I have not read the book!
Given the abstract presented I do have some comments.
I hope to be disproved on any of the opinions I have added
to this. Maybe denial is at the bottom of this.
> Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 10:05:15 -0500
> From: "Mac, Thu Yen" <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: States of Denial
>
> Dear fellow listserv members, there is an exciting new book from Blackwell
> Publishing that I would like to share with you.
>
> States of Denial
> By Stanley Cohen
>
> States of Denial is the first comprehensive study of both the personal and
> political ways in which uncomfortable realities are avoided and evaded.
> It ranges from clinical studies of depression, to media images of suffering, to
> explanations of the 'passive bystander' and 'compassion fatigue'.
I have lived in states of both personal and political realities. In the course
of these events I have evaded both personal and political hardships and I have
come out (at least in my mind -- unscathed). I have come close to "depression",
been able to escape media and have never tried to be a "passive bystander" or
succumbed to "compassion fatigue" -- I always got the job done!
> The book shows how organized atrocities - the Holocaust and other genocides, torture,
> and political massacres - are denied by perpetrators and by bystanders, those who
> stand by and do nothing.
In Peru, they experienced the "Shinning Path", the "Tupac Amaru" and other factions.
After the "terrorist" actions, they are now partially contained. There is no
"state of denial". They carry on with lives, as are provided, despite the
economic disadvantages involved -- I do not believe that is a "state of denial",
it seems to be just a plain "state of reality".
> Blocking out, turning a blind eye, shutting off, not wanting to know,
> wearing blinkers, seeing what we want to see ... these are all expressions
> of 'denial'.
If there is a "turning a blind eye, [sic] etc." it is not an "expression of denial",
...it is a state of antagonism to the IMF, WTO, etc.!
> Alcoholics who refuse to recognize their condition, people who brush aside suspicions
> of their partner's infidelity, the wife who doesn't notice that her husband is abusing
> their daughter - are supposedly 'in denial'.
I am an alcoholic, I don't drink anymore! I cannot respond to having abused a
daughter -- I never had one. The one thing I do know -- not because I ever had
a daughter -- is I would have prevented anyone abusing her, despite being an alcoholic!
> Governments deny their responsibility for atrocities, and plan them to achieve 'maximum
> deniability'.
Here we get into an issue of "transparency". The term has two (2) meanings:
- the first (1st) explanation is that "you pass the buck, to the person (organization) above".
- the second (2nd) is, you provide clear explanations of what happened.
Either way responsibility is denied, not by citizens, but by governments!
> Truth Commissions try to overcome the suppression and denial of past horrors.
Ooh, did George Orwell, Robert Heinlein, Aldous Huxley, Goedel, Frijtof Capra,
R.D. Lang, Thorstein Veblen, Escher, I.V Blausberg, Bach, V.N. Sadovsky, Bach,
Thomas Jefferson, E.G. Yudin, William Poundstone, Douglas Hoefstaeder, etc. not
explain it properly?
> Bystander nations deny their responsibility to intervene.
Just watch CNN!
> Do these phenomena have anything in common? When we deny, are we aware of
> what we are doing or is this an unconscious defense mechanism to protect us
> from unwelcome truths?
I really do not believe we DENY!, I do not believe we develop a "defense
mechanism", I do believe we cope and unveil "unwelcome thuths"!
> Can there be cultures of denial? How do organizations like Amnesty and Oxfam
> try to overcome the public's apparent indifference to distant suffering and
> cruelty?
Maybe they don't develop "apparent indifference", it's just that media and
otherwise don't appear beyond the programs on TV that nobody ever sees.
Personally, only because I do not have cable and switch between the cartoons
shown on a specific channel and others where these programs are actually shown,
I wouldn't know otherwise. I do learn of these "cruelties" only because I have
access to the Internet.
> Is denial always so bad - or do we need positive illusions to retain our sanity?
I would leave "denial" to my dear wife. She is about to become a Psy D., Ph.D. in
Health Psychology, and next month will be able to comment.
> -Winner of the American Society of Criminology's International Division
> Award for outstanding publication of 2000-2001.
>
> 'The sociologist Stanley Cohen, who spent many years in Israel before
> continuing his academic work in Britain, offers one key to why wars happen,
> why peace settlements do not take, and why terrible conflicts are ignored or
> dealt with ineffectively.
Um, given the amendments to bill C.36:
``terrorist activity''
« activité terrorist »
``terrorist activity'' means
(a) an act or omission committed or threatened in or outside Canada that, if committed in Canada, is one of the following offenses:
(i) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(2) that implement the Convention for
the Suppression of Unlawful Seizure of Aircraft, signed at The Hague on
December 16, 1970,
(ii) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(2) that implement the Convention for
the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Civil Aviation, signed at
Montreal on September 23, 1971,
(iii) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(3) that implement the Convention on
the Prevention and Punishment of Crimes against Internationally Protected
Persons, including Diplomatic Agents, adopted by the General Assembly of the
United Nations on December 14, 1973,
(iv) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(3.1) that implement the International
Convention against the Taking of Hostages, adopted by the General Assembly
of the United Nations on December 17, 1979,
(v) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(3.4) or (3.6) that implement the
Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material, done at Vienna
and New York on March 3, 1980,
(vi) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(2) that implement the Protocol for
the Suppression of Unlawful Acts of Violence at Airports Serving International
Civil Aviation, supplementary to the Convention for the Suppression of
Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Civil Aviation, signed at Montreal on
February 24, 1988,
(vii) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(2.1) that implement the Convention
for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Maritime
Navigation, done at Rome on March 10, 1988,
(viii) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(2.1) or (2.2) that implement the
Protocol for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Fixed
Platforms Located on the Continental Shelf, done at Rome on March 10, 1988,
(ix) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(3.72) that implement the
International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings, adopted
by the General Assembly of the United Nations on December 15, 1997, and
(x) the offenses referred to in subsection 7(3.73) that implement the
International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Financing, adopted
by the General Assembly of the United Nations on December 9, 1999, or
(b) an act or omission, in or outside Canada,
(i) that is committed
(A) in whole or in part for a political, religious or ideological purpose,
objective or cause, and
(B) in whole or in part with the intention of intimidating the public, or a
segment of the public, with regard to its security, including its economic
security, or compelling a person, a government or a domestic or an
international organization to do or to refrain from doing any act, whether
the person, government or organization is inside or outside Canada, and
(ii) that is intended
(A) to cause death or serious bodily harm to a person by the use of
violence,
(B) to endanger a person's life,
(C) to cause a serious risk to the health or safety of the public or any
segment of the public,
(D) to cause substantial property damage, whether to public or private
property, if causing such damage is likely to result in the conduct or
harm referred to in any of clauses (A) to (C) and (E), or
(E) to cause serious interference with or serious disruption of an
essential service, facility or system, whether public or private, other than
as a result of lawful advocacy, protest, dissent or stoppage of work that
does not involve an activity that is intended to result in the conduct or
harm referred to in any of clauses (A) to (C),
and includes a conspiracy, attempt or threat to commit any such act or omission, or being an
accessory after the fact or counseling in relation to any such act or omission, but, for greater
certainty, does not include an act or omission that is committed during an armed conflict and
that, at the time and in the place of its commission, is in accordance with customary
international law or conventional international law applicable to the conflict, or the activities
undertaken by military forces of a state in the exercise of their official duties, to the extent that
those activities are governed by other rules of international law.
``terrorist group''
« group terrorist »
``terrorist group'' means
(a) an entity that has as one of its purposes or activities facilitating or carrying out any
terrorist activity, or
(b) a listed entity,
and includes an association of such entities.
> His new book stresses how central denial is in conflict, indeed in all
> human life. The concept is well known, but Cohen's careful building up of
> the detail of denial in its many forms is truly illuminating.
Sorry, like I said, I have not read the book. Just the abstract presented to the list.
> He leads the reader to the conclusion that it is denial that is "normal"
> and an ability to see the truth and act accordingly which is rare, whether
> in individuals or in governments.'
"Normality" is personal and the capacity of ability to see the truth is definitely
"rare", beyond that I have to agree that the capacity to act accordingly is even
"more" rare!
> --Martin Woolacott, The Guardian
>
> 'This is a pathbreaking and comprehensive study of how political actors,
> civic groups, and private citizens manage to know and not know about the
> atrocity and suffering around them, a rare book whose practical value for
> activists and officials is as great as its contribution to scholarship.'
>
> --Eric Klinenberg, Le Monde Diplomatique
>
> February 2001
> 360 pages - paperback/hardcover
> ISBN: 0745623921
> List Price: $29.95; $62.95
>
> Ordering Information:
>
> To order States of denial, please go to:
> http://www.blackwellpub.com/asp/book.asp?ref=0745616577 or call Blackwell
> Publishing at 1- 800-216-2522.
>
> Thank you,
> Thu Yen Mac
> Blackwell Publishing, Boston, MA - Oxford, UK
> <[log in to unmask]>
>
> Please feel free to forward to other colleagues who would find this
> interesting.
>
Cheers!
--
Han Tacoma
~ Artificial Intelligence is better than none! ~
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