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Psychopathology of
the BoJos
Ever since my
immersion as a student in the bizarre subculture of the BoJos, I've found the pathology of their mental illness both
fascinating and repulsive. And in my layman's opinion,
mentally ill is exactly what their paranoid, aggressive, and
delusional condition amounts to.
The single best book I can recommend to help you understand them is
The People of the Lie
by M. Scott Peck, M.D. This book is not about fundamentalists,
although it will help you understand them. Peck illustrates how evil
can come upon us stealthily in myriad ways: Cloaked in the most
humble and banal of
appearances, or bathed in charm, or thrust upon us through the
impersonal transactions of every day life, or posing as a benign
(even benevolent) authority figure. But
no matter how the culprits cloak their malevolence, they are all "people of the lie."
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Update! Every few
years I re-read The People of the Lie. I always
gain new understanding each time. I just finished reading it
again, and this is what I came up with...
Might
there be a high prevalence of
AMBULATORY
SCHIZOPHRENICS
among the BoJos?
Definition:
Ambulatory schizophrenia is a condition whereby the person is
generally free of symptoms and functions well in society, but
manifests schizophrenia when certain conditions (i.e., stressful
experiences) are met.
For example, imagine a confrontation with a BoJo in which
you present
Biblical contradictions which he or she cannot
explain away. In my experience, the typical response would go
something like this: (1) BoJo becomes flustered,
then enraged, then aggressive; (2) BoJo reacts with an
over-the-top diatribe in which he/she manifests paranoid
delusions of "Christian" persecution, simply because
he/she cannot uphold his/her end of a debate; (3) BoJo unleashes a verbal
soup of personal insults, non sequiturs, Bible-verse
regurgitating, and other irrelevant and illucid comments. This
is the same kind of behavior that an ambulatory schizophrenic
manifests -- see the first and third symptoms below...
Schizophrenic symptoms per DSM-IV:
(See if you can correlate these symptoms to the above
hypothetical example -- or to the many real-life BoJo behaviors
which I have amply documented throughout this website.) In
a clinical setting,
two or more of the following can confirm a diagnosis
-- but only one is required if the delusions
are bizarre or if hallucinations include hearing
voices.
- Delusions (i.e., false beliefs - of grandeur, of
paranoia, of persecution, or of control)
- Hallucinations (i.e., auditory, visual, smell, or
tactile)
- Disorganized speech (i.e., frequent incoherence
or derailment of thoughts)
- Grossly disorganized or catatonic behavior
- Negative symptoms (i.e., flat affect, lack or
decline of speech, lack or decline of motivation)
Tying it all together:
ln The People of the Lie, M. Scott Peck, M.D.
observes that ambulatory schizophrenics make up a large portion
of the personality types that he classifies as "evil."
Furthermore, he comments that "evil" personality types are
themselves by and large the children of ambulatory
schizophrenics.
The remainder of this webpage is devoted to postulating that
the BoJos are, in significant number, malignant narcissists.
Dr. Peck appears to confirm this theory: He pegs "evil"
personality types as essentially a sub-type within the broader
classification of malignant narcissism |
In my opinion, as a layman and "armchair
psychologist," the Joneses are probably malignant narcissists. The
entire university administration, faculty, staff, and student body
are organized and run to feed the pathological narcissism of those
at the top. Rules and rewards/punishments flow from the
top down. Loyalty and obedience flow from the bottom up --- or else!
Here's a page from
North Carolina Wesleyan
College that I think is directly on point. Excerpts
(key points in red):
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"Narcissism is a somewhat less severe form of psychopathy. It
manifests aggressive, paranoid, and
borderline characteristics, but
more commonly appears in the form of envy, greed, power lust, an
extensively rationalized sense of entitlement, and a
pathological grandiose self. Unlike psychopaths,
narcissists can experience loyalty and guilt; but like
psychopaths, narcissists lack empathy or caring for others,
viewing people as "playthings" to be used.
Female narcissists tend to be the kind that "sleep" their way to
the top; male narcissists tend to get ahead by becoming involved
in massive power struggles.
Psychologists suspect that the cause of
narcissism is severe mental or physical pain in childhood at the
hands of a powerful, idealized mother-father figure.
Inconsistent parental attitudes on aggression and self-assertion
as well as childhood experiences of being valued for specific,
precocious talents seem to be the prime determinants. They never
learned who to identify with -- the aggressor or victim, and
they developed a pragmatic philosophy of siding with winners,
regardless of who was in the right or wrong. In fact, they
believe that the "good" is usually changeable and fickle while
"bad" is stable and predictable. They live
life by idealizing those who satisfy their narcissistic needs
and systematically devaluing and denigrating those who do not.
Underneath their superficial charm, they
feel they have a right to control, manipulate, exploit, and be
cruel to others." |
That same article includes this chart, indicating a spectrum of
behaviors ranging from mild to severe in terms of their pathology
and manifestations:
PERSONALITY
DISORDERS IN THIS SPECTRUM
| |
Paranoid |
Narcissistic |
Antisocial |
Psychopathic |
Sadistic |
|
Aggressive style |
Provocative,
preemptive attack |
Denigrating,
demeaning to others |
Rebellious,
contemptible |
Malicious,
predatory |
Sadism |
| Superego development |
Defective |
Immature |
Deviant |
Perverse |
Defective and
perverse |
| Structure of conscience |
Retributive,
vindicates self |
Normal with
delusions |
Distorted |
Inverted |
Inverted |
| Destructiveness |
Vengeful |
Interpersonal
exploitation |
Instrumental and
Expressive crime |
Strategic
conquest and domination |
Prolonged
anguish and suffering |
This is how I peg the BoJos in relation to the above chart:
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I believe the
paranoid disorder (low end of the spectrum) is
pretty much universal among BoJos.
-
I believe the
narcissistic disorder is
quite common
among BoJos and that the
"interpersonal exploitation"
behavior would
be correlated to one's status (i.e., more likely to
manifest in a BoJo
administrator than a student).
-
I believe that the
antisocial
disorder is
present
among BoJos, but I
cannot say to what extent.
I
believe that an antisocial personality can feed on the BoJo
atmosphere and exploit it. For example, I think the BoJos who
picketed the pope and shouted
"antichrist! antichrist!" at him are an example of this type.
-
I believe that the
psychopathic
disorder is probably
about
on par with the antisocial. Fred Phelps of "God Hates Fags" (a
former BoJo student) is, in my opinion, an example of this type.
-
I
believe the
sadistic disorder
pervades the school's
dictatorial and vindictive disciplinary system. For example,
students are not only encouraged but
required
to report on each other. The ones who thrive in this kind of
cut-throat environment are rewarded with positions of student
leadership and minor authority. Those in the faculty and
administration who have prospered in this oppressive workplace are, in my opinion, people
adept at gaming the system, pleasing higher-ups, and who derive satisfaction from their positions of unassailable authority over the lives of
others.
I'm painting with a broad brush, and I'm sure there are exceptions
to my rather grim assessment. I don't pretend to have the
qualifications to wield this kind of information with
precision. Just take it as a rough "field guide to the feral BoJo."
Another relevant
article
by psychoanalyst Monroe Stein, Ph.D. reveals how the
fundamentalist mind works. Excerpts:
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"The fundamentalist's certitude, by
its strongly exaggerated nature, can be better understood as a
psychoneurotic symptom complex, a part of a neurotic defensive
formation, erected against unconscious doubt...."
"The panoply of neurotic
defensive formation of fundamentalism accounts in great measure
for their limiting of their social contacts.... They thereby
avoid the arousal in themselves of feelings of insecurity which
would otherwise be produced by encountering persons who
hold...contrary beliefs of a religious nature, thereby
endangering the fundamentalists' defenses against the powerful,
underlying doubt deep within themselves."
"Thus, the
fundamentalist in his or her own façade of self-righteousness
may, and commonly does, manifest only a thin, even translucent
disguise of his or her underlying 'sinfulness,' which the
neurotic defensive formation aims to hold in abeyance. In
brief, then, the fundamentalist not only possesses greater than
average, troublesome degree of underlying socially and morally
unacceptable trends, but he or she holds these 'sinful'
propensities in check only precariously." [Example: 50% of Christian men in poll report addiction to
porn.
See news article]
"In the same vein, when
engaging fundamentalists in serious discussion challenging the
validity of their religious beliefs, particularly concerning
supernatural phenomena and the literal interpretation of
biblical myths, they are virtually limited to countering the
challenge, with emotionalism and over righteousness, by
reaffirming, in hackneyed phrases, their stock beliefs. The
fundamentalist appears unable, evidently, to rise above the
level of reaffirmation, even if one points out to him his dogged
failure to rise above this level."
"The conclusion forces
itself upon one that the religious indoctrination to which
fundamentalists, including religious zealots, both expose
themselves repeatedly and to which they are regularly subjected
has the insidious effect of preventing the development of the
ability to think critically about dogma they embrace or, if such
ability has ever been acquired, to be paralyzed in exercising
it." [The very definition
of BoJo "education."]
"Still further, the
fundamentalist also appears disposed, as an expression of his
neurotic personality structure, to use the mini-guerrilla tactic
of 'cutting off,' again and again, his opponent's efforts to
voice his thoughts. At the same time, the fundamentalist seems
apt to augment such frustrating harassment by loud talking and,
even more maddening, snickering at the points his opponent makes
instead of replying thoughtfully to them.... The fundamentalist
can be expected to persist in doing so even though his opponent
confronts him, again and again, with the obstructionist nature
of the tactic, the feeling of insecurity that prompts it, and
its offending un-sportsman like, and harassing nature. One
gains the impression that the fundamentalist, by hostilely
persisting with stone faced indifference, thereby reenacts in
microcosm organized religion's long history of adamant
suppression of dissent as 'heresy.'" |
The real trick with fundamentalists in general and BoJos in
particular is not to let yourself become a victim of their
psychopathology. That's becoming increasingly difficult as fundies
attempt to control local, state, and federal governments in the
U.S., to impose their curriculum on public schools, to challenge the
separation of church and state through litigation, and generally to
foist their beliefs on everyone else. And, naturally, when
mainstream Americans resist this extremist agenda, then
we're the ones guilty of waging a culture war on them. But that's
the perversity of their paranoid, aggressive, and delusional mental
state. In the argot of the BoJos, "No doubt the problem lies with
you." (And that's malignant narcissism in
a nutshell.)
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