Vlog CCCLXXIII

S Fleurette 19 minutes ago

Yes, I said the same thing you did , "I am not responsible for someone else's choice of behaviors towards me.!". That is ridiculous, unreasonable and illogical.
Psychopaths torture and devastate mentally and materially . People just don't and can't believe or understand what that means. I was fighting for my life , my sanity and my home.

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Jennifer Armstrong 1 second ago

+S Fleurette The problem is that the history of psychotherapy takes a misogynistic route. There used to be something called a masochistic disorder. I'm sure there is still remnants of that thinking lingering in much of the contemporary therapy. What that does is make things many times worse. How does one escape the bad relationship with one's humanity intact? One has normal human emotions, but sympathy for the other (whether or not it is misplaced) can be interpreted as masochism. Does one have to kill one's emotions and hopes for the redemption of both the parties in order to escape the bind? Psychotherapy says "yes". But next minute it will turn around and accuse you of lacking empathy and of actually being the narcissist.
Traditional psychotherapy simply will not allow you to get out with your emotions intact.

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AFF level 1 goes very bad student looses both instructors

IMAGININGS

Subtle binary perversions in academia

Vlog CCCLXXII

Jennifer Armstrong 1 second ago

What I despise most about the Narcs is kind of what I call their jelly-wobble hands. You can put something precious into their hands -- figuratively speaking -- and they will be too inept and childish to be able to form a grip around it. The precious thing will fall out of their wobbly grasp and onto the ground. They are so deeply and profoundly incapable, even of forming normal sequences of reasoning, not even to imagine them coming to the rescue at the point of a crisis. They absolutely are incapable of anything. I think a large part of this is that they are so busy scanning the environment and anything you say for something that might distantly be related to how others perceive them (ideas of reference) that they are unable to focus on anything else that is going on, above all the bigger picture. They can never see the big picture of anything.
Really, these are utterly contemptible.

Understand the dialectical nature of Bataille's transgression

A clarification on the Freudian and Hegelian nature of Bataille's mode of transgression. You need to go directly to the primary texts and not read postmodernist interpretations, which flatten reality out.

Cf. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=getwpRNK_LU

Games Narcissists play

Games Narcissists play:



'via Blog this'

Narcissists and structurelessness

Vlog CCCLXXI

I always had the impression people were hearing something to the effect that I am a very, very big narcissist (this was before I knew what a narcissist was). Later, I understood more about the media propaganda campaign against people with white skin originating from Africa. The campaign had been pretty thorough and made us look like lazy people, placing ourselves at the top of the social pyramid without working to get there and lounging around by the pool all day. No wonder people were angry with me, and no wonder however much I tried to prove myself it was never enough. I had to do combat, constantly, with a false image, and to some extent the false image also became internalized, making me forget my own real memories and what I had really been about whilst I was still in Africa.
Then, when I began to get a sense of how big was the discrepancy between what was real and what was merely projected onto me, those whom I thought would have been automatic allies (on the side of the truth) showed their hands. They were really very much against me.
So it was that I learned about the nature of sweeping propaganda campaigns and how difficult they are to do anything about.

Conciliatory gestures from the home front

On payment and/or collegiality

Vlog CCCLXX

Yes, this is good about dehumanization. This is exactly what happened to me, as society put a narcissist shield over and against me. There was one situation of abuse after another, and nobody could acknowledge it because to admit what had happened (and what was still happening) was the equivalent, in people's minds, of releasing a colonial devil (me) into their midst. So they just kept abusing, and covering up. And how did I know for sure this was abuse? Because I tested the same behavior used against me on others and people certain reacted very quickly and it triggered their moral alarm. But as for me, a totally different standard applied. Any normal, human communication about the issues was dismissed as so much "whining" or even as evidence of multiple character flaws. I had to basically suck it in whilst finding various methods of coping.

Subtle Ignoring - How to spot a Narcissist 101

A covert narcissist's reframing of reality

On initiation / Transgressing against "not looking back"

When the abyss gazes into you, gazing back

Amnesiac Narcissist's Selective Memory: It's All About Narcissistic Supply!

Rhodesia, was it always losing the war? (and other queries)

Self-recovery in "primitive" Vs. modern contexts

The use of technical terms in philosophy

The tar-baby of psychoanalysis

Discussion with Mike about so-called "left fascism"

Narcissism, soul loss and shamanism

How The Soul Effects Personality Disorders Pt. 2

Jennifer Armstrong 1 second ago

These are good videos -- but my sense of it is that "the soul" is sort of like the emotional level of one's identity, as well as one's sense of purpose. When people relentlessly attacked my African identity, I ended up losing my "soul".

The hellish inner journey & back

view from a Loadmaster!

Narcissists, context & disorientation

Part 2: on Georges Bataille and transgression - YouTube

Part 2: on Georges Bataille and transgression - YouTube: lloplop 7 minutes ago

+Jennifer Armstrong I don't really get it. I know Freud well. I know Hegel well. Nietzsche is hard to discuss. Out of the philosophers I have studied extensively, he is surely one. I feel I do not quite have a hold of him on some levels in the way I understand Hegel. I cannot seem to locate to the logic here that differs from Hegel, it just seems like a restatement of his logic with the addition of freud and maybe the Nietzsche I'm not quite sure of? I have a long way to go. I have Eroticism: death and sensuality, Tears of Eros, Visions of Excess, and a bunch of his fiction work. I just ordered the Accursed Share vol. 1,2,3. Do you have any recommendations for other texts? What about secondary literature? I appreciate you taking the time to respond. Thanks a lot.

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Jennifer Armstrong 1 second ago

+lloplop With regard to Nietzsche, it's all basically looking at history and morality through a psychological lens, with a kind of Yin and Yang dynamic, only in the sphere of morality. Nietzsche also wanted to make history very, very conscious to us, through his psychological lens. He thought we could take control of it better if we understood what we had been doing all along, so that we were no longer just behaving unconsciously.
Bataille takes up Nietzsche's project, but he doesn't want to redeem the aristocratic outlook, as Nietzsche does. Rather, he wants to do everything he can, using Nietzschean-style psychology, to push forward a proletarian revolution.
Whereas Nietzsche sees that one must destroy the old, unconscious ways of doing things, and take control through mastery, Bataille wants to destroy the current bourgeois order. It is a political agenda, attempted through psychology, specifically Nietzschean psychology.
There is no short cut to seeing all of this, I am afraid. I spent a decade and a half on Nietzsche. That's how I can see his motifs reproduced in Bataille, but always with a twist and a different direction.
The motif in Nietzsche is of transcendence (mountain climbing), but in Bataille is is lowliness and descent from the heights.
I would just recommend reading the primary literature over and over until you start to see some parallels, especially in Bataille's oblique references toThus Spoke Zarathustra.

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Narcissists are eventually easy to combat

Besieged by the American perspective

Narcissists Love to Hate

Technical addendum: What is the "God principle"?

What I meant when referring to the psychology of the "God principle" in the previous video. (Addendum to the previous video.) How this links to the psychology of monotheism and belief in an afterlife.
It should be borne in mind that attacking the internalization of the God principle within oneself does not negate the principle, but diffuses it and distributes it more evenly within one's psyche.
*** This is a purely technical video, expressed in technical terms, like a computer programme. ***

VLOG

The dis-honour of the bourgeois revolutionaries of today

Narcissists and Emotional Communication

Narcissists and Emotional Communication: "I had one narc. who emulated all the postures of people whom I had felt sick with, in the past, many of whom were narcs, after I asked him to read my memoir. He just suddenly began acting mentally unwell, but not in a way that represented, so much a particular individual, but by conglomerating those things that I had noted I had found in the past to be upsetting.

This really disturbed me as it was the reaction I was least expecting. Also this guy was a professional in thinking, an academic, and I wondered how it could be possible his thinking had degenerated until it was the condensation of Anti-Thought. He kept bombarding me with his Anti-Thought, after that, whenever he got a moment between other conversations. It was quite shocking, not because I had not encountered various levels of narcissistic disturbance before, but just the way he had collated and condensed all the things I had found offensive into his own attitudinal stance. He was highly, highly trained in real thinking, but this is what he had reduced himself to. I felt it as a strong attack, but I could not fathom any reason for it. When I eventually asked him, he stonewalled me and said he "could not remember" and (in another mention) that he "did that all the time"."



'via Blog this'

Benign aggression

Besieged by the American perspective

Interview with a shogun

Don't presume upon "the most spiritual people ever"

Time stamps and oil glands

On to the next day, in Perth

Slicelife during the rain: Perth (via spy sunglasses)

Addendum: What is the "God principle"?

Understand the dialectical nature of Bataille's transgression

The hellish inner journey & back

Narcissistic Abuse | Sounding Crazy to Others | Surviving The Aftermath

Yeah, I I've had that a lot too -- people treating me like I was crazy. In fact, it was considered conventional during the nineties to label women, in particular, "oversensitive". So, I thought, well perhaps that could be true. I come from a very warlike society originally, but we women were nowhere as tough or as stoical as the men were expected to be. So I worked more on my toughness and developed my inner will and stoicism. I also upgraded my expectations that most people around would be much tougher than I, and that I could basically tell them anything and not expect them to react. In fact, the opposite was true. Most people couldn't put up with even a tenth of what I had been putting up with all this time without over-reacting. I tested that. I found it to be true. And after all of this, something even stranger happened. I was accused of aiming to be tough and not just accepting conventional gender roles. The goal posts were changed!
This could make you completely crazy. It almost did, to me.

Those who presume to totally understand mankind

(1) In fact I think this is the view behind... - Jennifer Frances Armstrong

In fact I think this is the view behind postmodernism: don't separate yourself from the rest of us, or have any hint of an independent identity -- you are just being violent.
But reducing yourself to infancy by having no adult identity is a form of extreme emotional violence.

Krishnamurti Foundation of America

2 hrs · 

More relevant than ever http://bit.ly/1ML52tx

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Jennifer Frances Armstrong and it is also pretty arrogant to presume that one has access to "a total understanding of mankind"

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We don't share the same cultural background, therefore be on the alert

What Don Juan is teaching

Privileged knowledge distribution within the colonial system

NARCISSISTIC INJURY: defusal attempts within contemporary culture

What is ressentiment/narcissism really?

white skin privilege?

Laura Herbst commented on Patti J North's post in LAST OF THE RHODESIANS Laura Herbst 12 November 11:39 I wonder how many black people in Zim feel their independence has given them any substantial privilege Comment history Christine Tutt 12 November 09:36 Exactly! Proves that the system worked if you put in the effort!! I wish he would give an acknowledgment to that. Jennifer Frances Armstrong 12 November 07:02 Yeah, I am sick to death of the stupidity that pronounces me to have been privileged. Even in the contemporary Westerners' own material terms I was very far away from being privileged. Rae Sunlay 12 November 06:51 As for the situation Rhodesia "got itself into" it is simplistic to place blame on any one thing or person. We took the situation we were put in and did the best we could to keep our country alive, both black and whites, but outside forces were against us from the beginning and the meddling saw our demise. Given time and alot less outside interferrence I believe we could have had a good shot at becoming a truly integrated country which is alot more than those poor bastards have now under FREEDOM. All they have now is MIGHT IS RIGHT - try feeding your kids on that! Rae Sunlay 12 November 06:45 Came to this discussion late as usual! There is no doubt colonial life did offer "privledges" that were not available to africans but most assume "privledges" mean wealth etc. Alot of us come from ordinary working class families and I for one had a wonderful childhood but one that would be considered poor financially. May Hanwith-Horden 12 November 06:17 Like you Patti we had it tough but had a wonderful upbringing with good ethics an morals and were taught that love and hard work will always stand you in good stead. View all comments Original post Patti J North 11 November 22:57 Just a thought here... please feel free to disagree with me... after a discussion with Chris Greenland and another member saying that we Rhodies are actually to blame for the situation Rhodesia got into.. and that we were privileged ones... I was just sitting here thinking about the words privileged whites... I grew up piss poor but surrounded with love... privilege perhaps is not monetary nor unfairness ~ instead it is way of life.. I was privileged to be raised a strong Rhodesian woman... raised knowing right from wrong.... raised to say no if I felt an injustice was being made... raised to speak my mind... raised to stand tall and proud... raised not to take no for an answer when others in charge don't want to make a decision ... Are these privileges ? heck no imho they are a Rhodesian way of life that my parents raised me in and I for one am damn thankful... Blessings on my Rhodie parents who raised me the right way !!

Vlog CCCLIII

Mid-life crisis -- indeedy. I have been trying to make sense of the life I had to fight to have, defensively, because of wave upon wave of narcissists. As I resolve the issue of having had different parts of my self shattered, and needing to find a way to consolidate the different parts, I am going back and further back into the original script or programming of my upbringing and first fifteen years of life. These were solid. (I didn't know as much as I do now, but psychologically at any rate these were very, very solid years.) What contemporary Westerners have tried to teach me about how I ought to behave has generally been proven wrong by the evidence that what they say in fact doesn't work for me. It's time to stop gambling with the risk of being pulled apart by doing this or that arbitrary thing with the understanding that this is "adaptation".
It's time to draw back everything into the original whole.

Narcissism Hit Job

NARCISSISTIC INJURY: defusal attempts within contemporary culture

Breakfast (with Whitlam)

How the primitive mind works

This is an excellent and detailed analysis.
I think the need to "win" occurs at the level of the primeval self, or what might be termed "lizard brain". You can imagine lizards posturing on the ground, raising and lowering their heads in an intimidating gesture. The lizard that is intimidated first runs away leaving the other lizard as "the winner".
I think it is very important to understand this game, as it is played not just by narcissists (who obsess about this game at the expense of everything else), but is also a part of how we engage in politics and do our social organisation.
Also, there is a certain period in our developmental stage where we all need to gain a certain amount of "wins" to feel good about ourselves. If we do not do so, then even though we may employ the rational mind as much as possible to convince ourselves that we are still good and worthwhile people, our primeval mind will veto this conclusion. It's very painful but we can be undermined at the point where we are establishing our credibility in the world, and this undermining, when it occurs, is primarily in our own eyes.
I consider that we really do need to understand how this works, so that we can take control over ourselves, so that for instance if I feel I am failing in one area of life I can give myself some "wins" in another area. That is why I challenged myself to do skydiving, because it was a way to give myself "wins". One's own observing mind is impressed by this, and is reinforced at a very foundational level.
By contrast, if we do not understand how our primeval minds work, which is on the basis of getting and consolidating a certain basic number of "wins", we can become more easily victimized by narcissists, because their power seems to us much greater than our own.

INNER EXPERIENCE and our destructive human animality - YouTube

INNER EXPERIENCE and our destructive human animality - YouTube

David Racz 38 minutes ago · LINKED COMMENT

Walter Benjamin veered close to Bataillean destruction but differently. They both thought it Divine. Benjamin seems to see it ethically though in an idiosyncratic justice. It would be interesting to compare them.

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Jennifer Armstrong 1 second ago

+David Racz The problem is that by combining or closely associating the two points of views (Bataille's -- and Benjamin's as you've described it), we get something that in my experience would be a fundamental contradiction.
Let me try to explain a bit...
One of the ways in which I was able to come to terms with the primitive destruction of my identity was by depersonalizing it, and seeing this destructive outcome as having been in the hands of a violent and superior power. Now, let me make it very, very clear, that the destruction of my identity was prescribed, condoned and constantly carried forward by moralists. Along with the fact the destroying my sense of my Rhodesian identity served their narcissistic interests and gave them all sorts of pleasures in doing what they did (for instance mob stalking), the moralists could tell themselves that they were doing something good, by getting ride of the nasty "colonial" mentality of the past.
I have been the victim of "idiosyncratic justice" and it demoralized me and almost made me crazy.
The only way I could overcome this downward slide and put myself back on a stable psychological road is by telling myself, over and over again, that there was nothing ethical about my destruction -- rather there was something glorious about being able to experience it AND survive it.
So I take the side of Bataille any day, rather than that of the idiosyncratic moralists, meting out their "justice". Bataille's formulation, is after all, on my side, whereas how could one recover from anything if one felt or thought that moralists had a right to do what they did?

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