Despite our individual differences, we’re also driven by collective instincts to be accepted; to be ‘normal’. The social instinct to conform is as inherent as its opposite, and both are present from birth. It’s just a hint that you may (or not), suffer strange psychic disturbances at mid-life, when your individuality begins to emerge (if it does).
If it does, don’t panic; this split in the personality is natural. But, because it’s so little acknowledged or understood, we must go far back in time to discover the reasons why. The younger generation may be astonished that this search for the historical roots of our behavior leads into the ancient world — of the nineteen-fifties.
The brutality characteristic of that time was recorded on crude black and white media transmissions through a ‘boob tube.’ Brief but startling interruptions in the fantasy-based programming allowed viewers to tune into real-time events at the end of each day — for a half-hour.
Euphemistically referred to as ‘news’, these horrifying glimpses into reality were gradually numbed by unconscious associations with the pleasant dream-world surrounding them. Uncritical ego-tendencies fostered an eager audience quick to embrace the new, subliminal means of repression.
To redirect any thought or reflection on the actual state of affairs, “sit-coms” depicting outlandish exaggerations of human behavior, accompanied by dubbed laughter at prescribed intervals, subtly informed a smooth flow into the newly scripted norm.
Fiercely competitive game shows stressed object-acquisition and fantasies of entitlement to spur industry following a devastating world war — and to avert attention from the threat of unconscious destructive tendencies designed to compensate a fantastic view of natural law. Owing to the anxiety of the time, all desperately seized upon the new medium without compunction. This is not to be wondered at:
Contrasting with today’s cutting-edge medical specialist, a ‘general practitioner’ slapped the newborn’s bottom in that distant age to jump-start its breathing. Judging from available records, since most infants’ lungs were then located in the chest cavity, we can only theorize that it was to accustom it at the outset to being hit by parents and strangers alike. The para-sexual practice was so prevalent, we assume it to have been a primitive birth rite associated with the reigning cult of violence.
No general instruction or education was provided for the care of the wee thing, and upon initiation it was thenceforth dispatched to the homes of inexperienced novices whose worst traits were only magnified by the confusion of having brought a primitive self-replicant into their private, inside-out social bubbles. The ignorance and arrogance required to tackle such a task without knowledge or preparation were happily endorsed by all, along with a host of other irrational behaviors typical of that age.
The powerful symbolic significance of the child-image was unrecognized by the rude psychology of that era; its more comprehensive evolutionary function remained as unconscious as in the Anthropithecus Abnormalis of prehistoric times. We now understand the child-image to be a profound psychic function: each generation’s highest hopes doubled back against a conscious fear of change for the purpose of self-examination and reflection with the aim toward higher development.
Relentless coaching served to repress this natural, albeit unconscious function, and contradictions intended to reveal nature’s forward aims via thoughtful reflection borne from a desire to understand one’s nature were subliminally absorbed ‘as is’ by the infant, as through a looking glass, to be channeled into the hostile and defensive reactions required to participate in the norm.
The pointless and frustrated squandering of vital life energies dedicated to re-interpreting such natural functions into embarrassing and inadmissible private “necessities” afforded effective early training for the grander cultural illusions awaiting the tiny initiate.
As determined as the efforts were, they failed to fully repress the instinctive drive to self-awareness lurking behind the dissociated intellect of that day. Devious commercial marketing of all manner of useless gadgetry merged with a vast entertainment industry to siphon off the psyche’s persistent demand for personal and social consciousness. This only plunged the culture deeper into regression.
The natural, ape-like instinct for imitation was artificially managed to retard the much-needed reflection, and the child was alternately cajoled, hit and screamed at to ensure conformity to the mass madness. So advanced was emotional retardation in the boys, they yearned to hit others far beyond the attainment of physical maturity.
Many habitually struck their spouses, not just in retribution for the chimp-like traditions forced upon them, but to hone the competitive ruthlessness which drove the obsessive commercial machinery. Most were routinely whipped into submission from an early age to abet the general conspiracy of self-neglect required for an exclusive focus on objects far exceeding practicality. Darwin’s theory of natural selection suggested a dark psychic paradox.
The primitive desire to hit and be hit was integral to the compensatory objectives of educators and parents and fitted so neatly into the collective program, none inspected the deep personal insecurities beneath the violent cycle of reaction and response.
Due to guilt-ridden projections, the imitative function bidding the youngsters to practice the lessons they learned on each other was paradoxically punished. Authorities had also to rationalize the humiliations inflicted upon their own youth: unconscious retaliation for the still-living brute in them and the buried shame of ignominies required to mold its natural reality into a credulous and exploitable machine of artificial design.
No reliable records exist of the girls’ reactions to such conditions. They were segregated into a far-off emotional world beyond psychic reach of the boys who later became the men who furnished the only reports available. Today’s more objective assessments must discard them as too subjective — self-inflated male caricatures of an early stage of development.
The crude psychic split between the sexes was so deeply rooted, males often persisted in chiding one another long into adulthood for crossing the artificial sexual barrier when mating for purposes outside coitus.
Consonant with the lack of reflection and the blind acceptance of rote gender roles, moribund religious rituals deeply entrenched in a rigid patriarchy held any reconciliation of the sexual divide in strict abeyance.
As psychic images were then viewed as concrete ‘things’ (the by-product of a too-rational attitude), the repressed urge to reconcile contradictory impulses and the consequent one-sidedness contributed significantly to a fragmented gender-identification and a confusing mix of sexual proclivities which naturally attracted all, whether positively or negatively. Appearance dictated that sexual identity existed only in the body, and causation was ascribed to simplistic notions of hereditary weakness and/or childhood trauma as suited the psychological bias of the investigator.
Unconscious fealty to patriarchal ideals, along with with weak compensating feminine images, was so tightly woven into the fabric of society that the effete religious views were shrouded in superstition and forbidden any elaboration. It remained to be discovered that the goals of psychology were inseparable from spiritual development, and their separate inquiries remained at cross-purposes.
Hidden beneath the religious cult was a morbid fear of nature which persisted despite the irrefutable evidence of its destructive effect on the only reality which supported it. The compulsions of instinct were only a small step beyond being perceived as external demons of unknown origin just as they had been for eons.
The rote science of that era was so fixed on material substance, symbols were declared meaningless across the psychic board. Any emotional advancement was thus stopped in its tracks. Because of the stoppage created by a too-rational, extraverted viewpoint, the innate balancing function of spiritual values needed to guide the employment of dissociated technologies eventually metastasized into a compulsive greed for personal wealth and power.
For a more serious inquiry into collective ideals, visit Amazon.