“The United Kingdom Has Gone Mad”
This was the heading of an article written
about Brexit for the New York Times by Thomas L Friedman on April 12th
2019. In this article Mr Friedman writes about the agonising and
incomprehensible act of self-harm the UK is currently hell bent on enacting. It
is an excellent piece of journalism and I want to use his heading to think,
from a psychoanalytic view, why his title it is so apt.
I, like so many others, was moved to tears
as I watched one of the D-Day remembrance ceremonies that took place
at Ver-Sur-Mer on June 6th. The only politicians present
at this particular event were Theresa May and Emanuel Macron.
Of course I felt sad for the huge loss of
lives, but it was the warmth of President Macron’s address and Theresa May’s
response that moved me to tears. Why? Because after three years of hearing
nothing but divisive rhetoric and hostility between the general
public, politicians and journalists, these two leaders were acknowledging the
enormous value of co-operation, compassion and love.
For so long our country has been revelling
in hate and division. Manipulated by politicians for their own ends, we have
been driven to a primitive state. Whipped up to believe that the world only
operates in a binary way, the pull to join one side or the other of the Brexit
argument is irresistible, as is the delightful feeling of being right
while all the others are wrong.
No wonder those who have the temerity to
suggest we compromise and come to some sort of mediated agreement
are relegated to the periphery of the debate. Who wants
reasonableness when we have been encouraged, indeed given permission, to be vitriolic
and hate filled.
It is natural for an infant to be in, what
is called later in life, a paranoid state. Natural to project his feelings onto
his mother and, when he does so, to see her as two separate people. When he
hates her, she is the wicked stepmother, when he loves her, she is the good
fairy. In healthy development this state doesn’t dominate for long. With the
help of loving parents the infant comes to realise that love and hate can be
experienced in the same mind and often at the same time. He comes to realise
that life isn’t binary and, in embracing a mature state of mind, recognises
that other people who are separate from him with different ideas, are neither
monsters nor angels.
But Mr Friedman is right, as a nation we
have gone mad when it comes to Brexit. That is to say that we have regressed to
a primitive and paranoid way of being, operating from a none thinking state
that simply sees anyone who sees things differently to us as deluded.
I passionately want to remain in the EU. I
like the philosophy of integration and believe the move away from isolation
towards co-operation is a progressive step and evolutionary step. I shout and
scream at the television when, it seems to me, only Leavers are asked their
opinion and I have experienced levels of hatred towards my countrymen over the
past three years that I didn’t believe I possessed. As I write this piece I am
literally in two minds, the one that knows without a shadow of a doubt that the
way forward is to remain in the EU and reform it - and my psychotherapeutic self
who knows that there is another way of thinking that should be respected,
listened to and thought about. But that is the trouble with this situation;
there is NO thinking going on and anyone who dares to suggest we do so gets
shouted down as a traitor, as betraying democracy and the will of the people.
Thinking is hard work, it means bringing
together two different ideas out of which a third, creative idea can emerge. It
means giving up the belief that you are right and that anyone who thinks
differently to you is an idiot. It means giving up that delicious feeling of
belonging to the good tribe, which only exists because of the hated other
tribe. It is very hard to give up certainty - I find it so - but there is also
a wonderful sigh of existential relief when I experience, as I did when
watching the D Day ceremony, my connection with the rest of humanity.
I expect it
is the connection we all need to find if we are to stop going mad and become
sane again.
Pauline Hodson, Oxford, UK
Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist
pauline.hodson@btconnect.com
The Business of Therapy
14th
June 2019 – The Guardian
Therapy to get us thinking again
Therapy to get us thinking again
For three
years, the UK has been revelling in hate and division, says Pauline
Hodson, and individual therapy for aspiring politicians could create new
insights and awareness, says Elizabeth Adalian. Meanwhile, some
responsibility for the toxicity of politics must surely lie with electors,
says Pamela Davies
Those, like Rory Stewart, who have the temerity to suggest
we compromise, are relegated to the periphery of the debate,’ says Pauline
Hodson. Photograph: Andy Rain/EPA
George Monbiot writes that “psychotherapy would take the
toxicity out of politics (Journal, 12 June). He says: “Almost everywhere
we see the externalisation of psychic wounds or deficits” and that Sigmund
Freud claimed “groups take on the personality of their leader”.
For three years, the UK has been revelling in hate and division.
We have been whipped up by politicians to believe the world only operates in a
binary way – the pull to join one side or the other of the Brexit argument has been irresistible, as
has the delightful feeling of being right while all the others are wrong.
No wonder those, like Rory Stewart, who have the temerity to
suggest we compromise and come to some sort of mediated agreement, are
relegated to the periphery of the debate. Who wants reasonableness when we have
been encouraged by our leaders to be extreme.
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As a nation we have gone mad when it comes to Brexit. That is to
say that we have regressed to a primitive and paranoid state.
We refuse to think, and simply see anyone who views things
differently as deluded. Thinking is hard work. It means bringing together two
different ideas out of which a third, creative, idea can emerge. It means
giving up the belief that you are right and that anyone who thinks differently
is an idiot. It means giving up that delicious feeling of belonging to the good
tribe that only exists because of the hated other tribe.
But didn’t these tribes come together briefly when we watched
the D-day ceremonies; didn’t we feel for a day connected to the rest of
humanity; and isn’t that the connection we all need to find if we are to become
sane again?
Pauline Hodson
(Psychoanalytic psychotherapist), Oxford
Pauline Hodson
(Psychoanalytic psychotherapist), Oxford
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• The quote from the
article – “For some people it is easier to command a nation and to inflict
terrible suffering than to process their own trauma and pain” – reminds me of a
seminal book on the subject I read many years ago called The Drama of Being a
Child, by Alice Miller. In fact, the imprint of the traumatic effects of the
primal years led me to write a book, Touching Base With Trauma: Reaching Across
the Generations.
****** 25th June 2019
Subject: RE: Did I send you this already?
No
– that’s a new one to me. Boris hasn’t changed in 40 years – has he?
BUT,
is tutor Hammond any relation to Chancellor Hammond?
You
must have read this – this morning.
I
was Boris Johnson’s boss: he is utterly unfit to be prime minister
Noel
PS
– in the staged lovers’ picnic photo – why is that woman holding a carving knife under
the table?
