Little Foot-Stampers and Fist-Shakers

Our Little Gang of Nannies

Nanny Speak or Mob Rule was our comment (below) on the Gang of Eight that got the Times-Standard to publish their vocal animus in the July 22, 2011, My Word. In today's My Word: "Authors failed to do their homework on Atkins" Sue Brandenburg takes exception to their assault on Councilwoman Linda Atkins and other pious and self-righteous statements. To quote:

“The firing of Police Chief Garr Nielsen was the last straw for a large group of people who have endured the incompetency and arrogance coming from some of the city management and some of the past and current city council members.”

She then proceeds to explain what she means by, “incompetency and arrogance.” Also, for those that have the stomach to keep up on the Debt Debate going on with President Obama and the Republican, you can get a real good idea what she's talking about. What soon becomes apparent, along with the “incompetency and arrogance,” is the deceptive swindle that's in play backed up by lies and false accusations. Each side is trying to force or coerce the other side. No one is negotiating in good faith. The irony is, that is exactly how the United States and in particular Barack Obama deals with other peoples and countries of the World. Now it is exactly how he is treating his so-called Republican adversaries and is, in fact, being treated in return.

Looking at the primary letters of which were published here, here and here as My Word articles you'll readily see a couple of common themes: ideologues enforcing their personal beliefs as logic facts. Two, never taking personal responsibility for anything they say or do – And conflating their personal opinions with who and what they believe or think they are as a person. In other words they take EVERYTHING personally. More importantly and one of the reasons the Editors of the Times-Standard had responsibility to NOT publish these peoples' letters is that they use every means to viciously brand or label those that don't believe or agree with their right to judge, in this particular case Councilwoman Linda Atkins, as mental, delusional or not sane. Their actions, stated beliefs justifying their actions when compared to paranoia identifies these people exactly for what they are and what their intent is - BULLIES AND BULLING.

To better understand the connection you need to read the interview with: Norway’s Johan Galtung, Peace & Conflict Pioneer, on How to Stop Extremism that Fueled Shooting - Johan Galtung is a man who’s spent half a century pursuing nonviolent conflict resolution. This comment really caught my attention as our goal here at the Joe Blow Report is to stimulate thinking:

I don’t use the word "terrorist." That’s an American vocabulary, which has found much too much usage. It’s a sign saying, "Stop thinking. He’s just simply bad and evil." 

Galtung's granddaughter, who came to the island on the same boat as Breivik and survived, asks: "How can we prevent movements like the movement Breivik participated in?"

Let me give one answer immediately. Challenge these people on the extreme right in debate. Get them out in public space, in the open. Challenge them. Let me only say one thing. If you want to challenge them, you should have been well prepared. These people are well prepared. Don’t underestimate them—point one. *** And I can only say, having done it, it’s very, very easy. But you have to understand them. That doesn’t mean you have to accept them, but you have to go your portion of the way.

Even more noteworthy was listening to what that guy in Norway, Anders Behring Breivik, said motivated him, what his Christian beliefs are and who he attacked and why. The Guardian Newspaper has a relevant article today on this very subject: Anders Behring Breivik: the truth in delusion - “The case of Anders Breivik in Norway reminds us that the relationship between madness and responsibility is complex”

“Paranoia has three classical components. The paranoiac has located a fault or malignancy in the world, he has named it, and has a message to deliver about it. For Breivik, the conviction is that Europe is rotten, that the name of this rottenness is Islam and that it is his mission to expose and excise it. 

Whereas many schizophrenic subjects experience an invasion inside their body, the paranoiac situates it outside: there is some badness out there in the world. Where for the schizophrenic the other is often too close, intruding into their body; for the paranoiac, self and other are rigidly separated: the other is outside. And hence the paranoiac subject is always innocent: it's the other's fault. 

Paranoia here should be differentiated from paranoid. Anyone can be paranoid, but paranoia as such implies a rigid system of beliefs with explanatory power, according the subject a fixed place in the world: for Breivik, that of the "perfect knight" battling Islam. The other common misunderstanding of paranoia is to assume it always involves persecution. In fact, many paranoiacs locate the malignancy not in a person but in some aspect of the world: a disease; environmental problems; danger to children.” **** 

“The paranoiac's delusion here can be false but it can equally be absolutely true.” ****
“The madness lies not in the content of the beliefs here but in the person's relation to the belief. If certainty about the belief replaces doubt, we are in the realm of psychosis.” **** 

“This nuances the old-fashioned idea that the subject is only responsible for a crime if he "knew the difference between right and wrong", since the central feature of paranoia is precisely that the person does know the difference. That, indeed, is why they are psychotic: they harbour not doubt but utter conviction that what they are doing is the right thing.” [Emphasis added]

When the newspaper publishes these people's letters they are enabling them and facilitating their paranoid delusions. All that does is "grease" the way for the "Anders Behring Breiviks" in Humboldt County.
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--Joe