Post New

Borrowing from "GH" on another board:

Helen Mirren once said: Before you argue with someone, ask yourself, is that person even mentally mature enough to grasp the concept of a different perspective. Because if not, there's absolutely no point.

A corollary:

A couple of months ago I was on a cruise ship off the South African coast. One of the guest speakers was an investigative journalist who had held the South African government's feet to the fire. As she was explaining the challenges of working under a populist, egotistic president (Jacob Zuma) who had wrested power from the judiciary and who had associated with corrupt oligarchs (the Guptas). At that point, a handful of Americans loudly got up and left the auditorium. They then went to the ship's captain and complained that the speaker had maligned US President Donald Trump.

Since the speeches are all recorded, I re-watched it later in my cabin. Not only didn't she mention President Trump, but never mentioned the US (or any government other than South Africa).

Ever since, I have been wrestling with how to define the level of "doublethink" which would cause someone to be insulted/aggravated by a speaker assigning a set of attributes to someone they may never have heard of which, subconsciously, they associated with their leader - yet found it necessary to protect him from those very attributions.

Heck, I'm an engineer not a shrink, but there must be some official name for this sort of reaction (Stockholm syndrome?).

When I was in business, all of the chips I was placing on the table came out of my pocket. Similarly, the chips I bet in the "Wall Street Casino" are mine. Long ago, I decided that emotions were my enemy as were subjective feelings fostered by uncertainty, political stupidity and so on. Much of my wife's family perished during the first half of the 1940's in Europe and for as long as I can remember we have structured our finances to be "portable" in case the "it can never happen here" happens. We are still; far from what I would call a tipping point, but it is clear that our country is now marching to a significantly different beat than it has been for the past few generations and both the rule of law and the rules of economics have been jettisoned.

Jeff

References:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidency_of_Jacob_...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gupta_family

but there must be some official name for this sort of reaction

There is book about it: The Ugly American (Spankee edition).

A couple of months ago I was on a cruise ship off the South African coast. One of the guest speakers was an investigative journalist who had held the South African government's feet to the fire. As she was explaining the challenges of working under a populist, egotistic president (Jacob Zuma) who had wrested power from the judiciary and who had associated with corrupt oligarchs (the Guptas). At that point, a handful of Americans loudly got up and left the auditorium. They then went to the ship's captain and complained that the speaker had maligned US President Donald Trump.
Since the speeches are all recorded, I re-watched it later in my cabin. Not only didn't she mention President Trump, but never mentioned the US (or any government other than South Africa).

A truly amazing story, thanks for sharing it.

Some people seem to generalize using categories that are too broad to be usefully correct. ("you're either with us or against us"?) Presumably they heard something in the speech that tagged Mr Zuma as being part of their own over-broad mental category already containing Mr Trump, and saw slighting of one as slighting of all.

Sometimes finer distinctions are required. As, for example, categories like Muslim, Resident of Israel, Palestinian, Jew, Israeli, Resident of Gaza, IDF soldier, Hamas member, terrorist, and so forth. Safest not to overgeneralize--that list alone probably covers over 100 non-zero sets of people.

(in case any of those is a trigger word for an overgeneralizer, please note that I did not say anything good or bad about any member or non-member of any of those groups)

Jim

There is book about it: The Ugly American (Spankee edition)

Fun digression:
Few know that the titular ugly character, Mr Atkins, is not the one with the unpleasant views. If one were likened to the Ugly American, it would be a compliment. (to one's moral stance anyway, if not one's face)

Jim

Presumably they heard something in the speech that tagged Mr Zuma as being part of their own over-broad mental category already containing Mr Trump, and saw slighting of one as slighting of all.

They also probably, and perhaps correctly, saw it as an allegorical commentary on Trump as well.

The popular television show M*A*S*H was set during the Korean War, and only depicted the Korean War. They never mentioned the Vietnam War once, since it would have been anachronistic to the setting of the show. But it was still very much about Vietnam as well.

Whether the same is true of the speech about Zuma will depend on the particulars of the speech, of course. But it's entirely possible that their reaction was more rational than the OP is giving them credit for.

Post New

Macroeconomic Trends and Risks FAQ

---

Contact Shrewd'm
Contact the developer of these message boards.