Projection is nearly everywhere.
Nice kids from nice homes do charity work or advocate for "victims" and get their throats slit. They never saw it coming because it is not something they would ever do.
Crass, cynical older people know that everybody is "on the take".
What we believe about "everybody" is a short resume of who-we-are.
I am not sure what that says about me. I believe that every person is capable of great kindness and great cruelty at any given time. We are all saints and boneheads.
And while I believe that almost everybody seeks to maximize their gains, it is not possible to discern what any person sees as a gain, similar to Maslow's Hierarchy but more far more chaotic and capricious.
Everybody has bias and acts in their own self interest. Some people won't admit it; be concerned about them. Others willingly state their starting point; you can better understand and work with them since you know where they are coming from and since they are honest about it.
ReplyDeleteAbout one person in twenty is crazy and the self-interest theory become very convoluted.
DeleteWhat we believe about others is a resume of who we are - I agree 100%. Our experiences with others, our upbringing, our current motivations, plus whatever is "hard-coded" into our brains all affect how we interpret and react to a given situation or person. And that reaction to the same situation may change over time as we change.
ReplyDeleteMost of us try to do the "right" thing. Maybe I'm a pollyanna for believing that, but I generally think most people are good. However there are exceptions and those folks can be very cruel, either in word or deed.
My experience with projection is when people are not calm and thought out, they grasp for accusations to throw out.
ReplyDeleteItIis when they mad and looking for stuff to throw against the wall and see what sticks that people show you what is inside them.
This is my innermost evil, and I know you are evil so... Or I know I would do this in your place so you must be...
Liberals knew how dirty they were (racism, sexual harassment) so they immediately make those accusations against the right.
ReplyDeleteProjection is defined as accusing the other person of that which you yourself are doing. This is most routinely done by a category of people that the headshrinkers call Cluster B's. The Cluster B disorders are Narcissistic Personality Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder, and Histrionic Personality Disorder. Most Cluster B's are a combination of the three. All of them engage in projection pretty much all the time.
ReplyDeleteWhat interests me the most is that in my experience, hardcore Leftists without exception use projection as their main modus operandi. Which begs the question - Are all true believing Leftists Cluster B's, and if so, is this why they are Leftists? Michael Savage has always said Liberalism (Leftism) is a mental disorder. And is that mental disorder specifically Cluster B?
The average person who is not a Leftist and not a Cluster B does not, in my opinion, engage in projection much, if at all.
I do not think we do things for the right reason. We know right from wrong. That is always open to discussion but there are codes of decency that most if not all of us accept as universally being right.
ReplyDeleteWhat we do is more subjective.
When I do something for someone, I do it because I want to and I do not expect anything in return. No credit. No applause or praise. Nothing.
If I apply my values I will almost always do something that would be considered decent. I might hope for a positive outcome or result and there is nothing wrong in that. As long as I do not 'identify' with my doing this, I am not using a situation for my own gain.
The problem with do gooders is that they see virtue in what they do and expect praise for it. Because they are so needing praise they enter into situations where there is real danger. They project their positive reward before they even get there. Projecting is selfish and self aggrandizing behavior. It does not stand up to real scrutiny in one's soul; if the person has one.
I remember at one office when they took the batteries out of the store room at Christmas (AA and AAA). I complained. "Why," I asked "would anyone steal batteries?" I was skeptical.
ReplyDeleteUntil they told me that they had gone through three big boxes in a week (when they normally lasted two months).
Ooops.