Reply #18: Abusers. That absolutely nails it. [View All]

They are abusers. They are abusive. And who do they speak for? MORE abusers. Abusers have to knock somebody else down to build themselves up. They are sick. So are the republi-CONS. Those who gravitate toward them, as I have seen in some of my emails, are those who are truly still hurting from 9/11 and want SOMEBODY to pay for it. Barring any logical answers or searches for treatment, they lash out. They need to see SOMEBODY pay for it. Since they as individuals are powerless to go make Osama pay, personally, they take it out on whoever's closer to them.

My mom is still like that, although not nearly as much so since my dad died. Mind you, he NEVER hit her, or me, either. Not EVER. That must be said. But he was abusive in other ways, mainly psychological - towards her. Somehow I escaped the brunt of it, but my mom did not. LOTS of humiliation and degradation. Finally walked out on her and kept company with other women - rather shamelessly in public, so all her friends knew, too. She'd married a substitute for her father, but he actually DID beat her and her siblings as well as terrorizing and mind-fucking them. She endured a lifetime of this.

Her solution? LOTS of anger. Planet-sized wads of it. Never sought counseling. Never even considered it. Somehow, to her generation, that was just a whole lot more shameful than seeking help to overcome situations that truly WERE shameful - or shame-filled. That anger stayed put and was never dealt with, so it simply sat and festered. Since I was the only one at home, I was the one most conveniently available to lash out at. So I became her whipping post. Not literally, mind you. To her credit, I will say she never hit me, either. But she might as well have. Verbally - on an ongoing basis. The sniping, fault-finding, anger, resentment, name-calling, screaming, serious hostility and negativity, and verbal vitriol was damned near constant. NOTHING I did would ever please her, or would ever be enough. I believe she felt, deep down, that she was horribly aggrieved and that SOMEBODY, somehow, somewhere, HAD to pay for it. Someone had to pay. So it wound up being me.

I'm no shrink. It's just what I lived through, and what I've been led to conclude, and for which I did get myself some help. I think too many in our country are just too wounded, for whatever reason, and have to lash out. The 9/11 stuff is just an excuse for most. Just an extreme manifestation of how "unfair" everything is. They won't seek help, either. Hard to do, too, when you're certain you don't need help - because there's nothing wrong with YOU, it's always that OTHER somebody over there whose fault it is. It's never YOUR fault. This syndrome ALWAYS demands a scapegoat - someone or something OUTSIDE onesself. To many, it's a lot of nameless, faceless "liberals" who've just made everything all awful every which-a-way, and they're to be punished. Because SOMEBODY, somewhere, somehow, just simply HAS to pay. The last thing these wounded, twisted people would ever consider doing is looking within themselves for answers, or accountability, or any responsibility for whatever plight they're in now. Heaven forbid they admit they made a mistake, or were wrong. Much easier to be wronged - than wrong yourself. We have a pResident like that, even now. We have an entire national syndrome like that now. We see it all being acted out, now.

Michael Moore makes another great point - in a continuing series. Even Dr. Dean has diagnosed us as a country (especially us liberals) as being depressed, and beaten down. These guys know something. They need to be listened to. Closely and carefully. They're saying some very important things.