2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43
Speech at the round table "Crisis in Ukraine: a psychotherapeutic approach" organized by the European Union of Psychotherapists and the private University of Sigmund Freud, which took place in Vienna on December 5-6 this year.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak at this high forum about such an agonizing and counterversioned occasion.
The wording of the topics of the reports leaves open the question of where the mainstream of this discussion can return: we will talk about psychotherapeutic assistance and crisis support for the victims, or perhaps we will argue about the very essence of this conflict.
In the first case, we would have to talk about the content and form of therapeutic assistance and crisis support, about protocols for providing assistance, training for volunteers, material, technical and human resources. And then such a meeting had to be as public as possible, take place in Ukraine, where every day thousands of volunteers in military hospitals, civilian clinics, psychotherapy centers, live and over the phone, do this hard work throughout the year.
But in the stated topics of reports we hear about "Group trauma and pathology", "Russian identity of the 21st century" and the definition of Russian armed aggression with the annexation of Ukrainian territories as a civil war. In this place we find ourselves on thin ice, because our knowledge can help knowledge, or become a means of propaganda. Therefore, having such a short time to speak, I must touch the most painful issues with a dot-and-dash line.
In the beginning, as it should, remember Freud, or rather the story that connects him with Philip Galsman. Philippe Halsman (1906 - 1979) - the founder of surrealism, friend of Salvador Dali, in 1928, even before he became a photographer and famous, was sentenced to ten years for the murder of his father, dentist Morduchei (Mark) Galsman. Galsman Sr. died during an excursion in the Austrian Alps, having fallen from a great height. No one, except his twenty-two-year-old son, saw this tragedy, but the Innsbruck court found Philip a murderer. As a matter of fact, there was no evidence. But the Galsmans were Jews and were not citizens of Austria. Nazi sentiments in the Alpine Republic in those years already influenced all aspects of life, including justice. It looks, which is why the verdict turned out to be a condemnation. The case became scandalous. A pan-European public protest arose against the bias of the court. Many celebrities spoke up in defense of Philip Galsman, among them Albert Einstein and Thomas Mann. Two years later, the guy was released, demanding to immediately leave Austria.
During the trial, the defense of Philip Galsman made an unexpected move. A forensic psychiatric examination carried out at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Innsbruck (which has now, since 2004, become the Medical University of Innsbruck), recognized that the defendant had an Oedipus complex - the motive for the murder. And the lawyer, on the same basis, made the opposite conclusion and demanded to release his client from responsibility for the death of his father. Freud criticized this approach. The creator of psychoanalysis did not see the connection between the presence of the Oedipus complex and predictable parricide. After all, the Oedipus complex is always present, and that is why it cannot be used in deciding the question of guilt.
Thus, Freud established an intellectual boundary in an arbitrary speculative sense. There is an oedipal conflict, but it is interpreted as a universal human psychological background, and not as a direct motive for the crime.
Let's go back to the crisis in Ukraine: is there a conflict between the “Russian World” and the “European choice”? Certainly so. This political and public debate has been going on for many years. The two revolutions of 2004 and 2014 became the quintessence of this confrontation of worldviews. Is this something unique? Certainly not. Examples of Catalans, Basques, Scots, or Belgian cleavage come to mind. The difference between these conflicts and the Ukrainian conflict is that they occur within the Western world, and not on its border. There is no near-by stagnating empire striving to move its borders, an empire where compromise is considered a manifestation of weakness, and the conflict is resolved by destroying one side of it.
The modern Western tradition keeps the conflict mainly in the form of a civilized discussion, trying to find a source of development in the tension created by it. Therefore, it may be difficult to understand the logic of the actions of the aggressors there.
And therefore, things must be called by their proper names. There is ideological tension in Ukraine (as in many other countries), but this is the background, not the direct cause of the killings. If we understand this conflict as a civil war, and not as an external military invasion against the background of general tension, then all our subsequent conclusions will be deliberately false. Just as the internal psychological oedipal conflict is neither the reason nor the justification for the real murder of a real father, so the internal ideological crisis in Ukraine does not explain and does not justify a real act of aggression on the part of Russia: with real saboteurs, with real tanks and a really whipped passenger by plane.
In the case of Galsman, Freud distinguished between the mental and the legal. He understood her well. Do we understand it?
Recommended:
Sexual Relations Between Men And Women: Myths And Reality
The difference in attitudes towards sex between men and women is taken for granted. It is believed that men think about sex all the time, do not skip a single skirt and are prone to polygamy. Women are rumored to be hunting for men's wallets, a penchant for long-term and reliable relationships, and an inability to have frequent orgasms.
Here And Now In Contact Between Mother And Child. How To Be A Bad Mother
I would like to share a little experience of psychotherapy with several young mothers who have recently given birth to their first child and are faced with the problems and difficulties of their new situation. The events described relate to that recent time, when the consultation of a psychologist and work with a psychotherapist seemed to many to be something unusual and exotic.
3 Differences Between Resting Therapy And Crisis Therapy?
Many people turn to therapy when an inevitable collapse occurs - they were fired from their jobs, divorced their husbands, caught the child using drugs or strong alcoholic drinks, brought themselves to exhaustion or depression. Psychotherapists agree that psychotherapy begins from the place when the client has dealt with his crises, basic anxieties, strong feelings, affects and began to work for deepening, for change.
Psychotherapeutic Session In The Integrative Approach "Working With Fear"
Tell me how you were born, and I will tell you about your main strategies in life - achieving goals, forming preferences, affection, relationships with others and the world, possible addictions and preferences. In the concept outlined by S.
Psychological Crisis - A Mismatch Between A Person's Needs And Abilities
The situation of losing something important in life plays not only a dangerous role, but also creates our personality. This is the creative adaptation of man. Ph.D. gestalt therapist, psychiatrist - suicidologist Merab Mamardashvili was once asked:
