Communism /pseudo-liberalism is the greatest danger of the emotional plague to the Western World from within. Islamism is the greatest danger to it from the outside. Today’s communists have developed the capacity to largely imitate the appearance of their environment. Like the cuttlefish, they can take on any image of their surroundings thereby concealing their true identity. This ability to simulate is why they do not present themselves as the typical sinister looking fringe elements that they were associated with a generation ago. In fact, the more inconspicuous they can make themselves, the more “Americanized” they look, the more effective they are in destroying their American victims from within, so therefore, camouflage is one of their primary methods of defense. Since they have taken on the facade of an honest-to-goodness true liberal American and refer to themselves as “progressives,” it would be more accurate to describe today’s communists as pseudo-liberals.
Today’s pseudo-liberals belonging to the American Democratic Party function in exactly the same manner as did Communist Party members in the Soviet Union. Like old time communists, the function of pseudo-liberals in politics is to take control of the government, deny whatever freedoms that exist and ultimately turn America into a Soviet Style dictatorship. It is not a matter of conscious choice for them. Like the cuttlefish, pseudo-liberals have a structural compulsion to behave in this manner. It is not in their power to function otherwise.
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Neither Left Nor Right
The Emotional Plague
Charles Konia, M.D. 
Vorwaerts und nicht vergessen…
http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/inside-politics/2012/apr/30/new-obama-slogan-has-long-ties-marxism-socialism/
Is anybody still worrying about communism these days? Communism ceased to exist over 20 years ago. Hardly anybody is still in favor of it now, and those few are a joke. The idea has been so badly discredited that it will be several generations before anything remotely resembling it can stand a chance. Worrying about “communism” is a hangover from the ancient 1950s, no more relevant today than a modern Italian worrying about a barbarian invasion.
The mild social-justice measures advocated by the weak and powerless American “left”, really more of a “pseudo-left”, are the sort of half-measures the capitalist system usually puts in place to keep the peasants quiet. That was how they saved capitalism in the Depression of the 30s. They gave the peasants a few modest crumbs like Social Security and the jobs offered by the CCC, and that prevented a socialist revolution from developing in America.
There are many worse problems to worry about than the mythical “communists”. The development of modern technologies of state control and monitoring every private action, for example, and the rise of a nearly all-powerful scientific and medical establishment, for another. And of course, the on-going assault of technology on the environment, which, together with the ever-growing population, are threatening to destroy the ability of the earth to support life. Compared to THAT issue, the minor differences between the capitalist and socialist models of how to distribute property are of no significance.
Communism is alive and well in the person of the pseudo-liberal character. Many pseudo-liberal/communists are in today’s American Democratic Party where they are pushing through their socialistic agendas. Your problem is that you have no knowledge of socio-political characterology. I suggest that you carefully read my books, The Emotional Plague and my forthcoming Neither Left Nor Right. Political character types are identified by their political character structure which originates from their particular pattern of body armor not necessarily by the ideas that they seem to hold. In the case of today’s communist, his ideas have been carefully concealed by a liberal facade. This is why they are called pseudo-liberal/communists.
The choice individuals make between different social and economic models, such as capitalism vs. communism, is a matter of preference, not pathology. Attempting to stigmatize as pathology choices one dislikes is a distortion of the social and medical sciences common to both the right and the left, one of the best-known examples being the Soviet Union sending political disidents to mental institutions.
The idea that one choses which soco-economic program to advocate because of a particular pattern of physical armoring is not one that I have found in the writings of Reich that I have read. Can you refer me to the appropriate citation from his writings, please?
This proposition has no apparent relationship to the social insights of Reich, which were on the subject of the connection between individual living conditions, due mainly to economic circumstances, and the appeal of fascism in the Germany of the Depression years. What is the basis for this claim? Is there any evidence for it?
I can refer you to chapter 13 in Man in the Trap by Elsworth Baker. In that chapter he correlates different patterns in the thinking of different socio-political character types. In my book, The Emotional Plague, I show that from a characterological standpoint the further an individual belongs on the political extremes of the Left or the Right the more armored he is and, as a result, the more disturbed is his thinking in the direction of either mechanism or mysticism. Also, see my articles on armored and functional thinking in The Journal of Orgonomy.
The act of choice of economic models that you call a matter of preference is in fact based on an individual’s character armor. What Reich found in his clinical work is that all people are armored and that, therefore, people’s thinking is disturbed in ways that are determined by their armor. There is no such thing as a thought that exists independently of the character structure of the person who is thinking it. We are not stigmatizing someone who thinks irrationally. That would be thinking moralistically. We are simply describing a medical/psychiatric condition. People have to get used to looking at social pathology the way a physician looks at a physical illness.
Dr. Konia:
I asked specifically for a citation from REICH, not Baker. I have read Man In The Trap, and while I found it interesting, frankly, Baker simply is not in the same class with Reich, who was a world-class original thinker, quite famous from early in his career, while Baker is unknown outside the small circle of orgonomy and even within that circle is far from universally accepted. Is there anything written by Reich which suports your contention that it is personal patterns of armoring rather than large-scale social and economic conditions that determines political preferences?
As for your own writings, citing oneself is a sure route to a failing grade in any college course. No instructor will allow citing one’s own writings as a source.
There are some perfectly rational motives for choosing socialist measures in some situations, just as there are perfectly rational motives for prefering capitaistic measures in others. For example, a couple with many children may prefer the community spend a lot of money on schools, while a couple without children may object to the higher taxes that would cost them to educate other people’s children. Both are being rational. A business owner may want lower taxes, but an invalid may prefer higher benefits for the disabled. Both may be accused of selfishness, but neither is irrational.
But beyond the lack of evidence for the proposal that armoring developed in childhood is responsible for political preferences in adult life, a proposition never suggested by Reich as far as I recall, there is a larger problem here. It is not so very far in time since the eugenics movement was considered cutting-edge science and countless individuals were subjected to atrocities by medical doctors, including lobotomies and forced sterilization, in the name of science. If what you are proposing were to become widely accepted, would we next have to fear compulsory orgone therapy for those who have a political disagreement with an orgonomist?
Treating political opponants as medical cases, suffering from some diagnosable illness is dangerous. It leads to the temptation to prescribe for the “patient” instead of debating the issues. The Soviet Union was notorious for doing this. Despite your outward ideological difference with the Soviets, you seem to be following the same path.
The late Thomas Szaz wrote several excellent books on the issue of the restraints that must be imposed on psychiatry to prevent it from deteriorating into an agency of political repression. We cannot afford to encourage any assumption that people we disagree with are mentally ill lest they someday hold the reins of power and make the same assumption about us.
After all, the psychiatric establishment of his day considered Reich insane. Using the exact same formula you offer, they would happily have sent him to a mental institution if they could have done so. And there are plenty of psychiatrists who would consider all modern-day Reichians mentally ill and worthy of involuntary commitment. Fortunately, psychiatry does not yet have that much power, but you seem to wish it did, if only it was your own particulat brand of psychiatry that had it.
By all means, educate the public. There is a great need for that. But please refrain from conflating political opinions with medical diagnosis. Political discussions should be about the issues, not about the alleged mental condition of the people who favor one program or another.
With the discovery of the emotional plague, Reich founded the science of social orgonomy. With the discovery of socio-political character types Baker extended the science of social orgonomy into the political realm. Although Reich alludes to socio-political character types as , for example, when he speaks of liberals functioning from their superficial layer, he never developed this line of thinking. Nevertheless, Reich’s discovery of the various non-political character types that he describes in detail in Character Analysis supports the view that he believed that an individual’s character structure was the primary determinant in his thinking and behavior. Baker simply extended this line of reasoning into the socio-political sphere.
Of course there is danger in generalizing because in our society most armored people are a mixture of characteristics ascribed to the political Left and the Right. However, those belonging on the political extremes of the Left and the Right are emotional plague characters because they are out to destroy the lives of others and for that reason they are are unquestioningly evil not from a moral standpoint but from a medical pathological standpoint.
The degree of emotional health of those working in social orgonomy is their most important qualification if the science is to survive.
Thank you for explaining the origin of the views you expressed. Sometimes it is hard to distinguish between what Reich said and what his epigones have added onto his findings since then.
In his major socio-political works, The Mass Psychology of Fascism, The Sexual Revolution, The Break-in of Sexual Morals, etc., Reich described the effects on political ideologies of the living conditions of young adults forced into un-natural abstinence because they could not afford to leave their parent’s home and establish their own, or were for other reasons limited in their power to choose their own life-styles. He finds this abstinence the underlying cause of religious and nationalistic ideologies that agitate against sexuality, and substitute gratifications such as nationalistic chauvinism, team sports, Hollywood movie fantasies, and fantasies about famous celebrities, al of which prevent development of the independent character that folows initiation of an adult sexual role.
In the article included in Character Analysis in which Reich first presented the concept of the Emotional Plague Character as a specific diagnosis, he goes into great detail in describing the syndrome, but says little about what causes it. In fact, what he does say implicates the currently existing sex-starvation of the plague character as the motivation for the plague behavior, not long-ago childhood experiences.
Reich says little or nothing in his socio-political writings of the personal armor formed in early childhood as a factor in determining adult political positions. He seems to expect that an adolescent who is able to find both a suitable mate and an environment that allows their relationship to develop will grow out of any earlier armoring and develop into an independent-minded adult.
It was only much later, after the birth of his son, Peter, that Reich devoted much attention to infancy and early childhood development. But he does not ever say, anywhere, that an individual, whatever his early childhood experiences, cannot reach adult character development if the proper conditions exist in adolescence.
There has been a strong tendency in orgonomy, especially in America, to forget about the window of oportunity presented by adolescence and concentrate on armor formed in childhood as the most important cause of adult neurosis, including political irrationalities. There may be a basis for this in treating individual patients in a medical setting, but when it comes to “treating” a whole society, any possibility of affecting widespread cultural childrearing practices must somehow convince the adults first, and since they are already firmly established in their armored patterns and the rationaizations for retaining them, that remains unlikely to happen.
On the other hand, teen-agers are able to fight for their own rights and establish their own life-styles if given a minimal amount of help and encouragement by a few concerned adults. This opens a way to practical action to change the age-old culture which cannot be done if already damaged adults must first be convinced to change how they act toward children. An orgonomic attempt to reach adolescents is long overdue.
The United States Government currently spends $176,000,000 a year on a Federal program to get teenagers to sign a Contract With God not to have sex until they are married. Both parties support this boondogle because it buys votes in the Bible Belt. While it is not working very well, it is undoubtedly adding to the anxieties of many young people and harming their chances of ever becoming rational adults. An orgonomic intervention of some sort, possibly in the form of an orgonomic sex-education website aimed at teenagers, could go a long way towards countering such malign influences.
While I agree that both extremes of the political spectrum are equally deranged, the individuals who occupy those extremes are a very small number compared to the vast majority. And Reich tells us that the real issue in history is the psychology of the masses, not that of the few individuals like Hitler or Stalin who are only put into positions of power by those masses. It is not the relatively few emotional plague personalities we need to be concerned about, but the majority whose feelings of powerlessness make them listen to them and follow their lead.
I am in agreement with all that you say. I would add that when Reich died in 1957 the anti-authoritarian transformation had not yet started. The breakthrough of the sexual drive which accompanied the transformation and the lack of a distinction between healthy and sick sexual expression that began around 1960 and that we are seeing today make todays adolescents more inaccessible to education than those who grew up in the authoritarian era. I agree that we must find a way to educate these young people but the anxiety relieving effect of both legal and illegal drugs makes our task very difficult. Take a look at my latest blog on the early onset of puberty.