quest


I am a woman born 1949 and my quest is to find a mindmate
to grow old together as a mutually devoted couple
in a relationship based upon the
egalitarian rational commitment paradigm
bonded by intrinsic commitment
as each other's safe haven and secure basis.

The purpose of this blog is to enable the right man
to recognize us as reciprocal mindmates and
to encourage him to contact me:
marulaki@hotmail.com


The entries directly concerning,
who could be my mindmate,
are mainly at the beginning.
If this is your predominant interest,
I suggest to read this blog in the same order
as it was written, following the numbers.

I am German, therefore my English is sometimes faulty.

Maybe you have stumbled upon this blog not as a potential match.
Please wait a short moment before zapping.

Do you know anybody, who could be my mindmate?
Your neighbour, brother, uncle, cousin, colleague, friend?
If so, please tell him to look at this blog.
While you have no reason to do this for me,
a stranger, maybe you can make someone happy, for whom you care.

Do you have your own webpage or blog,
which someone like my mindmate to be found probably reads?
If so, please mention my quest and add a link to this blog.


Friday, April 29, 2011

301. Literature: The Prototype of the Jerk - 1

Literature: The Prototype of the Jerk - 1
Often, while things are bad enough in real life, literature tops it with even worse examples.    I lately watched Shakespeare's play 'The Taming Of The Shrew'.    Years ago I have seen in a theater, and all I remember is the anger, that I felt.
Now I happened to find two versions of it, both obviously using the original text, but the adaptation and acting was quite different, so was the selection of the text used.   

1.  There is a very well made animated version made by the BBC, it is a cartoon appearing as if played by puppets.   
It is the sad story of a woman, Kathrina, who gets so much under a psychopath's ruthless power, that she not only is helpless under his domination, but her entire personality gets so much crippled, that she not only submits externally to her inferior role, but finally accepts it as appropriate for her.    
This is even worse than the Stockholm Syndrome and the Jerk Attachment Syndrome in entry 268.    In both syndromes, the victims gets in a paradox way attached to a jerk or a captor, but their sanity is at least as far preserved, that they are still aware, that they are the victims of an outrage.    Poor Kathrina in the play is in the end so brainwashed and mentally deformed, that she believes herself, that what had been done to her was to her own best.   She has not only been broken, but made believe to have been improved.    She is not herself any more.

The play was written more than 400 years ago, and set in a social situation, where the unlucky Kathrina had no chance to have any independent existence.    Not only her happiness and her subjective wellbeing, but her survival depended first on her father and then on the mercy of a husband.    Her father is a cruel brute, who merciless marries her off without even considering her consent.   His cruel decision to forbid the marriage of his younger daughter before Kathrina having been married has also divided and estranged the sisters.   Her sister wants her sacrifice for selfish reasons.    Kathrina is alone and has nobody to trust and to support her.   

The father marries her to a psychopath, who only wants the father's money and is not interested in Kathrina as a person.   She is a body for Petruccio, a commodity, an object to be used and abused at his convenience.  He values her not more than he values a dog or a horse, whose will he considers needs to broken.    Kathrina is not more than a piece of degraded and devalued merchandise traded between her father and Petruccio.   

Insensitive people think that this play is a comedy.   But even though it is superficially funny, in reality it is the tragedy of a broken destroyed life of a woman, who looses her dignity and ends as a  paradoxically happy doormat.    Maybe that was her only way of surviving the trauma of being married against her will to a psychopath.   She was married for life, in catholic Italy in those days, there was no way out for a woman from her plight, except maybe to escape to a convent.   

2.   Then I saw the movie from 1967 with Elizabeth Taylor.   That movie is unfortunately rather inconsistent.   In the beginning, Kathrina is presented as a weird and uncontrolled fury, who would even today be brought into therapy for anger management or even some more severe diagnosis.  
From the moment of the marriage on, she has become the unhappy intelligent woman with an independent spirit under the brutal domination of a jerk, similar to the other version.   Petruccio is presented a bit less cruel but still a dire fate for Kathrina, who seems to try to play the role of the pseudo-docile wife, as she is at the mercy of this psychopath and avoids anything, that would provoke more atrocities upon her.  
But the end does not fit, because the brainwashing into a deliberate doormat comes too abrupt and too sudden, and it is not clear, what caused it.   


No matter the divergent interpretations of the two versions, the play is psychologically dangerous, because emotional morons, jerks and other immature men are encouraged to become abusive.    The gist of the play is the message, that abuse succeeds.
The play feeds their dangerous delusion, that it is not only possible and acceptable to cruelly abuse a woman until she is broken and does not resist anymore to the life of a commodity, but even worse, that the woman in the end would be happy as a doormat.    If they get wrong ideas, that abuse is justified by the final acceptance of the victims, this encourages them to become abusers to real women.

Also interestingly enough, Kathrina is presented as if nobody would want to marry her.   The question, if maybe her father had caused an early death to his wife by his cruel treatment, and that Kathrina was justified in preferring not to marry to avoid the sad fate of her mother.   The play implicitly insinuates, that it is always beneficial for a woman to be married, even to a psychopath or a cruel jerk.   

After having written this far, I googled and found out, that there are quite a lot of other people also calling Petruccio a psychopath and an abuser and also explaining Kathrina's incomprehensible downfall as the Stockholm Syndrome.  As far as I have understood, these interpretations were based upon the text by Shakespeare, not upon any enacted interpretations.   Once again, I had my own ideas about the play, but they were too obvious to be original, others had them before me.      

300. Shared Commodities

300.   Shared Commodities
Once I chatted with a man, who told me, how he had such a good buddy, and how they were very close ever since they went to school together.   They were now sharing an apartment, because it is practical and economical for people to share commodities, no matter if it is a bathroom, a coffee maker or a washing machine.   But those two guys did not stop here, they decided, they wanted to add one more very special commodity to their sharing.  

They wanted to share a woman.  
 
For a moment I thought he was pulling my leg, but they were serious about it.   As a woman, it took me a moment to let this preposterous outrage sink in.   But in their mind, it was logical.    They wanted a housekeeper for only one apartment, therefore in their mind sharing her was the most economical solutions.   They obviously figured that there was not enough space and chores to maintain two women, and sharing her body too seemed to be just a minor detail in the arrangement.  

Thursday, April 28, 2011

299. Emotional Cheating

Emotional Cheating
If a jerk or an emotional moron accepts not to cheat, he does this, because it is such a common simple rule, that even he can understand, that he risks to loose the woman and therefore the control over his commodity.    But an emotional moron often has no clue about the meaning of emotional cheating and the boundaries of discretion and exclusivity.
   
In entry 253 I described, how an emotional moron can be someone, who is his only one-man-ingroup, and everybody is outgroup, no matter what social roles they have, and that a woman in his life also is outgroup.   He may share with her the bed and the roof, but other than that, he does not value or perceive her as someone special, with whom he would share exclusive intellectual and emotional bonds, of which the rest of the world is excluded and which is protected by discretion.  

The behavior of the emotional moron depends upon his general level of trust.   He may be so distrusting, that he refuses to share his innermost feelings and the truth about his motives even with his partner.   I described, what happens in this situation in entry 297 about The Backlash of Not Trusting.

The emotional moron often has no perception for boundaries and the subtle differences of social roles.   He does not know, whom to keep how much emotional distance of.   He lacks any sense of discretion and tells to outsiders details of the relationship, that he owes to his partner to keep private.    He does not even bother to inform her or to ask her permission before his indiscretions.   He is violating her trust and this is a form of betrayal.   It is emotional cheating, when he shares details of his relationship with other women.    He commits a transgression.

When he tells private details to a third party in her presence, she at least has the chance to correct wrong impressions by adding her own point of view.  
But if a man tells others about their private life without her knowledge, then she is prone to meet his friends or acquaintances, being oblivious of what he has told them and what wrong ideas they have about her.   She meets people, with whom he has ruined her reputation with onesided accounts of conflicts and she cannot correct it.

A couple's life needs to be kept discreetly from all outsiders.    If an intrinsically committed partner tries in vain to communicate with a bonding disabled other, and she is in so much distress, that she needs support, then she may have no choice but to confide in a close friend, but this is only acceptable as an exception from the rule of exclusivity.  

Emotional morons are a hazard to a woman in many ways.

298. Dandelion

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

297. The Backlash of Not Trusting

The Backlash of Not Trusting

A jerk (or an emotional moron) often gets involved in an intimate relationship, that should be intrinsic commitment based upon trust, but he does not trust.   The jerk avoids the danger of being taken advantage of by an allegedly not trustworthy woman, but he pays a very high price for his caution. He damages his reputation of being reasonable, competent and sane. 

The jerk's behavior is motivated by his emotions, his needs, his attitudes, his basic values, his morals, his plans, his sore spots, his life experience and other parts of his personality.  Usually his behavior can be logically explained, but only when all his motivations and their subjective magnitude and urgency are known.  
But the jerk, who is unable to trust, hides as much as he can of what he considers as dangerous information.   As a result, his behavior is incomprehensible and appears strange, weird, ludicrous and dysfunctional.    Casual observers can shrug their shoulders, but a woman, who is the frequent target of painful and incomprehensible actions, starts to wonder.    She asks him questions in her attempt to understand, but his answers seem to be never convincing, but often absurd.   In his efforts to hide his true self, he excuses and pseudo-explanations are just lame and not logically convincing.   

The longer she gets puzzled about his inconsistent and strange behaviors, the more she looses respect, until she is wondering, if he is a weirdo, a halfwit or brain damaged.   When she treats him as such, he gets even more of a jerk and a bully, and things deteriorate even faster. 
A relationship without trust is doomed. 

296. Bears and Jerks

Bears and Jerks

For a woman, bears and jerks have a lot in common.   

When a woman hikes in the bear's territory with a backpack full of food, this is very dangerous.    If the bear smells the food, he wants it.   If the woman does not give it to him, the bear will attack her and harm her very seriously.    She has no chance to find an agreement with the bear by constructive communication, the bear cannot be convinced, that the food is hers.   He cannot even be talked into a compromise to share the food.    He wants the food and he uses his power to get it.   The bear is unable to comprehend any reasoning and cannot be influenced.   The woman is helplessly at the mercy of the bear.   If the woman does not keep at a safe distance and runs, whenever she sees a bear, he will harm her.     The bear is a predator, the woman is the prey. 

With a jerk (this includes the emotional moron), the situation is the same.    
When a woman gets near a jerk, appearing to be a suitable commodity for him, this is very dangerous.    If the jerk notices the benefits to be obtained from her, he wants them.   If the woman does not submit to be a commodity, the jerk will attack her with rage and intimidation and harm her very seriously.    She has no chance to find an agreement with the jerk by constructive communication, the jerk cannot be convinced, that the benefits are hers and only to be earned.   He cannot even be talked into a compromise of a fair deal.  He wants the benefits and he uses his power to get it.   The jerk is unable to comprehend any reasoning and cannot be influenced.   The woman is helplessly at the mercy of the jerk.   If the woman does not keep at a safe distance and runs, whenever she sees a jerk, he will harm her.   The jerk is a predator, the woman is the prey. 

295. Intrinsic Commitment and Emotions

Intrinsic Commitment and Emotions

A viable relationship has to be a fair balance of giving and receiving, according to the relationship deal.     I can only last, if both partners feel satisfied with the relationship.    

Entries 262 and 98 are about the difference between intrinsic and extrinsic commitment.   But there are some more differnces:
  • How the satisfaction with the relationship is measured.
  • If and how information about satisfaction or dissatisfaction is conveyed and shared.
  • How a partner handles dissatisfaction.   

Extrinsic commitment is based upon the balance of material and practical benefits and services.   In extrensic commitment, the compliance of the deal or the dissatisfaction of the failure thereof can easily be claimed and evaluated.     If a man demands a  specific service or benefit from the woman, no matter if by agreement or by his entitlement delusion, it is easy to specify and to blame her for what he did not get.    
A man, who considers the woman as a commodity, has the power to bully her to do and to comply with what he wants.    Bullying it the man's method to deal with his dissatisfaction, that the woman does not agree to be a commodity.   She has only the power to leave, and that is, where his power ends. 
Bullying as a love killer (entry 294) therefore only happens, when the bonding-disabled man establishes extrinsic commitment.    Bullying happens, when either the woman wants intrinsic commitment or accepts extrinsic commitment, but as a fair deal and not as his commodity.  

The man remains ignorant, that the woman's dissatisfaction is caused by the imposed role of a commodity, he is deaf to her complaints and blames her dissatisfaction instead upon her alleged flaws.    Bullies are unable to trust, that makes them such a hazard.   The man does not trust the woman, he never believes any of her statements about her feelings, he cannot be influenced to alter his using her as a commodity.  When she tells him, how much a specific behavior is hurting, he believes, that this behavior cannot hurt anybody, because it is his entitlement.   He attributes her feeling hurt as her own flaw and continues his hurting behavior.   Her pain accumulates, until the relationship has no more value for her and she leaves.  


Intrinsic commitment is about emotions, the relationship deal is giving each other the feelings of wellbeing in a safe haven. Nothing can be gained by power.   A man can never bully a woman to love him.   If he wants to be loved and his wellbeing to be cared for, he can win her good will only by treating her the way she needs and wants to be treated.   

The conscious measurement of satisfaction with the relationship is the perception of pleasant and unpleasant emotions elicited by the partner.   While extreme emotions are usually visible, more moderate emotions are often not visible on the outside, but have nevertheless a significant impact upon a person's general wellbeing.   This impact can accumulate.   A person can feel either content and happy or hurt most of the time, but this can be hidden from the awareness of the person causing these emotions.    Therefore sincere communication about the true innermost feelings is the only way to find out with certainly, if the partner is satisfied with the relationship.   This means to ask, to listen and to trust, that the other tells the truth.  

Each partner evaluates the relationship very subjectively by what he feels.  These emotions are real and valid, they are the true measurement of the quality of the relationship, because the only purpose of intrinsic commitment is to be more happy and less unhappy than alone.   The partners can compare notes about the dynamics of their behavior, but the emotional reactions are subjective.   People can react very differently to the same experience.   What is extremely painful for one person can be of no significance to another.    In this case, the subjective experience has validity, no matter, if the cause of the experience has empathy, understanding and insight or not.  
Therefore intrinsic commitment requires absolute trust in the truth of the other's declarations of how he feels, and it requires taking everything said for serious and at face value.    It requires to ask and show interest in the emotional reactions of the other as a result of the own behavior.   Intrinsic commitment is the never ending endavor of making each other perceive the relationship as emotionally beneficial.   

Whenever a woman tells a man, that she feels hurt because of a specific behavior of his, he knows that he needs to change the behavior.   If he continues his hurting behavior and she reaches the point of feeling more hurt than happy, then the relationship has become worthless for her, and she has no reason to stay.  

A sane, decent and mature man in intrinsic commitment is aware of these basic facts:
  1. The emotions of a woman are real, true and valid for herself, no matter, what others think or claim that she should feel.
  2. The woman's evaluation of the relationship is based only upon her own subjective emotions, as she experiences them.
  3. Disagreement, claims, denials, accusations, interpretations can influence and distort, how the man perceives and interprets the expressed and declared emotions of the woman, but he cannot influence, what the woman subjectively feels.  
  4. If the man wants to influence the emotions of the woman, he can only change his own behavior, that causes the emotions.   If he wants her to feel happy, he has to treat her well.
  5. The only way to make a woman stay in a relationship of intrinsic commitment is to treat her in a way, that causes her to feel happy, and to abstain from all behavior, that hurts her.    
  6. A woman has no rational reason whatsoever to be or to remain in a relationship, where she experiences more pain than joy and happiness and the pain is a result of the man's behavior.  
  7. Pain caused by hurting behavior cannot be annihilated or compensated with any other benefit.    Such pain can only avoided by stopping the hurting behavior.  

The jerk or the emotional moron asks, how good he feels because of having control over a woman as a commodity.    
The wise man asks, how good he can make the woman feel, when and because she is with him.

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

294. The Effect of Bullying upon Love

The Effect of Bullying upon Love

When a man wants a woman to do something for him, no matter what it is, he has the choice between two principally different strategies.
  1. He bullies her to do it using pressure, threat, anger, extortion or intimidation.
  2. He treats her so well, that she cares and loves him enough to do it by her own good will.
The starting point for both strategies is the relationship deal, in which they have agreed to fulfill each other's needs.   

When the man's focus is selfish, then he chooses the first strategy.  His priority is to ascertain, that he gets his needs met by applying whatever power he has, be it physical strength, situational or financial advantage.   As far as he does give something back to the woman, he restricts it to just as little as he believes is enough to make her function.  

When the man's focus is based upon trust and appreciation, then he chooses the second strategy.   He makes efforts to earn the woman's love and care, he gives first, because he trusts her, that the more he gives, the more he will get in return.    With this strategy, love, attachment, bonding grows stronger over time.


Of course, no woman would consciously decide to become a selfish man's commodity, if she would notice, that this is his goal, before it is too late.   But there are reasons, why a woman can temporarily be in a relationship, where she is bullied.   
  1. The man fulfills the woman's needs in one aspect, like sharing activities of traveling and attending cultural events.  His bullying does not drive her away immediately, because she attempts to put up with it, as long as her resilience lasts.
  2. The man starts like a nice man as described in entry 285 about the abuse-hoovering cycle.   He only converts into the bullying guy after she had already fallen in love with the apparently kind and caring man.
  3. She has become afflicted with the jerk attachment syndrome as describe in entry 268.

So there is the situation, that a woman by mistake loves an unworthy man, who bullies her.   She can rationally come to the conclusion, that he is unworthy, she could even take the decision to end the relationship in spite of her fatal love.  But she cannot just decide to stop loving him as a consequence of her insight, that he does not deserve her love.   

Fortunately for her, he himself helps her to get out of the trap, and he is often oblivious of this.   Every time, when he hurts her, and it is not accidentally but by his choice of selfish behavior, the pain she feels decreases her love.    Being bullied to be a commodity is a powerful love killer and when she is cured of her misplaced love, she is free to end the relationship and feel relief.   

A woman can go through this experience either with a jerk and psychopath or with an emotional moron.    But there is one huge difference.  
The jerk knows, that he can bully a woman to serve as a commodity only for a limited time.    After that time, he has to move on and find another victim and he has no conscience to stop him.   The jerk is not bothered, what the woman thinks or feels, as long as he gets, what he wants.   
The emotional moron has no clue, what is going on.   As long as the woman does, what he wants, everything seems ok for him.    He is oblivious of the difference between a woman acting by her own benevolent choice or by intimidation, and he has no clue, that his bullying is a love killer.      His own behavior could even shock him, were he able to get aware of the woman's real agony.  
The emotional moron is misguided by a logical error.   He believes that when the woman yields to his bullying and does or allows without resistance, what he wants, she has automatically changed her mind to agree with his entitlement delusion. He believes, that he is able to coerce her to think, what he wants her to think.   He does not consider his behavior as bullying, but as doing her a favor against her resistance.  He believes to improve her cognition and to teach her her appropriate role in his life.   He has not perception, that she feels hurt by being bullied and dominated.    

Monday, April 25, 2011

293. Woodruff

Woodruff - the fragrance is all over the garden


Sunday, April 24, 2011

292. Poofing and Dumping

Poofing and Dumping

Once I was contacted on a dating site by a German, who had emigrated to some far away country as a young man and was considering returning to Germany.    I exchanged a few emails with him.   I got suspicious that he may be a new 'reincarnation' of someone else under a different name, whom I had been in contact with.  Therefore I googled my new contact, I will call him C.    I found a touching appeal of a distressed woman, asking if anybody has any information about a man with the name of C.   

I talked with the woman on the phone.  She told me the story.   C. had been staying with her for a few weeks.   When he left to return to his home, he disappeared into thin air at the place of a stopover.    She never heard from him again.   She wrote him emails, tried to call his land line and his cell phone, wrote him SMS, but he never replied.    She was so worried, that some accident could have happened, that she even contacted the embassies.   
We compared notes and she had no doubt, that my new contact was her C.    At that time I shared her impression, that he was an extreme but rare case of a jerk.  By now I have got aware, that such jerks are unfortunately by far not as rare. The behavior has even a name, it is called poofing and others have told their stories on dating forums.
  
Dumping is principally similar to poofing, but at least the jerk spares the woman to worry about him, as he declares to her in some short but unambiguous way, that he has no intention to continue the relationship.   He prefers email, SMS or maybe the phone, but usually does not bother to have a personal talk about his reasons.  He decides to dump, and the dumped woman has no influence upon his decision. 
As long as the contact is platonic, I do not call it dumping.  While two persons are still attempting to find out, if they are compatible enough, each has still the moral right to decide not to enter a relationship.   But as soon as they are intimately involved, ending a relationship, that both had agreed to enter, by dumping is cruel, brutal, and a very serious moral transgression.   

I consider poofing and dumping as the logical consequence of the spreading of the emotional plague of promiscuity as a socially accepted behavior and a social norm in modern western cultures.    (More about this in entry 104, Promiscuity is Emotional Psychopathy and entry 101, Promiscuity is a Scourge of Humanity.)  
Men have always been afflicted by an instinctive urge to promiscuously use women's bodies.   But as long as monogamy was considered the social norm and the only morally acceptable way to maintain sexual homeostasis, men usually had at least the theoretical knowledge, that using a woman's body without commitment is doing emotional harm to her.  
Since the fatal so called sexual liberation, unfortunately that knowledge has been widely lost.    Today even men, who want to be good, caring and responsible men, have the fatal delusion, that if they use a woman's body for a night without being personally affected and forgetting her the next day, the woman experiences it the same way.  They are oblivious of the harm done.  This delusion causes serious damage to women, poofing and dumping is part of it.  

Poofing and dumping men are either ignorant or unconcerned by a lack of any conscience, that when a decent and sensitive woman allows them the intimacy of her body, she entrusts her dignity to him, she trusts him, that she is valued as a bonded partner and not degraded to be used only as a body and a commodity.   She trusts, that by taking possession of her body, he accepts his obligations and responsibility.   

1.  As long as they are not physically involved, he is responsible to be guided by the usual rules of correct behavior between true friends.   But by getting intimately involved, he is responsible for not hurting her dignity and her feelings.   He is responsible for every pain she suffers as a result of being with him, if he uses, devalues, degrades her to be a commodity at his convenience and not an equal partner in intrinsic commitment.    He is responsible not only for what he does deliberately, but also for what he does accidently.    He is responsible for everything experienced by her as a result of becoming intimate.    A decent and mature man, who does not want this responsibility, has the moral obligation to abstain from getting involved. 

2.  His obligations from physical intimacy are to do anything possible to make the relationship work.    If he feels an impulse to end the relationship, his duty is self-control over his impulse, his duty is to communicate with the woman about his impulse and to give her a fair chance to influence the reasons for his impulse.   
  • There can be a misunderstanding, that can be cleared. 
  • There can be a conflict, that can be solved by a compromise. 
  • He can have a personal or psychological problem, for which he needs to ask and accept her support.
In short, he owes the woman a chance for a shared decision based upon an agreement.  The agreement can either be the decision to continue the relationship as a result of his making efforts to change his reasons for his impulse, so that he wants himself to continue the relationship.    Else he owes her to communicate until she is convinced herself, that it is also better for her to end the relationship.   

Physical intimacy creates both partner's duty to stay together, until they both agree to end the relationship.    Of course, the intention or agreement to end the relationship can be expressed peacefully and decently by direct communication, or it can be expressed indirectly by committing a very grave moral transgression.    A man, who cheats, implicitly agrees to end the relationship, even though it is not his conscious intention.    Not cheating was an implicit or explicit part of the relationship deal.   Breaking the deal is an implicit intention to end the relationship.     That means, that when  the victim of  a serious transgression decides to end the relationship, this is not dumping but agreeing to the end a relationship already destroyed by the transgression. 

The man, who dumps the woman, only superficially and technically ends the relationship by leaving her.   In her experience, the end of the relationship is really caused by his serious moral transgression of forcing his disrespectful solitary decision upon her instead of communicating for an agreement.  This destroys her trust and therefore the foundation of the relationship.  
The jerk, who dumps a woman in search of a better commodity, but who believes in the back of his mind, that she will be available to be hoovered back at his convenience (entry 285), is not aware, that his behavior is a serious moral transgression.    The woman, who allows to be hoovered back, has been desensitized to feel appropriate outrage.   
It is not only sad and unfortunate, that so many jerks, psychopaths and emotional morons consider promiscutiy, dumping and poofing as acceptable behavior, it is even more sad, that many women have lost the perspective of what is acceptable behavior, they have been desensitized to consider being dumped as bad luck and not as an outrage.   They believe that entering a relationship is accepting the risk of being dumped like being out in a thunderstorm and risking to be hit and hurt by a flash.   Therefore too many women allow to be hoovered back by worthless psychopaths.

Saturday, April 23, 2011

291. Computer Art

modiefied versions of the cherry blossoms picture in entry 269




Friday, April 22, 2011

290. A Metaphor for Denial

A Metaphor for Denial

A man drives underneath a steep cliff.    In front of him lies a boulder on the road.    Any person of normal intelligence drives around or stops.   A moron drives straight on until he hits the boulder with full speed.    His reason is his denial of reality in favor of his belief of what should be.  
The moron in denial believes that there cannot be any obstacles, because a road is made to drive upon it without obstacles.    If he is alone in the car, he is a candidate for the Darwin award.   But if there is a woman with him in the car, who repeatedly warns him with growing urgency, and he ignores her warnings, then he is responsible for the harm, that hitting the boulder does to her.   He believes his definition of a road more than he believes the perception of reality of the woman.

The emotional moron is just like that man.   He has entered a relationship and believes that by using domination, the road is free with no obstacles to get all his needs out of the woman, whom he believes to be a commodity.   The woman repeatedly warns him, that he is running with full speed towards the destruction of the relationship.   He is in full denial until it is too late, and the relationship is over.  He is responsible for the harm, that he does to the woman by ignoring her warnings.  He believes his delusion of the woman's appropriate role as a commodity more than her attempted explanation about her reality.   

Maybe there should be a Darwin award for the most stupid way to destroy a relationship and to drive a woman away.   

Thursday, April 21, 2011

289. France is a Very Progressive Country

France is a Very Progressive Country

I just read about this and I am very pleased.  
"A cross-party commission of French MPs have recommended criminalising all clients of sex workers, meaning anyone who buys sex from any kind of prostitute would face prison and a fine."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/13/france-illegal-pay-sex
"We must "look to the client, long overlooked but central player in prostitution" . Goal: "Make him aware of the implications of these actions." And then, to penalize him. Creating, by statute, tort sanctioning the use in prostitution of a sentence of six months in prison and 3000 euro fine. "
http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/8781225-prostitution-the-state-wants-to-charge-the-customer
That really made my day:   Finally another country is following the example of Sweden and establishes a law to influence the social norm towards the long overdue acknowledgment, that women's bodies are not commodities to be used and bought. 

The European Union is over regulating so much.   Why don't they make the law against the abuse of women valid for the entire European Union?   
Why is Germany such a backwards country, that here prostitution is considered a legal occupation in no way different from hairdressing or pedicure, paying taxes and social insurance contributions?    Not only that, but German women on unemployment benefit risk to loose their subsistence, if the job center sends them to work in a brothel and they refuse.   This is an outrage, even if the job is cleaning or book keeping.       

If they would not only pass that law in France, but also rigorously prosecute the clients and fine them, this would bring in a lot of money.   That money then could be used for a training program for young boys at school about the benefits of a monogamous relationship, installing in them so much respect for women, that it would never occur to them to abuse a woman's body for sex.    If enough clients get caught and are forced to pay, if all young boys are given the anti-promiscuity training, then France could become a real paradise for women.     There is an expression in German for a real good life, it is living like god in France.    But then, it would also be possible to live like a goddess in France.

Vive la France!   

288. The Distorted Memory of the Emotional Moron

The Distorted Memory of the Emotional Moron

Some emotional morons seem to have a very specific distortion of their memory.     They store every blame, grudge and devaluation of a woman in their memory as carved in stone for eternity.   But they store the explanation and information in favor and defense of the woman as if written with chalk on a slate, that gets washed off by the next rain.    She has no chance to ever counterbalance his wrong perception and opinion of her, which gets from bad to worse as a consequence of the distorted memory.   

When a woman experiences something distressing, some disappointment, something hurting, no matter if caused by the emotional moron himself or by someone else, and he does not understand, what is going on, he automatically jumps to the conclusion, that she is a drama queen, hysterical, flawed.  
As an emotional moron, he is oblivious, that someone can experience anything, which he does not know of or which he would not be affected by at all.  In his simple mind, what does not exist for him, cannot exist for her.   An emotional moron not only lacks empathy, but he lacks any knowledge of the fact, that other people have very real and valid feelings and experiences, even though he himself has never even heard of them and they are beyond his imagination.    He is completely oblivious, that he cannot evaluate other people's behavior without sufficient information about their invisible emotional reality, and this information can only be obtained by asking for and listening to their introspection.   
Instead, he believes in his wrong assumptions based entirely on observations.  As a result, he observes the woman's incomprehensible distress without the shade of a doubt as an indication of her flaws and he stores this observation and interpretation in his permanent unmodifiable memory.    It just does not even occur to him to wonder, what really is the matter with her, let alone ask her a respectful question about her subjective experience.  

The woman wants a relationship to be a bonded intrinsic commitment based upon sharing the innermost feelings and understanding each other.    When she gets aware of his unfavorable evaluation of her distress, she makes efforts to explain to him everything she has experienced, felt and thought, in the hope to gain his understanding and his appreciation, that her distress was an appropriate reaction to her experience.  
Being an emotional moron void of any understanding about intrinsic commitment and such abstract needs of her, he has no clue, why she is so anxious and driven to explain herself to him, why it is important to her at all. 
If he finds no way to avoid it, he sometimes does listen with reluctance, he even tells her that he has understood her explanation and her introspection.  
But the next time, when he finds a new blame to put on her, when he starts another rant about his new and all his already accumulated grudges and blames, he is back at repeating his original claim of her being a hysterical drama queen, just as if she had never attempted to make him understand her feelings and her reality.    His grudges and blames accumulate, her explanations disappear without any effect.  

She might even write her explanations down, print them and hand them over to him to read.   This way she wants to give him a chance to make an attempt at his own speed, ease and convenience to understand her better.   It is all futile.  There is no way to influence him.   Her distress in previous episodes will forever be in his mind as an indication of her being flawed, and he will again and again repeat this to her.   

The question remains, why then did he claim at one moment to have understood?    There are several possibilities, and they are probably all of them sometimes valid.
1.   He temporarily understands but does not store this in his memory but forgets it immediately or very soon as if she has never said anything.
2.   He pretends to have understood, because he is not at all interested in her explanations, he is bored and wants to end the discussion.
3.   As a narcissist, he appreciates every indication allowing him to believe in her being flawed, but her explanation is not welcome, so he only pretends to listen and to have understood. 
4.   His ability of abstract thinking and of understanding mature emotions is so impaired, that he is unable to understand her explanations, but does not admit it.    He only pretends to have understood.
5.   He does not take her for serious or does not trust her to tell the truth.    He believes his own interpretation of his observations more than he believes her introspection and explanation.   He pretends to have understood, because he did not value her enough to listen.

This accumulation of unfavorable interpretation of more and more instances of her behavior has a very detrimental long term effect upon the relationship.    Events, that are incomprehensible only to an emotional moron and make the woman appear in an unfavorable light, happen in every relationship and cannot be avoided.    The longer this goes on, the more he devalues her, and she has no chance of stop this process.

She has no influence on what the emotional moron thinks of her and as a consequence, she also has no influence, how he treats her.   Since his opinion of her determines how he treats her, devaluing her serves to him as his justification for domination and bullying.   Along with the accumulation of grudges and devaluation, his treatment of her deteriorates.      

Every once in a while, when something pushes his hostility and anger button, he starts to declaim his whole database of blames and grudges like pouring a flood of mental diarrhea over the woman.    It is a known psychological fact used in commercials, that the more often something is repeated, the more people start to accept it as true.  The emotional moron obviously believes, that by repeating his claim of her alleged flaws often enough, she will finally agree to be flawed.    But as long as the woman's self-esteem remains undamaged, his repetition of his same old grudges and blames is just a painful nuisance for her and the harm done by it is indirect.   His ranting about her deficiency has the effect of convincing himself, and with every of his repetitions, he believes more in her flaws.  

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

287. The Narcissistic Bluffer

The Narcissistic Bluffer

A narcissist has a never satisfied need for adulation, adoration, admiration.   Even when he has successfully got a woman into the role of his doormat, he still wants to get more narcissistic supply from additional sources.   

If he were really good with some skills or qualifications, he would have no reason to be a narcissist, he could feel good about his true accomplishments.    But his intelligence and general aptitude are somewhat limited.   If he has a good memory and enough talent in his verbal expression to compensate for other deficits, then he is predestined to become a bluffer.  

First of all, he carefully chooses his audience.    They are all people, who have some kind of a problem, either psychologically or intellectually.  From his subjective perspective, he chooses his suitable ditch full of people, to whom he can feel superior.   All new age, religious and selfhelp groups are the ideal playground for the bluffer.  Either he only pretends to have the problem of the group's focus, or maybe he has it very lightly, or he may only believe to be afflicted himself.    He has not real convictions, in the core of his personality his is just gullible.    He can change his religious and new age believes easily and radically, if he has exhausted the patience of one group and moves on to another.    Everything except the narcissism is only skin deep, all the bluffer's convictions, attitudes and his pseudo-wisdom.

The bluffer enters the group apparently as a member like everybody else.   But as soon as he gets the occasion, he climbs on a pedestal and starts to impress the group with his monologues.   He comes well prepared, he has read books about the specific problem or belief system of that group, and he has memorized a lot of theory and advice, that he now pours out over the awe stricken audience.   For them, it is impressive, but they have no clue, that he repeats, what he has read, without any deeper comprehension.    Even though he has elevated himself upon a pedestal, the ground above the ditch is still much higher.  

For an observer from a distance, all his pseudo-wisdom is nothing more then mental diarrhea.    He pours out so much of it, that hardly ever anybody has a chance to get a word in.   But he only focuses on his own performance, and he does not even notice, that when the genuine sufferers in the group talk about their experiences, he lacks empathy and understanding.    He is a parrot and not a participant.   
In religious groups the bluffer learns the specific scriptures of the group by rote and preaches from his pedestal.  Here his role is even easier, because the religious believes make no rational sense to nobody except the believers.   Only skeptical people outside are able to be critical about it.   
He appears quite genuine and convincing, with an assertive body language and a strong voice.   He is not consciously bluffing the others, he is also bluffing himself.    He is oblivious, that what he repeats from books are only words for him, and that there is a more abstract and complex meaning for others, that he looses completely.  
   
If anybody would ask really learned questions, it would fast become obvious, that the bluffer has no comprehension of what he talks about.     It would be obvious to anybody but the bluffer himself.    The bluffer reads some books about a topic, and then he believes he knows it all and is the specialist.   When he meets a real professional with a degree, and he cannot comprehend him, the bluffer does not recognize his own limitations, instead he declares the professional as incompetent.    
 
He succeeds to bluff the people in the groups, because all he does is talk.   He could for example preach about the importance of responsibility, even though he himself has no clue, what responsibility means and how to apply responsibility to his own behavior.
The narcissistic bluffer could even join a self-help group of victims of jerks.   He would sincerely believe to be himself the victim of abuse, even though he has a suffering doormat at home.  When at the end of the micro cycle of abuse (entry 286) he himself had driven the woman into outbursts of calling him idiot or a**hole, he starts to believe her to be the abuser.  

The bluffer does not communicate, he only distributes his mental diarrhea.   Input by perception of the utterings of others is impeded.    He has a filter, which allows the narcissistic supply in form of praise and admiration pass through a wall, of which most of other people's utterings, especially the critical ones, bounce off.    He does not bother to listen, because while he believes that everybody else can learn from his alleged wisdom, he does not expect any valuable input from others.   He does not listen to people's feedback, so he avoids to ever be made aware, that in reality he has no clue of what he talks about.

When one group tires of him, he just moves on to another.   People, who recognize his performance as mental diarrhea shrug their shoulders and shun him.   Those who attempt to give him any critical feedback are shunned by him.   The bluffer has many superficial acquaintances, whom he has impressed.  As long as he impresses them, they are blind to what is behind his bluff.     
But he is very alone, because whenever people get close, they do not stay close for long.    They experience the inconsistencies and discrepancy between his words and his behavior, and his hurting and annoying treatment drives them away, before they can become real friends, who would bother to give him the sincere feedback, that he would need.   Instead they just avoid him.    

He has no chance to ever improve.   Over time the bluffer looses the touch with reality.   He believes more and more in his grandiosity and expects, that everywhere the pedestal is already waiting for him, not only in the ditch, but also, when he moves around on the ground above.  
   
With women, his method is similar.   He bluffs any woman ready to be bluffed to believe, that he were the kind of man she is looking for.  What person she is, makes no difference, as long as she looks up to him, accepts his pedestal as his birthright and gives him narcissistic supply.    Not having a real personality, he again bluffs himself to believe to be the match for any woman, who gives him narcissist supply without resistance.      

But if he ever errs in his choice of his victim and bluffs a fervently egalitarian woman to mistake him for an egalitarian man wanting a close and committed relationship, then trouble starts.   When such a woman experiences in real life, that his behavior is the contrary of his big words, then his bluff stops to be impressive for her.   
They are not in the ditch, and when he climbs onto his pedestal to be above her in his attempts to get her adulation, she pulls him down from the pedestal.   The bluffer becomes furious.   If he is not allowed to be above her on the pedestal, then he considers her appropriate place below him in the ditch.   When he attempts to push her down into the ditch, she resists and they struggle until she can free herself.    
At the time, when he bluffs her into the relationship, she considers him to be at par with herself.  But as soon as she starts to see through his bluff, she wonders, if it is not he, whose place is down in the ditch.   

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

286. The Micro Cycle of Abuse

The Micro Cycle of Abuse

The Abuse-Hoovering-Cycle in entry 285 is a macro cycle, but there is also a micro cycle of abuse.   In entry 124 I used the example of a couple walking through a city and the man suddenly stopping in front of a ticky-tacky restaurant to illustrate the difference between a caring man and a jerk.  

A considerate mature man would only suggest to her to eat there.    If she does not like the place, they would agree on a compromise.   They would look around for a while, maybe an hour, if they find another place, that they both like, but if not, they would come back.    
The considerate man also is someone, who informs a woman in advance of what is going on, so that she can be a part of all decisions.  He does not wait to tell her of his wish to eat, until he stands with pangs of hunger in front of a restaurant.  He takes note of first signs of getting hungry, and before he is craving for food, he suggests to find a place to eat that both like.

The jerk feels entitled to get, what he wants, immediately and the woman is a commodity to serve his needs.    The jerk is alone in this world, he has no shade of a doubt, that no alternative exists to his executing and enforcing his solitary decision, what to do about a need, as soon as he gets aware of having it.   Any other person in his reach is either a tool or a hindrance to his decision.  
If the restaurant scene is in a foreign country, the woman is the commodity to translate the menu.   With the jerk, she has no chance to have her needs and wishes considered as equal to his.    He either bullies her with an outburst of so much anger into the restaurant, that she has no choice but to submit, before it escalates into a public scene.   Or if he outwardly agrees to find another place to eat, even if indeed they find a really nice place where he does enjoy the food, he still blames her forever for her resistance to submit to his needs in immediate obedience.    He perceives her resistance to be a commodity as an outrage and not as her right of an equal partner.

If the woman is someone like me, then the most important part of a relationship is the closeness of reciprocally sharing all the innermost feelings.    That means, that he tells her his true and uncensored feelings, but also, that he is interested in hers and that he wants to know her true feelings in his attempt to treat her, how she needs and wants to be treated.  

After having been bullied into the restaurant, the woman feels extreme pain due to this act of devaluation and disrespect, of not being asked but dominated, of having his will forced upon her, of her needs not even being considered.     Mistaking him for a good natured and decent man, who just was not aware of what he is doing, she later on attempts to share her feelings with him.   She tries to make him understand, how much his behavior has been hurting her, and why.   Under the assumption, that he cares for her, she attempts to support him in learning how to treat her in the future with more respect and consideration.   
But instead of getting signs of caring understanding, she talks to a wall.   With some annoyance, he keeps on repeating, that he was hungry, as if being hungry is enough justification for his domination.   He firmly believes, that when he is hungry, he alone has the right to decide, what to do about it, as if she did not exist.   This for him is just self-evident and nobody and nothing can instill any doubt about this in his mind.   

She talks to a wall, when she craves to get the understanding of a mindmate.   She feels alone, but she had entered a relationship to be the safe haven of being understood and considered.   The pain of feeling alone and not understood aggravates the feelings of having been humiliated by the bullying.    She wants to find relief from her pain, and the only possible relief for her is getting through the wall and change his attitude about what is the correct way to treat her.   

She repeats her attempts to explain her feelings, her experience, her perception to him, but it is as futile as the attempts of a fly to leave through the window pane.    In the meantime, he continues to use rage and anger to get her compliance with whatever he wants, and thus things are getting worse for her.   
After a while, her craving to influence him to stop his hurting behaviors becomes a compulsion, and the futility finally makes her loose her countenance.    When she calls him an idiot and an a**hole and such, then this confirms his belief, that she is inferior, flawed and hysterical.   It enhances his already strong belief, that what goes on in her mind is of no significance at all.   
He had started the abuse by bullying her into the restaurant, but in the end, he can point out, that it was her, who used abusive language.    This reinforces his delusion, that his behavior is correct, and her disapproval and her sufferings are indicating, that she is flawed.   He feels even more self-righteous, when he continues to bully her.   As a consequence, she suffers more, her self-control gets weaker, her outbursts get more frequent and more vehement. 
 
If the woman does not have the wisdom and the strength to get rid of that jerk, before it gets too bad, then she will break down one day.      

Monday, April 18, 2011

285. The Abuse-Hoovering-Cycle

The Abuse-Hoovering-Cycle

There are many web pages full with heartbreaking stories of women, who have been devastated by going several times through the Abuse-Hoovering Cycle.   The men may be narcissistic psychopaths or narcissistic emotional morons or any other kind of jerks.   
But there is a general pattern.   These men appear all to have two distinct personalities like Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.   In the experience of the victims, they switch unexpectedly from one mode into another.   

The woman meets nice Dr. Jekyll, gets involved with him and after a while, he converts into the abusive Mr. Hyde.   When the victim's tether is reached, she is either able to end her agony herself, or the abuser dumps her in search of other prey.   Some time later, the abuser comes back as nice Dr. Jekyll and hoovers her in to restart the relationship.    Then comes another round of abuse, another end, another hoovering and this goes on much too long for the victim.

The victims are usually very puzzled, how the same man can be so different.    The explanation suggested most often considers the abuser as the genuine person, and the nice Dr. Jekyll as a perfect act of role playing to manipulate the victim.   

I think, there is another possible explanation.   For a narcissistic person, anybody else, including a partner, is a commodity serving to supply him with adding value to himself in his own experience and perception.   
This can be reached by two methods.   He can either devalue others to feel superior, or he can feel lifted up by the contact with someone, whom he idealized, glorifies and admires.    When an abuser oscillates between being Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, he oscillates between applying one or the other of the two methods, always choosing the one, which gives him the most narcissistic supply out of the woman at any moment.  
 
The tragedy starts, when nice Dr. Jekyll meets a woman, whom he secretly considers as out of his league, as too good to be true, as a trophy, whom to show off and feel uplifted in his self-esteem.    He courts her, idealizes her, cherishes her, worships the ground she walks on.   But after they get involved and he gets to know her better, things change drastically.   He discovers, that she is a person with her own needs and not there to serve his only, and in his eyes, that is a huge flaw and ends his idealization of her.   Even worse, she gives him feedback about things, that others would accept as a part of the normal process of adapting to each other.   In his perception, her criticizing devalues her.    He pushes her from the throne. 
She is not above him anymore, no more good enough as the trophy to be proud of.   At that point, he converts into nasty Mr. Hyde.    He starts to abuse her and treat her as his doormat, until she breaks down and becomes dysfunctional.   Once he perceives her as dysfunctional, he is able to regard her as inferior and subjectively gain value for himself by comparison with her.   But being abused, he women stops to give him any more narcissistic supply, she does not admire or adulate her abuser.   It she stays with him, it is because she is afflicted with the Jerk-Attachment-Syndrome (entry 268).   In this case, he leaves in pursuit of a source for better narcissistic supply.    Else she leaves, when she has enough.   
But after some time, if both are lonely, the cycle restarts.    He has attempted to get narcissistic supply from other women, but did not succeed, and in his memory, he reidealizes and reglorifies her.   Thus he reconverts himself back into the nice Dr. Jekyll and starts to hoover her.   If her Jerk-Attachment-Syndrome is bad enough, she gets sucked in for another round of the Abuse-Hoovering-Cycle.        

It is such a tragedy for the women, and it happens so often, and the question is, why.   But that will be the topic of another entry.  

284. Trust

Trust

A bonded relationship with intrinsic commitment is based upon mutual trust and trustworthiness.    This requires two partners, who both are able and motivated to make the fair balance of giving and receiving the basis of the relationship.   
Trust implies, that one partner can tell his true innermost feelings to the other and the other will never use this knowledge for selfish purposes.   
Trust implies, that one partner can influence the other in constructive communication to treat him the way he needs to be treated. 


1.  There is no trust, when two persons do not know each other well enough and are not interested or bothered to do so, because they both limit the relationship to be superficial and physical, like being friends with benefits and other arrangements for convenience based upon physical infatuation.    But the lack of trust is not a problem, if it is by consent.  

2.  There is no trust, when there is a power struggle or domination, and it is a tragic problem.  
In a power struggle, both are fighting to get, what they subjectively believe, that they are entitled to get.   
In domination, one had the better weapons and has established a hierarchy of power.

A power struggle can happen:
2.1.  When someone like a narcissist has the delusion to be entitled to special privileges and is not aware, that this impedes the other from getting a fair balance of giving and receiving.  
2.2.  When two persons have contradictory needs and are not aware of it.   They both believe to rightfully struggle to get a fair deal from someone appearing to claim onesided privileges.

The power struggle ends either with ending the relationship or:
1.  When the narcissist has established his domination and is able to apply his power to press his all his needs out of the subdued victim.    
2.  They gain mutual awareness of each other's needs and find a compromise to fulfill them and establish a trusting relationship.

Dynamics: 
A jerk or psychopath establishes domination, because he knows, that he is not trustworthy and that no woman in her right mind would trust him and accept her role in his life as to be used and abused.   For him, domination is the only way to have a relationship to fulfill all his needs and privileges, that he feels entitled to.   He knows, that with trust, he cannot get this.

A sane and mature man knows, that he cannot have a committed relationship without trust, and he attempts to build trust.   If he cannot trust a woman, he does not get involved with her.

An emotional moron does not know, what trust means.   He also does not know, where and when his selfish needs curtail the equally justified and valid needs of others. 
As a consequence, he believes, that every relationship is a power struggle, and that he can only get his needs fulfilled, if he is able to become the dominating male in a relationship and to limit the subdued woman's allegedly selfish taking advantage of him.  
An emotional moron is someone, who believes in his privileges as he believes, that the woman's purpose and even own wish is to serve his needs at his convenience.   He enforces domination in full oblivion of the woman's perception of it being abuse, he enforces domination as establishing, what he believes as correct.    An emotional moron believes in sincerity, that a woman exists for his convenience, as I have explained in entry 282.   He sincerely believes, that there is something wrong with a woman, if she resists to serve his convenience.   Logically, every woman, who insists to be a partner and to get a fair balance of giving and receiving, is considered as warranting to be forced into her right place by domination.  

An emotional moron is pathetic figure stuck in a dead end.    He is caught in his false belief of an entitlement to so many selfish onesided privileges in a relationship, that no mature woman in her right mind will ever concede them to him as justified.   He projects his own selfish entitlement of privileges onto her and believes, that if he does not struggle, he will get nothing.    

==> Every attempt he makes to have a relationship leads automatically in a struggle, when the woman defends herself against his unjustified claims of entitlements.   
==> Due to his belief, that without struggling he gets nothing, he never yields, when a woman struggles in self-defense.   Thus he can never experience, how much he would get without struggling for more, if instead he would take, what the woman gives him deliberately.  
==> Being deprived of the experience of how much of value he can get without struggling, he is unable to correct his unrealistic and unjustified expectation.   He cannot learn, what expectations are fair enough to get them from a woman without struggling and domination.  

He has no chance to learn, what is a fair deal, and he cannot learn to trust a woman to get a fair deal from her.  

Saturday, April 16, 2011

283. Urges, Cognition and Psychopathy

Urges, Cognition and Psychopathy

The following are speculations after pondering over the jerk's claim for his convenience in entry 282
As mentioned in earlier entries, I think that the human behavior is the result of the relative strength of cognition and instincts.    When the cognition is stronger than the instincts, then the person is able to act rationally, when the instincts are stronger, the person uses the cognition as a powerful tool serving the instincts.   
So far, I had been using this concept on the major instinct of breeding and the auxiliary instincts of sexuality, ingroup-outgroup and hierarchy to acquire resources.   
But I think I can broaden this concept to include the relative strength of hedonistic urges for food, drink, sexual homeostasis and general comfort compared with the strength of cognition.    People, whose cognition is stronger than their hedonistic needs can live in a fair exchange with other people, acknowledging their needs as valid and accepting fair deals.   They can evaluate, that sometimes other things are more important than physical needs and self-control can be very beneficial.   
But those hedonists, whose urges are stronger than their cognition, use whatever intelligence they have as a powerful tool to fulfill as many of their urges for the least price and with the least delay.  

This can also explain the behavior of psychopaths, because it seems obvious to assume that psychopaths are driven by hedonistic urges.  I cannot imagine an ascetic psychopath.  Urges strong enough to override all control and cognition like in an animal are usually physical.  
While their predominant cognition enables people to see themselves as interacting with others for the equal benefit of all, while they can understand justice and the rights of others, the psychopath only has the intelligence to know these things by rote, as methods, but not concerning himself as guidelines for the own behavior.  His urges are so strong, that his knowledge of the rules of social interactions is derailed to only serve his selfish purposes.    
The psychopaths can have the complete knowledge how to make a woman believe in his sincere commitment, he can be able to lure and manipulate a woman to accept a relationship with him.    But his urges are stronger than his cognition, and once he has her under his control, he does not continue to use his knowledge for the benefit of a happy couple.   Instead he now uses, abuses and takes advantage of her by allowing himself every selfish impulse that he has.    

I also had already previously stated my assumption, that the predominant urges and instincts determine the identity and the value system of a person.    Those with a high breeding instinct develop an identity as dedicated parents, a value system based on the glorification of children and an attitude that their purpose in live is procreation.  They take this for granted and some of them are oblivious about how some people do not want to breed.

It seems that this is also the case with a psychopath, whose whole identity is determined by his need for physical pleasures and comforts, and whose value system is based upon taking it for granted to be entitled to the limitless supply of all the pleasures he wants.  The phrase 'at my convenience' of the jerk in entry 282 illustrates this.  For him, a relationship with a woman has to be at his convenience only.   The psychopath is just oblivious, that other people are not commodities, and he has no conscience, no matter, what he does.    He is oblivious, that it is practically impossible to have a relationship, that is equally at the unmodified convenience of both partners.   To be at the convenience of both as a couple, they need to find agreements and compromises.    But when the psychopath insists to get the woman entirely at his convenience, she is a commodity, serving his convenience paying the price of her own disadvantaged position.     

Maybe psychopaths are a kind of relapse to earlier phases of evolution, where even food was so scarce, that only those, who ruthlessly and without a conscience took, what they could get, had a chance to survive and to breed.   But when with agriculture and complexer societies the requirement for survival changed to the ability for mutually beneficial social interactions, cognition evolved to be stronger than the urge to eat all the food and let others starve, and psychopath became obsolete for the survival of the species.   Unfortunately for their victims, too many reappear once in a while as an anomaly.    

282. A Specimen of A Jerk

A Specimen of A Jerk

In entry 257, I wrote that I can offer to my mindmate a place to live, where the risk of natural catastrophes are very low.   I did not mention, that I am looking for someone, who either likes the idea to come and live here with me or someone to move together between two countries.    It means following my steps of carefully building commitment as described in entry 252.    But once the bond of commitment is physically sealed, it means to be and to stay together, no matter where.    Intrinsic commitment means a wish to share each other's life, and that means sharing time and activities.  

I was corresponding with someone, who is retired and free to go, where he wants to.   He wrote me this, and the capital letters are his own emphasis.       
"i would never go to any foreign country to live forever before i had spent at least a year going back and forth AT MY CONVENIENCE before i could make a committment to stay with you for the rest of my life."
I was speechless for a moment, when I read this.   First I thought: what a jerk!   But on second thought he seems more like an emotional moron, who is unaware, that a woman like me rejects such an impertinence and impudence.    A psychopath would intend such a scheme, but would attempt to manipulate the woman into bed by false promises of commitment.  

The man feels entitled to come and go at his convenience.    That means, that he does not want a woman to be together all the time, and it means, that he alone decides, when to be together and when not, excluding the woman from a decision, which has a heavy impact upon her.

This one statement tells the entire attitude of this jerk concerning the role of a woman in his life.   Even though he had pretended before to want a woman as an equal partner, his concept very clearly tells the contrary.    

1.  A woman is a commodity
This man considers a woman as a commodity, whose sole purpose in life is being there for him, when he wants her.   Like a commodity, an object, he wants to find her waiting for him in the locker, where he had stored her, whenever he wants to make use of her.    In the meantime, he may well chase other women or forget her over whatever else is more important than she.    But she has to remain available for him on demand.

2.  He does not value a woman as deserving a fair balance of giving and receiving
Once he has gained control over a woman as a commodity, he perceives and considers her as his property, that he can use without giving anything in return.    

3.  A woman has only an unimportant function in his life 
He chooses a woman for her body and maybe for getting supply, if he is a narcissist.   He does not choose her to have a companion, who is intellectually and emotionally attractive enough to share his every day life with her, to share activities and intellectual pursuits.    He does not honor a woman's brain as something beneficial for himself.

4.  He dominates the woman
He reserves the decision, when to be together, for himself alone, and he can enforce it by just leaving.   He does not accept to share decisions with a woman, he feels entitled to force his decisions upon her.  This is domination.    

5.  He degrades a woman
He wants a woman to allow him to use her body, but he does not consider it as correct to give her anything of value for her in return, he does not accept any obligations towards her.  He degrades her to be a friend with benefits.    He does not respect her dignity. 

6.  He is oblivious of a woman's own needs and emotions
A woman's own subjective perception and resulting emotions just do not exist for him.   He considers her availability for him as the purpose of her existence.   He is oblivious of her needs.   He is void of any consideration of how she experiences his attitude and treatment.   

7.  He supplies no safe haven for a woman
The man is not reliable and not predictable, coming and going at any time, which a woman can neither influence nor even know in advance.    She cannot trust him.  

Such a man is a nightmare.   The only good thing about this particular jerk is his honesty.   He has warned me with this huge red flag to keep away.    I prefer to be alone rather than to be with such a jerk, even though I am lonely and it is important for me to find my mindmate.   

281. Contradictors

Contradictors
Contradictors are persons, who contradict everything, that is said to them.  They do the contrary of what others ask them to do.   The do on purpose, what others ask them to refrain from doing.  

There are at least two types of contradictors, those with a purpose and those, who automatically contradict, as if they would not know any other option. 

1.  Automatic Contradictors

There is a psychiatric diagnosis in the DSM, called ODD, Oppositional Defiant Disorder.   It is considered as only an affliction of children.   The description is here.  
http://www.minddisorders.com/Ob-Ps/Oppositional-defiant-disorder.html
I have read people wondering, what becomes of children with ODD, when they grow up.   Some then develop to be psychopaths, sociopaths or cases of antisocial disorder.   But maybe the milder cases of childhood ODD just become automatic contradictors.

2.  Hierarchy Instinct

Some people experience others automatically as competitors in a hierarchy.   If they are not below, then they are above.   All interactions serve the purpose to get above those, who can  be pushed down, and to challenge those, who are still in a higher position.    Equality is something unknown to them.
In entry 39, I already described verbal fencing as a replacement for the duel with a sword.    Verbal fencing is a duel of wits, but contradicting is a much cruder behavior, when it serves as a weapon to gain a higher position in a hierarchy, which implies also to gain power over resources.   
Contradicting is part of forming a hierarchy based upon the main assumption of being superior by knowing better or by believing to know better.   A contradictor attempts to proof to know better as his way of proofing his entitlement to the higher position.   The contradictor believes, that he knows everything better, so he has no reason to listen to the other or to be interested in what he has to say.   
The contradictor waits all the time for an occasion to give evidence of his superiority, so he scrutinizes, what others say, without listening to his real message, but luring for a handle for a contradiction.   He just checks the other's utterances for anything, that he can react to fast enough with a contradiction.    As soon as he has succeeded in jumping in with his contradiction, he stops to listen and never really hears or learns anything of what others say.    He often does not understand or is clueless, what the other is really talking about.  
The contradictor considers agreement and consent never as an expression of closeness, but as the submission of those below him on the hierarchy.    He would never agree to anything, because he wants to move up the ladder by challenging those above him, and he expects them also to contradict him to keep him below.    He lives in a world without consent.  

Contradicting is for the contradictor a power tool, not a means of communication.    His life is emotionally isolated, while he outwardly is busy struggling with others over the hierarchy.   He fights to keep those below from challenging him, he fights to challenge those above, and those on the same level are his competitors, who also are fighting for the level above.   Therefore the contradictor is isolated behind an invisible wall, contradicting is a method to pushing people away and keep them at a safe distance.   As he knows nothing but the hierarchy struggle, he expects only challenges and contradictions from others.

For a contradictor, a relationship with a woman is just another hierarchy, where he of course usurps the position as the dominator.   The contradictor contradicts, whatever the woman attempts to say, as a method to keep her in the inferior position, that he has assigned to her.   He can never find out, who she really is or what she thinks and feels.   The contradictors baseline is emotional isolation, even in a relationship.  

Contradicting or agreeing as a goal represent two distinct attitudes towards a partner in a relationship.   Contradicting is not the same as disagreeing.    Egalitarian partners get bonded and close by agreement, consent and thinking alike.   There baseline is agreement and when they discover disagreement, then they both experience it as a task for communication.   They acquire, supply and exchange all information and all evidence, until they can find an agreement, that is convincing to both.   Disagreement makes them uncomfortable, they both are motivated to restore the harmony of agreement.

When an egalitarian woman gets accidentally involved with a contradictor, they get into an impasse.   Figuratively, when he sits on a step of a flight of stairs, and she sits down at his side to be close and communicate, he either moves one step up, or he pushes her one step down.   If she attempts to get back to his side, he pushes her away and forced her to remain on the lower step.  

Thursday, April 14, 2011

280. Subjective Reality - 2

Subjective Reality - 2

A viable relationship is based upon the common endeavour to spare each other pain and to care about each other's happiness.    This requires a mutually full awareness of each other's subjective experiences as valid and real.   It also requires the full unrestricted mutual disclosure of both partners' true innermost feelings.   What causes pain and how much is respected as a part of the partner's personality and not devalued as a weakness and a flaw. 

Both partners need the validation of their feelings as real and as appropriate.  They need mutually to accept, that each other's reactions are logical, in proportion and adequate to the severity of what they have subjectively experienced, even if they would not react the same under similar circumstances. 

One partner has either the empathy to feel the pain of the other or he has the trust to take any of the other's statements about subjective experiences as true.   Otherwise he is unable to care and to alleviate pain and discomfort.   Caring persons never assume or tell their partners, what they should feel and what not.   They are interested to know, what the other really feels, and this can only be found out by asking and by listening.  

When one partner respects and appreciates the other as an equal and as a person of rationality and intelligence, then not understanding the other's behavior or utterances is considered as a matter of communication.    Jumping to the conclusion, that all incomprehensible behavior of the other indicates flaws, shows disrespect.    Asking and listening until there is understanding shows respect.  
This goes both ways.   Not explaining, when the other does not understand, but expecting submission to incomprehensible behavior is also disrespect.    Appreciation is based on both, on interest in the other's subjective reality and on sharing the own.  

When such partners support each other with advice, suggestions and offering help, this is based upon the accepted reality of the other, not by redefining and reinterpreting it.

This requires, that both partners have full understanding of the dynamics between them.   It requires especially the full awareness of the difference between when one partner initiates an action, and when one partner reacts to what the other has initiated.    A completely logical reaction can appear incomprehensible, if mistaken for an action by the own initiative.     

This requires trust.   If one partner doubts the self-disclosure and statements of the other with suspicions of a hidden agenda or exaggeration for the purpose of manipulation, he can never know the true subjective reality.
  
It also requires mutual verification, that what one understands as the other's reality is the same as what was attempted to be conveyed.   

Undistorted knowledge of the other's subjective reality requires to beware and not to fall into psychological traps of doing the following without correction by verifying it:
  • Projecting the own reality upon the other.
  • Taking anything for granted
  • Jumping to conclusions instead of listening
  • Confounding wishful thinking with reality
  • Avoiding the truth by denial
In short, it is important to avoid applying to the partner's reality the same defense mechanism, that people are prone to use in distorting the full awareness of their own reality.

The three steps to understanding the partner's reality are:
  1. Acknowledging the own complete ignorance of the partner's subjective reality.
  2. Asking, listening to and verifying in cooperation and communication with the partner without doubting the sincerity and accuracy
  3. Accepting the partner's reality as equally valid and justified as the own

Accepting the partner's reality is not possible, when it contradicts the own basic values or needs.   In this case the couple is not compatible as mindmates in intrinsic commitment.    Tolerance and denial are not a solution for bonding.   
Tolerance only works for those couples, who have the mutual agreement of being only infatuated with each other's bodies, without a wish to deeply be bonded or of breeding as the main purpose of the relationship.   

Example:   When one partner's subjective reality is based upon religious believes, while the other's reality is based upon rationality and science, then the two can gain full knowledge of the partner's subjective reality, but they are incompatible, because the can never accept the other's reality as equally valid and justified as the own.   Their tolerance is mutual condescension.   The religious person often feels sorry for the nonbelievers lack of enlightenment and dire fate after death.   The rational person considers the blind belief as a deficit in rationality.