role in the overdiagnosis of BPD.
5) I would wager a lot that, in most cases of severe, honest to god borderline, narcissistic, and antisocial personalities, they are to a large extent born that way.
6) That said, diagnosis of BPD can be difficult for all kinds of reasons. Good clinicians know to take their time with diagnosis. One reason is that people with BPD are often misdiagnosed as depressed, bipolar, chronically psychotic, and more. Their reported symptoms can vary, and their relationship to the truth can at times be tenuous. They have a tendency to glob onto particular diagnoses that are trending at the moment. Schizophrenia in the 50's and 60's, eating disorders and multiple personalities in the 80's and 90's, various gender escapades today.
7) There are many useful ways to think about personality disorders in relation to more normal mental functioning. One of the most useful, in my opinion, is focusing on what particular psychological defenses ("defense mechanisms") are being used. Some defenses are mature, like sublimation and humor. Others are more primitive, like splitting, projection, projective identification, etc. We all engage in primitive defenses from time to time (who hasn't engaged in splitting before?), but those who are severely personality disordered are often unable to make use of the more mature defenses on a consistent basis, and that gets them into big trouble.
There is a ton to say about this, maybe I'll write a piece on this from the psychiatrist perspective some time.
For those interested, I highly recommend Nancy McWilliams' book Psychoanalytic Diagnoses, which is one of the best books on personality disorders around.
Great comment, Martin.
1) Agreed.
2) Mostly agreed. Lobaczewski would argue that the phenomena have their ultimate source within individuals (in this case BPD), but that that influence spreads among the members of the mass movement - perhaps to the point that most of the manifestation is from ordinary members, but he's fairly insistent that it doesn't start from "nowhere". There are definite vectors that begin the process.
3) Thanks for this perspective. I think you're right.
4) Good stuff. Tying in with number 2, Lobaczewski would argue that "trait" is the primary vector, inducing "states" among members of the mass movement.
5) Agreed.
6&7) More good stuff.
//There is a ton to say about this, maybe I'll write a piece on this from the psychiatrist perspective some time.//
Looking forward to it!
//For those interested, I highly recommend Nancy McWilliams' book Psychoanalytic Diagnoses, which is one of the best books on personality disorders around.//
Will have to check this out. Thanks!
The population mental health decline over the last few decades has been sstaggering. While the indoctrination and toxification are significant factors, the destruction of the family and secularism are at the heart of it. I won't associate with anyone that is not actively following a teleologic lifestyle anymore. It's just not worth it.
I agree. And people seem to just take the mental health abyss as normal, not as a sign that we've done something horribly wrong, which we have. There's a lot that needs fixing, and I think the best place to start is at the family level, and on the shared-lifestyle level. We need to reinvigorate communities on the local level (helped along via online communities, but it can't be limited to that, I think). Michael McConkey over at "Circulation of the Elites" has been writing about this too.
I skipped looking at this until now. I hope it is interesting to some people. I am sure there are those who don't even believe that personalities like this exist. They are very real.
Two comments about the shoplifting video.
1. Unfortunately, if the police did show up they would probably come down more heavily on the store employee for assault. Because this works.
2. That's some bottomless purse. Like an infinite capacity cornucopia.
I find a couple of your assertions quite "bold and self-defeating". Like when you say that "critical theory" and "feminism" are the product of "schizoids". (I mean, don't make it so obvious that you are catering for highly politicized American conservatives... not everyone reading this blog is American, and there's a whole universe outside of your culture). I don't now how you define critical theory, but a quick google search takes me to a wikipedia definition that goes like this: "A critical theory is any approach to social philosophy that focuses on society and culture to reveal, critique and challenge power structures". (how dare they, right?). An equally cursory google search for "feminism" takes you to: "the advocacy of women's rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes". (Again, how dare they, right??) I mean, challenging traditional power structures? You must be insane! Another thing that called my attention: not a single word about Depp's personality. No space? You should write about conservatism some day. I find that some people have a pathological need for rigid and traditional societal structures, otherwise they feel insecure and threatened, but then again, I'm not a psychologist.
//I find a couple of your assertions quite "bold and self-defeating". Like when you say that "critical theory" and "feminism" are the product of "schizoids". (I mean, don't make it so obvious that you are catering for highly politicized American conservatives... not everyone reading this blog is American, and there's a whole universe outside of your culture). //
I recommend reading Pluckrose and Lindsay's book "Cynical Theories." It will be pretty clear why I categorize those theories as schizoidal and doctrinaire (also search here for my articles on schizoidia and schizoidal philosophy, to see how and why I categorize them as I do).
//I don't now how you define critical theory, but a quick google search takes me to a wikipedia definition that goes like this: "A critical theory is any approach to social philosophy that focuses on society and culture to reveal, critique and challenge power structures". (how dare they, right?). An equally cursory google search for "feminism" takes you to: "the advocacy of women's rights on the basis of the equality of the sexes". (Again, how dare they, right??) I mean, challenging traditional power structures? You must be insane! //
"But antifascist means they're against fascism. It's right there in the definition! How dare they, right? I mean, who isn't against fascism?"
Read Cynical Theories first, then we can talk. Also, read the sections in Ponerology on schizoidal philosophy. Here are the page numbers to make it easier: pp. 105-109, 186-191.
//Another thing that called my attention: not a single word about Depp's personality. No space? //
This post is about borderline PD. Depp doesn't have BPD.
//You should write about conservatism some day. I find that some people have a pathological need for rigid and traditional societal structures, otherwise they feel insecure and threatened, but then again, I'm not a psychologist.//
I agree with this.
Gotta add more more thing: "I find a couple of your assertions quite "bold and self-defeating"."
Perhaps unintentional, but this was a not so subtle way of tying "bold and self-defeating" assertions to the subject of the article, which was bold and self-defeating *decisions and life choices* - such as pooping on beds and instituting Lysenko-ist agricultural policies.
I'll admit to my statements being bold. As for self-defeating, we'll just have to wait and see.
So I glanced at your blog and was amused to see that you don't take Gates' philanthropy at face value (nor should you), yet somehow continue to take the self-presentation of the social justice lunatics at face value ('feminism is just what feminists say it is!' Just, lol). The woke are the ideological shock troops of the global system represented by the former. None of them are honest about their motivations.
It's furthermore worth pointing out that a mountain of research consistently reproduces the result that mental illness is extremely prevalent on the contemporary left, whereas on the right it is at normal levels. Most of that research is in an American context, I think, but my personal experiences in Europe strongly suggest that the same pattern is true there. Given that the focus of Harrison's blog is on the malign influence of mental pathology on politics, you might understand why he tends to focus on the left.
But feminism isn't just one thing either isn't it? There are many concepts of feminism. As in the case of "critical theory", I just quoted the most basic and at-hand meaning available. The woke culture, as in many other current "liberal" politics and trends, is just the result of the many handouts the powerful elites give to the masses so they will think of themselves as modern and well... liberal. Since the establishment is basically not going to allow any structural and meaningful political or economic change, they give this lgtb culture to the masses and make a lot of noise about it, trying to pass this as real change and progress. That's my point of view about the hypocrital woke culture.
Regarding the mountain of research about mental illness on the Left, I'd rather not consider the US Left as Left. For me, as for many people around the world, your Left is just center-right with an hypocritical discourse about gay rights and immigration. I mean, to call the psychopath Hillary Clinton, a Wall Street lackey and a warmongerer, a "leftist", is just mind-bending for most Latin Americans. Most liberals in Latin American politics are considered right or center-right, not left. Mostly because they are only liberal when it comes to economics and free market. Here, Left means anti-neoliberalism and anti-conservatism. or progressive in a more classical way (no in the sense of I support the lgtb agenda so I'm progressive). So HRC doesn't fit in the left part of the spectrum, being a corporate profit and private power enabler. She talks like a feminist? who cares about discourse? that's political strategy. Go tell the women of Libya or Syria about HRC feminism... Salvador Allende was a leftist.
"But feminism isn't just one thing either isn't it?"
I'd say academic feminism is pretty uniformly bad. And as with critical theory, when you look at the actual leaders of the movements, the people who write the central books and papers, you'll see typically schizoid portrayals of human nature.
As for the "other" feminisms and critical theories, I see those more in terms of the varied responses to schizoidal theories that Lobaczewski talks about. Many normal people will read such theorists, latch on to the bits that sound sane, and "critically correct" the pathological bits. And there's a lot of pathology in those founding texts.
Perhaps you can give me a few examples, or one example would be enough, of those schizoid portrayals of human nature you are talking about, so I can understand what you are reffering to. As I said earlier, woke culture is an elite handout to the masses, through their elite foundations and institutions, to produce in those masses the feeling of living in a liberal and progressive culture, lacking real and meaningful change, which of course is out of the question. Therefore, it would make sense that that particular academic world would be filled with hypocrites, perhaps even with pathological liars.
As a start (again, read Lindsay and Pluckrose): https://thoughtcatalog.com/jake-fillis/2014/05/23-quotes-from-feminists-that-will-make-you-rethink-feminism/
I think your analysis of ideology is a bit off. Woke culture isn't an "elite handout", per se. Yes, they do promote it, and I think they do it partially for the reasons you state. But they didn't create them. The ideologies were created by disaffected intellectuals - often anti-authority intellectuals. Those ideologies are simply useful to pathocrats, due to their inherent falsity and capacity for weaponization.
The feminists quotes... ok. Every ideology, religion or system of thought with enough adherents will see a number of them devolve into an insane and dangerous cult. You can make a list of lunatics and their hateful and insane thinking for every system of though, odeology or religion of some size.
Yes, disaffected intelectuals in the service of the CIA and the Western elite: https://thephilosophicalsalon.com/the-cia-the-frankfurt-schools-anti-communism/?fbclid=IwAR1_UBtg9awGQqBWbF2A9V26uACZK9zwj7eGjuKVgg0rZsBRq26e-73e9Nc&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
I honestly don't care which part of the world you happen to be in. The left is a force for dyscivilizational destruction wherever it happens to be - Freire and Lula in Brazil, Rousseau and Robespierre in France, Trotsky and Stalin in Russia, Mao in China, Pol Pot in Cambodia. Your 'no true Scotsman' argument is adjacent to 'but that wasn't real communism/communism has never been tried'. It rings hollow.
As for feminism, yes, there are multiple strains of that memetic pathogen, all of them awful.
I don't know, I'm a "classic" 60s feminist and I don't think I'm awful. I do find a lot of the modern stuff pretty appalling.
You may be a feminist, but you're not feminism ;)
What John said. ;) I'm cool with many feminists. As long as they don't write books! lol (Though even there I may be willing to make an exception or two.)
OK. This is why I dislike philosophical arguments — they often get bogged down in semantics. I was unaware of the difference.
Oh, but I do care about you not caring, I really do. About feminism, I really hope people would see themselves as human beings in the first place, and not as a male/female who feels so threatened about the other gender. Because there's a lot of that in the conservative right: fear and a threatened identity. The left (not your left, tho...) is a force for civilization. It was the redistributive politics of the left that saved the world from complete right wing tyranny under capitalism during the 20th century... I mean, the 8 hour work day, just one big example. And it was Communist Russia who saved the world from fascism, of course.
"And it was Communist Russia who saved the world from fascism, of course."
One pathocracy destroyed another pathocracy.
isn't pathocracies all we have? aren't we part of one right now? In any case, that pathocracy indeed destroyed the other one, or did the biggest part in its destruction.
Communist Russia would have gotten plowed under by Germany if it hadn't been for the bottomless economic support provided by the evil capitalist pigs in America. Which isn't to say the Russians didn't fight like devils, they did, and deserve credit for that victory. To give the credit to communism, however, is simply absurd. Russia fought off similar incursions under the Tsars. Furthermore, Stalin had to reverse some of his purges - the commies had sent too many competent officers to the gulags for being insufficiently enthusiastic about communism, and they paid the military price for that in the early days of the war.
Also funny how the Berlin Wall was built to keep the citizens of East Germany from escaping to West Germany. I guess they didn't know how well they had it, what with being liberated from the right wing tyranny of capitalism.
>The left (not your left, tho...) is a force for civilization.
You're No True Scotsmaning again.
You foreigners (as you defined yourself) really like to lecture we Americans don’t you? So far you haven’t impressed.
Indeed, Allende was a commie, and good riddance.
Get your motte & bailey here! Get your motte & bailey here!
Hey, man! Maybe when you're done typing out wikipedia definitions and telling everyone how awesome Marxism is, we could all go stand with Ukraine together or something! What are you doing to celebrate Women's History Month, by the way? I bet whatever it is, it's something really awesome that will, like, totally smash the patriarchy and stuff! Oh, gotta go. Rachel Maddow's on. TTYL!
You said it "I am not a clinician". I am and was trained in Dr. Colin Ross' Trauma Model. Many people have analyzed Amber Heard's behavior from media reports and a very sensationalized and highly biased trial and reports of. I contend that although there might be some facts and truth from these reports, these reports are not evidence or fact based. They have very little to do with what either Amber Heard or Johnny Depp are about. To me the reports are biased against women and in particular Ms. Heard. The Borderline Personality Disorder designation in the DSM -5 is particularly biased. It pathologizes female behavior. The psychological and psychiatric community is so heavily male in its orientation and power base and it just perpetuates myths about women's behavior and pathologizes women's voices and concerns. You have taken the mantle and run with it.
I tend to agree with Dr. Ross' opinion that most mental health diagnoses and etiologies are trauma based. I find your article on this very difficult to read because you are using the diagnosis which is biased in itself to pathologize and trash mostly women. I have unsubscribed because of this and other articles that I totally disagree with. Not at all helpful, with not a bit of compassion and extremely biased
"[BPD] pathologizes female behavior."
The types of behavior that characterize BPD are not *female* behavior. That's like saying antisocial PD pathologizes *male* behavior. They more or less adequately capture *pathological* behavior. Toxic femininity and toxic masculinity.
"The psychological and psychiatric community is so heavily male in its orientation and power base and it just perpetuates myths about women's behavior and pathologizes women's voices and concerns."
All my female friends have used their voices to express concern to me about women like Amber Heard.
"Not at all helpful, with not a bit of compassion and extremely biased"
I wish women like Heard had a better childhood. I sympathize with everyone who suffered, and then goes on to cause suffering to others. I also sympathize with their victims.
I also have compassion for all those antisocial men. I also think they should be held accountable for their crimes.
Here's Amber, just being a regular ol' female.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oz42WmqPCJk&ab_channel=HollywoodIsles
I've certainly met my share of BD men and in each case, it was their mother that kept them from developing into healthy men. I always put them on to the book: The Invisible Presence by Michael Gurian, and they always appreciate it. And then I say goodbye for good, hoping they will be better men to their next woman.
I was a clinician and had many “BPD” clients over the years (or rather clients who demonstrated a constellation of symptoms that agreed with the DSM criteria - I’m not a DSM advocate, never labeled clients according to the DSM, but have found it useful to understand patterns of psychopathology) - all those clients were women and my mother demonstrated the same symptoms (needless to say my life was hell being brought up under such psychopathology - I guess you’d say I’m pathologizing my mum, but that’s only because she was/is psychopathological. And if you don’t have the lived experience of being under such insanity then it’s impossible to appreciate what a hell it is, and palming off the diagnosis as a biased error or misrepresentation of women annuls the actual experience of the suffering family members). I’m sure there are men who display the same symptoms but I did not personally encounter them - just as I had 3 obvious psychopaths who were all men but no women with those characteristics. So am I biased?
I agree that there is likely a biopsychosocial aetiology that most often has a early complex trauma component. I saw that in every one of these clients.
I think the characterization Harrison has written here is spot on.
Of course if the symptoms are not long standing and deeply dysfunctional it’s wrong to label a woman BPD because she has an emotional meltdown or acts irrationally. The label can be wielded as a weapon. But I know what a devastating condition this can be - whatever you want to call it, this attachment trauma, it’s very real and not a ploy to “trash women”.
Thanks, Winston. I'm the same re: DSM, it's helpful, but flawed too. Re: BPD in men, Josh Slocum talks about BPD in gay men. I think there may be a connection there.
"The psychological and psychiatric community is so heavily male in its orientation and power base..."
Pure flapdoodle.
I need to remember "flapdoodle" for my Toadpipe lessons!
So uh. Most women are BPD? That isn't the own you think it is.
As for the psychiatry being heavily male, lol, lmao.
https://mobile.twitter.com/RichardvReeves/status/1603473003513319428
I had a colleague, a female psychologist and mental health nurse in her 60s, tell me that the field is so male dominated and misogynistic that all women in the field are treated as “silly little girls”. She went on to tell me about her latest revelations on power inequalities, etc, etc (all the repackaged Marxist garbage). And she’s an educator… I despair.
I didn’t even bother to point her to the most basic statistics on gender in the field - she lives in a completely different reality.
Good for her! Statistics, data, empirical evidence, logic, contextual thinking, gestalt awareness, pattern recognition, and trend analysis are all tools of the patriarchy, don't you know.
She seriously would have had such a retort if I gave her the evidence!
I also had many family members who suffered under the BPD mother/wife/sister and life was as much hell for the family as it was for the BPD - a few cases I had, the family/husband/boyfriend had come from a female therapist who had tried to see and explain the family dynamics as if each member were equally responsible for the behavior - playing into the BPD hand and alienating the others. Needless to say this did nothing to help the situation.
This was a decade ago - I’ve not done clinical work for some time now. But I suspect that with the wave of wokeness sweeping through psychology I wouldn’t be surprised if this sort of thing is commonplace now.
I empathize with him having survived a similar sort of mum.
So THAT’S why you are the way you are! 😉