Political Ponerology: A Science on the Nature of Evil Adjusted for Political Purposes - Andrew Lobaczewski

29 Axel Munthe, (1857-1949) physician, psychiatrist, and writer, was born in

Oskarshamn, Sweden. He was educated at the University of Uppsala and at

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THE HYSTEROIDAL CYCLE

tive of historical time, it would be harder to examine the re-

gression of the ability and correctness of reasoning or the in-

tensity of “Austrian talk”, although these approximate the crux

of the matter better and more directly.

In spite of above-mentioned qualitative differences, the du-

ration of these time-cycles tends to be similar. If we assume

that the extreme of European hysteria occurred around 1900

and returns not quite every two centuries, we find similar con-

ditions. Such cyclical isochronicity may embrace a civilization

and cross into neighboring countries, but it would not swim

oceans or penetrate into faraway and far different civilizations.

When the First World War broke out, young officers danced

and sang on the streets of Vienna: “Krieg, Krieg, Krieg! Es

wird ein schoener Krieg ...”. While visiting Upper Austria in

1978, I decided to drop in on the local parson, who was in his

seventies by then. When I told him about myself, I suddenly

realized he thought I was lying and inventing pretty stories. He

subjected my statements to psychological analysis, based on

this unassailable assumption and attempted to convince me that

his morals were lofty. When I complained to a friend of mine

about this, he was amused: “As a psychologist, you were ex-

tremely lucky to catch the survival of authentic Austrian talk

( die oesterreichische Rede). We young ones have been incapa-

ble of demonstrating it to you even if we wanted to simulate

it.”

In the European languages, “Austrian talk” has become the

common descriptive term for paralogistic30 discourse. Many

people using this term nowadays are unaware of its origin.

Within the context of maximum hysterical intensity in Europe

Montpellier in Paris where he received his M.D. He studied the work of the

French neurologist Jean Martin Charcot and used hypnosis in his own work

with the physical and psychological symptoms of his patients. He later be-

came physician to the Swedish Royal family. He became known as “the

modern St. Francis of Assissi” because he financed sanctuaries for birds. As a

writer Munthe recounted his own experiences as a physician and psychiatrist.

He is most famous for the autobiographical work The Story of San Michele

which was published in 1929. [Editor’s note.]

30 Paralogism: n. illogical or fallacious deduction. paralogical, paralogistic, a.

paralogize, v.i. be illogical; draw unwarranted conclusions. paralogist, n.

[Editor’s note.]

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91

at the time, the authentic article represented a typical product of

conversive thinking: subconscious selection and substitution of

data leading to chronic avoidance of the crux of the matter. In

the same manner, the reflex assumption that every speaker is

lying is an indication of the hysterical anti-culture of mendac-

ity, within which telling the truth becomes “immoral”.

That era of hysterical regression gave birth to the great war

and the great revolution which extended into Fascism, Hitler-

ism, and the tragedy of the Second World War. It also pro-

duced the macrosocial phenomenon whose deviant character

became superimposed upon this cycle, screening and destroy-

ing its nature. Contemporary Europe is heading for the opposite

extreme of this historical sine curve. We could thus assume that

the beginning of the next century will produce an era of opti-

mal capability and correctness of reason, thus leading to many

new values in all realms of human discovery and creativity. We

can also foresee that realistic psychological understanding and

spiritual enrichment will be features of this era.

At the same time, America, especially the U.S.A., has

reached a nadir for the first time in its short history. Grey-

haired Europeans living in the U.S. today are struck by the

similarity between these phenomena and the ones dominating

Europe at the times of their youth. The emotionalism dominat-

ing individual, collective and political life, as well as the sub-

conscious selection and substitution of data in reasoning, are

impoverishing the development of a psychological world view

and leading to individual and national egotism. The mania for

taking offense at the drop of a hat provokes constant retaliation,

taking advantage of hyper-irritability and hypo-criticality on

the part of others.31 This can be considered analogous to the

European dueling mania of those times. People fortunate

enough to achieve a position higher than someone else are con-

temptuous of their supposed inferiors in a way highly reminis-

cent of czarist Russian customs. Turn-of-the-century Freudian

psychology finds fertile soil in this country because of the simi-

larity in social and psychological conditions.

America’s psychological recession drags in its wake an im-

paired socio-professional adaptation of this country’s people,

31 The litigious nature of Americans is known the world over. [Editor’s note.]

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leading to a waste of human talent and an involution of societal

structure. If we were to calculate this country’s adaptation cor-

relation index, as suggested in the prior chapter, it would

probably be lower than the great majority of the free and civi-

lized nations of this world, and possibly lower than some coun-

tries which have lost their freedom.

A highly talented individual in the USA finds it ever more

difficult to fight his way through to self-realization and a so-

cially creative position. Universities, politics, and businesses

ever more frequently demonstrate a united front of relatively

untalented persons and even incompetent persons. The word

“overeducated” is heard more and more often. Such “overquali-

fied” individuals finally hide out in some foundation laboratory

where they are allowed to earn the Nobel prize as long as they

don’t do anything really useful. In the meantime, the country as

whole suffers due to a deficit in the inspirational role of highly

gifted individuals.

As a result, America is stifling progress in all areas of life,

from culture to technology and economics, not excluding po-

litical incompetence. When linked to other deficiencies, an

egotist’s incapability of understanding other people and nations

leads to political error and the scapegoating of outsiders.

Slamming the brakes on the evolution of political structures

and social institutions increases both administrative inertia and

discontent on the part of its victims.

We should realize that the most dramatic social difficulties

and tensions occur at least ten years after the first observable

indications of having emerged from a psychological crisis.

Being a sequel, they also constitute a delayed reaction to the

cause or are stimulated by the same psychological activation

process. The time span for effective countermeasures is thus

rather limited.

Is Europe entitled to look down on America for suffering

from the same sickness the former has succumbed to several

times in the past? Is America’s feeling of superiority toward

Europe derived from these past events and their inhuman and

tragic results? If so, is this attitude anything more than a harm-

fless anachronism? It would be most useful if the European

nations took advantage of their historical experience and more

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93

modern psychological knowledge so as to help America most

effectively.

East Central Europe, now under Soviet domination,32 is part

of the European cycle, albeit somewhat delayed; the same ap-

plies to the Soviet empire, especially to the European portion.

There, however, tracking these changes and isolating them

from more dramatic phenomena eludes the possibilities of ob-

servation, even if it is only a matter of methodology. Even

there, however, there is progressive growth in the grass-roots

resistance of the regenerative power of healthy common sense.

Year by year, the dominant system feels weaker vis-a-vis these

organic transformations. May we add to this a phenomenon the

West finds totally incomprehensible, and which shall be dis-

cussed in greater detail: namely, the growing specific, practical

knowledge about the governing reality within countries whose

regimes are similar. This facilitates individual resistance and a

reconstruction of social links. Such processes shall, in the final

analysis, produce a watershed situation, although it will proba-

bly not be a bloody counter-revolution.

The question suggests itself: Will the time ever come when

this eternal cycle rendering the nations almost helpless can be

conquered? Can countries permanently maintain their creative

and critical activities at a consistently high level? Our era con-

tains many exceptional moments; our contemporary Macbeth

witches’ cauldron holds not only poisonous ingredients, but

also progress and understanding such as humanity has not seen

in millennia.

Upbeat economists point out that humanity has gained a

powerful slave in the form of electric energy and that war, con-

quest, and subjugation of other countries is becoming increas-

ingly unprofitable in the long run. Unfortunately, as we shall

see later in this work, nations can be pushed into economically

irrational desires and actions by other motives whose character

is meta-economic. That is why overcoming these other causes

and phenomena which give rise to evil is a difficult, albeit at

least theoretically attainable, task. However, in order to master

it, we must understand the nature and dynamics of said phe-

32 At the time of writing, 1984.

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nomena: an old principle of medicine that I will repeat again

and again is: “Ignota, nulla curatio morbi. ”

One accomplishment of modern science, contributing to the

destruction of these eternal cycles, is the development of com-

munication systems which have linked our globe into one huge

“village”. The time cycles sketched herein used to run their

course almost independently in various civilizations at different

geographical locations. Their phases neither were, nor are,

synchronized. We can assume that the American phase lags 80

years behind the European. When the world becomes an inter-

related structure from the viewpoint of communicating both

information and news, different social contents and opinions

caused by unlike phases of said cycles, inter alia, will overflow

all boundaries and information security systems. This will give

rise to pressures which can change the causative dependencies

herein. A more plastic psychological situation thus emerges,

which increases the possibilities for pinpointed action based on

an understanding of the phenomena.

At the same time, in spite of many difficulties of a scien-

tific, social and political nature, we see the development of a

new community of factors which may eventually contribute to

the liberation of mankind from the effects of uncomprehended

historical causation. The development of science, whose final

goal is a better understanding of man and the laws of social

life, could, in the long run, cause public opinion to accept the

essential knowledge about human nature and the development

of the human personality, which will enable the harmful proc-

esses to be controlled. Some forms of international cooperation

and supervision will be needed for this.

The development of human personality and its capacity for

proper thinking and accurate comprehension of reality entails a

certain amount of risk and demands overcoming comfortable

laziness and applying the efforts of special scientific work un-

der conditions quite different from those under which we have

been raised.

Under such conditions, an egotistic personality, accustomed

to a comfortably narrow environment, superficial thinking, and

uncontrolled emotionalism, will experience very favorable

changes, which cannot be induced by anything else. Specially

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95

altered conditions will cause such a personality to begin disin-

tegrating, thus giving rise to intellectual and cognitive efforts

and moral reflection.

One example of such a program of experience is the Ameri-

can Peace Corps. Young people travel to many poor develop-

ing countries in order to live and work there, often under primi-

tive conditions. They learn to understand other nations and

customs, and their egotism decreases. Their world view devel-

ops and becomes more realistic. They thus lose the characteris-

tic defects of the modern American character.

In order to overcome something whose origin is shrouded in

the mists of time immemorial, we often feel we must battle the

ever-turning windmills of history. However, the end goal of

such effort is the possibility that an objective understanding of

human nature and its eternal weaknesses, plus the resulting

transformation of societal psychology, may enable us effec-

tively to counteract or prevent the destructive and tragic results

sometime in the not too distant future.

Our times are exceptional, and suffering now gives rise to

better comprehension than it did centuries ago. This under-

standing and knowledge fit better into the total picture, since

they are based on objective data. Such a view therefore be-