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THE
SOCIAL
ENEMY
WITHIN


By Fintan Dunne
eIoNews.com
2nd November '01

General Jack D. Ripper Commie Hater.
Kubrick's 1964 film: Dr. Strangelove

Ripper: "Its incredibly obvious isn't it? A foreign substance is introduced into our precious bodily fluids without the knowledge of the individual. That's the way your hard-core Commie works."


In Stanley Kubrick's 1964 film, Dr. Strangelove, the paranoia of General Ripper about foreign substance in his bodily fluids seems uncannily prophetic.

Twenty years later scientist Robert Gallo confirmed Ripper's suspicions: a foreign substance called HIV had indeed been introduced into our bodily fluids- not by 'Commies' - but by 'Sex'.

General Ripper is torn between an external "Commie" enemy, and a suspected internal enemy in his bodily fluids. Today we are encouraged to face another looming enemy -this time it's Islam. Let's look at some of the social psychology of all this.

TO BE or NOT TO BE

The primal motivation behind all paranoia is fear of death itself. The inherent dualism of life presents contradictions between day and night, left and right, male and female etc. Our psyche is most aware of the dualism ME and NOT ME. Followed by: LIFE and NOT LIFE.

In human psychology we equate the dualism of ME and NOT ME with that of LIFE and NOT LIFE.

If I need to assert ME, it probably comes at the expense of all that is NOT ME -especially YOU! Existence is a life and death struggle.

Just watch two four year-olds grapple over a toy. "ME" says the first child. "No...ME!" counters the second. All things being equal they could battle eternally over that toy.

But the infant won't stay a 'dualist' (or duelist!) forever. Soon the rough and tumble of the school playground will turn our dualist into a pluralist. From the dualism of the 'one,' the child progresses to the pluralism of the 'many.'

FROM PROJECTION
TO INTROJECTION

In fact, that movement to the 'many' is the process our world society has been going through since the pluralist revolution of the 1960's.

The communications revolution which followed made us aware that 'Commies' are just people too. We became increasingly aware of those who are 'NOT US' and who think differently to 'US'.

This is how the 'social mind' grows up. Although composed of adult members, the social mind is but an infant: nations battle over territory like infants warring over toys. It is depressing to realize that the collective mind lags so far behind the developmental capacity of the individuals of which it is composed.

But eventually, the social mind- like the infant, learns to communicate. Like a growing child, the 'Nation' or group becomes more aware of the diverse world around it. This thrust has been mirrored by the growth of the Internet.

However, this development deeply challenges the methods by which the individual/group psyche copes with death fears. Before, the classic means was to project all fears of the enemy (NOT US = DEATH) outwards onto other groups. Now, because of growing awareness, these projections no longer work so well. If we cannot 'dump' our death fears elsewhere- where will they go?

They go inwards. We have to adsorb the fears- introjecting them rather than projecting. The group comes to realize that it is WE who are our own worst enemies- not some OTHERS. Now the enemy is not without: the enemy is within.

Furthermore, that blurring of the boundaries between ME and NOT ME me produces a psychological momentum which threatened both group and individual psyches.

If interpersonal boundaries fall, where will we end up? Dancing naked as in
Woodstock? Shock. Horror. We still need our psychological clothes and we hesitate to shed them.

In the Gospel of Thomas, Jesus is quoted answering this question: "On what day will the
Kingdom of Heaven arrive?" With this answer: "On the day that you trample your clothes into the ground." Deeply threatening to the puritan complex that has reared it's head in the USA before --during prohibition, McCarthyism, jogging and health crazes, etc..

THE ENEMY WITHIN

All the dynamics required for the regressive AIDS hysteria were in place by 1984- a symbolically appropriate year: Big Brother represents all the parental influences the social infant is attempting to outgrow.

The temptation to run back to Big Mommy or Big Daddy to avoid the threatening world outside, was strong - perhaps inevitable.

The AIDS hysteria erupted because:

1) The internalization of the 'enemy' was satisfied by finding a threatening enemy within the individual body: The HIV virus.

2) The internalization of the 'enemy' was further satisfied by finding a threatening enemy within the group body: the alleged carriers of the virus --homosexuals, drug users and 'naked' sexual hedonists.

3) The hysteria relieved the pressures of the thrust towards openness by encouraging isolation instead. An obsessive fear of contamination is found in individual neurosis- now this erupted in the group mind.

Interesting too that the AIDS theory was announced in the U.S.- perhaps the most culturally introspective nation in the world. It is more than a little coincidental that the initials "US" form the word "US" --the primal group.

And now the internalized AIDS enemy is being supplemented with another Islamic enemy -as threatening as the previous "commie" was perceived to be.

How do we become entrapped by this enemy hysteria? Surely a rational media should should be our best defense. And how did Science become the tool of the regressive AIDS hysteria? Is not Science the defender of truth against superstitious hysteria?

IRRATIONAL RATIONALITY

When General Ripper first came up with his "foreign substances" theory he immediately felt it was "incredibly obvious." This feeling of an idea so perfectly answering all questions is a hallmark of psychotic delusion.

The paranoiac feels deep relief that at last he understands why his life is a mess: Martians posing as humans have been thwarting him all along! This explains everything!

The same delusional dynamic drove the assertion by the 'discoverer' of HIV, Robert Gallo and the scientists who followed in his footsteps. There were of course many other possible hypotheses to explain the circumstances of the diseases that were affecting gay men in the early eighties.

Dissenting scientists have struggled to find acceptance for these alternative ideas. But alternative explanations lack the emotional impetus that has hypnotized both the scientific establishment and the public. The 'virus' theory satisfies psychological needs and wins out.

Blanket scientific objectivity is a myth. The God of Logic is subject to personal bias and the whims of the infantile social mind. Every scientist is first a social animal --to an extent determined by his or her own psychological maturity. Science is also pragmatically governed by economic factors that are in turn driven essentially by social dynamics.

In any event, scientific medicine traditionally sees treatment as a war waged on the battleground of the patient's body. David Ho advised launching a preemptive strike against the virus. Much of our 'rational' medicine is merely militaristic nonsense.

The same "hit 'em early- hit 'em hard" theory was favored by hawks among the Cold War military and is also prominent in our response to the Islamic "threat".

CYCLES OF FEAR

There is some light at the end of the tunnel. First, just like any child, the social infant must eventually grow up. That is inevitable and evolutionary. Second, there is a cyclic pattern to these regressive social movements.

The 'Roaring Twenties' were followed by economic depression and eventually war in the 1930's. The subsequent 'baby boom' led to the spiritual Sixties- only to founder in the materialistic Eighties and Nineties.

The prison population in the
US has risen dramatically- abortion statistics rose too (the opposite of a baby boom). All were indications of a war against the enemy within. The tensions of the approaching millennium accentuated this drift.

But once through the millennial barrier, a thousand years of future offers another upswing, even though a coherent vision about that future has yet to emerge. And right now the fear dynamic still holds.

However, some 'social infants' are determined to scrap the parental power of government, medical and scientific institutions. This goal is even embraced by some enlightened thinkers within governments themselves -not just by a few fringe anarchists. Some of us are keen to embrace the challenges of growing up.

Copyright © 2001 Fintan Dunne. eIoNews.com.
Reproduce entirely and non-commercially only


Dr. Strangelove

Or:
How I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb,
( the virus and the hordes of Islam.
)

1964


General Jack D. Ripper
Commie Hater.

In
Stanley Kubrick's
1964 film: Dr. Strangelove


Ripper:
"Its incredibly obvious isn't it?"

"A foreign substance is introduced into our precious bodily fluids without the knowledge of the individual. That's the way your hard-core Commie works"

Mandrake: Uh, Jack, Jack, listen, tell me, tell me, Jack. When did you first...become...well, develop this theory?

Ripper: Well, I, uh... I... I... first became aware of it, Mandrake, during the physical act of love.

Mandrake: Hmm.

Ripper: Yes, a uh, a profound sense of fatigue...a feeling of emptiness followed.

Luckily I... I was able to interpret these feelings correctly.
Loss of essence.

Mandrake: Hmm.

Ripper: I can assure you that it has not recurred, Mandrake.

Women uh...women sense my power and they seek the life essence. I do not avoid women, Mandrake.

Mandrake: No.

Ripper: But I... I do deny them my essence.


SCENE 2


General
Ripper: Have you ever seen a Commie drink a glass of water?

Mandrake: Well, I can't say I have.

Ripper: Vodka, that's what they drink, isn't it? Never water?


Mandrake: Well, I -- I believe that's what they drink, Jack, yes.

Ripper: On no account will a Commie ever drink water, and not without good reason.

Mandrake: Oh, eh, yes. I, uhm, can't quite see what you're getting at, Jack.

Ripper: Water, that's what I'm getting at, water.

Mandrake, water is the source of all life. Seven-tenths of this earth's surface is water. Why, do you realize that seventy percent of you is water?

Mandrake: Uh, uh, Good Lord!

Ripper: And as human beings, you and I need fresh, pure water to replenish our precious bodily fluids.

Mandrake: Yes.
(he begins to chuckle nervously)

Ripper: Are you beginning to understand?

Mandrake: Yes. (more laughter)

Ripper: Mandrake. Mandrake, have you never wondered why I drink only distilled water, or rain water, and only pure-grain alcohol?

Mandrake: Well, it did occur to me, Jack, yes.

Ripper: Have you ever heard of a thing called fluoridation. Fluoridation of water?

Mandrake: Uh? Yes, I -- I have heard of that, Jack, yes. Yes.

Ripper: Well, do you know what it is?

Mandrake: No, no I don't know what it is, no.

Ripper: Do you realize that fluoridation is the most monstrously conceived and dangerous Communist plot we have ever had to face?

Mandrake: Do I look all rancid and clotted? You look at me, Jack. Eh?

Look, eh?

And I drink a lot of water, you know. I'm what you might call a water man, Jack - that's what I am.

And I can swear to you, my boy, swear to you, that there's nothing wrong with my bodily fluids.

Not a thing, Jackie.


1984


"When it comes to infections, we don't accept a little bit of positive blood cultures. Infectious disease has taught us for years-
you treat it early and you treat it at the outset with everything you've got
"

Dr. David Ho,
Virus Hunter
"Hit 'em Hard" AIDS strategist, in 1996



2001

"We are going to disrupt these people through preemptive attack ... at selected points and times they will be killed suddenly, in significant numbers, and without warning. ... We will find their money and freeze it. We will arrest their front agents. If we can find out how they eat, or play or receive rewards, or where they sleep -- we will go there and kill them by surprise."

Former Clinton administration drug czar, retired Army Gen. Barry McCaffrey, in a letter on terrorists to a cadet.


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