The Demonization of the Opposition

POSTED BY: SoupCatcher
UPDATED: Sunday, August 1, 2004 20:50
VIEWED: 35776
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RUE

Sunday, July 18, 2004 9:29 PM

BOING !!!!

Light bulb goes on.

THANKS !!! SignyM

Maybe two subtly different ideas were confounded here: demonization and personalization. Many people think Bush and cohorts are pure evil, but that is personalization. What distinguishes personalization from demonization is personalization is, well, personal, and based on experience with the individual. A person does certain negative things over and over, and so one makes negative character assumptions about the person. Demonization is the opposite, in the sense that it seeks, in contradiction-to - or in the absence of - experience, to strip individuality as well as humanity from its target(s). It creates faceless groups of non-humans. (Serbs and other groups lived side by side in the same villages for at least a century. In the run-up to war, there was generalized demonization of the non-Serbs. I think I remember reading an article about that in Newsweek, of all places. In fact, the author said that war was GOING to occur, as evidenced by the propaganda. And they provided some telling interviews of non-Serbs, who were saying - we've always lived side by side and never had a problem, but now with all this going on, we don't feel safe. And so a cycle of hatred and fear was created. In fact, the author was prescient by about 8 months.)

And of course demonization is propaganda. And propaganda is of necessity a tool of the controllers.

I too noticed that Drakon hasn't responded. Good luck to you both.

RUE

Sunday, July 18, 2004 9:36 PM

HKCavalier,

I read somewhere that 9 out of 10 children will repeat an abusive pattern, but 1 out of 10 will decide early on to do better, because of the negative example. The 'Horse Whisperer' (the real person) was a '1 out of 10'. I don't know quite how this fits in with acknowledgement vs denial, so if you can put your thinking cap on and help me out, I'd be TRULY much obliged.

RUE

Sunday, July 18, 2004 10:04 PM

I love to learn, and I've already learned a lot from people on this board. So thank you SignyM, HKCavalier, and others.

SIGNYM

Sunday, July 18, 2004 10:26 PM

HK Cavalier- beautifully said. I believe that the opposite of denial would be called consciousness or awareness. It's a life-long work to become aware not only of your most basic assumptions (which are the hardest to see) but also of your physical state and your ugliest motivations- as well as your best.

If anyone can tell me how to get there from here, be my guest!

Rue- Demonization. The scary thing is how frightfully EASY it is to do- a few months of newspaper and TV bias can undo a lifetime of direct experience. I don't know how it is that a German who had known penniless Mrs Goldstein for years can suddenly turn around a believe in the Jewish banking conspiracy.

RUE

Sunday, July 18, 2004 10:57 PM

Sorry, no help available from me on the consciousness (awareness) thing. I have yet to even find a single personal basic assumption, let alone get past one.

It's a work in progress, I guess.

Out of curiosity, have you found a basic assumption of your own? If yes, how did you do that?

PS I read in a science fiction story about a traveller who'd gone a few days without food. At the end of the trip, he was eating in a cafeteria, sitting next a stranger who was carping about something or other. The story went that the traveller was listening to the whining, but the 'hind part' of his brain was saying 'Food now. Food good.' and so just blew it off. In another book, I read "I was young, and fed, and was allowed to sleep, and so I had hope." I think the authors had some insight into the effect of physical state on thought (a biophysical rendition of Maslow's (?) hierarchy).

It's knowledge about the world AND insights like that, about basic assumptions, effect of physical state etc, that come from others, that I appreciate.

So thanks again to the many who've enriched my life.

SOUPCATCHER

Sunday, July 18, 2004 11:05 PM

There's multiple types of demonization that serve different purposes. There's wartime demonization of the citizens of countries who we are fighting, such as what Signym talks about, the purpose of which is to help us get behind the destruction of our enemy. But there's also demonization of people who are within our own borders, the purpose of which is to marginalize. Something they both share is to turn people from individuals into faceless groups and to change opponents into enemies so that any means used against those groups become acceptable. Sometimes demonization spills over across these categories. [warning: painting with the broad brush].

In California, we have a history of demonization. During the gold rush there was an influx of people from around the world. Too many people competing for the same resources led to groups demonizing each other. One of the results being legislation to give groups an edge: foreign miner taxes and anti-Chinese-immigration being two examples. The unfortunate result of this was that people who were basically murderers and bandits were elevated to heroic status by those being demonized (the legend of Murieta and the factual Vasquez). There were parallels to this in the border states after the Civil War with groups such as the Jesse James gang (who my relatives from Missouri still insist did more good than harm much in the same way that my relatives from Arkansas talk about the good things the Klan did). Another example from the depression would be more in line with the demonization that Drakon talks about: poor farmers demonizing the banks and bankers who foreclosed on them rallying behind bank robbers like Pretty Boy Floyd in Oklahoma and Bonnie and Clyde in Texas.

The migrants from the Dust Bowl who showed up in California were routinely lumped together and the epithet of "Okie" still had power for my parents generation ("Well you know she married an Okie," said in such a tone that you expected a spit in the dirt to follow. Or, "Bakersfield is the armpit of California, that's where all the Okies ended up."). The "boat people" who followed in the seventies for different reasons fell into the same category. As did the Latin American illegal immigrants who started coming in greater numbers in the eighties but were still being mis-labeled as Mexican, who had been illegally immigrating all along.

The sub-humanizing of the Japanese during WWII spilled over to Americans of Japanese ancestry and led to the forceable incarceration of tens of thousands. In a classic move of pitting two marginalized communities against each other, property confiscated from Japanese-Americans was often given to Mexican-Americans.

There is also demonization against homosexuals. Just listening to some of our elected representatives will show that to you.

So I'm not sure where I'm going with this. I kind of just ran out of steam after talking off the top of my head for a while .

I shaved off my beard for you, devil woman!

RUE

Sunday, July 18, 2004 11:17 PM

Talk away!

RUE

Sunday, July 18, 2004 11:40 PM

There've been some interesting recent studies on whom do people recognize as 'human.' Since I think they were done on Westerners, this might qualify the results.

Generally, one recognizes as 'human' and has empathy for, a person who resembles those you grew up with. So middle class white kids growing up in a middle class white family in a middle class white neighborhood will include someone from that category as as 'like them' - human. That may make it possible for middle class white people to pass-by the homeless, the demented, the poor, the darker-skinned, etc and not flinch at the pain.

The photographer who took the picture of the man in the suit going down headfirst out of a Twin Tower said - people cringed because they thought 'it could be me'. (And in fact the photographer compared that reaction to the lookey-loo reaction to other death photos, like those of John Kennendy, Robert Kennedy etc. They weren't 'like us'; they were rich and famous; and so people didn't flinch.)

On the other hand, I have a strong belief that people in a society become what society tells them 'people' are. (Otherwise how could you have gotten the Aztecs to sacrifice tens of thousands of their neighbors to ensure the return of the sun?) In the US people are competitors. There isn't a strong ethic of thinking of others as brethren.

As to how this fits into the process of 'demonization', I'm not sure.

RAZZA

Monday, July 19, 2004 1:43 AM

Wow! What an intersting thread between some obviously smart folks. A person could spend hours going through all the information here. I must say for the record that I lean toward Drakon's point of view in this discussion, but have to say those of you on the other side of the issue are giving him a run for his money. It amazes me how civil things on this board remain even in such heated debates. While that has been some squabbling and name calling, both sides have shown remarkable restraint, something you don't see a lot of in other discussion boards. I thought I would chime in to the discussion with a response to CAPNHARBATKIN's challenge to Drakon about the prison scandals:

Drakon's Assertion:
"Second, again we are talking about bad guys, folks who have gassed Kurds, killed both civilian Iraqis and US troops, terrorists and thugs. "

My offered evidence that this is not true:

" Many of the prisoners abused at the Abu Ghraib prison were innocent Iraqis picked up at random by US troops, and incarcerated by under-qualified intelligence officers, a former US interrogator from the notorious jail told the Guardian."
( http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1211374,00.html)

"Military officials said 70% to 90% of the Iraqis swept up for interrogation were arrested by mistake, the International Committee of the Red Cross reported."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2004-06-09-our-view_x.
htm

I have to say it is very difficult to defend this assertion, but I will take a stab at it. Firstly, you quote the Manchester Guardian, not exactly an unbiased source, having said that, Torin Nelson mentioned in the piece sounds like a credible witness and doesn't appear to particularly bias, but even he states in the article "...So, in theory it is in fact very possible that purely innocent Iraqis could be placed in an environment where they could be brutalised, abused, "softened up" or even killed." Notice that he did not state categorically that he had any knowledge of innocent people being submitted to the problems at Abu Ghraib, only that in theory it is a possiblilty. I would say that in theory it is possible that no innocents were abused as well.

Drakon's Assertion:
"...this was all being handled by the military courts long before we ever heard about it, or saw one picture"

My offered evidence that this is not true:

"Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, also shares in the shame. Myers asked “60 Minutes II” to hold off reporting news of the scandal because it could put U.S. troops at risk. But when the report was aired, a week later, Myers still hadn’t read Taguba’s report, which had been completed in March. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld also failed to read the report until after the scandal broke in the media"

http://www.armytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-2903288.php

(BTW: Gotta love that as a source!)

"Secretary Rumsfeld has clung so blindly to his own vision that even after the media began to publicize the atrocities at Abu Ghraib, he said last week that he had not yet read an official Army report on the Abu Ghraib abuses --- a report that had been completed in March."
http://www.rochester-citynews.com/gbase/Gyrosite/Content?oid=oid%3A260
5

Here Drakon's position is easier to defend. You yourself say that a the army's report (also called the Taguba Report, see it here - http://www.agonist.org/annex/taguba.htm) was completed in March. Since 60 minutes aired the stories in early May Drakon's assertion that the military was already investigating and pursuing the matter through proper channels before any pictures were seen seems obvious. I like your comment about the Army Times source btw. I also find it ironic that an OpEd piece from on of the military's own newspapers would tend to refute the position of many on this thread that our civil liberties are being eroded on a daily basis. Open criticism of the top military brass in a military paper, hardly an indication of a country on the rapid track to a police state.

SOUPCATCHER

Monday, July 19, 2004 7:54 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Razza
Wow! What an intersting thread between some obviously smart folks. A person could spend hours going through all the information here. I must say for the record that I lean toward Drakon's point of view in this discussion, but have to say those of you on the other side of the issue are giving him a run for his money. It amazes me how civil things on this board remain even in such heated debates. While that has been some squabbling and name calling, both sides have shown remarkable restraint, something you don't see a lot of in other discussion boards. I thought I would chime in to the discussion with a response to CAPNHARBATKIN's challenge to Drakon about the prison scandals:

Hi Razza. I haven't been following the prison scandals in enough detail to feel informed enough to comment on the particular details you bring up but I wanted to welcome you to the discussion. I, too, have been heartened by the overall tone of this conversation and those of others on this particular board. It only took me a few minutes reading the yahoo message boards to realize how civil things are here. It might be because we all, no matter what our political beliefs, are fans of firefly and so there is at least some commonality. At least I'd like to think so.

Quote:
Originally posted by Razza
The subject of this discussion thread is a very pertinent one to our current political climate. I find it very unsettling that forces on both sides find it necessary to denigrate their colleagues in the opposition. It is not necessary to view your political opponent as a cursed enemy, and for the most part I do not believe most politicians hold this view. Election years have a way of bringing out the worst in everyone in our very american desire to win, unfortunately. Hopefully the vitriol will not be so great that we fall in to the trap of destroying ourselves as Lincoln predicted:

Yeah. I'm worried about the next few months. In the past I have operated under the assumption that no matter how my views differ from others politically we all still want what is best for the country, we just have different ways of going about it. The strategy is similar if the tactics are different. But the demonization appears to be growing and I sincerely hope wounds are not opened that can't be healed, no matter what the November outcome.

I shaved off my beard for you, devil woman!

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