A long time ago, at least in human terms, I was bumbling through my first four years of undergraduate studies at SUNY Geneseo, the purported “Harvard of the SUNY System”; see the November 12, 1990 article: “SUNY Campus in Cornfields Cultivates Ivy Reputation”. They did have ivy on a few of their older brick buildings. Now don’t be too impressed. When I went there the school was populated by first generation college students like me and some of our parents were not very supportive of our choice to go to college. In my case the big draw was to get out of my house and to play soccer. I got to do both and by the end of my fourth year, I was essentially red-shirted my first year, I had one more year of eligibility left and a year to finish up a degree. Yes, I was on the five year plan but if memory serves me correctly it was $1200.00 a semester tuition, room and meals included, so financing it was not a real issue. I had started as a biology major but that ended with my second course, Non-Vascular Plants, the most boring course I had ever taken. Then I tinkered with Geology, a couple of years of Physics/Engineering and finally settled on Psychology. My last year was almost all psychology courses and I fulfilled all my credits except for one course. The second semester of that year I finally began to approach my potential earning four A’s and a B in statistics. I had redeemed myself somewhat. I had to take one more course the following year and I received permission to do so at a college close to home. Degree completed!
Yes, I did return home and it was a poor choice but more about that in my upcoming book: “All About Me”. It was supposed to be an Autobiography but now it will be a “Memoir” as that is the trend. Spoiler alert…it will be a tribute to how special I am, a parody of sorts. Maybe I’ll write it in the third person when referring to myself: “John woke up this morning. John wanted some breakfast so he called the chauffeur to go pick up a goat cheese and egg white omelet. Now that John was now rich. John wanted to extend John’s life as long as possible hence the egg whites. The profits from the book will go to various charities, that is after House Hunters finds me a mountain villa in Costa Rica. I can’t wait to see myself on Cable T.V. getting a tour of a 7000 square foot house with a 270 degree ocean view: “Excuse me but the color selection in here is just horrible! And the tiles are very 60’s. How do people live like this? And no soaking tub in the master bedroom…ugh. It seems like the asking price of 2.3 million is a bit high since we will have to do a lot of renovating to bring it up to modern standards and put our stamp on it.”
Excuse my digression (said with a special English royalty accent) but back to the task at hand. One of my courses was taught by a Professor who we saw three times during the semester: the first class, the mid-term exam, and the final exam. He asked us what grade we wanted and then gave us a reading list to earn that grade. The “exams” consisted of meeting with him and discussing them. At least this is how I remembered it. He was very serious and I found him terrifying as I still had difficulty believing I should be allowed to be in the same room with most Professors. He had been trained directly by Carl Rogers. He now spent a significant amount of his time at Attica Prison teaching inmates. I wish I had the necessary confidence to show up at his office and speak further with him. He was very interesting.
I believe it was in his class that I came into contact with the writings of Erich Fromm in particular his book: “The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness”. A bit of history regarding Fromm: “The catastrophic First World War and the chaos that it led into the world deeply unsettled Fromm’s beliefs and changed his worldview completely. He once said: “When the war ended in 1918, I was a deeply troubled young man who was obsessed by the question of how war was possible, by the wish to understand the irrationality of human mass behavior, by a passionate desire for peace and international understanding. More, I had become deeply suspicious of all official ideologies and declarations, and filled with the conviction ‘of all one must doubt.” http://www.erichfromm.net/. He was bothered by what he accurately considered insanity. I am too. Are you? If so you now have another expert to support your perceptions. If not start reading and see what develops. Reference Fromm in your conversations. And make that two experts. I came from SUNY Geneseo…the Haaaarvaaard of the SUNY System.
I can relate to this. The barbarism and stupidity of settling conflicts by violence has always been troubling to me. But it has been the norm for so long we just accept that it is just the way things are and subscribe to all sorts of unproven notions that people are inherently violent. We are not inherently violent and there is significant evidence to support that violence is a choice driven by social factors. Fromm’s book challenges many of the assumptions we have about violence. It is a fascinating study of human aggression. Fromm delineates two types of aggression. The first is “benign aggression consisting of accidental, playful and self-assertive acts or acts resulting from ego hurt, escape from reality, a desire to conform or be free, or a need to attain a desirable goal. Fromm feels that these are defenses against man’s growth and can be eliminated by constructing a society in which no one is threatened.” The second is “malignant aggression, consisting of sadism and a passionate desire for cruelty and destruction, is the result of “exploitation and manipulation” which in Fromm’s opinion produces boredom and triviality. This type of aggression he feels can be substantially eliminated when the existing socioeconomic conditions are replaced by conditions favorable to the development of man’s genuine needs.” http://www.rosenfels.org/J2Zellner.
He also explains “malignant narcissism as a psychological syndrome comprising an extreme mix of narcissism, antisocial behavior, aggression, and sadism. Grandiose, and always ready to raise hostility levels, the malignant narcissist undermines families and organizations in which they are involved, and dehumanizes the people with whom they associate.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malignant_narcissism. In “The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness” Fromm went further describing the necrophilic character: “Necrophilia in the characterological sense can be described as the passionate attraction to all that is dead, decayed, putrid, sickly; it is the passion to transform that which is alive into something unalive; to destroy for the sake of destruction; the exclusive interest in all that is purely mechanical. It is the passion to tear apart living structures.” How many of these life-negating personality types are out there? We know about some of the historical figures such as Hitler, Idi Amin, Pol Pot and many others. Anyone who constructs a genocide would likely qualify. But what about the sadistic individuals among us who enjoy causing suffering and feel justified in doing so? Everyday cruelty can come in many forms including outright physical violence, verbal assaults including intimidation, and the many forms of structural violence, such as prejudice and discrimination, that I have discussed in the past.
All of Fromm’s books are worth a read. He provides some important perspectives on what supports us in becoming a life-negating or life-affirming force. If we take away fear people generally behave in a life-affirming manner. Fromm is accurate when he states that meeting people’s socioeconomic needs, or providing a basic sense of safety, will go a long way towards creating a more peaceful world. The question is how we can get people to consider this perspective and commit to a world without warfare and structural violence. I have a couple of ideas. First, let’s recognize the types of people Fromm described for what they are, mentally ill and terribly destructive. Treatment consists of not rewarding them with wealth and power. That normalizes the behavior and it becomes a cultural value. That means we need to increase our self-awareness and learn to assert ourselves in their presence. In essence, to stop following their lead and instead resist them, by adhering to a set of ethical standards beginning with basic human rights. Second, let’s start making peace and conflict studies a requirement in all school curriculums starting in Elementary School. Many of the youth in this world are aware of the difficulty we are in, especially environmentally, and are taking action. It’s time some of us “older types” get on board and support their efforts. It is time for us to respect their vision and wisdom and follow them. They are the true leaders. It is time we make engaged or assertive compassion the center of our ethics and actions.