A contribution to the understanding of TDS.
The shock of the 2016 election that first propelled Donald Trump to the White House produced a few good-faith attempts in the prestige press to understand the president’s supporters, especially among the white working class. Those days, fleeting as they were, are far behind us now. Laura K. Field’s Furious Minds: The Making of the MAGA New Right is less a book than the cornerstone of an information operation. It is intended to do two things: discredit any attempt to find anything rational or worthy in Trump’s political program, and ostracize as racist psychopaths anyone who dares try.
BV
Thanks for this reference and the link to Anton’s review. Excellent, sobering and ultimately depressing.
Bill,
Reading Anton’s damning critique of what passes for rational argumentation in this woman’s book calls to mind the observations of old man Jung long ago on animus possession* in the female:
“Woman is compensated by a masculine element and therefore her unconscious has, so to speak, a masculine imprint. This results in a considerable psychological difference between men and women, and accordingly I have called the projection-making factor in women the animus, which means mind or spirit. The animus corresponds to the paternal Logos just as the anima corresponds to the maternal Eros. But I do not wish or intend to give these two intuitive concepts too specific a definition. I use Eros and Logos merely as conceptual aids to describe the fact that woman’s consciousness is characterized more by the connective quality of Eros than by the discrimination and cognition associated with Logos. …. In women, … Eros is an expression of their true nature, while their Logos is often only a regrettable accident. It gives rise to misunderstandings and annoying interpretations …. This is because it consists of opinions instead of reflections, and by opinions I mean a priori assumptions that lay claim to absolute truth. Such assumptions, as everyone knows, can be extremely irritating. … [W]ith women it is a question of power, whether of truth or justice or some other ‘ism’… The ‘Father’ (i.e., the sum of conventional opinions) always plays a great role in female argumentation. No matter how friendly and obliging a woman’s Eros may be, no logic on earth can shake her if she is ridden by the animus. …”**
Needless to say, as is the case of the anima/shadow constellation, when the archetype of the animus absorbs the personal shadow’s primitive, destructive, aggrieved, power-seeking qualities, an intensified possession takes places, one which further degrades rationality and emotional stability. This is a wide-spread phenomena among les dames of the American Left.
Vito
*This is found among women who have strongly repressed and hence failed to confront or integrate the personal shadow, the basic step in individuation, the absence of which renders an encounter with the archetypical animus contents of the psyche impossible or distorted, as in possession. In this state the animus overwhelms the conscious personality, the ego, and rather than acting as a supportive inner guide, providing it with such positive “masculine” attributes as logic, initiative, courage, and spiritual meaning, becomes autonomous, despotic, and harmful.
**Collected Works, Vol 9, ii, paragraph 29
Vito,
The animus is the masculine element in a woman just as the anima is the feminine element in a man. Animus and anima are shadow elements as long as they remain unconscious. The task of individuation is to integrate these shadow elements into the ego by becoming conscious of them. The failure of Laura Field to become conscious of her animus allows the animus-qualities (rationality, courage, initiative) to become distorted in the ways you indicate in your second comment. I find your Jungian analysis plausible and applicable to a lot of women on the Left. (Ever watch the ladies on The View?)
But of course, ‘psychologizing’ of this sort or of any sort is legitimate only after one has has shown (or at least has made a strong case for) the falsehood of the person’s views. ‘Psychologizing’ (and ‘sociologizing’) cannot substitute for a strictly objective evaluation of the views being put forth. Agree?
One problem here is whether such an objective evaluation is possible for us humans.
Bill,
For the sake of clarity: The signs of an autonomous, negative animus dominating a woman’s ego include such indicators as the holding of rigid, often irrational opinions that are taken as unassailable truth; defensive forms of argumentation that are power-driven rather than truth-seeking; excessively critical judgements of others, often expressed aggressively; argumentative and controlling behaviors; and the forfeiture of feminine qualities, such as intuition and relational warmth.
Vito
>>woman’s consciousness is characterized more by the connective quality of Eros than by the discrimination and cognition associated with Logos. …. In women, … Eros is an expression of their true nature, while their Logos is often only a regrettable accident. <<
Does not Jung go too far here? I agree completely with the first sentence. That connective quality, that warmth, empathy, compassion, the disposition to nurture, protect, etc — isn't that why we love women, and why we need them to complement and complete us men? But it may be OTT to say that Eros is their true nature, which implies that no woman can be 'logical,' discriminative, etc. I am talking about really feminine women, not men with an alternative form of plumbing, if you catch my drift. I could give a long list: Judge Jeanine Pirro, Maria Bartiromo, and on and on, beautiful, sexy, but sharp as tacks, conservative women in the main.
Bill,
I don’t think that Jung is denying that women have logical or discrimitive capacities, but rather that these typically less central to their natures. He recognized variations in the prevalence of Eros versus Logos in individuals, and he did not deny that women cannot reason, discriminate, or engage in logical thinking. Rather, women have access to Logos, especially by way of the animus, which, if well integrated with the ego, supports clear thinking and rationality.
Vito
Vito,
The really important question, however, is the one I posed in the response to your first comment.
Sorry, Bill. I did not see your first comment.
Yes, I agree. Psychological analysis cannot take the place of “strictly objective evaluation of the views being put forth.”
Vito