Collision with Reality: What Depth Psychology Can Tell us About Victimhood Culture

Collision with Reality: What Depth Psychology Can Tell us About Victimhood Culture

"An awkward and aggressive boy who was not well-liked by classmates or teachers, Jung must have welcomed the opportunity to escape from school. At childhood’s twilight hour, faced with the looming demands of adolescence, Jung withdrew from the world. For a while, his fate hung in the balance, as he drifted towards the possibility of permanent, self-imposed marginalization and infirmity.

In my therapeutic work with mothers of teens and tweens, I am a frequent second-hand witness to children who, seeking to avoid the developmental demands of approaching independence, cling to their frailties in much the same way 12-year-old Jung did...

Personal or collective attitudes that create an invitation to victimhood and infirmity can alter what we expect for ourselves. Embracing a status of oppression or affliction can be helpful, as it marshals needed care. However, when held onto too long, it can invite disengagement from life, and an avoidance of one’s fate. Worryingly, it also has negative implications for personal mental health, as it may foster a sense of helplessness.

Thinking of ourselves as oppressed or infirm may inadvertently cultivate what psychologists call an external locus of control... having an internal locus of control is associated with less stress and better health, whereas having an external locus of control is correlated with anxiety disorders. Importantly, an internal locus of control appears to be a decisive factor in determining whether one will be psychologically resilient. As a society, therefore, it is in our interest to cultivate an internal locus of control, and indeed, the popular notions of grit and mindset are undergirded by locus of control theory. However, some environments are fostering its opposite.

A mother in my practice recently shared that her child’s seventh grade year began with the teacher having students share their preferred pronouns. Immediately afterwards, this mother’s 12-year-old daughter began identifying as genderfluid and became preoccupied with her new status as a member of an oppressed minority. Though the teacher undoubtedly meant to communicate tolerance and acceptance, she inadvertently created an inducement to victimhood.

Some current cultural trends award increased social status to those perceived as victims. Sociologists have posited that a new moral culture of victimhood is developing on college campuses. In such a culture, being a victim raises one’s standing and confers virtue, in part because it mobilizes protection and support from powerful third parties. The increased status of victimhood may account for the rise in “digital self-harm” that researchers have identified when teens cyber-bully themselves.

Victimhood culture rewards us when we are aggrieved, helpless, and weak. It therefore encourages us to experience ourselves as being at the mercy of external forces beyond our control, which, as we have seen, may have negative consequences for mental well-being...

In certain subcultures today, having a mental health diagnosis brings with it perceived advantages. On Tumblr, there are communities of those who have diagnosed themselves with dissociative identity disorder. Many Tumblr users proudly list their mental health conditions in their profiles, including anxiety, depression, borderline personality disorder, and PTSD. Author Angela Nagle has named this Tumblr phenomenon “the cult of suffering, weakness, and vulnerability.” In addition to a moral culture of victimhood, a related tendency encourages us to think of ourselves as unwell.

The tendency towards self-diagnosis on Tumblr mirrors currents in the wider culture as the number of mental health disorders have proliferated. In the late ‘70s, the first Diagnostic and Statistical Manual contained roughly two dozen diagnostic categories. The most recent revision to this catalogue of modern maladies lists 265.

A diagnosis carries with it a sense of absolution. It isn’t our fault that we have anxiety or depression. Forces beyond our control have conspired against us...

An October 2017 New York Times article entitled “Why Are More American Teenagers Than Ever Suffering From Extreme Anxiety?” looked at the rising tide of teen anxiety in the United States... Special educational 504 plans address student anxieties by allowing kids to leave class early, use special entrances, and seek out safe spaces when they are feeling overwhelmed. A therapist interviewed for the Times article worries that these kinds of “avoidance-based” accommodations only make anxiety worse by sending the message to kids that they are too fragile to handle things that make them uncomfortable...

She spends most of her days at home alone texting friends, relieved never to have to set foot in a high school again. The issue here isn’t just about kids who can’t get to class. The stakes are higher, and have to do with a life of meaning and purpose on its way to being forfeited.

Jung noted that “a neurosis is always a substitute for legitimate suffering.”...

Thousands of years before anyone spoke of an “internal locus of control,” the poets and bards of earlier epochs knew the decisive importance of walking toward one’s fate. The one who did this was known as the hero"


In other words, victim culture is... a self-fulfilling prophecy


Related:

Jay Hubbard - "Why Depression And Suicide Rates Have Increased

"Political players, professors, and advocates, in teaching our citizens to embrace a victim mentality, have - perhaps unintentionally - conditioned our people into a state of "learned helplessness."...

When political actors, professors, and advocates inaccurately portray the degree of injustice occurring within our society, or when they disproportionately focus on a true but infrequent injustice, or even if they merely claim said injustices to be systemic rather than specific and individual exceptions, they're instilling a sense of hopelessness in those who listen. By tapping into the human condition's natural desire to shift blame away from oneself, entire worldviews are crafted around the core concept of avoiding responsibility. One way to rationalize this mentality is to believe one is routinely victimized by a supposedly oppressive system in a nearly insurmountable way...

If people feel they cannot change their circumstances, they may genuinely feel as if they aren't in control of their life. They may just give up and feel hopeless.

This is, in fact, what the science shows...

If people feel they cannot change their circumstances, they may genuinely feel as if they aren't in control of their life. They may just give up and feel hopeless.

This is, in fact, what the science shows"