Homosapiens are One F–ked-Up Species!
It should be well-known that a common human tendency is to not assess our own strengths and weaknesses accurately. It is often an advantage to have other trusted individuals provide us with their perspectives about us when we attempt to do an objective self-assessment.
I think this is also true when most humans attempt to assess the strength’s and weaknesses of their own species, the Homosapien.
A friend of mine, another Ph.D. practicing Psychologist, with 40 plus years of experience and I were discussing the recent murder of nine black Christians in a bible class in South Carolina by another crazed (and racist) barbarian.
My colleague told me that, when his patients/clients ask him how people could do some of the awful things they do to others, he now states the title of this blog (which I borrowed from him) to them.
My colleague said he frequently softens this exclamation, but added that the profanity included carried “the emotional punch” he often wants to create with his statement. I agree with him on this matter.
On the other hand, it might be said that we both have a slanted perspective on this matter. After all, people do not come to see us unless they personally have a problem or someone is treating them badly. I believe this perspective is incorrect, my colleague and I both live in a broader social environment and have done so for a great many more hours than we send working as therapists. I will simply leave it to world history to counter this skeptical remark.
My friend and I are not the first to confess such thoughts. Albert Ellis argued that humans are basically irrational. Ellis developed an early form of cognitive therapy designed to correct his patient’s deeply held and automatic irrational beliefs that caused them to feel anxious, depressed, frustrated and angry. Ellis identified numerous common irrational beliefs that underlay so much of humanities self-defeating/self-abusive behaviors. See the following: http://changingminds.org/explanations/belief/irrational_beliefs.htm
Considering the various bad behaviors that human’s often demonstrate from a different perspective, Homosapiens are very intelligent creatures who developed a language that they often use it to cleverly deny their own very obvious basic animal nature. In other words, we have propagandized ourselves into thinking that we are something special and apart from the conditioning and learning laws and principles that shape the behavior patterns of all of the animals on earth. At times we are also prone to deny the genetic influences on our behavior, now well-documented by science.
We call ourselves humans and, though we are often quick admit that we are not perfect…and we may point to the worse examples of human imperfections (Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Jack the Ripper, etc., etc.,), we are far more likely to say positive things about our own human nature. We speak glowingly about we homosapiens: our great intelligence and wisdom, arts, literature, sciences, technologies, various humanitarian efforts and accomplishments, and so much more.
Beyond all of this, many of us believe that we are the children of God and that we are very special among all other creatures in the universe. We claim to be made in God’s image, given stewardship of the earth and dominion over all other animals.
It is important to note that scientific evidence is accruing that humans who hold such beliefs and follow the teachings their benevolent God, are more likely to be mentally and physically healthier, happier. and well-behaved than those who do not.
But, my colleague and I, both of us Christians, are mindful that humans remain animals imbued with strong tendencies toward mistaken inferences, self-delusions, and the denial of reality. Also certain that certain pathogenic histories of learning (abuse, neglect, abandonment and psychological trauma) commonly cause us to become hopelessly dependent upon others who neglect and abuse us; compulsively involved with substances and activities that harm or kill us; or cause us to neglect, abuse, neglect, abandon, traumatize, or even kill our offspring and others around us.
In addition to the many good things that homosapiens have done, we have also invented a massive technology that we have used to poison, abuse and destroy life on planet earth. Also, just like other micro-organisms living in their smaller ecosystems, we mindlessly consume the finite energy resources available to us and spread our pollution world-wide with little regard for the quality of life for all life forms beyond our own life-spans.
Another counter-intuitive observation about homosapien “wisdom” has been made by historians of human behavior patterns at sociocultural levels. They have recorded that there is a political tendency for humans to seek freedom from tyranny. But, when this is achieved, in the form of a democracy, within roughly 200 years the tendency is to seek more tyrannical forms of governance.
See the following for this idea pertaining to the dwindling life-span of our own American Democratic Republic. Other more contemporary intellectuals have made similar arguments.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Fraser_Tytler
How does this perspective relate to what is happening to America now?
I hope you will think about all of this.
I will return with a continuation of these basic concerns about the nature of us Homosapien animals.
V. Thomas Mawhinney, Ph.D.
6/26/15
Please Share This With Friends and Family!
Tags: 200-Year Life-Span of Democracies?, Albert Ellils, Alexander Fraser Tyler, Homosapiens are One F--ked-Up Species!, Self-Defeating Nature of Homosapiens, The Irrationality of Homosapiens, V. Thomas Mawhinney Ph.D., VTM
Cultural Survival Skills 
June 29, 2015 at 8:22 AM |
Moe some thoughts about Democracy and Republic-Huck.America: Republic or Democracy?by William P. MeyersLately, from politicians, radio-talk show hosts, and other commentators, we have heard that we should forget about democracy, because the U.S.A. is a republic. But some questions are being posed by democracy advocates: What is a republic? What is a democracy? Should the United States be a mere republic, or a genuine democracy?Republicans and other democracy detractors point to the U.S. Constitution and bits of history, and say, “See, the Founding Fathers who wrote the Constitution gave us a Republic. They believed democracies were dangerous and unworkable.”On that, they are partly right, but they fail to mention that democracies and republics overlap. They are not opposites. And they fail to account for the history of American government since 1788, much less the debates that took place in America prior to 1788, when the U.S. Constitution was substituted for the Articles of Confederation.Democracy means rule of the people. The two most common forms of democracy are direct democracy and representative democracy. In direct democracy everyone takes part in making a decision, as in a town meeting or a referendum. The specific rules may vary: perhaps everyone must agree, perhaps there must be consensus, perhaps a mere majority is required to make a decision. The other, better known form of democracy is a representative democracy. People elect representative to make decisions or laws. Again, specifics vary greatly.And, surprise, a representative democracy is a kind of republic. What distinguishes a republic is that it has an elected government. Representative democracies are, therefore, a kind of republic. Self-appointed governments such as monarchies, dictatorships, oligarchies, theocracies and juntas are not republics. However, this still allows for a wide spectrum. The classic is the Roman Republic, in which only a tiny percentage of citizens, members of the nobility, were allowed to vote for the Senators, who made the laws and also acted as Rome’s supreme court. Most people would say that Rome was a Republic, but not a democracy, since it was very close to being an oligarchy, rule by the few. Although the Roman Republic was not a dictatorship (until Augustus Caesar grabbed power), it did not allow for rule of the people. In both theory and practice the Soviet Union, that late evil empire, was a republic (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) because the lawmakers were elected, if only by the Communist Party members.Beginning with the Constitution’s adoption, America has been a Republic. But the dominant trend over the last two centuries has been to make it into a democracy as well, a representative democracy, also known as a democratic republic. True, the creation of the Constitution itself was partly a reaction against democracy. In states like Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts, the situation was getting way too democratic for the monied aristocracy that had, since the American Revolution, refused to share power with ordinary men.The causes of the American Revolution were many, but for the monied class there were three principal aims. They sought self-government: that is, they sought to rule the colonies themselves, to further their own interests. They sought to protect the institution of slavery, which had been endangered by Lord Mansfield’s ruling against it in the Sommersett case of 1772. And land speculators like George Washington sought to seize more Native American Indian land, which the British had outlawed.But to win the American Revolution this predatory elite needed help. Their own rhetoric about freedom and equality led to widespread demands for the right to vote: universal suffrage. In other words, the people began demanding democracy. Even the slaves (white and black alike) demanded to be freed and allowed to vote.After the British were defeated a centralized, national government was seen by George Washington and company not as a method of extending freedom and the right to vote, but as a way of keeping control in the hands of rich. They wrote several anti-democratic provisions into the U.S. Constitution. Slavery was institutionalized. The Senate was not to be elected directly by the people; rather Senators were to be appointed by state legislatures. The President was not to be directly elected by the voters, but elected through an electoral college. The Supreme Court was to be appointed. Only the House of Representatives was elected directly.More important to our democracy-versus-republic debate, the U.S. Constitution left the question of who could vote in elections to each individual state. In most states only white men who owned a certain amount of property could vote. So, on the whole, the first federal government that met in 1789 was a republic with only a fig-leaf of democratic representation. This is what today’s commentators mean when they say America is a republic, not a democracy.Fortunately (for the democrats), the early federal government was not very powerful. In state after state it became easier for white males to qualify to vote. And slowly, decade after decade, our republic became a democratic republic.At the national level the major steps toward democracy can be marked by amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The Bill of Rights guaranteed limits to the power of the federal government. The Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery. The Fourteenth Amendment effectively extended the vote to all adult male citizens, including ex-slaves, by penalizing states that did not allow for universal male suffrage. The Fifteenth Amendment explicitly gave the right to vote to former slaves. After the Supreme Court ruled that the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments did not extend suffrage to women, a vigorous campaign for the vote was launched by women, who received the vote through the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920.But the main Amendment that tipped the scales from the national government of the United States being a mere republic to being a true representative democracy was the often-overlooked Seventeenth Amendment, which took effect in 1913. Since 1913 the U.S. Senate has been elected directly by the voters, rather than being appointed by the state legislatures. That makes the national government democratic in form, as well as being a republic.There will always be anti-democratic forces in any society. The most blatantly undemocratic feature of U.S. government in the 20th century was the unconstitutional but systematic disenfranchisement of African-American and other non-white citizens. This came to an end in the 1950’s and 1960’s with a series of Supreme Court decisions against segregation laws, the passage of Civil Rights Acts, and the passage of the Twenty-Fourth Amendment outlawing poll taxes. We even lowered the voting age to 18 with the Twenty-Sixth Amendment in 1971.There are no longer any voter-qualification impediments to democracy in the United States. But many have noted that the will of the people has tended not to prevail, and that a majority of people eligible to vote are so discouraged that they do not vote. The main reason for this is the buying and selling of elections and politicians by the wealthier class of citizens and their special interest groups. A year or more before elections take place, the winner is decided by those who vote with dollars. But this is a defect in democracy, not a reason to abandon it. The answer is to cure the defect, not to attempt to destroy our representative democracy.February 19, 2002 Please circulate freely.See also: Democracy or Republic: selected essays
Date: Fri, 26 Jun 2015 19:25:08 +0000 To: soaringeagle41@msn.com
LikeLike