About nine years ago I began this blog, and one of the first sets of words that I wrote were:
We have all experienced name calling, insults and teasing, even the greatest presidents, the most talented athletes, and every member of your favorite band. If someone insults you, calls you names, or teases you, it does NOT mean that you are a bad person.
Although being treated disrespectfully does not mean that you are a bad person, skillful handling of these types of situations can have an enormous influence on how much you are liked and respected by others, and how you regard yourself as a person.
Since then, I have published quite a few posts that offered suggestions for handling this sometimes difficult type of situation (for example see HERE, HERE, and HERE). Now, as I was wondering what to write about for this week’s post, I noticed C-SPAN had just announced the results of its latest survey that had historians and other professional observers of the presidency rate U.S. presidents. Abraham Lincoln, consistent with many previous surveys over the years, came out on top. And it just so happens that I have been reading of late, Carl Sandburg’s biography of Lincoln. In its many pages, we find regularly Lincoln dealing with people throwing insults at him. So, I thought I would take this opportunity to share with you how this highly respected person dealt with them.
Examples of Lincoln Dealing with Insults
Stanton’s Insults
Secretary Stanton
Edwin M. Stanton served as Secretary of War during the Civil War, and in the early part of his tenure in that position he regularly threw insults at President Lincoln. At one point, for example, according to Sandburg’s Lincoln biography, Stanton angrily called his boss behind his back the original gorilla. When told about this by someone who was furious that Lincoln would let one of his subordinates insult him, Lincoln replied, “Now, now, Stanton is entitled to his opinion.” Then, with a twinkle in his eyes, Lincoln went on to say, “What concerns me is that I have found that when Stanton says something, he is usually right,” and with that, Lincoln brought forth a delightful smile.
A committee of Western men, headed by [Congressman Owen] Lovejoy, procured from the President an important order looking to the exchange of Eastern and Western soldiers with a view to more effective work. Repairing to the office of Secretary Stanton, Mr. Lovejoy explained the scheme, as he had done before to the President, but was met by a flat refusal.
“But we have the President’s order sir,” said Lovejoy.
“Did Lincoln give you an order of that kind?” said Stanton.
“He did, sir.”
“Then he is a d—d fool,” said the irate Secretary.
“Do you mean to say the President is a d—d fool?” asked Lovejoy, in amazement.
“Yes, sir, if he gave you such an order as that.”
The bewildered Congressman from Illinois betook himself at once to the President, and related the result of his conference.
“Did Stanton say I was a d–d fool?” asked Lincoln at the close of the recital.
“He did, sir; and repeated it.”
After a moment’s pause, and looking up, the President said:“If Stanton said I was a d–d fool, then I must be one, for he is nearly always right, and generally says what he means. I will step over and see him.”
Now, you may be starting to get the impression that Lincoln would let Stanton bully him, but that appears to not be the case, as we can see from the following example, also from The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History:
General James Fry, a War Department official who had frequent opportunity to observe the relations between the two men, noted such anecdotes were “interpreted as meaning that Lincoln could not control Stanton. The inference is erroneous. Lincoln, so far as I could discover, was in every respect the actual head of the administration, and whenever he chose to do so, he controlled Stanton as well as all the other Cabinet ministers.” Fry related a conflict between President Lincoln and Secretary Stanton which concluded with the following dialogue in Stanton’s office. Stanton said: “Now Mr. President, those are the facts, and you must see that your order cannot be executed.” The President cordially replied: “Mr. Secretary, I reckon you’ll have to execute the order.” Stanton objected: “Mr. President, I cannot do it. The order is an improper one, and I cannot execute it.” The President stared down the shorter Stanton and firmly issued an order: “Mr. Secretary, it will have to be done.” And indeed it was.
We get a little glimpse of Lincoln’s perspective of how he thought it best to handle Stanton when he got angry and began to throw out insults, from the following:
Senator Dawes
Henry Dawes dropped in on the President after the appointment was announced to congratulate him on getting such a man as Stanton for his Cabinet, in the next breath making some remark that led Lincoln to say, yes, there were those who had warned him that the new Secretary of War would run away with the whole concern. “We may have to treat him as they are sometimes obliged to treat a Methodist minister I know of out West. He gets wrought to so high a pitch of excitement in his prayers and exhortations that they are obliged to put bricks in his pockets to keep him down. We may be obliged to serve Stanton in the same way, but I guess we’ll let him jump a while first.”
As Lincoln got more and more familiar with Secretary Stanton’s intense, irritable nature, he made allowances for it because he knew how the excitement of the time tried men’s tempers and shattered their nerves. And yet, there were times Lincoln could not just ignore how Stanton was reacting to someone. On one occasion, Stanton was particularly angry with one of the generals.
“I would like to tell him what I think of him!” he stormed.
“Why don’t you?” Mr. Lincoln agreed. “Write it all down – do.”
Mr. Stanton wrote his letter. When it was finished he took it to the President. The President listened to it all.
“All right. Capital!’ Lincoln nodded. “And now, Stanton, what are you going to do with it?”
“Do with it? Why, send it, of course!”
“I wouldn’t,” said the President. “Throw it in the waste-paper basket.”
“But it took me two days to write —”
“Yes, yes, and it did you ever so much good. You feel better now. That is all that is necessary. Just throw it in the basket.”
After a little more expostulation, into the basket it went.
Perhaps Lincoln, when he himself got worked up either because someone threw some insult at him, or for any other reason, also wrote letters of this sort to help him work out his feelings.
Insults By Others
General Grant
Stanton was, by no means, the only one to insult Lincoln. At one point, the president was confronted by a hail of insults for supporting U.S. Grant. The chief objection to the general was that he was thought to be intemperate with whiskey. Lincoln replied, “If I knew what brand of whiskey he drinks I would send a barrel or so to some of the other generals,” and then he leaned back in his chair and had a laugh.
No American president has uttered more immortal words than he did. We are moved by the power and lyricism of his speeches a century and a half later—not just by their hard, clear reasoning, but by their beauty. It is hard to imagine anyone hearing without admiration, for instance, this sublime passage from the first inaugural address:
I am loth to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.
Yet this speech was characterized by an editorial writer in the Jersey City American Standard as “involved, coarse, colloquial, devoid of ease and grace, and bristling with obscurities and outrages against the simplest rules of syntax.”
Later in this section of The Atlantic article we learn:
As for the Gettysburg Address—one of the most powerful speeches in human history, one that many American schoolchildren can recite by heart (Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth …) and a statement of national purpose that for some rivals the Declaration of Independence—a Pennsylvania newspaper reported, “We pass over the silly remarks of the President. For the credit of the nation we are willing that the veil of oblivion shall be dropped over them, and they shall be no more repeated or thought of.” A London Times correspondent wrote, “Anything more dull and commonplace it wouldn’t be easy to produce.”
These insulting remarks were, at times, met with a humorist quip. For example, Stephen Douglas called him two faced during a debate and Lincoln responded “If I had another face, do you think I would wear this one?” At other times, he would respond to the flood of nay-saying with a weary wave of his hand and say, “Let us speak no more of these things.”
Conclusion
I think Alexander Hamilton Stephens, who had served as the Vice President of the Confederacy, well expressed what many who had an opportunity to get to know Lincoln came to feel about him. Thus, in a speech several years after the war, Stephens recalled getting to know Lincoln when they both served together in the House of Representatives prior to the war. “He was warm hearted; he was generous; he was magnanimous, ‘with malice toward none, with charity for all.'”
As Stanton declared at Lincoln’s death bed, with tears in his eyes, “He was one for the ages.”
All of that being said, it is my hope these Lincoln stories might inspire you when you find yourself confronted with insults. With Lincoln as an example, perhaps you might find yourself coming up with a few jests that can be employed as insults come your way, just to lighten things up a bit. And perhaps you might find yourself considering the wisdom of looking to see if there is any merit imbedded in any nasty phrased comment, kind of like what Lincoln did when he declared that he better step over to discuss the matter with Stanton after Stanton had thrown an insult at him.
Let me add, now, some personal advice. If you find, as a result of a nasty remark, that you need to spend a little time experiencing waves of distress in the pit of your stomach, take all the time that you need. Meanwhile, consider writing about what you might wish to say to the insulter. And by all means, avoid falling into the trap that an insult can define you as bad.
In closing today’s post, I shall leave you with some words by Rudyard Kipling that appears as part of his poem titled “If.” They seem to me to capture some of the essential character of Abraham Lincoln:
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise,
….
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
My Best,
Jeff
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
A couple of years ago I wrote a post titled, “Am I Bad For Being Sad?” There I discussed the tendency in our society to promote the notion that when we experience sadness it is a symptom indicating there is something wrong with us. I then asked readers to consider the possibility that this notion may be disrespectful and harmful, and it may be far better to frame our sad experiences as healthy, and a process that serves the function of planning our future. In that post, to encourage readers to think about this, I used two parables and a New York Times article in which the writer relates the experience of a woman dealing with sadness. Today, let’s take a quick look at a summary of that earlier post, and then I’ll discuss a research article that helps to deepen a discussion of this issue.
A Brief Summary of the Earlier Post
In the first parable, a mother tells her son it is time to go to bed, he resists, and eventually he begins to cry. The mother responds:
Don’t you dare start with this crap or I’ll give you a real reason to cry! You’re acting like an infant!!! Now you stop this instant and get to bed!!!”
In the second parable, the same set of circumstances occurs except that the mother replies to her son’s tears differently. Instead of getting angry, she says in a caring manner:
“I see you are feeling sad. That’s understandable. You were enjoying the game so much, and you’re disappointed about having to stop. You know, when we feel sad, it’s to help us figure out how to better handle what we do in the future. I wonder how we can better handle the going to bed situation. Any ideas, Carl?”
After presenting these two parables, I asked readers some questions:
Will this mother’s response in the first parable to her son’s sadness lead him in time to not only feel sad about whatever led to his sad feelings, but additionally, to feel bad for not living up to his mother’s expectations of what a good, mature person should feel during disappointments?
Might he, thus, learn to have a kind of double depression each time he is disappointed–depression at the disappointment, plus depression because he is depressed?
With this mother’s approach, might he eventually become motivated to drown his negative emotions in alcohol, or mask them with illegal or prescription drugs?
In contrast to the first parable, the second one has the mother explaining that the experience of sadness is natural and has the potential to be helpful. I noted that this doesn’t instantly eliminate a period of sadness. Then I asked readers:
Is it possible that by viewing sadness as natural and helpful, might it eliminate much of the self-insults that make a sad experience worse?
Might it also helpfully guide attention toward constructing positive future plans?
After discussing these questions, I then went on to the New York Times article that I used to further deepen the sadness discussion. There, the writer tells us about Laura.
When Laura was young, she saw a psychiatrist because from time to time she would begin to sob. He convinced Laura there was something wrong with her and sold her on the idea that she needed to take a prescribed pill. Before long he had her taking a whole cocktail of pills.
When on the drugs, Laura said, “I never had a baseline sense of myself.”
Eventually, Laura began to question her psychiatrist’s medical model, and although she suffered through the process of weaning herself off the prescription drugs, finally she reported that she felt as if she were learning the contours of her adult self for the first time. When she felt dread or despair, she tried to accept the sensation without interpreting it as a sign that she was defective. “It felt like a revelation,” she said, “to realize that the objective in being alive isn’t the absence of pain.” The article concludes with Laura stating, “I never felt helped by the drugs in the sense that I have meaning, I have purpose, I have relationships that matter to me.”
There is quite a bit more that I covered in my earlier post on this subject, and I hope you consider reading it (see HERE). In that post, I relied chiefly on stories to illustrate the relevant issues, for stories are particularly helpful in making sense of life’s challenges. However, there is another path toward understanding–scientific research. So, let us now turn to a research article employing the scientific method that focuses its keen eye directly on today’s topic.
The Research Article
A team of researchers (Brock Bastian, et al.) published an article in the peer reviewed journal Emotion titled, “Feeling Bad About Being Sad: The Role of Social Expectancies in Amplifying Negative Mood.” The authors begin by summarizing previous relevant research, then describe four studies they carried out to throw light on this subject, and then present their conclusions. The entire article can be viewed for free HERE. It is a bit long and written using some technical language and complicated statistics so I thought I would provide the gist of it to those who prefer a shorter read.
Upon reviewing previous research, they found evidence that in many cultures people are expected to strive for happiness and not to feel sad or stressed. Moreover, happiness has been enthusiastically promoted as important for personal well-being and a meaningful life. Even common malaise is often diagnosed as an illness and is considered detrimental to our own and others’ health.”
The authors go on to say,
One does not need to look far to see which emotions are socially valued and more normative than others. Daily we are reminded of the value of happiness, from TV advertising that highlights the hedonic pleasures of consumption, to national campaigns designed to improve happiness and well-being. Meanwhile, commonplace emotional experiences such as sadness, depression, or anxiety are pathologized and medicalized, viewed as deviant from desired norms…. Negative emotions are touted as bad for our health… and can be “cured” with an array of drugs and interventions designed to quickly and efficiently return us to normality. On the other hand, the many benefits of negative emotions, such as their creative potential…, importance for interpersonal relations…, and role in achieving a rich and meaningful life… are rarely prominent in current social discourse.
When the authors write that the benefits of negative emotions are rarely prominent in current social discourse, they are referring to modern Western individualistic cultures such as Australia, Great Britain, and the United States. They contrast these Western cultures with the very different attitudes of many people in Asia. Thus, the authors write,
[T]he importance placed on happiness and the devaluation of sadness is not as apparent in Asian cultures. In Japan, acceptance, emotional balance, and even hardship are highly valued, and the pursuit of happiness often has “immoral” connotations.
Now, after the authors described the previous research that I have sought to summarize, they then begin to describe their four original studies. In brief, hundreds of people, mostly Australians, but some from Japan, were asked to rate several of their personal characteristics on a scale that ranged from 1 (strongly disagree) to 9 (strongly agree). Examples of the characteristics they were asked to rate themselves on are:
Feeling sad makes me dislike myself.
When I feel sad I feel like a bad person.
It is very important to me not to feel sad.
I would always try to avoid feeling sad.
Feeling sad is normal.
Feeling sad is an important part of life.
There is far more to these four studies than just having people rating themselves, but this gives you some idea of what was done.
Among the findings, there was a clear tendency for Australian individuals to feel worse about themselves when experiencing negative emotions than the Japanese individuals who were more likely to view sadness as normal and helpful.
The authors’ final conclusions, after looking at the result of all four studies, are:
Emotions are fundamentally social phenomena. Our research provides the first evidence that people’s generalized beliefs about how others expect them to feel may play a central role in their emotional experience and well-being. Our work shows that the more people hold beliefs that others expect them not to experience negative emotions, the more frequently and intensely they are likely to experience those negative emotions. Such ironic effects also relate to indicators of well-being, such as satisfaction with life and depression. Moreover, our findings suggest that these relationships are at least partly mediated by negative self-evaluations that people have when they experience undesired emotions. Attempts to promote the value of feeling good over the value of feeling bad by emphasizing social norms for these emotions may therefore have the effect of making people feel bad more often.
Now, relevant to this discussion, there does exist some evidence that sometimes people who experience depression end up hurting themselves, or lapse into periods in which their functioning diminishes. This evidence is used by many psychiatrists to urge people to take psychiatric drugs. But, is it really the depression that leads these people to hurt themselves, or is it how they respond to their sad feelings that lead to various undesirable outcomes?
In contrast to the medical model that urges drug treatment, there is evidence that the drug treatments increase suicide and disabilities.
Robert Whitaker
For an excellent review of this evidence see Robert Whitaker’s fine book, Anatomy of an Epidemic: Magic Bullets, Psychiatric Drugs, and the Astonishing Rise of Mental Illness in America.
Now, let’s say you were brought up immersed in a culture that favors happiness over negative emotions. If you had become convinced it would be wise to change your old habits of self-hate when experiencing depression, perhaps you might find it hard to break those habits. What can you do?
By reading this blog beginning with the earliest post can help to support making the change. You can begin at the earliest post by clicking HERE. Two of its benefits are, it is completely free, and you can utilize it at your own pace.
Another approach is to go to a personal counselor well trained in promoting the notions that sadness is helpful and self compassion is a better way to deal with it. The personal interaction with a skilled, supportive counselor can be a powerful motivator to make the needed changes in your life. Its chief drawback is its financial cost.
If you do wish to utilize this approach, I can recommend two professionals who are excellent–my son, Jack Star Rubin, and his wife, Emily. Their services are provided online via Skype or Zoom. You can access their webpages HERE.
OK then, I think I’ll end this discussion for now. That said, please feel free to extend it in the comment section below.
My Best
Jeff
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
During an early part of my psychological services provider career, I was hired as a school psychologist in Rochester, New York. There, students were regularly referred to me because a teacher or parent had become concerned about how a student was doing at school.
When I met individually with these students, I first introduced myself, and then I’d say something like, “I was asked to meet with you to see if we can figure out how to make school better for you.” Then I’d spend a little time trying to see if we had some common interest, such as some music stars, baseball players, TV shows, etc. By connecting with students in this pleasant way, it lightened up our exchange. Next, I got down more directly to the business at hand, seeking to find out, from the student’s perspective, how school was going.
Early in my tenure in this job, this meant that I would just ask the question, “Say, by the way, how’s school going for you this year?” Typically, I would get just a very brief answer, such as, “OK,” or, “I hate school.” Naturally, I wanted to explore more deeply this issue, so I would clumsily begin to ask followup questions and too often I wouldn’t get much that was helpful. However, in time, I developed a psychological interview that really managed to be insightful in figuring out ways to improve a student’s school experience. So, today I thought I would share it with you, for I think it would be helpful, not only for other school psychologists, but for teachers and parents as well.
Psychological Interview
How are things going for you this school year? (After each question, leave a few lines for you to write out the student’s answers.)
Tell me how things are going for you this year by putting a circle around one of these numbers. If you circle the 1 it means you think things are going very bad for you. If you circle a 2, it means you think things are going bad, but not quite very bad. If you circle a 3, it means you think things are going well for you, and if you circle a 4, it means you think things are going great!
Very bad 1 2 3 4 Great
Thanks for doing that. Now, tell me, things you enjoy doing are…
Do you have any problems this year that are getting in the way of doing your best at school?
Tell me about your school work, what’s hard for you, and what’s easy?
Your favorite subject is…
Subjects you don’t like are…
Your grades are…
Tell me some things you are good at.
Tell me some things you wish you were better at.
Do you have friends at school?
Name some of your friends.
Now, when I ask you about friends, I’m not just talking about kids you like doing things with, though it’s great to have some of them to do things with. To me, a real friend is somebody who, if something good happens to you that person feels good for you, and if something goes bad for you, that person cares about what you are going through, and tries to help you out in some way. Any of the kids you mentioned as friends this kind of friend?
Do you have friends where you live?
Name some of your friends where you live.
How have you been getting along with the other students at school?
Rate yourself on the following: I like the way I get along with the other students at school.
Agree 5 4 3 2 1 Disagree
I like the way I get along with the teachers at school.
Agree 5 4 3 2 1 Disagree
I like myself.
Agree 5 4 3 2 1 Disagree
I like the way I get along with other people in my neighborhood.
Agree 5 4 3 2 1 Disagree
Tell me about you and your teachers.
Tell me about how you get along with your teachers.
Tell me about your all time favorite teacher, and why you liked her or him so much.
Tell me about a teacher you had a hard time getting along with.
Are there any grown-ups that really care about you, and think you’re special?
Do you like school?
Rate how much you like or dislike school by circling one of these numbers:
I love school 5 4 3 2 1 I hate school
What can we do to make school a better place for you?
Do you feel you get enough help in school?
Tell me about how much exercise you get.
Discussion
Well, there you have it, an outline for a psychological interview that will help to draw out important information regarding a student’s school experience. Why might this be a useful thing to do? I found, when using this approach, that students very much appreciate an adult really taking the time to see how they are doing. Moreover, discussing the results of the interview with people I respect and the parents and the educators working with the student often led to some helpful ideas for improving the student’s school experience
To take one example, I once interviewed a student we will call Bobby. He indicated that this school year was going very bad for him by circling a 1 on that question. On further questioning, Bobby indicated he found school had him sitting way too much, he had no friends, and he enjoyed and thought he was good at playing chess.
Bobby had learned to play chess when he was younger. His older brother had taught him, and they had enjoyed playing against one another, but in recent years his brother preferred playing with some guys his own age. With no one to play with, Bobby would read some books on chess, and he also watched a lot of TV. On the questionnaire, it became clear that he got no exercise other than two times per week when he had his physical education class.
As I discussed this information with Bobby’s parents, they found it insightful, and decided to take some steps to improve Bobby’s life. They signed him up for an after school chess club suitable for Bobby’s age and he loved it. Moreover, several students in Bobby’s grade at his school also attended the after school program, and as they got to know one another, they began meeting before school to discuss common interests, ate lunch together in the school cafeteria, and on the weekend they got together to play chess and to do other fun stuff.
To address the issue of a lack of exercise and that Bobby felt uncomfortable sitting so long at school, he and his whole family began to take an hour walk after supper twice a week, and on the weekend they would take an even longer hike. This added walking each week made it much easier for Bobby to sit for long periods during school hours, and it no doubt is supportive of a healthier lifestyle.
After these changes had been implemented for a few months, I again had Bobby fill out several of the rating scales from the psychological interview to get a sense of how helpful the changes had been. He now indicated the school year was going much better than when I first interviewed him. On the question he had originally circled a 1 indicating things were going very bad for him, now he circled a 3, indicating things were going pretty good. Sitting for such long periods at school was now not as aversive, and he also indicated he had made some real friends. The changes on several of the rating scales that appear on the interview outline helped to confirm to the parents that real progress had been achieved. So, if you will, give the interview a try and let us know if you found it helpful.
My Best,
Jeff
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
Welcome to From Insults to Respect. Today, we once again take up the topic of crying and its relationship to respect.
Perhaps some might wonder why more than one post was not sufficient to amply cover this tearful topic. I would have been among those who wondered about this a few years ago, but then I wrote a post titled, “Responding to Criticism: Four levels of Maturity.” There, the most immature level was originally described as:
1. This level requires displaying one or more of the following:
Weeps or sobs with tears or pouts
Physically attacks the criticizer
Damages property
I had derived this level along with the three higher levels by first making a lot of TV shows with a variety of actors. In each show, the actors respond to criticism in different ways. Then I asked others to view the shows. Together, the viewers and I discussed our reactions to the way the actors in the video recordings handle criticism.
I soon became very familiar with what people thought of as immature and mature responses. I then put them in order from the least to the most respected. Then, when I published the post that described these four levels of maturity, I began to get a great deal of criticism because I included the crying description as one of the most immature responses.
To address the criticism, I wrote a follow-up post titled “Responding to Criticism by Crying: Is it a Sign of Immaturity?” It became one of my most popular posts immediately upon my publishing it over seven years ago. Since then, people every single day continue to find it through search engines and regularly provide thoughtful comments. Apparently, the post touches a sensitive nerve, and raises new questions that I have tried to answer in follow-up posts.
Weeping, sobbing and crying will only be viewed as the lowest level of maturity if the person responding to criticism does nothing else but that, or if he or she does that along with the other lowest level responses such as physically attacking the criticizer or damaging property. If, after crying, he or she then begins to display responses consistent with level 4, crying will no longer be viewed as a sign of immaturity.
With that change in my “Responding to Criticism” model, I thought that had put an end to the topic of crying, but then I noticed how embarrassed many folks are if they cry in front of others, typically apologizing and feeling guilty. So I wrote a post about this titled, “I’m Sorry For The Tears.” That post also led to some heartfelt responses. For example, one reader wrote:
I think it is great to get a conversation going about crying. I actually became so emotionally cut off for a period that I didn’t cry for about 10 years. When I began to let my emotions move again though and started to be able to let some tears fall again, I felt that it actually was extremely healthy for me. The tears seem to help emotions move and process through me far better than just forcing them down inside myself like I did for so long. I think the stigma against crying is an unhealthy one, and yes I feel that it is great to develop other tools for processing emotions as well, so that we can have many options for processing the hard things in our lives.
Incredibly, the topic of crying continues to be brought up by readers of this blog, thus leading me to write several additional posts delving into more and more subtle domains. Examples of these can be found in posts titled “Am I Bad for Feeling Sad?” and “Tears at the U.S. Open.”
And now, recently, I was listening to Bob Dylan’s Street Legal album and the song, “Baby, Stop Crying” came on. It led me to to think about today’s question, “Is it okay to ask someone to stop crying?”
Dylan’s Song, “Baby, Stop Crying”
To begin thinking about this, let’s take a quick look at some of the lyrics of Dylan’s song, which he sings, it seems to me, with a bit of annoyance, although we can see in the lyrics he’s trying at the same time to be compassionate:
You been down to the bottom with a bad man, babe
But you’re back where you belong
….
Baby, please stop crying, stop crying, stop crying
Baby, please stop crying, stop crying, stop crying
Baby, please stop crying
You know, I know, the sun will always shine
So baby, please stop crying ’cause it’s tearing up my mind
Go down to the river, babe Honey, I will meet you there Go down to the river, babe Honey, I will pay your fare
…. If you’re looking for assistance, babe Or if you just want some company Or if you just want a friend you can talk to Honey, come and see about me …. You been hurt so many times And I know what you’re thinking of Well, I don’t have to be no doctor, babe To see that you’re madly in love
Baby, please stop crying, stop crying, stop crying Baby, please stop crying, stop crying, stop crying Baby, please stop crying You know, I know, the sun will always shine So baby, please stop crying ’cause it’s tearing up my mind
How well did the character in the song handle this crying situation? In thinking about this, I think we can agree that when someone is crying, there are times when it can be annoying. For example, I was once in a hotel room, extremely tired, trying to fall asleep. A baby on the other side of my wall began to let it all out at the top of her or his lungs. I recognized that it wasn’t the baby’s fault, and as a parent myself, I felt some compassion for what was going on. Nevertheless, I sure wished that baby would please stop crying.
I stayed silent. Some time later, upon reflection, I came to think I probably would have been wise to have called the front desk to see if another room was available, but I just laid there fuming for quite some time until I finally dozed off.
In the Dylan song, the character he created is not a baby, he cares about her, but pleads with her to stop crying. He tries to be helpful by offering to pay her fare to go to a more pleasant place–the river. He also lets her know that if she wants to have a friend to talk with, he’s more than willing to make himself available. He does say please, when pleading for her to stop crying.
Is there anything wrong with this approach?
For me, personally, with the exception of the crying baby in the hotel example, and a few times when I was shopping in a store where a baby was loudly crying in an ear piercing manner, I don’t recall experiencing annoyance from anyone crying. Instead, I welcome the opportunity to offer my empathetic support. To me, empathy is the capacity to feel the experiences, needs, aspirations, frustrations, sorrows, joys, anxieties, hurt, or hunger of others as if they were her or his own. It feels natural to me to remain present and to communicate that I care.
That said, I certainly recognize not everyone is the same as me. So, let me try to put myself in the shoes of the character in the song.
Hmmm. Well, if the person identified as babe in the song is crying and it begins to wear on my nerves, I don’t think I would ask her to please stop crying. I guess what I would do is say something like, “Babe, I’m going to take a walk around the block for a few minutes to deal with some feelings that are coming up within me regarding what you are going through. I’ll be back as soon as I can, and then if you think of anything I can do to help, please let me know.” As I prepare to leave, I might go over to her, give her a tender kiss on the cheek, and a gentle loving touch on the back of her shoulder.
I wonder how others feel about this. I invite your thoughts and expressions of your emotional reactions.
My Best,
Jeff
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional and social intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
Welcome to From Insults to Respect. Today we explore the wisdom of flinging two related insults at Donald Trump’s supporters–insults that fall under the general headings of “crazy” and “mental illness.” Let’s begin with the “crazy” insults.
The “Crazy” Insults
Attorney General William Barr announces DOJ found no evidence of fraud that would overturn the election results.
Trump, by all authoritative analyses, lost the 2020 election by approximately seven million votes, as well as an ample number of electoral votes. Despite this, he has, and continues to claim, he won by a landslide.
Moreover when he took government documents that he was not legally permitted to take, his lawyers had to have made clear to him this was a felony, the penalty of which is time in prison. Because a large majority of his supporters say they believe his claims and that he has done nothing wrong, many Americans think they have made sense of this by viewing his supporters as crazy. Is this wise?
“Crazy” is a concept used when people are puzzled about the actions of others or themselves. By using this type of name calling, it really doesn’t provide any clarification, but to some, they think it does. So, we might hear something like the following conversation:
“What’s going on with these Trump supporters who believe he won the election?”
“They’re crazy.”
“Yeah, that’s gotta be it.”
I understand a great many people are just fine with using the crazy concept. Nevertheless, I would like you to consider the following possibility.
Thinking crazy is really the explanation for why people believe as they do about Trump serves to reduce a degree of angst. Since angst can be experienced as uncomfortable, it makes some sense people might be motivated to reduce it. However, if instead, we adopt the choice to maintain this angst and come to experience it as pleasantly challenging and useful, it may lead to deeper insights.
The angst, when used in the pleasantly challenging manner, according to this theory, prods us to continue searching for understanding while keeping the door open for insights to drift in. The history of science validates the enormous progress that can be made by people who refused to let difficult problems be set aside by a nonsense concept posing as a reasonable answer.
Is the Mental Illness Concept Better than the Crazy Concept?
Trump’s supporters, in addition to being called crazy, have repeatedly been called mentally ill as a way to make sense of what seems to be irrational. Because the mental illness concept is supported by many doctors, including many psychiatrists and psychologists, some folks have been left with the impression that it must be a more sound, scientific concept than “crazy.” Is it?
Two Contrasting Opinions About One Particular “Diagnosis”
To explore this issue, let us first take a look at how the term was used against Trump in a January 11, 2021 article. It appears in Scientific American, was written by Tanya Lewis, and is titled, “The ‘Shared Psychosis’ of Donald Trump and His Loyalists.”
Dr. Lee
There we learn that psychiatrist Bandy X. Lee is affiliated with Yale University’s Department of Psychiatry, and has diagnosed those who are loyal to Trump as having the serious mental illness she calls “shared psychosis.” According to Dr. Lee, this refers to:
…the infectiousness of severe symptoms that goes beyond ordinary group psychology. When a highly symptomatic individual is placed in an influential position, the person’s symptoms can spread through the population through emotional bonds, heightening existing pathologies and inducing delusions, paranoia and propensity for violence—even in previously healthy individuals.
Although this may or may not sound plausible to you, framing it as a diagnosis based on sound scientific evidence has led to serious problems for Dr. Lee.
Dr. John Krystal
Shortly after her so called diagnosis, her boss at Yale, Dr. John Krystal, fired her. He had first provided her the following warning, “The recklessness of your comments creates the appearance that they are self-serving in relation to your personal political beliefs and other possible personal aspirations.”
A New York Postarticle titled, “Yale Psychiatrist Says She Was Fired For Calling Trump and Supporters Mentally Ill,” further develops this story. There we learn Dr. Lee has become embroiled in a lawsuit in an effort to regain her job.
“Since she was acting on a citizen’s duty to contribute her gifts to society … her speech is protected under the First Amendment,” her lawsuit claimed.
“Trump’s presidency represented an emergency which not only allowed, but required, psychiatrists in the United States to sound the alarms,” her legal team said of her “professional responsibility to protect society.”
“Trump’s mental health was affecting the mental health” of everyone in the US, “placing the country at grave risk and undermining democracy itself.”
Supporters of President Donald Trump hold signs as they attend a “Stop The Steal” rally.
Now, to be upfront about my own opinion about Trump, personally I disagree with him and his supporters about who actually fairly won the election. Moreover, there are a number of theories that I have been mulling over as I try to understand the reasons why his supporters have concluded his claims are true. At the same time, as a supporter of the principles of science, I recognize the importance of distinguishing my theories from facts. Dr. Lee’s theory, when couched as a doctor’s diagnosis, in my opinion, runs afoul of this principle.
Clarifying the Difference Between A So Called Psychiatric Diagnosis and The Cause For a Mental Health Concern
When psychiatrists use their mental illness classification system and call it a diagnostic system, they do so despite numerous scientific arguments about its shortcomings (see HERE for a full description of these). In brief, the “mental illness” concept is way too subjectively defined, and the vast majority of the specific mental illness labels, such as anxiety disorder, psychosis, etc., have insufficient reliability and evidence of validity to be considered scientific. Moreover, a diagnostic system speaks to etiology, that is, the cause, set of causes, or manner of causation of a disease or condition. These psychiatric labels do not come with any proof of what is the cause of what is being labeled.
To clarify what I mean by this, let us take a look at a condition with which we can all easily understand.
You have trouble starting your car. You bring it to Fred, your friendly local mechanic. On hearing your concern, he provides an initial theory of what is causing this—perhaps your car needs a new starter. This is the initial “theoretical” diagnosis. Then, Fred inspects the starter and finds that it is in fine shape. Thus, his original theory of what is wrong proves incorrect. He then theorizes that your spark plugs are dirty. He takes a look and finds that they are indeed dirty. He cleans them up, puts them back in their proper place, and the car starts right up. In the end, he “diagnosed” what was wrong with your car—it had dirty spark plugs.
Now, let us say Fred, instead, had just asked you a few questions. Then, before finding out what was the cause of why your car had not been starting, he told you that the problem is that your car has “Major Nonstarting Disorder.” This statement is very different than “diagnosing” your car’s problem unless we want to dramatically expand the definition so it loses any precision.
The psychiatric mental illness diagnostic system is described in a manual published with the title, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). There it refers to itself as a manual for making diagnoses. This masks the difference between the following three types of statements:
“My theory is that the reason your car is not starting is that it has a broken starter.”
“The cause for your car not starting is it has dirty spark plugs.”
“Your car has ‘Major Nonstarting Disorder.’”
The first statement offers some theory for understanding the cause for what someone believes has gone wrong. The second statement indicates that the cause for what has gone wrong has been clearly established. The third statement just restates the expressed concern or concerns in some jargon. The only real diagnosis in the three statements is statement 2. Statement 1 is a theory of what the diagnosis may be.
The DSM does not claim its so called “diagnostic classifications” are just a theory of what the cause is for the expressed concern; it doesn’t even provide a theory. The manual’s developers explicitly say it is theory neutral. The DSM labels are just type 3 statements, that is, just statements that restate expressed concerns into medical jargon. Thus, the lack of reliability and validity for the DSM classifications and applying the word “diagnosis” to them in a misleading, imprecise manner are just three of its many serious principles of science violations.
Contrast psychiatry’s DSM “diagnosis” system with a diagnosis system used by other doctors. If someone comes to a virologist expressing a concern about being feverish, having difficulty breathing, and loss of taste, the doctor will label these as the patient’s medical complaints, rather then simply translating the complaints into medical jargon and then claiming the jargon constitutes the diagnosis. Instead, the virologist, after writing down the various complaints, will then look for the cause for these complaints. If it is found that there is the presence of the Covid 19 virus, the doctor will say the diagnosis is a Covid 19 infection.
Now, in Dr. Lee’s legal case, we learn that she goes beyond utilizing the DSM-like label of “Shared Psychoses.” She actually provides a theory of what her concern is regarding Trump supporters. However, she doesn’t clearly state that her theory is just a theory. Thus, when people put together that she is a doctor, along with her claim that she has made her “diagnosis,” unscientific conclusions are readily made by the public.
A Brief Story To Illustrate The Problem Of Using Mental Illness Terms As Explanations
On one fine spring day, I was sitting on a Central Park bench and two women were sitting one bench just to my right reading their newspapers. Suddenly, one of them cried out, “Sophie, can you believe this! The story I’m reading here, oh my God! This young boy, seventeen years old mind you, the same age as my Jonathan, he’s struggling with ideas about suicide. Seventeen years old, his whole life before him and he wants to kill himself. What would lead a boy to this?”
“Such a young boy, Bessie?”
“Yes. My God.”
“He must have some type of mental illness.”
“Oh, you’re right, Sophie. I just glanced at the next paragraph, and a psychiatrist explains that the boy has a mental illness called major depressive disorder.”
With that explanation, the two women nodded to one another, and continued on to another story, seemingly satisfied that they now knew why the boy was dealing with this issue.
Story Discussion
This notion that when a psychiatrist says someone has a mental illness, or some type of mental illness, that this offers a valid explanation for why the person is struggling with personal difficulties is, as far as I’m concerned, a bunch of nonsense. Just before the incident in the park, I had seen a performance of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, which tells the story of a boy about the same age as the one in the story Bessie was reading and is also struggling with feelings of committing suicide. As Shakespeare’s story unfolds, the audience is presented with a character that has motivations, conflicts, frustrations, disturbing situations and emotions. In the end, I left with some insights into why a character such as Hamlet might struggle with feelings of suicide.
In my opinion, even a play, which lasts but two or three hours, can only provide in its narrative a simplified account of what real life stories are all about. And yet, in today’s world, for many people a very different type of play is sufficient for providing the reason why someone is dealing with a challenging concern. This new type of play begins with the curtain rising. A character says to the audience he is struggling with feelings of suicide. A psychiatrist then proclaims the character has the mental disorder known as major depressive disorder, and then the curtain comes down. That’s the whole play. And people walk away fully satisfied that an adequate explanation has been provided.
Conclusion
That said, I leave you with the following suggestion: If you have a theory of why people continue to support Trump and his continued claims that he won the 2020 presidential election by a landslide, let those with whom you want to share your theory know it is a “theory,” and forgo the mental illness name calling. By doing so, you may not get as many cheers from people who agree with you. Nevertheless, among people truly seeking to deepen their understanding of this difficult to understand phenomenon, you will be more respected. Moreover, for those who may disagree with your theory, they will appreciate your ability to distinguish fact from theory. You’ll come across, I theorize, as more open-minded and you will be modeling a higher level of discourse than what we have been hearing from many of our political leaders.
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional and social intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
Welcome to From Insults to Respect. Today we examine a conflict witnessed by millions that involves U.S. Congressman Jim Jordan at a U.S. House Coronavirus Hearing angrily questioning infectious disease expert Dr. Fauci. It can be viewed on YouTube HERE.
The conflict provides a real life event of interest, and not being ourselves embroiled in the immediacy of the situation, we can now reflect somewhat dispassionately at what occurred. We might, for example, upon reflection, come up with a more effective way to handle particular points in the conflict, and then be better prepared when we find ourselves in a similar situation. So, with that in mind, let’s move on to a brief summary of the conflict, look at some of the actual transcript of the two parties engaging during the hearing, and a critique of how the two participants acted.
The Conflict
Briefly, Congressman Jordan desired to defend the U.S. Constitution and the liberty of Americans. In his view, interfering with his desire are a set of recommendations developed by the CDC that Dr. Fauci has given voice to as part of the job the current president has hired him to do. Jordan appears to believe Dr. Fauci is guilty of promoting recommendations that interfere with liberty and the Constitution. At the same time, Dr. Fauci desires to do his job without facing personal attacks and a style of questioning that he referred to as ranting.
As the video of the conflict moves forward, it becomes apparent that Jordan wants Dr. Fauci to describe what objective criteria he will be using to determine when the restrictions on liberty will no longer be necessary. Additionally, he wants Dr. Fauci to tell him how much longer it will be until that criteria is met.
At first, Dr. Fauci is reluctant to describe the objective measure, explaining it depends on a variety of ever changing conditions, such as the percentage of people who will agree to be vaccinated, how resistant new emerging variants of the virus will be to the available vaccines, and other factors that can sprout up. But, after making clear that any estimate that he gives must be viewed as very tentative, Dr. Fauci finally provides his best guess–when the number of daily infections drop to 10,000 a day, which may very well be reached by early to mid summer if the vast majority of people are vaccinated.
Once Dr. Fauci gives his best guess, Jordan, in an apparent effort to suggest that any guess by Dr. Fauci is worthless, said:
You said that when Texas ended their lockdown, ended their mandates, this was inexplicable and this would, quote, “lead to a surge in cases.” But Texas is at the bottom of the 50 states. But all of the states at the top are lockdown states. So, that guess didn’t look too good. What explains why Texas is so darn low as compared to the rest of the states. Lockdown states have a much higher rate than the state of Texas which over a month ago said that we’re not going to have all these lockdowns and all of these mandates that you say we have to have a lockdown.
Dr. Fauci replied:
There’s a difference between lockdowns and the people obeying the lockdown. You know, you can have a situation where they say we’re going to lockdown and yet you have people doing exactly what they want to do.
It is at this point that Jordan’s time for questioning expired. So, now let’s turn to some of the transcript of the conflict that reveals some exchanges between the two parties that I think are worthwhile to critique.
Some Key Conflict Moments
Jordan began his questioning of Dr. Fauci as follows:
Jordan: Dr. Fauci, when is the time? When, in your written statement you say, “Now is not the time to pull back on masking, physical distancing, and avoiding congregating settings. When is the time? When do Americans get their freedom back?
Dr. Fauci: When we get the levels of infection in this country low enough that it is not a really high threat.
Jordan: What is low enough? Give me a number. I mean, we have had fifteen days to slow the spread that turned into one year of blocked liberty. What metric, what measure, what has to happen before Americans can get their freedom back?
Dr. Fauci: My message, Congressman Jordan, is to get as many people vaccinated as quickly as possible so we can, to get the level of infection in this country low so that it is no longer a threat. That is when, and I believe when that happens you will see…
Jordan, interrupting Fauci: What determines when?
Dr. Fauci: I’m sorry…
Jordan: What measure. I mean, are we just going to continue forever. When do we get to the point? What measure, what objective outcome do we have to reach before Americans get their liberty and freedom back?
Dr. Fauci: You know, you are indicating liberty and freedom. I look at it as a public health measure that keeps people from dying and going to the hospital.
Up to this point, Congressman Jordan’s questioning had been energetic, but to my ear, reasonably respectful, while Dr. Fauci’s tone was level headed and calm. Now, Jordan turns his tone to one that strikes me as exasperation and disbelief:
Jordan, his voice has become louder: You don’t think that American liberties have been threatened the past year, Dr Fauci? They’ve been assaulted, their liberties have.
Dr. Fauci: I don’t look at this as a liberty thing, Congressman Jordan…
Jordan, interrupting Dr. Fauci: Well, that’s obvious!
Dr. Fauci: …as a public health thing. I disagree with you…
Jordan, again interrupting: You think the Constitution is suspended during a virus, during a pandemic? Certainly not.
Dr. Fauci: This will for sure end when we get the level of infection very low. It is now at such a high level that there is a threat of major surges…
At this point, Jordan again interrupts in the middle of Dr. Fauci’s sentence and begins to list examples of Americans loss of liberty, and among them, he says, “The governor of our third largest state meets with physicians and that video is censored because it dared to disagree with Dr. Fauci, so I just want to know when Americans are going to get their liberties back.”
Dr. Fauci: You know, I don’t think anything was censored because they couldn’t disagree with me. I think you are making this a personal thing and it isn’t.
Jordan: It’s not a personal thing.
Dr. Fauci: No, you are. That is exactly what you are doing.
Jordan: No. Your recommendations carry a lot of weight, Dr. Fauci. We just had the chair of the financial services committee saying she loves you and you’re the greatest thing in the world.
Dr. Fauci: My answers are consistent with [cross talk] may I answer the question please. My recommendations are not a personal recommendation. They are based on the CDC guidance and which are underscored by…
Jordan, interrupting, says: And I’m asking the question, What measures have to be attained before Americans get their first amendment liberties back?
Dr, Fauci, now sounding clearly annoyed: I just told you that!
Jordan: You haven’t given anything specific. You said we hope, tell me something specific.
Dr. Fauci: Right now we have about sixty thousand infections a day, which is a very large risk for a surge. We’re not talking about liberties, we’re talking about a pandemic that has killed 560,000 Americans. That’s what we are talking about.
Jordan: And I don’t disagree with that. And I understand how serious that is. But I also understand businesses have been shut down, people can’t assemble in their own home with their family, people can’t go to their loved one’s funeral… [he gives many more examples of loss of liberty] and I want to know when Americans will get their first amendment liberties back.
Dr. Fauci: Well, you just said people can’t assemble in their own homes. They can. That’s a CDC recommendation. [after some crosstalk Dr. Fauci continues] You are going to see a gradual, from, right now we are at an unacceptable high level, regardless of who you are. We’re going to see, as more and more people are vaccinated and we get over three million people a day, you are going to see the level of infection go down and down, and gradually there will be more flexibility to doing the things you are talking about.
Jordan: What number do we get our liberties back? Tell me the number.
Dr. Fauci, after some crosstalk: I can’t give a number.
At this point, Jordan’s time for questioning expires, but he gets to have another round of questioning a little later. He begins with repeating his earlier question, “Can you give us a specific indication, some outcome that will have to be attained, so Americans know when they are going to get their liberties back.”
Dr. Fauci: You are asking for a number. If I have a number, it would have to be my best estimate, and that would be that when the number of infections a day are well below ten thousand a day. At that point, there would be a gradual pulling back of a number of the restrictions you are talking about, particularly when people are vaccinated more and more because a combination of, if you are vaccinated you are protecting yourself for sure, and the more people who get vaccinated in the community, the lower the number of infections will be.
Jordan: Well, give us an idea. I mean, you’ve given us thoughts on all types of subjects, you’ve opined on all kinds of issues. Give us your guess then.
Dr. Fauci: I just did.
Jordan: No, you didn’t. You didn’t give us a time. Are we going to be here two years from now still wearing masks?
Dr. Fauci: You’re ranting again.
Jordan: No, I’m not ranting.
Dr. Fauci: You are.
Dr. Fauci eventually gives his tentative estimate that most restrictions may be lifted early to mid-summer.
Critiquing the Conflict Management Skills of Congressman Jordan and Dr. Fauci
Let’s begin with Congressman Jordan. Most of his questions were relevant and initially he doesn’t sound particularly belligerent. In my opinion, he could have done better throughout by asking his questions in a warm and friendly manner. When Dr. Fauci made a few comments that Jordan objected to, rather than utilizing the conflict resolution skill of disagreeing without being disagreeable, he instead angrily raises his voice and repeatedly interrupts Dr. Fauci in mid-sentence. What would disagreeing without being disagreeable have looked like in their exchange? I think by empathetically providing statements from time to time that indicated he knows Dr. Fauci has been the bearer of bad news throughout the pandemic and that’s a rough situation to be in, could have helped to traverse some of the roughest terrain of this conflict.
Now, let’s turn to critiquing Dr. Fauci’s handling of the conflict. With the exception of three brief moments, I think he kept his tone of voice in a matter of fact manner that was fitting for this occasion. Where he faltered on this score will be discussed shortly.
Dr. Fauci also answered the questions posed to him in a manner that struck me as fair given the number of factors in steady flux. His biggest mistake, in my opinion, occurred by not taking advantage of making a connection with Jordan on their shared values.
What do I mean by this? Let’s go back to the transcript when after Jordan is expressing his frustration about the loss of liberty that has occurred during the pandemic and his interest in defending the U.S. Constitution, Dr. Fauci replies:
You know, you are indicating liberty and freedom. I look at it as a public health measure that keeps people from dying and going to the hospital.
Although I get the point Dr. Fauci was making here–his job is to provide recommendations to slow the rate of infection and elected officials are in charge of what recommendations are to be mandated–I nevertheless think Dr. Fauci would have done far better to have answered somewhat like the following:
I share with you the love of liberty and freedom, Congressman Jordan, and well recognize the enormous frustrations that have been ongoing during this pandemic. The restrictions about family gatherings have been awfully hard, numerous people who have a business ended up with devastating losses, people have lost their job, and on and on, all of this has been terribly difficult to deal with emotionally as well as financially. And yet, according to the best scientific data we have available, if we did nothing to try to decrease the spread hundreds of thousands of more people would have died, and hospital personnel would have been even more overwhelmed than they had become at the height of the U.S. experience with this pandemic.
Congressman Jordan, I fully share your love of the Constitution and the desire and obligation to defend it. And in sharing these values, I take note of the context where liberty is explicitly mentioned in the Constitution. In its preamble it states its purpose is, and I quote, “…establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.”
By being embroiled in our current effort to provide for the common defense against our current enemy, the virus, we might find it easy to lose sight of the full context of the Constitution that mentions, justice, tranquility, welfare, and liberty. Therefore, it makes sense to take a step back to recall from our history our fight against our common enemy during World War II.
At that time, we pulled together as one nation, and yes, there were sacrifices that were made to some liberties. There was rationing of many items, men had to leave their jobs to enter into war zones where bullets were flying toward them and bombs going off. Women who wanted to be with their husband and raise their children had to put this aside to go to work in stifling factories. There was some censorship of citizens who sought to provide aid and comfort to the enemy. Meanwhile, the welfare of the soldiers was provided for at the expense of taxpayers, and not all citizens were happy about this.
Now we are engaged in providing a common defense to battle this pandemic, a battle that has led to the deaths in one year of nearly twice the total number of deaths that occurred during the four years of World War II. Sacrifices are being made. I’m not happy about them, but I was hired by the president to provide my recommendations based on science and a vetting process involving experts at the CDC, to decrease the spread of the virus. Consistent with our Constitution, it is up to our elected officials to decide which recommendations to make mandatory. Citizens have the right to file a suit in court if they believe their rights are being violated.
With regards to the U.S. Constitution’s goal of insuring domestic tranquility, I have observed that a number of our elected officials have been working very much against this principle, and instead are fanning the flames of hatred and division. I ask all of us here today who share the values written in our Constitution to be mindful of the full context of all that is wisely written there.
If Dr. Fauci would have made these types of connections with Jordan’s values, it may very well have taken the wind out of Jordan’s sails, tempering his ire.
Now let’s turn our attention to the three times Dr. Fauci’s matter of fact tone went a bit off the rails. The first of these occasions occurred when Jordan blamed him for a video that was censored. Dr. Fauci objected while having this exchange:
Dr. Fauci: You know, I don’t think anything was censored because they couldn’t disagree with me. I think you are making this a personal thing and it isn’t.
Jordan: It’s not a personal thing.
Dr. Fauci: No, you are. That is exactly what you are doing.
Although I agree with Dr. Fauci’s point that Jordan was coming off as making it personal in words and tone of voice, Fauci’s response, in my opinion as someone trained in conflict resolution, is less than ideal. In conflict resolution we often teach people to make “I” statements rather than insisting on an opinion. Thus, Dr. Fauci might have done better if instead of saying, “No, you are. That is exactly what you are doing,” he said pleasantly, “Well, although you don’t view it as a personal thing, I’m experiencing it as exactly that. To be clear, I did not advocate that the video be censored, and I fully support freedom of speech.”
The second point at which Dr. Fauci went a bit off the rails was during this exchange:
Jordan, interrupting, says: And I’m asking the question, What measures have to be attained before Americans get their first amendment liberties back?
Dr. Fauci, now sounding clearly annoyed: I just told you that!
Jordan: You haven’t given anything specific. You said we hope, tell me something specific.
I get why Dr. Fauci was exasperated at this point. He believed he had provided the best answer available, but I do think Jordan was in his rights to ask for a more specific guess. Dr. Fauci eventually did provide more specifics that came when Jordan made this request.
Shortly after this exchange, the third time Dr. Fauci went off the rails, in my opinion, occurred when he accused Jordan of ranting. After Jordan denied this, Dr. Fauci insisted that he is ranting. This moved the conversation to a long, irrelevant period during which Jordan’s anger apparently had greatly increased, and he went into a long paragraph defending himself, saying he’s an elected official, Dr. Fauci is not, Dr. Fauci’s salary is very high, and on and on.
Dr. Fauci’s frustration with Jordan’s interruptions and his angry tone of voice is understandable. And though ranting may have been an accurate description, most people would view Dr. Fauci’s comment as an insult. Insulting someone in the middle of a conflict just leads to more trouble than it is worth. I think Dr. Fauci would have been better off just saying something like, “Congressman Jordan, I am having a hard time dealing with your tone and frequent interruptions. I understand you have strong feelings about this, as I certainly do. Maybe we need a break so I can deal with how I’m feeling.”
Well, those are a few thoughts that came to mind while observing this congressional exchange. I’d love to get other views.
Wishing for all of you to stay safe,
Jeff
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
As I write this post, we are into the third week of the trial of former police officer Derek Chauvin. The trial involves Mr Chauvin’s use of force with George Floyd, which began when a store employer from Cup Foods was paid by Floyd with a counterfeit $20 bill to purchase some cigarettes. When a store employer demanded that Floyd return the cigarettes, he refused, and consequently the employer called the police.
At 8:08, police officers Kueng and Lane arrived, briefly entered Cup Foods, and then crossed the street to Floyd’s SUV. At 8:12, a mere four minutes after arriving, the two officers had handcuffed Floyd, and Kueng had assisted Floyd to sit on the sidewalk against the wall in front of a restaurant.
At 8:13, Kueng and Lane told Floyd he was under arrest and walked him to their police car across the street. When the officers tried to get Floyd to enter the back of the police car, Floyd fell to his knees, clearly not wanting to enter the vehicle, and he explained, he was not resisting, but that he was recovering from COVID-19, that he was claustrophobic, had anxiety, and that he did not want to sit in the car. Despite this, Kueng and Lane continued to try to put him in the car, while Floyd begged them not to, repeatedly saying “I can’t breathe” and offering to lie on the ground instead.
At 8:17, officers Chauvin and Thao arrived in another police car, joining Kueng and Lane and two other officers who arrived in another police car, with Chauvin assuming command. By 8:19, two minutes after arriving, Chauvin pulls Floyd away from the police car, Floyd falls to the pavement, and while Floyd lay on his chest with his cheek to the ground, still handcuffed, Chauvin begins to press his knee against Floyd’s neck. Meanwhile, Kueng applies pressure to Floyd’s torso, and Lane applies pressure to Floyd’s legs.
By now, anyone reading this post well knows that after more than nine minutes with Mr Chauvin holding his knee against Mr Floyd’s neck, Mr Floyd ends up dead.
A Call For More De-Escalation Training
Shortly after this awful incident, the media became awash with calls for police to learn de-escalation strategies. According to a Scientific Americanarticle, “de-escalation aims to decrease the use of force against civilians by teaching officers techniques to slow things down and use time, space and communication to find an alternative.” Moreover, the article reports that:
I found myself pleased to see so many were thinking about de-escalation after this awful incident. Nevertheless, I became frustrated because none of the articles bothered to describe in a detailed manner what a de-escalation approach would look like starting at the point Chauvin arrived to arrest Floyd. So, I thought it would be worthwhile for me to offer one approach for your consideration.
A Proposed De-escalation Approach For Dealing With The Type Of Situation Chauvin Faced
In the situation we are discussing when Chauvin arrived and assumed command, Floyd had no weapon and his hands were handcuffed behind his back. Let’s imagine it was me who assumed command in this type of situation.
Me to officers on the scene: What’s going on?
Officer Lane: We are trying to arrest Mr Floyd for allegedly trying to pass a fake $20 bill to buy cigarettes. Mr Floyd is reluctant to be placed in the patrol car.
Me: Did he explain why?
Officer Lane: He said he is recovering from COVID-19, that he’s claustrophobic, has anxiety, and when we tried to get him in the car he began to cry out that he is having trouble breathing. He says he is willing to lie down on the ground instead.
Me: Okay, let’s stop trying to push him into the car, and give me some time to discuss this with Mr Floyd. [I go over to Mr Floyd, and say] Hi Mr Floyd, I’m Officer Jeff Rubin, how are you?
Mr Floyd: I can’t get into the car, I’m claustrophobic, and when they try to put me in there, I start to have trouble breathing.
Me: I see. I understand being claustrophobic can bring on an anxiety attack, and that can make breathing hard. I’m here to see if I can help. Let’s slow things down. I’m not going to rush you to do anything. Take some time to catch your breath. Is there anything I can get for you, a drink, or something else?
Mr Floyd: No, I just need to settle down for a few minutes.
Me: That’s fine. Take your time. Please keep in mind this whole incident involves a fake $20 bill and a few cigarettes. The last thing that you want to do is to end up with a resisting arrest charge, or even worse, an assaulting an officer charge, both much more serious charges. If we bring you in without any more trouble, I’ll write in my report that you had some anxiety about getting into the police car but after a little breather, you were fully cooperative. That would be enormously helpful for you. So, take all the time you need to settle down, and let me know if I can be of any help in any way. [Then I would wait, planning to not say anything for up to fifteen minutes, unless Floyd begins to show some indication he wanted to express his anxiety about what he is experiencing. If so, I would empathize with his feelings. To illustrate this, let’s see what that might look like in our next exchange].
Mr Floyd: Oh, man, when my brother Philo finds out about this, man, he’s gonna kill me. Oh, man!
Me, showing concern: You’re worried how your brother is going to take this.
Mr Floyd: Man, he’s gonna go nuts!
Me: It’s not a pleasant feeling when someone in your family gets upset with you, is it?
Mr Floyd: Man! (Then, after a brief pause) He’ll stick by me though, he always does.
Me: Nice.
Me, after 15 minutes has passed: How are you doing now, Mr Floyd?
Mr Floyd: I still need a few more minutes.
Me: OK, take a little more time. Keep in mind that we can move you into the car real slow, and I’ll go with you for the ride if you want. We can talk the whole way, and the whole ride will be over in 5 minutes. You want to give that a try?
Mr Floyd: Oh my God, my kids! What am I gonna do about them?
Me: It sounds to me like you really care about your kids (said in a warm and concerned tone).
Mr Floyd: I got five of them, and two grandkids. When I lost my job because of Covid, man, I haven’t been much help.
Me: This Covid virus has really turned a lot of lives upside down (said sadly).
Five minutes later, me: Are you starting to get ready?
Mr Floyd: Not yet, I still need some time to deal with this. Maybe I could use a drink of water.
Me: Officer Lane, please go in the store and buy a bottle of water for Mr Floyd. I’ll reimburse you out of petty cash.
Discussion
Dr Jeffrey Rubin
By now, you have gotten a sense of how I would have handled the situation. Every 15 minutes I would ask Mr Floyd how he is doing, empathize, and then ask him calmly if he was ready to give it a try to go to the station. From time to time I would tell him that if he starts to try and becomes too anxious, he could sit back down on the pavement until he is ready to try again.
Now, this approach may seem like it would take way too long for busy police officers to carry out, but bear in mind that the way Chauvin handled the situation, hundreds of hours and millions of dollars have been consumed. Also bear in mind that most people who are being arrested quickly cooperate with police officers to avoid being charged with resisting arrest. From my experience, typically the approach I’m advocating comes to an end within 15 to 30 minutes because people get tired of just sitting on the pavement with pedestrians passing by with puzzled looks on their faces.
So, there you have it, one specific description of what a de-escalation approach might look like. I present it as a jumping off point for further discussions on this deeply troubling episode. To my readers, please, if you will, chime in with suggestions about what you don’t like about this approach, and what might be an improvement.
My Best,
Jeff
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional and social intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
Welcome to From Insults To Respect. Today’s topic: How might parents wisely respond to their teenager’s experience with depression?
Imagine your thirteen-year-old teenage daughter begins to express a concern about being depressed. Many in the psychiatric profession, heavily backed up by the pharmaceutical industry, would urge you to make an appointment with a psychiatrist as fast as you can. That approach typically leads to the doctor encouraging your daughter to take pills referred to as “antidepressants.” The main argument that is made for beginning this type of treatment is, “untreated depression is associated with an increased risk of suicide.”
This fear arousing comment frequently works because parents tend to jump from this statement to the thought that treatment with so-called antidepressants either eliminates this risk or significantly reduces it. But a large body of evidence suggests just the opposite: That the use of antidepressants doesn’t reduce the risk of suicide, but actually appears to increase it. At the same time many studies have been suggesting that depression is an inherently temporal phenomenon and most episodes will remit spontaneously even in the absence of treatment. There is reason to believe that depression is often beneficial and an adaptation that evolved because it keeps individuals focused on complex social issues until they can be resolved. Medications, although they sometimes appear to work by suppressing symptoms, they do so in a manner that leaves the underlying episode unaddressed and patients at elevated risk of relapse whenever they are taken away. Moreover, these drugs are associated with a number of troubling side effects, and many find that once they start using them, stopping them can lead to some awful withdrawal reactions that are far worse than the initial experience of depression.
Long before these drugs became available, William James, arguably the most brilliant American psychologist of all time, was forced to address his 13-year-old daughter’s struggle with depression. This was back in May 1900, while James was himself suffering from heart problems.
After failing to get satisfactory care from doctors in the United States, professor James and his wife went to Europe to see if he could find a more helpful doctor. His daughter, Peg, was left with family friends, Mr. and Mrs. Clarke, and their children. Upon receiving several letters from Peg expressing the difficulties she was going through, James wrote her a long, thoughtful reply, which I present for your consideration.
The Letter
Darling Peg,
Your letter came last night and explained sufficiently the cause of your long silence. You have evidently been in a bad state of spirits again, and dissatisfied with your environment; and I judge that you have been still more dissatisfied with the inner state of trying to consume your own smoke, and grin and bear it, so as to carry out your mother’s behests made after the time when you scared us so by your inexplicable tragic outcries in those earlier letters. Well! I believe you have been trying to do the manly thing under difficult circumstances, but one learns only gradually to do the best thing; and the best thing for you would be to write at least weekly, if only a post-card, and say just how things are going. If you are in bad spirits, there is no harm whatever in communicating that fact, and defining the character of it, or describing it as exactly as you like. The bad thing is to pour out the contents of one’s bad spirits on others and leave them with it, as it were, on their hands, as if it was for them to do something about it. That was what you did in your other letter which alarmed us so, for your shrieks of anguish were so excessive, and so unexplained by anything you told us in the way of fact, that we didn’t know but what you had suddenly gone crazy. That is the worst sort of thing you can do. The middle sort of thing is what you do this time—namely, keep silent for more than a fortnight, and when you do write, still write mysteriously about your sorrows, not quite open enough.
Now, my dear little girl, you have come to an age when the inward life develops and when some people (and on the whole those who have most of a destiny) find that all is not a bed of roses. Among other things there will be waves of terrible sadness, which last sometimes for days; and dissatisfaction with one’s self, and irritation at others, and anger at circumstances and stony insensibility, etc., etc., which taken together form a melancholy. Now, painful as it is, this is sent to us for an enlightenment. It always passes off, and we learn about life from it, and we ought to learn a great many good things if we react on it rightly.
[From margin] (For instance, you learn how good a thing your home is, and your country, and your brothers, and you may learn to be more considerate of other people, who, you now learn, may have their inner weaknesses and sufferings, too.)
Many persons take a kind of sickly delight in hugging it; and some sentimental ones may even be proud of it, as showing a fine sorrowful kind of sensibility. Such persons make a regular habit of the luxury of woe. That is the worst possible reaction on it. It is usually a sort of disease, when we get it strong, arising from the organism having generated some poison in the blood; and we mustn’t submit to it an hour longer than we can help, but jump at every chance to attend to anything cheerful or comic or take part in anything active that will divert us from our mean, pining inward state of feeling. When it passes off, as I said, we know more than we did before. And we must try to make it last as short a time as possible. The worst of it often is that, while we are in it, we don’t want to get out of it. We hate it, and yet we prefer staying in it—that is part of the disease. If we find ourselves like that, we must make ourselves do something different, go with people, speak cheerfully, set ourselves to some hard work, make ourselves sweat, etc.; and that is the good way of reacting that makes of us a valuable character. The disease makes you think of yourself all the time; and the way out of it is to keep as busy as we can thinking of things and other people—no matter what’s the matter with our self.
I have no doubt you are doing as well as you know how, darling little Peg; but we have to learn everything, and I also have no doubt that you’ll manage it better if you ever have more of it, and soon it will fade away, simply leaving you with more experience. The great thing for you now, I should suppose, would be to enter as friendly as possible into the interest of the Clarke children. If you like them, or acted as if you like them, you need not trouble about the question of whether they like you or not. They probably will, fast enough; and if they don’t, it will be their funeral, not yours. But this is a great lecture, so I will stop. The great thing is that it is all true….
At this point in the letter, James changes the subject, explaining how his treatment for his heart problem is going, what he has been doing to deal with things back home even though he is thousands of miles away, and expressing frustration about the cold, sunless weather. He then concludes:
Your mother is sleeping, and will doubtless add a word to this when she wakes. Keep a merry heart—“time and hour run through the roughest day”—and believe me ever your most loving
W.J.
How did Peg end up after receiving this letter? She wrote to her mother that, “Papa’s letter was a beautiful one; it cheered me immensely.” She also said she was determined to act upon Papa’s advice; and “with God’s help I think I shall be a better girl.”
She went on to attend Bryn Mawr College, acted in a couple of plays, married, and had two children. She was viewed as the best of citizens in San Francisco, working with the civil rights group, supporting the Community Chest operations and heading up the Ladies’ Protection and Relief, and devoted her time as war began in 1939 to British War Relief. Throughout her life, she did have two more bouts with depression, but she handled them well. The last one, at her husband’s urging, she went with him hiking in the foothills near Santa Clara, and after a while, the exhilarating experience of being in the wonderful and exhilarating landscape, along with the lively exercise, led to the depression passing. The family legend pronounced this a California cure for a New England psychological illness.
My Interpretation
Dr Jeffrey Rubin
The letter begins as a response to a letter Peg had written to her parents after a long silence. Apparently, she had been led to be silent because of her mother’s urging that when she is in a bad state of spirits she should try to “consume her own smoke,” and grin and bear it.
For those who are not familiar with the phrase, it means to accept aggravations in silence and to react with an extra effort of hard work so that those about you may not be annoyed with the smoke, dust, and soot of your complaints. Plainly, James was not satisfied with this approach. Thus he explains to Peg that the best thing for her to do is to communicate with her parents at least weekly about how she is doing, including sharing with them if she is in bad spirits and describing it exactly as she would like.
James’ next words may sound contradictory. He tells Peg the worst thing for her to do is to pour out the contents of her bad spirits on others. And then he writes that because she refers to her sorrow in her most recent letter in too mysterious a manner, he wishes that she be more open about it.
I’m not really sure what distinction James was trying to make here. My best guess is he was trying to encourage her to avoid TAKING OUT her sad/upset feelings on others, but still speak openly about what she is feeling, at least to her parents.
James, in the end, chose to encourage Peg to express what she is going through as she wishes. I like this, particularly if what she expresses is to be received with empathy and love. Note that James signs off his letter with the words, “…believe me ever your most loving W.J.” I think this strikes exactly the right tone.
Elsewhere in the letter, James begins to frame Peg’s experience as helpful for producing “an enlightenment,” if “we react on it rightly.” The wrong way, according to James, is to get into the habit of accepting the woe without doing anything constructive about it. The right way is “to jump at every chance to attend to anything cheerful or comic or take part in anything active that will divert us from our mean, pining inward state of feeling.”
It is interesting that James suggests that when we act wrongly, it is “usually a sort of disease, when we get it strong, arising from the organism having generated some poison in the blood.” Two years later, in his classic book The Varieties of Religious Experience, he refers to this type of biological theory as “simple-minded” and “superficial medical talk.” To explain his position, he wrote that many so-called “healthy-minded” individuals believe that those who worry are “morbid minded” and “diseased,” but it may very well be true that “the world’s meaning most comes home to us when we lay them most to heart.” Like James, I view framing these challenging experiences as a type of disease as flawed. It is much more helpful to view them as useful tools that, if handled well, can potentially provide us with some enlightenment.
I also agree with James that there is a right way and a wrong way to deal constructively with our feelings of woe, but perhaps we differ on some specifics of what is to be viewed as wrong. James claimed in the letter that we must try to make our sad feelings last as briefly as possible and not an hour longer than we can help.
I believe that, rather than fighting against melancholy, we should allow ourselves some time to be with it, just as we would if an old friend came to visit. We can spend this time observing, in a nonjudgmental manner, the emotions drifting through us in a manner similar to a scientist observing a flock of birds flying off in the distant sky. When it comes to grief, we need not set some artificial time limit by which we “should be” through with the process.
Nevertheless, just as when a friend visits, after a while we come to recognize that it is best to move on to other valuable activities, just as James recommends. But later, we can go back to letting ourselves take some time to be with our sad feelings once again, going back and forth like this until the roughest parts of these experiences have passed. For me, taking time to be with my feelings like this, and also taking time to respond as James suggests, works very well. Similarly, if we can teach our children to accept and handle these ebbs and flows, it is likely to benefit us both.
I’m not suggesting that James would disagree with me on this issue. His encouragement for Peg to fully express her feelings to him and her mother at least weekly allows her to be fully and regularly with her feelings. Recent research indicates that folks going through a period of depression, if they write about what they are experiencing for a period of time, referred to as expressive writing, can be enormously helpful. He wrote his letter to Peg when he wasn’t feeling well, and in a day or two, with more time to reflect, he no doubt would have added far more nuance to this topic, some of which might well be in line with my own views.
Although the letter should not be viewed as a full account of James’ position on what to say to a child under similar circumstances, I offer it because it provides some relevant ideas for 21st-century parents to consider when deciding how best to respond to their children’s struggles.
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
Regular readers know that I have been presenting the theory that a powerful way to increase the respect that others have for you, and the respect you have for yourself, is to become a master at responding to criticism. To that end, I have presented a model that describes five levels of maturity for responding to criticism (see HERE and HERE). In this model, level 1 is viewed as the least mature, level 2 is viewed as more mature, and so on up to level 5. In addition to describing each of these levels, I presented the case that this model makes sense (see HERE and HERE), and I have, from time to time, provided examples of people using the most mature level in order to help individuals who choose to perfect this skill (see HERE,HERE, and HERE). Today, we will once again look over all five levels, and then, after a quick look at a level 5 example we discussed in an earlier post, we’ll then take an in depth look at a fresh new example.
Let’s take a look at these five levels.
Five Levels of Responding to Criticism
1. This level requires displaying one or more of the following:
Weeps or sobs with tears or pouts without also using level 4 response
Physically attacks the criticizer
Damages property
2. This level requires displaying one or more of the following:
Insults the criticizer (either with words, hand gestures, the sticking out of a tongue, the rolling of the eyes, or smirks)
Glares at the criticizer
Threatens the criticizer
Punches, kicks, or throws an object without physically hurting someone or damaging anything
Criticizes the criticizer without first fully addressing the original criticism.
3. This level requires displaying one or both of the following:
Displays defensiveness without directly insulting the criticizer (raising voice’s volume or pitch)
Displays a lack of interest either by verbally indicating this, or with nonverbal cues, or complete silence.
4. Level 4 individuals listen to the criticizer in a supportive, warm, friendly style, and then make it clear that they fully understand what was said. Moreover, they put the criticizer at ease by making statements that indicate that the wise learn from criticism. Some time is spent on showing that they are thinking about the criticism. If, after thinking about the criticism the criticism is deemed to be correct, they make a statement frankly indicating, “I can see your ideas have merit and I intend to use them in the future.” If they are not sure if they agree, they make a statement indicating that they are very interested in what was said, plan to think a little more about this over the next few days, and then they will be ready to discuss this further. If, after thinking about the criticism, the criticism is deemed to be incorrect, a statement is made designed to disagree without being disagreeable. More specifically, a sense of humor, some listening in a caring way and a few smiles help to traverse rough terrain. As the episode winds down, the criticizer is encouraged to feel comfortable communicating suggestions in the future.
5. In addition to actions consistent with level 4, people responding to criticism in a manner consistent with level 5 seek ways to use, whenever they disagree with the criticism, a technique known as steering in the direction the criticizer would prefer to go. That is, rather than just disagreeing without being disagreeable, the criticized person seeks to find a new choice of action that creatively utilizes some aspect suggested from the criticism. Steering cannot be incorporated into all situations, but it is an additional goal of the most mature individuals.
An Old Example and A New Example of a Level 5 Response
Old Example: Here’s a quick example of my responding to criticism at level 5 that I discussed in an earlier post. My wife, Andrea, and I were getting dressed to go to a party. When Andrea saw what shirt I put on, she criticized my choice, saying, “That’s not quite right for this occasion.”
Although I disagreed with her, before I began to tell her I disagreed, I silently asked myself, “Can I steer in the direction of Andrea’s criticism?”
I quickly realized that I have two other shirts that I would enjoy wearing to this party as much as the one I initially picked out. And so, I pulled them out of my closet and said, “Well, since you don’t like the one I picked out for this evening, how about either of these two?”
“Oh,” she says, “the one on the left would be perfect. Thanks, dear.”
Notice that despite disagreeing with Andrea’s criticism, I found a way to reach an agreement with which both of us were satisfied. Andrea felt that I listened to her concern and was appreciative that I would make an adjustment to please her.
New Example: Today’s new example comes from a beautifully written book I happened to be reading, The Known World, by Edward P. Jones. The story takes place in Virginia mostly before the Civil War. In this part of the story, a conflict has sprung up in the county involving Harvey and Clarence.
Harvey has sold to Clarence for $15 a scrawny cow with practically no meat on its bones. Prior to the deal, Harvey had lied to Clarence, claiming that the cow was a good milker, though in fact more milk fell from the sky than from the cow. After the sale, when Clarence found this out, he was getting pretty frustrated, but then one day, all of a sudden, the cow turned into an excellent milker, and continued to be so. When Harvey found out about this, he wanted the cow back because a cow flowing with milk was not what he had taken $15 for.
When Clarence refused, a feud began, with threats and guns being fired, some of the bullets landing pretty near the children. So, Clarence’s wife, Beth Ann, went to Sheriff John Skiffington. “We will kill him or he will kill us,” she cried.
When Sheriff Skiffington gets Clarence, Beth, and Harvey together to try to settle the conflict…
“You sell Clarence and Beth Ann that cow?” Skiffington asked Harvey.
“Yes, I did, John.”
“Well, that should be the end of it, Harvey,” Skiffington said. “The law is on Clarence’s side. Square bargain. Clean deal.”
It is at this point Harvey begins to criticize Sheriff John Skiffington’s position.
“Now wait here a minute, John,” Harvey said. “Maybe I shoulda got to you first and pled my case, steada bein second to testify like I am.”
“John, you can see what we had to wrestle with out here,” Beth Ann said. “This kinda talk and bullets to keep em company.”
“The only bullets were from your side.” Harvey looked at Skiffington. “Or are you to believe all her side on that too? Maybe if Clarence would stiffen up a—”
“I take no side but the right one,” Skiffington said to Harvey, and if you don’t believe that then you can turn around and go home.” He waited. “I ain’t got time to waste on this cow business, Harvey.” He and Harvey were now facing each other. Beth Ann knew enough about life to know when things were dancing their way so she was quiet. Skiffington stepped to Harvey so that they were but two feet apart. You tell me this, Harvey, if that cow had died a day after you sold it to him, a day after now. No, not a day, not even a day. One hour after you sold it to him, just long enough for Clarence to lead the thing from your place, over the rise to his place so all them hooves are standing on his land and he owned it free and clear and then it up and drop dead on him, would you give him his money back? Would you think you sold him a dead cow and give him his money back? Now would you?”
“I’d feel it was the right thing maybe, seeing as how…I mean after all, the cow didn’t live long anough…”
Skiffington was disappointed in the answer but he knew he should not have been. He took Harvey’s shoulder and they walked away from everyone. “You sold him the cow, Harvey, and there ain’t a thing I can do. There ain’t even nothing President Fillmore can do. You know that if I thought there was something wrong, that if Beth Ann and Clarence was wrong in any way, I would stand up for you. I would move heaven and earth to make it right for you Harvey. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, John, I do.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t want any more bad things between you two men, not a one. Do you understand me, Harvey?”
“Yes, John, I do.”
“I’ll say this to you: Twice a week you send two of your chaps over here with whatever they can carry to take back some milk . But only two of them chaps, Harvey, and just twice a week. No return trips for that day. One trip and that’s all. And never you or your wife are to come.”
Harvey wiped his mouth with his hand, then wiped his brow with his sleeved arm. His eyes teared because he had gotten the worst of it after setting out with a plan five weeks before that should have left him on top with $15. He nodded.
“Stand here,” Skiffington said and went back to Clarence and Beth Ann, who agreed to what he had told Harvey.“John, am I gonna have any more trouble outa him, shooting trouble?” Beth Ann asked.
“Will this end it, John?” Clarence asked.
“There won’t be no more. No more of this.”
“By whose word then, John?” Beth Ann said. “His word or your word.”
“First his word, then backed up by my word,” Skiffington said.” Good,” and she shook Skiffington’s hand and then he shook her husband’s hand.
Skiffington went back to Harvey. “If things stay peaceful, then there might be more days with milk for you, Harvey, but that has to come from Clarence and Beth. They can give you more days ’cause it’s their property.” Harvey nodded. He turned to leave. “And, Harvey, if someone shoots at Clarence again, I will come out to get you, and it will be a different world for you, your wife and your chaps.”
Discussion
In the above scenario, Harvey has a conflict with Clarence and Beth. When Sheriff John Skiffington is asked to help resolve the conflict, the sheriff expresses his opinion that the law is on Clarence and Beth’s side and therefore the sale of the cow is final and that should be the end of the conflict. It is at this point that Harvey criticizes the sheriff, saying in essence, that the sheriff has offered his opinion by just hearing Clarence and Beth’s side of the story, and not hearing his side. Now, to be fair to the sheriff, he had already asked what he felt was the pertinent question directly to Harvey, and Harvey replied by admitting he did indeed sell the cow to Clarence and Beth. Nevertheless, Harvey indicates he has more to say on the matter and should be listened to before the sheriff draws any conclusion.
Now, at first the sheriff is rather abrupt when he says, “I take no side but the right one, and if you don’t believe that then you can turn around and go home.” After a pause, the sheriff goes on to say, “I ain’t got time to waste on this cow business.” To be fair to the sheriff, behind this scene’s plot of the novel the sheriff is under enormous pressure to be attending to some other very serious law enforcement issues. Nevertheless, upon reflection, the sheriff decides to take some more time to address Harvey’s criticism.
First, he tries to reason with him, by simply asking him what he would have done if the cow had suddenly died immediately after he had completed the sale with Clarence and Beth. Harvey replies that maybe he would have returned the money.
Because of incidences earlier in the novel, the sheriff has learned enough about Harvey’s personality to conclude he is lying. Nevertheless, Sheriff Skiffington does not call Harvey a liar, nor does he call him any other name, or seek to insult him in any other manner. Instead, he guides Harvey away from the others involved in the conflict to see if he could better resolve the conflict. The sheriff’s approach involves letting Harvey know that if he was right in this matter, he would take his side and even move heaven and earth to help him if he could, but the law is completely on the side of Clarence and Beth. And then, even though the sheriff believes he is right on this point, he nevertheless seeks to steer in the direction Harvey would like, by offering to get some milk from the cow each week in a manner that would not be much of a hardship for Clarence and Beth. This isn’t an ideal solution in Harvey’s mind, but the simple fact that the sheriff made some effort to do a little something on behalf of him, does lead to the conflict becoming resolved. As the novel continues, there is no more trouble between these antagonists.
At the end of the scenario, the sheriff tells Harvey that if he shoots at Clarence again, he’ll come out to arrest him. This may seem to be a threat, and because threatening a criticizer is, according to the model presented above, a level 2 response, should you conclude the sheriff handled this situation in an immature manner? Here’s why I don’t think this is the correct way to interpret this situation.
In my opinion, the sheriff’s statement was neither a threat nor a response to Harvey’s criticism. Rather, it was part of his duty as a sheriff to inform Harvey of the consequences he would be obligated to carry out under the law.
So, overall, I’m leaning toward giving the sheriff a rating of 4.7. It wasn’t perfect, in my estimation, so I took a little off the 5, but I feel, overall, he did a pretty good job under the circumstances.
Some might wish to make some suggestions regarding how the sheriff could have handled his response to Harvey’s criticism even better than he did. I think discussing those suggestions would be worthwhile, and I hope to hear from readers about this. At the same time, I’m hoping this post might be of help in better understanding the nature of steering, and how it can be used to better respond to criticism.
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional and social intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
Welcome to From Insults to Respect. Today we consider the experience of being booed, along with some suggestions on how to handle it. We begin with a rather famous booing example.
Getting Booed at Madison Square Garden
For those of us growing up in the 1950’s and 60’s, Ricky Nelson was a teenage idol. Some would, at the time, have picked Elvis Presley as the teenage idol, but for me, Ricky was right up there with Elvis,
My generation first got to know Ricky when he was 8 years old as one of the stars of the TV series, The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet. In 1957, upon turning 17, he began his long and successful career as a popular recording artist.
Ricky placed 53 songs on the Billboard Hot 100 between 1957 and 1973, including “Travelin’ Man” (#1), “Poor Little Fool” (#1), “Teenage Idol” (#5), and “Hello Mary Lou” (#9). He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on January 21, 1987.
As you can imagine, Ricky was used to warm and wild applause when he performed. But then, on October 15, 1971, many of the early rock stars, including Chuck Berry, George Harrison, John Lennon, and Little Richard, as well as Ricky, joined together to put on a concert at Madison Square Garden, billed as “The Garden Party.” When it was Ricky’s turn to perform, he chose to play The Rolling Stones’ “Honky Tonk Women,” and the crowd began to boo. Those at the concert reported that the booing was not directed to Ricky’s performance, but rather, to police who were dealing with some disturbance. Nevertheless, Ricky thought the booing was directed at him because he no longer looked like a teenager and his hair had grown long; or perhaps it was because he chose to play a song that was not one of his own earlier hits.
Adding to Ricky’s embarrassment of being booed, the press had written up the event in a rather cold hearted manner, stating he had been booed off stage. Ricky, in an interview available on YouTube, said that for a period after being booed it was like a dark cloud in the back of his mind. How did he handle this? Did he deny his feelings and try to escape from giving any thought to it, kinda like Linus does in the following cartoon:
In contrast to Linus’s technique, Ricky, in addition to recognizing he had been having waves of feeling blue, he began to write about the experience. Eventually, he placed those words into a song titled “Garden Party,” which reached #6 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #1 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart and was certified as a gold single.
Let’s take a quick look at a few of its lyrics:
I went to a garden party To reminisce with my old friends A chance to share old memories And play our songs again
When I got to the garden party They all knew my name No one recognized me I didn’t look the same
But it’s all right now I learned my lesson well You see ya can’t please everyone So ya got to please yourself
……
Played them all the old songs Thought that’s why they came No one heard the music We didn’t look the same
I said hello to “Mary Lou” She belongs to me When I sang a song about a honky-tonk It was time to leave
……
Ricky’s First Draft of Garden Party Lyrics
If you gotta play at garden parties I wish you a lotta luck But if memories were all I sang I rather drive a truck
But it’s all right now I learned my lesson well You see, ya can’t please everyone So ya got to please yourself
There are several additional stanzas in the song that are evocative of what it was like being at the Garden Party, but you get the general idea.
Because I was a big fan of Ricky’s during my teenage years, I followed his career as described in several interviews. Apparently he had a great deal of success playing at many county fairs, at times pulling in crowds of twenty thousand fans. I saw Ricky perform to a full house crowd at Minneapolis’s Guthrie Theater in 1982, three years before he died in a plane crash. The theater has 1,200 seats. His set was a fine mix of old songs and new, and judging from the applause, the audience loved it, and I did too.
Ricky Is Not the only Rock Star to Be Booed
Bob Dylan, after having great success writing and performing Woody Guthrie-influenced folk music, began in 1965 introducing some rock & roll songs into his sets. His folk fans were not at all happy about this, and their boos were unmerciful. Nevertheless, Bob kept playing the music he wanted to play, and he eventually found a new, much larger, audience that loved his new material. Eventually he impressed the Nobel Prize Committee so much that its members awarded him their prize for literature.
Lest you think the Beatles, arguably the greatest rock & roll band ever, somehow managed to escape the experience of being booed, think again. By 1966, they were far and away the most popular band in history, and then John Lennon, during an interview, in an off the cuff comment, stated, “We’re more popular than Jesus.” This led to people threatening to kill the band members, and newscasts showed people flinging Beatle albums into fires. John eventually apologized, and soon after, the Beatles recorded several number one hit singles and the enormously popular album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, considered by many the greatest album ever.
What Can We Learn From These Booing Experiences?
Some people who experience a booing experience come to think it is the end of the world, and they will never recover from their feelings of rejection. To each of them, I want to suggest that, as these three stories of rock & roll stars suggest, there is at least a chance that you will recover. Just keeping that possibility alive can be enormously helpful.
Moreover, as the story of Ricky Nelson suggests, by experiencing the waves of black clouds, and perhaps writing about the experience, you very well might learn something of value and come up with something creative for a future presentation.
In fact, expressive writing has demonstrated in research studies to improve health outcomes and to reduce the anguish people experience during episodes of depression. You can find the research supporting the expressive writing technique by clicking here and here.
The technique involves writing over the course of four days, for a minimum of 15 minutes at each sitting, about something that has led to your challenging emotional experience. As you do so, make sure you include not only what happened,but also what you felt when it happened, and how you now feel about what happened. Include your deepest emotions and thoughts about what occurred. Really let go and explore your feelings and thoughts about it. As you do so, recall the sensory experience of these feelings, not just the words that define the experience. In your writing, you might tie this experience to your childhood, your relationship with your parents, people you have loved or love now, or even your career. Explore, as well, how this experience is related to whom you would like to become, whom you have been in the past, or whom you are now.
Another thing we might want to consider from Ricky’s story is the attitude, “You can’t please everyone so you gotta please yourself.” Now, if you are seeking to earn a living from your presentations, this attitude doesn’t mean you can’t try to come up with a way to please yourself and also please your audience. Ricky couldn’t be pleased with himself if he had to just sing his old hits. For him, mixing in his old songs with new ones was essential, and he soon found a way to earn an enjoyable living doing that.
What can we learn from Bob Dylan’s experience with booing? Well, he also recovered from it, and the rest of us can too. And we also can learn that sometimes what we have to offer might be excellent, but not suited to a particular audience. Giving some thought on how to connect with the specific audience you want to reach makes sense.
Bob has an interesting approach to coming up with songs that are interesting to both himself and his audience. As he explains on one of his Theme Time Radio Hour shows, whenever he wants to come up with new material, he goes out into the world and sees what people are talking about. If the topic is something that has captured their interest, and if it is of interest to him as well, he soon finds himself writing a song about it. Of course, he adds a little creative flair to it, and this seems to work for him. Like Bob, I have found that when I think about what to write for new posts, listening to what others are currently talking about with interest can be helpful.
As for the Beatles, the lesson here might be that if you offend some folks during your effort to connect with an audience, perhaps a humble apology might help to ease some of the anger. Then, get on with doing your best to come up with fresh, interesting new material.
So, there you have it, some thoughts about dealing with the booing experience. I hope you found some of the ideas helpful, and that you will soon join us once again right back here at From Insults to Respect.
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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional and social intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.
We have all experienced name calling, insults and teasing, even the greatest presidents, the most talented athletes, and every member of your favorite band. If someone insults you, calls you names, or teases you, it does NOT mean that you are a bad person.
Now, as I was wondering what to write about for this week’s post, I noticed C-SPAN had just announced the results of its latest survey that had historians and other professional observers of the presidency rate U.S. presidents. Abraham Lincoln, consistent with many previous surveys over the years, came out on top. And it just so happens that I have been reading of late, Carl Sandburg’s biography of Lincoln. In its many pages, we find regularly Lincoln dealing with people throwing insults at him. So, I thought I would take this opportunity to share with you how this highly respected person dealt with them.
“Did Stanton say I was a d–d fool?” asked Lincoln at the close of the recital.
he inference is erroneous. Lincoln, so far as I could discover, was in every respect the actual head of the administration, and whenever he chose to do so, he controlled Stanton as well as all the other Cabinet ministers.” Fry related a conflict between President Lincoln and Secretary Stanton which concluded with the following dialogue in Stanton’s office. Stanton said: “Now Mr. President, those are the facts, and you must see that your order cannot be executed.” The President cordially replied: “Mr. Secretary, I reckon you’ll have to execute the order.” Stanton objected: “Mr. President, I cannot do it. The order is an improper one, and I cannot execute it.” The President stared down the shorter Stanton and firmly issued an order: “Mr. Secretary, it will have to be done.” And indeed it was.
As for the Gettysburg Address—one of the most powerful speeches in human history, one that many American schoolchildren can recite by heart (Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth …) and a statement of national purpose that for some rivals the Declaration of Independence—a Pennsylvania newspaper reported, “We pass over the silly remarks of the President. For the credit of the nation we are willing that the veil of oblivion shall be dropped over them, and they shall be no more repeated or thought of.” A London Times correspondent wrote, “Anything more dull and commonplace it wouldn’t be easy to produce.”
I think Alexander Hamilton Stephens, who had served as the Vice President of the Confederacy, well expressed what many who had an opportunity to get to know Lincoln came to feel about him. Thus, in a speech several years after the war, Stephens recalled getting to know Lincoln when they both served together in the House of Representatives prior to the war. “He was warm hearted; he was generous; he was magnanimous, ‘with malice toward none, with charity for all.'”If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,But make allowance for their doubting too;If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise,….Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
A couple of years ago I wrote a post titled, “
Don’t you dare start with this crap or I’ll give you a real reason to cry! You’re acting like an infant!!! Now you stop this instant and get to bed!!!”
“I see you are feeling sad. That’s understandable. You were enjoying the game so much, and you’re disappointed about having to stop. You know, when we feel sad, it’s to help us figure out how to better handle what we do in the future. I wonder how we can better handle the going to bed situation. Any ideas, Carl?”
A team of researchers (Brock Bastian, et al.) published an article in the peer reviewed journal Emotion titled, “Feeling Bad About Being Sad: The Role of Social Expectancies in Amplifying Negative Mood.” The authors begin by summarizing previous relevant research, then describe four studies they carried out to throw light on this subject, and then present their conclusions. The entire article can be viewed for free 
Daily we are reminded of the value of happiness, from TV advertising that highlights the hedonic pleasures of consumption, to national campaigns designed to improve happiness and well-being.
Meanwhile, commonplace emotional experiences such as sadness, depression, or anxiety are pathologized and medicalized, viewed as deviant from desired norms…. Negative emotions are touted as bad for our health… and can be “cured” with an array of drugs and interventions designed to quickly and efficiently return us to normality. On the other hand, the many benefits of negative emotions, such as their creative potential…, importance for interpersonal relations…, and role in achieving a rich and meaningful life… are rarely prominent in current social discourse. 
[T]he importance placed on happiness and the devaluation of sadness is not as apparent in Asian cultures. In Japan, acceptance, emotional balance, and even hardship are highly valued, and the pursuit of happiness often has “immoral” connotations.
Among the findings, there was a clear tendency for Australian individuals to feel worse about themselves when experiencing negative emotions than the Japanese individuals who were more likely to view sadness as normal and helpful.
Emotions are fundamentally social phenomena. Our research provides the first evidence that people’s generalized beliefs about how others expect them to feel may play a central role in their emotional experience and well-being. Our work shows that the more people hold beliefs that others expect them not to experience negative emotions, the more frequently and intensely they are likely to experience those negative emotions. Such ironic effects also relate to indicators of well-being, such as satisfaction with life and depression. 
Moreover, our findings suggest that these relationships are at least partly mediated by negative self-evaluations that people have when they experience undesired emotions. Attempts to promote the value of feeling good over the value of feeling bad by emphasizing social norms for these emotions may therefore have the effect of making people feel bad more often.
Now, relevant to this discussion, there does exist some evidence that sometimes people who experience depression end up hurting themselves, or lapse into periods in which their functioning diminishes. This evidence is used by many psychiatrists to urge people to take psychiatric drugs. But, is it really the depression that leads these people to hurt themselves, or is it how they respond to their sad feelings that lead to various undesirable outcomes?
During an early part of my psychological services provider career, I was hired as a school psychologist in Rochester, New York. There, students were regularly referred to me because a teacher or parent had become concerned about how a student was doing at school.
When I met individually with these students, I first introduced myself, and then I’d say something like, “I was asked to meet with you to see if we can figure out how to make school better for you.” Then I’d spend a little time trying to see if we had some common interest, such as some music stars, baseball players, TV shows, etc. By connecting with students in this pleasant way, it lightened up our exchange. Next, I got down more directly to the business at hand, seeking to find out, from the student’s perspective, how school was going.
Early in my tenure in this job, this meant that I would just ask the question, “Say, by the way, how’s school going for you this year?” Typically, I would get just a very brief answer, such as, “OK,” or, “I hate school.” Naturally, I wanted to explore more deeply this issue, so I would clumsily begin to ask followup questions and too often I wouldn’t get much that was helpful. However, in time, I developed a psychological interview that really managed to be insightful in figuring out ways to improve a student’s school experience. So, today I thought I would share it with you, for I think it would be helpful, not only for other school psychologists, but for teachers and parents as well.
Well, there you have it, an outline for a psychological interview that will help to draw out important information regarding a student’s school experience. Why might this be a useful thing to do? I found, when using this approach, that students very much appreciate an adult really taking the time to see how they are doing. Moreover, discussing the results of the interview with people I respect and the parents and the educators working with the student often led to some helpful ideas for improving the student’s school experience
To take one example, I once interviewed a student we will call Bobby. He indicated that this school year was going very bad for him by circling a 1 on that question. On further questioning, Bobby indicated he found school had him sitting way too much, he had no friends, and he enjoyed and thought he was good at playing chess.
Bobby had learned to play chess when he was younger. His older brother had taught him, and they had enjoyed playing against one another, but in recent years his brother preferred playing with some guys his own age. With no one to play with, Bobby would read some books on chess, and he also watched a lot of TV. On the questionnaire, it became clear that he got no exercise other than two times per week when he had his physical education class.
To address the issue of a lack of exercise and that Bobby felt uncomfortable sitting so long at school, he and his whole family began to take an hour walk after supper twice a week, and on the weekend they would take an even longer hike. This added walking each week made it much easier for Bobby to sit for long periods during school hours, and it no doubt is supportive of a healthier lifestyle.
I had derived this level along with the three higher levels by first making a lot of TV shows with a variety of actors. In each show, the actors respond to criticism in different ways. Then I asked others to view the shows. Together, the viewers and I discussed our reactions to the way the actors in the video recordings handle criticism.
So I wrote a post about this titled, “
Incredibly, the topic of crying continues to be brought up by readers of this blog, thus leading me to write several additional posts delving into more and more subtle domains. Examples of these can be found in posts titled “
You been down to the bottom with a bad man, babe
How well did the character in the song handle this crying situation? In thinking about this, I think we can agree that when someone is crying, there are times when it can be annoying. For example, I was once in a hotel room, extremely tired, trying to fall asleep. A baby on the other side of my wall began to let it all out at the top of her or his lungs. I recognized that it wasn’t the baby’s fault, and as a parent myself, I felt some compassion for what was going on. Nevertheless, I sure wished that baby would please stop crying.
In the Dylan song, the character he created is not a baby, he cares about her, but pleads with her to stop crying. He tries to be helpful by offering to pay her fare to go to a more pleasant place–the river. He also lets her know that if she wants to have a friend to talk with, he’s more than willing to make himself available. He does say please, when pleading for her to stop crying.
Hmmm. Well, if the person identified as babe in the song is crying and it begins to wear on my nerves, I don’t think I would ask her to please stop crying. I guess what I would do is say something like, “Babe, I’m going to take a walk around the block for a few minutes to deal with some feelings that are coming up within me regarding what you are going through. I’ll be back as soon as I can, and then if you think of anything I can do to help, please let me know.” As I prepare to leave, I might go over to her, give her a tender kiss on the cheek, and a gentle loving touch on the back of her shoulder.
“Crazy” is a concept used when people are puzzled about the actions of others or themselves. By using this type of name calling, it really doesn’t provide any clarification, but to some, they think it does. So, we might hear something like the following conversation:
Nevertheless, I would like you to consider the following possibility.
Trump’s supporters, in addition to being called crazy, have repeatedly been called mentally ill as a way to make sense of what seems to be irrational. Because the mental illness concept is supported by many doctors, including many psychiatrists and psychologists, some folks have been left with the impression that it must be a more sound, scientific concept than “crazy.” Is it?
When psychiatrists use their mental illness classification system and call it a diagnostic system, they do so despite numerous scientific arguments about its shortcomings (see 
You have trouble starting your car. You bring it to Fred, your friendly local mechanic. On hearing your concern, he provides an initial theory of what is causing this—perhaps your car needs a new starter. This is the initial “theoretical” diagnosis. Then, Fred inspects the starter and finds that it is in fine shape. Thus, his original theory of what is wrong proves incorrect. He then theorizes that your spark plugs are dirty. He takes a look and finds that they are indeed dirty. He cleans them up, puts them back in their proper place, and the car starts right up. In the end, he “diagnosed” what was wrong with your car—it had dirty spark plugs.
The psychiatric mental illness diagnostic system is described in a manual published with the title, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). There it refers to itself as a manual for making diagnoses. This masks the difference between the following three types of statements:
The DSM does not claim its so called “diagnostic classifications” are just a theory of what the cause is for the expressed concern; it doesn’t even provide a theory. The manual’s developers explicitly say it is theory neutral. The DSM labels are just type 3 statements, that is, just statements that restate expressed concerns into medical jargon. Thus, the lack of reliability and validity for the DSM classifications and applying the word “diagnosis” to them in a misleading, imprecise manner are just three of its many serious principles of science violations.
Contrast psychiatry’s DSM “diagnosis” system with a diagnosis system used by other doctors. If someone comes to a virologist expressing a concern about being feverish, having difficulty breathing, and loss of taste, the doctor will label these as the patient’s medical complaints, rather then simply translating the complaints into medical jargon and then claiming the jargon constitutes the diagnosis. Instead, the virologist, after writing down the various complaints, will then look for the cause for these complaints. If it is found that there is the presence of the Covid 19 virus, the doctor will say the diagnosis is a Covid 19 infection.
On one fine spring day, I was sitting on a Central Park bench and two women were sitting one bench just to my right reading their newspapers. Suddenly, one of them cried out, “Sophie, can you believe this! The story I’m reading here, oh my God! This young boy, seventeen years old mind you, the same age as my Jonathan, he’s struggling with ideas about suicide. Seventeen years old, his whole life before him and he wants to kill himself. What would lead a boy to this?”
With that explanation, the two women nodded to one another, and continued on to another story, seemingly satisfied that they now knew why the boy was dealing with this issue.
In my opinion, even a play, which lasts but two or three hours, can only provide in its narrative a simplified account of what real life stories are all about. And yet, in today’s world, for many people a very different type of play is sufficient for providing the reason why someone is dealing with a challenging concern. This new type of play begins with the curtain rising. A character says to the audience he is struggling with feelings of suicide. A psychiatrist then proclaims the character has the mental disorder known as major depressive disorder, and then the curtain comes down. That’s the whole play. And people walk away fully satisfied that an adequate explanation has been provided.
That said, I leave you with the following suggestion: If you have a theory of why people continue to support Trump and his continued claims that he won the 2020 presidential election by a landslide, let those with whom you want to share your theory know it is a “theory,” and forgo the mental illness name calling. By doing so, you may not get as many cheers from people who agree with you. Nevertheless, among people truly seeking to deepen their understanding of this difficult to understand phenomenon, you will be more respected. Moreover, for those who may disagree with your theory, they will appreciate your ability to distinguish fact from theory. You’ll come across, I theorize, as more open-minded and you will be modeling a higher level of discourse than what we have been hearing from many of our political leaders.
Welcome to From Insults to Respect. Today we examine a conflict witnessed by millions that involves U.S. Congressman Jim Jordan at a U.S. House Coronavirus Hearing angrily questioning infectious disease expert Dr. Fauci. It can be viewed on YouTube 
Briefly, Congressman Jordan desired to defend the U.S. Constitution and the liberty of Americans. In his view, interfering with his desire are a set of recommendations developed by the CDC that Dr. Fauci has given voice to as part of the job the current president has hired him to do. Jordan appears to believe Dr. Fauci is guilty of promoting recommendations that interfere with liberty and the Constitution. At the same time, Dr. Fauci desires to do his job without facing personal attacks and a style of questioning that he referred to as ranting.
At first, Dr. Fauci is reluctant to describe the objective measure, explaining it depends on a variety of ever changing conditions, such as the percentage of people who will agree to be vaccinated, how resistant new emerging variants of the virus will be to the available vaccines, and other factors that can sprout up. But, after making clear that any estimate that he gives must be viewed as very tentative, Dr. Fauci finally provides his best guess–when the number of daily infections drop to 10,000 a day, which may very well be reached by early to mid summer if the vast majority of people are vaccinated.
You said that when Texas ended their lockdown, ended their mandates, this was inexplicable and this would, quote, “lead to a surge in cases.” But Texas is at the bottom of the 50 states. But all of the states at the top are lockdown states. So, that guess didn’t look too good. What explains why Texas is so darn low as compared to the rest of the states. Lockdown states have a much higher rate than the state of Texas which over a month ago said that we’re not going to have all these lockdowns and all of these mandates that you say we have to have a lockdown.
Jordan: Dr. Fauci, when is the time? When, in your written statement you say, “Now is not the time to pull back on masking, physical distancing, and avoiding congregating settings. When is the time? When do Americans get their freedom back? 
Dr. Fauci: When we get the levels of infection in this country low enough that it is not a really high threat.
Jordan: What measure. I mean, are we just going to continue forever. When do we get to the point? What measure, what objective outcome do we have to reach before Americans get their liberty and freedom back? 
Jordan, his voice has become louder: You don’t think that American liberties have been threatened the past year, Dr Fauci? They’ve been assaulted, their liberties have.
At this point, Jordan again interrupts in the middle of Dr. Fauci’s sentence and begins to list examples of Americans loss of liberty, and among them, he says, “The governor of our third largest state meets with physicians and that video is censored because it dared to disagree with Dr. Fauci, so I just want to know when Americans are going to get their liberties back.”
Dr. Fauci: My answers are consistent with [cross talk] may I answer the question please. My recommendations are not a personal recommendation. They are based on the CDC guidance and which are underscored by…
Dr. Fauci: Right now we have about sixty thousand infections a day, which is a very large risk for a surge. We’re not talking about liberties, we’re talking about a pandemic that has killed 560,000 Americans. That’s what we are talking about.
Dr. Fauci: Well, you just said people can’t assemble in their own homes. They can. That’s a CDC recommendation. [after some crosstalk Dr. Fauci continues] You are going to see a gradual, from, right now we are at an unacceptable high level, regardless of who you are. We’re going to see, as more and more people are vaccinated and we get over three million people a day, you are going to see the level of infection go down and down, and gradually there will be more flexibility to doing the things you are talking about. 
Dr. Fauci: You are asking for a number. If I have a number, it would have to be my best estimate, and that would be that when the number of infections a day are well below ten thousand a day. At that point, there would be a gradual pulling back of a number of the restrictions you are talking about, particularly when people are vaccinated more and more because a combination of, if you are vaccinated you are protecting yourself for sure, and the more people who get vaccinated in the community, the lower the number of infections will be.
Dr. Fauci: You’re ranting again.
Let’s begin with Congressman Jordan. Most of his questions were relevant and initially he doesn’t sound particularly belligerent. In my opinion, he could have done better throughout by asking his questions in a warm and friendly manner. When Dr. Fauci made a few comments that Jordan objected to, rather than utilizing the conflict resolution skill of disagreeing without being disagreeable, he instead angrily raises his voice and repeatedly interrupts Dr. Fauci in mid-sentence. What would disagreeing without being disagreeable have looked like in their exchange? I think by empathetically providing statements from time to time that indicated he knows Dr. Fauci has been the bearer of bad news throughout the pandemic and that’s a rough situation to be in, could have helped to traverse some of the roughest terrain of this conflict.
Now, let’s turn to critiquing Dr. Fauci’s handling of the conflict. With the exception of three brief moments, I think he kept his tone of voice in a matter of fact manner that was fitting for this occasion. Where he faltered on this score will be discussed shortly.
swered the questions posed to him in a manner that struck me as fair given the number of factors in steady flux. His biggest mistake, in my opinion, occurred by not taking advantage of making a connection with Jordan on their shared values.
I share with you the love of liberty and freedom, Congressman Jordan, and well recognize the enormous frustrations that have been ongoing during this pandemic. The restrictions about family gatherings have been awfully hard, numerous people who have a business ended up with devastating losses, people have lost their job, and on and on, all of this has been terribly difficult to deal with emotionally as well as financially. And yet, according to the best scientific data we have available, if we did nothing to try to decrease the spread hundreds of thousands of more people would have died, and hospital personnel would have been even more overwhelmed than they had become at the height of the U.S. experience with this pandemic. 
In its preamble it states its purpose is, and I quote, “…establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.” 
Now we are engaged in providing a common defense to battle this pandemic, a battle that has led to the deaths in one year of nearly twice the total number of deaths that occurred during the four years of World War II. Sacrifices are being made. I’m not happy about them, but I was hired by the president to provide my recommendations based on science and a vetting process involving experts at the CDC, to decrease the spread of the virus. Consistent with our Constitution, it is up to our elected officials to decide which recommendations to make mandatory. Citizens have the right to file a suit in court if they believe their rights are being violated. 
If Dr. Fauci would have made these types of connections with Jordan’s values, it may very well have taken the wind out of Jordan’s sails, tempering his ire.
In conflict resolution we often teach people to make “I” statements rather than insisting on an opinion. Thus, Dr. Fauci might have done better if instead of saying, “No, you are. That is exactly what you are doing,” he said pleasantly, “Well, although you don’t view it as a personal thing, I’m experiencing it as exactly that. To be clear, I did not advocate that the video be censored, and I fully support freedom of speech.”
I get why Dr. Fauci was exasperated at this point. He believed he had provided the best answer available, but I do think Jordan was in his rights to ask for a more specific guess. Dr. Fauci eventually did provide more specifics that came when Jordan made this request.
Dr. Fauci’s frustration with Jordan’s interruptions and his angry tone of voice is understandable. And though ranting may have been an accurate description, most people would view Dr. Fauci’s comment as an insult. Insulting someone in the middle of a conflict just leads to more trouble than it is worth. I think Dr. Fauci would have been better off just saying something like, “Congressman Jordan, I am having a hard time dealing with your tone and frequent interruptions. I understand you have strong feelings about this, as I certainly do. Maybe we need a break so I can deal with how I’m feeling.”
As I write this post, we are into the third week of the trial of former police officer Derek Chauvin. The trial involves Mr Chauvin’s use of force with George Floyd, which began when a store employer from Cup Foods was paid by Floyd with a counterfeit $20 bill to purchase some cigarettes. When a store employer demanded that Floyd return the cigarettes, he refused, and consequently the employer called the police.
At 8:08, police officers Kueng and Lane arrived, briefly entered Cup Foods, and then crossed the street to Floyd’s SUV. At 8:12, a mere four minutes after arriving, the two officers had handcuffed Floyd, and Kueng had assisted Floyd to sit on the sidewalk against the wall in front of a restaurant.
At 8:17, officers Chauvin and Thao arrived in another police car, joining Kueng and Lane and two other officers who arrived in another police car, with Chauvin assuming command. By 8:19, two minutes after arriving, Chauvin pulls Floyd away from the police car, Floyd falls to the pavement, and while Floyd lay on his chest with his cheek to the ground, still handcuffed, Chauvin begins to press his knee against Floyd’s neck. Meanwhile, Kueng applies pressure to Floyd’s torso, and Lane applies pressure to Floyd’s legs.
Shortly after this awful incident, the media became awash with calls for police to learn de-escalation strategies. According to a Scientific American 
In 2016 Campaign Zero—a law-enforcement reform initiative developed by Black Lives Matter activists—helped conduct an analysis of 91 police departments in the largest U.S. cities. The study found that de-escalation mandates were 
In the situation we are discussing when Chauvin arrived and assumed command, Floyd had no weapon and his hands were handcuffed behind his back. Let’s imagine it was me who assumed command in this type of situation.
Me: Okay, let’s stop trying to push him into the car, and give me some time to discuss this with Mr Floyd. [I go over to Mr Floyd, and say] Hi Mr Floyd, I’m Officer Jeff Rubin, how are you?
If so, I would empathize with his feelings. To illustrate this, let’s see what that might look like in our next exchange].
Mr Floyd: I got five of them, and two grandkids. When I lost my job because of Covid, man, I haven’t been much help.
Imagine your thirteen-year-old teenage daughter begins to express a concern about being depressed. Many in the psychiatric profession, heavily backed up by the pharmaceutical industry, would urge you to make an appointment with a psychiatrist as fast as you can. That approach typically leads to the doctor encouraging your daughter to take pills referred to as “antidepressants.” The main argument that is made for beginning this type of treatment is, “untreated depression is associated with an increased risk of suicide.”
This fear arousing comment frequently works because parents tend to jump from this statement to the thought that treatment with so-called antidepressants either eliminates this risk or significantly reduces it. But a large body of 
Moreover, these drugs are associated with a number of troubling side effects, and many find that once they start using them, stopping them can lead to some awful withdrawal reactions that are far worse than the initial experience of depression.
Your letter came last night and explained sufficiently the cause of your long silence. You have evidently been in a bad state of spirits again, and dissatisfied with your environment; and I judge that you have been still more dissatisfied with the inner state of trying to consume your own smoke, and grin and bear it, so as to carry out your mother’s behests made after the time when you scared us so by your inexplicable tragic outcries in those earlier letters. Well! I believe you have been trying to do the manly thing under difficult circumstances, but one learns only gradually to do the best thing; and the best thing for you would be to write at least weekly, if only a post-card, and say just how things are going. If you are in bad spirits, there is no harm whatever in communicating that fact, and defining the character of it, or describing it as exactly as you like. The bad thing is to pour out the contents of one’s bad spirits on others and leave them with it, as it were, on their hands, as if it was for them to do something about it. That was what you did in your other letter which alarmed us so, for your shrieks of anguish were so excessive, and so unexplained by anything you told us in the way of fact, that we didn’t know but what you had suddenly gone crazy. That is the worst sort of thing you can do. The middle sort of thing is what you do this time—namely, keep silent for more than a fortnight, and when you do write, still write mysteriously about your sorrows, not quite open enough.
Now, my dear little girl, you have come to an age when the inward life develops and when some people (and on the whole those who have most of a destiny) find that all is not a bed of roses. Among other things there will be waves of terrible sadness, which last sometimes for days; and dissatisfaction with one’s self, and irritation at others, and anger at circumstances and stony insensibility, etc., etc., which taken together form a melancholy. Now, painful as it is, this is sent to us for an enlightenment. It always passes off, and we learn about life from it, and we ought to learn a great many good things if we react on it rightly. 
She went on to attend Bryn Mawr College, acted in a couple of plays, married, and had two children. She was viewed as the best of citizens in San Francisco, working with the civil rights group, supporting the Community Chest operations and heading up the Ladies’ Protection and Relief, and devoted her time as war began in 1939 to British War Relief. Throughout her life, she did have two more bouts with depression, but she handled them well. The last one, at her husband’s urging, she went with him hiking in the foothills near Santa Clara, and after a while, the exhilarating experience of being in the wonderful and exhilarating landscape, along with the lively exercise, led to the depression passing. The family legend pronounced this a California cure for a New England psychological illness.
Elsewhere in the letter, James begins to frame Peg’s experience as helpful for producing “an enlightenment,” if “we react on it rightly.” The wrong way, according to James, is to get into the habit of accepting the woe without doing anything constructive about it. The right way is “to jump at every chance to attend to anything cheerful or comic or take part in anything active that will divert us from our mean, pining inward state of feeling.”
I believe that, rather than fighting against melancholy, we should allow ourselves some time to be with it, just as we would if an old friend came to visit. We can spend this time observing, in a nonjudgmental manner, the emotions drifting through us in a manner similar to a scientist observing a flock of birds flying off in the distant sky. When it comes to grief, we need not set some artificial time limit by which we “should be” through with the process.
Regular readers know that I have been presenting the theory that a powerful way to increase the respect that others have for you, and the respect you have for yourself, is to become a master at responding to criticism. 
To that end, I have presented a model that describes five levels of maturity for responding to criticism (see 
Weeps or sobs with tears or pouts without also using level 4 response
Glares at the criticizer
4. Level 4 individuals listen to the criticizer in a supportive, warm, friendly style, and then make it clear that they fully understand what was said. Moreover, they put the criticizer at ease by making statements that indicate that the wise learn from criticism. Some time is spent on showing that they are thinking about the criticism. If, after thinking about the criticism the criticism is deemed to be correct, they make a statement frankly indicating, “I can see your ideas have merit and I intend to use them in the future.” If they are not sure if they agree, they make a statement indicating that they are very interested in what was said, plan to think a little more about this over the next few days, and then they will be ready to discuss this further. If, after thinking about the criticism, the criticism is deemed to be incorrect, a statement is made designed to disagree without being disagreeable. More specifically, a sense of humor, some listening in a caring way and a few smiles help to traverse rough terrain. As the episode winds down, the criticizer is encouraged to feel comfortable communicating suggestions in the future.
5. In addition to actions consistent with level 4, people responding to criticism in a manner consistent with level 5 seek ways to use, whenever they disagree with the criticism, a technique known as steering in the direction the criticizer would prefer to go. That is, rather than just disagreeing without being disagreeable, the criticized person seeks to find a new choice of action that creatively utilizes some aspect suggested from the criticism. Steering cannot be incorporated into all situations, but it is an additional goal of the most mature individuals.
When Andrea saw what shirt I put on, she criticized my choice, saying, “That’s not quite right for this occasion.”
Today’s new example comes from a beautifully written book I happened to be reading, The Known World, by Edward P. Jones. The story takes place in Virginia mostly before the Civil War. In this part of the story, a conflict has sprung up in the county involving Harvey and Clarence.
Harvey has sold to Clarence for $15 a scrawny cow with practically no meat on its bones. Prior to the deal, Harvey had lied to Clarence, claiming that the cow was a good milker, though in fact more milk fell from the sky than from the cow. After the sale, when Clarence found this out, he was getting pretty frustrated, but then one day, all of a sudden, the cow turned into an excellent milker, and continued to be so. When Harvey found out about this, he wanted the cow back because a cow flowing with milk was not what he had taken $15 for.
“Yes, I did, John.”
“John, you can see what we had to wrestle with out here,” Beth Ann said. “This kinda talk and bullets to keep em company.”
“I take no side but the right one,” Skiffington said to Harvey, and if you don’t believe that then you can turn around and go home.” He waited. “I ain’t got time to waste on this cow business, Harvey.” He and Harvey were now facing each other. Beth Ann knew enough about life to know when things were dancing their way so she was quiet. Skiffington stepped to Harvey so that they were but two feet apart. You tell me this, Harvey, if that cow had died a day after you sold it to him, a day after now. No, not a day, not even a day. One hour after you sold it to him, just long enough for Clarence to lead the thing from your place, over the rise to his place so all them hooves are standing on his land and he owned it free and clear and then it up and drop dead on him, would you give him his money back? Would you think you sold him a dead cow and give him his money back? Now would you?”
You know that if I thought there was something wrong, that if Beth Ann and Clarence was wrong in any way, I would stand up for you. I would move heaven and earth to make it right for you Harvey. Do you understand me?”
“I’ll say this to you: Twice a week you send two of your chaps over here with whatever they can carry to take back some milk . But only two of them chaps, Harvey, and just twice a week. No return trips for that day. One trip and that’s all. And never you or your wife are to come.”
“Stand here,” Skiffington said and went back to Clarence and Beth Ann, who agreed to what he had told Harvey.“John, am I gonna have any more trouble outa him, shooting trouble?” Beth Ann asked.
In the above scenario, Harvey has a conflict with Clarence and Beth. When Sheriff John Skiffington is asked to help resolve the conflict, the sheriff expresses his opinion that the law is on Clarence and Beth’s side and therefore the sale of the cow is final and that should be the end of the conflict. It is at this point that Harvey criticizes the sheriff, saying in essence, that the sheriff has offered his opinion by just hearing Clarence and Beth’s side of the story, and not hearing his side. Now, to be fair to the sheriff, he had already asked what he felt was the pertinent question directly to Harvey, and Harvey replied by admitting he did indeed sell the cow to Clarence and Beth. Nevertheless, Harvey indicates he has more to say on the matter and should be listened to before the sheriff draws any conclusion.
For those of us growing up in the 1950’s and 60’s, Ricky Nelson was a teenage idol. Some would, at the time, have picked Elvis Presley as the teenage idol, but for me, Ricky was right up there with Elvis,
My generation first got to know Ricky when he was 8 years old as one of the stars of the TV series, The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet. In 1957, upon turning 17, he began his long and successful career as a popular recording artist.
But then, on October 15, 1971, many of the early rock stars, including Chuck Berry, George Harrison, John Lennon, and Little Richard, as well as Ricky, joined together to put on a concert at Madison Square Garden, billed as “The Garden Party.” When it was Ricky’s turn to perform, he chose to play The Rolling Stones’ “Honky Tonk Women,” and the crowd began to boo. Those at the concert reported that the booing was not directed to Ricky’s performance, but rather, to police who were dealing with some disturbance. 
Nevertheless, Ricky thought the booing was directed at him because he no longer looked like a teenager and his hair had grown long; or perhaps it was because he chose to play a song that was not one of his own earlier hits.
When I got to the garden party
Bob Dylan, after having great success writing and performing Woody Guthrie-influenced folk music, began in 1965 introducing some rock & roll songs into his sets. His folk fans were not at all happy about this, and their boos were unmerciful. Nevertheless, Bob kept playing the music he wanted to play, and he eventually found a new, much larger, audience that loved his new material. Eventually he impressed the Nobel Prize Committee so much that its members awarded him their prize for literature.
By 1966, they were far and away the most popular band in history, and then John Lennon, during an interview, in an off the cuff comment, stated, “We’re more popular than Jesus.” This led to people threatening to kill the band members, and newscasts showed people flinging Beatle albums into fires. John eventually apologized, and soon after, the Beatles recorded several number one hit singles and the enormously popular album Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, considered by many the greatest album ever.
Some people who experience a booing experience come to think it is the end of the world, and they will never recover from their feelings of rejection. To each of them, I want to suggest that, as these three stories of rock & roll stars suggest, there is at least a chance that you will recover. Just keeping that possibility alive can be enormously helpful.
The technique involves writing over the course of four days, for a minimum of 15 minutes at each sitting, about something that has led to your challenging emotional experience. As you do so, make sure you include not only what happened, but also what you felt when it happened, and how you now feel about what happened. Include your deepest emotions and thoughts about what occurred. Really let go and explore your feelings and thoughts about it. As you do so, recall the sensory experience of these feelings, not just the words that define the experience. In your writing, you might tie this experience to your childhood, your relationship with your parents, people you have loved or love now, or even your career. Explore, as well, how this experience is related to whom you would like to become, whom you have been in the past, or whom you are now.
As he explains on one of his Theme Time Radio Hour shows, whenever he wants to come up with new material, he goes out into the world and sees what people are talking about. If the topic is something that has captured their interest, and if it is of interest to him as well, he soon finds himself writing a song about it. Of course, he adds a little creative flair to it, and this seems to work for him. Like Bob, I have found that when I think about what to write for new posts, listening to what others are currently talking about with interest can be helpful.
As for the Beatles, the lesson here might be that if you offend some folks during your effort to connect with an audience, perhaps a humble apology might help to ease some of the anger. Then, get on with doing your best to come up with fresh, interesting new material.