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Noah's Arkism, 21St Century Style NEWS, ANALYSIS, OPINION FOR THE PSYCHOANALYTIC COMMUNITY|ISSUE 29 AUTUMN 2019 Climate Emergency Climate Emergency – Review – Woman Diary – events – Getting Real Extinction Rebellion at War listing 5Noah’s Arkism,11 21 29 21st century style Sally Weintrobe “as I looked out into the night sky across all see the reality more clearly. They struggle those infinite stars it made me realize how with alterations in their self-view and may unimportant they are” rage, grieve and find it hard to think in proportion about their own responsibility. Peter Cook, comedian They are tasked with ‘working through’, ost of us have been including working through depressive and living in a bubble of persecutory guilt. When in the climate disavowal about global bubble, personal responsibility and guilt heating. We were can be projected onto and spread out awareM it was happening, but we minimized over social groups all ‘in it together’, ‘it’ its impacts. What might people be feeling being a high carbon lifestyle. When the as they emerge from the climate bubble? bubble bursts, people are vulnerable There is no space here adequately to to experiencing the shock of what was explore this, so I will look at just two issues. comfortably projected being suddenly returned. First, we know people find it difficult to emerge from a psychic retreat from reality. For example, I was talking with a friend They are in danger of feeling flooded with who said people are shooting kangaroos anxiety, shock, shame and guilt as they in Australia now. Kangaroos are dying of Continues on page 2 NEW ASSOCIATIONS | ISSUE 29 AUTUMN 2019 2 thirst because of global heating and people love and grief. The climate emergency, offering omnipotent quick fixes as pseudo scruples or conflicts”. He called it “the are shooting them because they do not because it is being faced at such a late repairs. alien”. The alien is the disassociated know what else to do. We sat in stunned stage, now brings difficulties with working silence before we both acknowledged we through of a tall order. Collective psychic ‘The political ruthless part of a mindset that in my felt deep shame at being part of this. work is vitally needed if we are to emerge current work I call Exceptionalism. from and stay out of the retreat. world we live in is Exceptions regularly override their inner concern in order to preserve their felt ‘What might Emerging from the climate bubble at now being called entitlement to see themselves as ideal people be feeling this late stage is also likely to stir survival ‘the crazy’.’ and special, to have what they want anxieties of different – and conflicting – and omnipotently to arrange things as they emerge kinds. We ignore these anxieties at our peril. The political world we live in is now so they need feel no moral conflict or from the climate One realistic anxiety about not acting on being called ‘the crazy’. ‘The crazy’ needs unease. Apparently. A particular kind climate is that there will not be enough food, considerable investigating, but it does of entitlement ensures the ruthlessness. bubble?’ water, clean air and shelter. One realistic seem to involve a rapid rise in contempt for Here is an example: we know an oil- inconvenient realities, laws and limits and Secondly, because we did not act earlier, anxiety about acting on climate is we lose the based economy leads us directly to global increasing entitlement to use omnipotent damage is much greater now and the freedom to ignore boundaries and limits and heating and to ecocide. Well it’s a no thinking to bypass these in order to struggles we have with shame, guilt and act as we please. brainer – continue with business as usual. construct virtual realities. ‘The crazy’ is not anxiety are now more difficult to face Where is the profit in taking care? Taking People emerging from a collective psychic just ‘out there’ in politics. It easily gets into and to work through. Some damage is care conflicts with our entitlements as retreat often feel reenergised and more us, and to stay sane in today’s world we irreparable and knowing we have been Exceptions. alive. However, they are also vulnerable. need to keep reminding ourselves of this part of causing it may feel too hard to stay They need the support of a culture of serious fact. I argue that neoliberal ideology and with. I have in mind, for example, John care that values truth and provides a economics is suffused with Exceptionalism. Steiner’s paper on Sophocles’ Oedipus at non-persecutory atmosphere. They need I believe two factors are adding to ‘the This mindset, on gaining global power in 1 Colonus. Bereft of support, Oedipus put the grounding that an understanding of crazy’. The first is Exceptionalism. The the 1980s, outsourced factories to countries out his eyes and retreated to arrogance politics can provide. These help to gain a second is mounting anxieties about the where labour was cheapest. It outsourced and omnipotence. Also, Hyatt Williams’s sense of proportion when trying to work climate crisis, a crisis which in large its pollution. It was behind the financial point that facing the irreparable can lead a through issues of anxiety, shame and measure Exceptionalism has caused. crash in 2008. It takes no responsibility person to want to obliterate all knowledge guilt. They also need strong leaders to for consequences, and that makes it truly 2 that the destroyed object ever existed. I help them face inner and outer climate Exceptionalism frightening. If it sees profit on one side Christopher Hering wrote a paper on a began with the Peter Cook quote as the reality. By strong leaders I mean empathic of the scales and suffering, death and form of ruthlessness,3 one much studied danger is that our love of the earth could leaders able to withstand omnipotence and destruction on the other, it will find that in psychoanalysis, for instance by Eric be obliterated if we do not work through able to help people withstand their own profit outweighs suffering. It put in place Brenman who called it narrow minded what it means that the climate crisis is omnipotence. Currently there is virtually a body of corporate law to support this and cruel.4 Hering said,“(it) does not know human caused. Obliterated would be the no support of this kind. Instead we see the position. any concern or mercy; it is devoid of any part of the self and the group that feels rise of ‘strong-man’ leaders shamelessly Continues on page 3 NEW ASSOCIATIONS | ISSUE 29 AUTUMN 2019 3 Neoliberal Exceptions also put in place a we currently witness - ‘the crazy’ - involves pressure of survival anxieties, may culture of un-care that works to set our a “break with (reality) globally, and ‘The idea, based build the phantasy according to detailed inner exception free. This suits the needs construct(ion of) an alternative, delusional, on omnipotent instructions given by leaders offering of the neoliberal economy. The current “magical” reality”.7 This is the inevitably pseudo containment. For instance, dominant culture incessantly invites and drift of Exceptionalism. ‘The crazy’ is thinking, is I will Britain as an island Ark, with all wicked nudges us to collude with corrupt and also being manipulated and shaped to try be saved, and undesirable people kept out after Brexit corrupting arguments. This, I believe, is to ensure that an oil-based economy can through strict immigration laws. The US not nearly recognised enough. Here is continue. the rest will be as a castle Ark with a stout wall to keep out one small example. Teresa May responds sacrificed.’ all brown skinned bad people. Europe as an to public pressure by announcing the UK Noah’s Arkism as a Ark with wire fences to keep out refugees will decarbonise by the year 2050. Then, response to anxiety Here are some examples of current Noah’s who include climate refugees. (under reported) the government makes All this is to introduce Noah’s Arkism, a Arkism: rapidly rising form of ‘the crazy’. The idea, 4. Another kind of ‘Arkism’ protects against switching to solar more difficult with a 1. Food, water and clean air are now based on omnipotent thinking, is I will be unbearable feelings. For example, many new rule that VAT must now be applied to threatened, and temperatures are rising. 5 saved, and the rest will be sacrificed. climate scientists are currently suffering solar installations. Many people collude Being middle class, my economic position with what is largely an ‘as if’ repair, near unbearable feelings. I will save myself In the biblical story of Noah’s Ark, God will save me. I must soon install air achieved with a target, and they feel more from these feelings by constructing for sees mankind as wicked, meaning violent conditioning. comfortable continuing with their life myself an impregnable Ark to keep the and full of corrupt thinking, and Noah as styles as usual. 2. Being mega-wealthy, I can move to New unbearable feelings in them (the drowned) the one and the only good just man. God Zealand. In the longer term, humans will and away from me (the saved). I am very drowns all life in a great flood, saving only The Exceptionalist mindset seeded the have the technology to move to Mars. Not expert at deflecting my feelings about Noah, his family and representatives of climate bubble, the largest and most all humans obviously, but alpha types like climate reality. I do not notice that when I animal species. They all board an Ark that consequential bubble in human history.
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