Having the Conversation
Dialectics, Dialogues, and Communications
The technocratic transhumanists totalitarian types are very good at being explicit in verbalizing what they want to happen, telling us their plans in detail, and in doing so helping to manifest their nightmarish vision of the future to come to pass. They also do this in such a way that we are always on the back foot, and are exhausting our energy just reacting to them. In doing so, they constantly distract us from visualizing, vocalizing, and manifesting what we want for our future.
So instead of only on focussing on opposing their plans, I feel it is time to plan our plans for our own vision of the future, and to begin to visualize the shape of a culture, or at least the sub-culture, which we do want to live in. Indeed, I hear a lot of people, including myself, talking a lot about what we don't want, but very few of us even knowing, let alone putting down on paper, what we do actually want instead.
This article is intended as a contribution to this, in terms of a vision of how we can heal the divides, and hence also resist further divide-and-rule efforts of the technocrats, by changing the way we talk to each other and problem solve together.
Yes, I do realize we will never get good faith conversations from a large majority, and I remain shocked and disappointed at how some people were so ready to ostracize friends and family just for a difference of opinion on public health strategies. I remain saddened and appalled at just how willing many people were to fall for the divide and conquer tactics, and to scapegoat, and even wish death on, others.
Yet, I believe there are still people who can be persuaded, with the right approaches, to join the humanist side, so we can boost the numbers, and gain the safety in that, of those of us resisting the oncoming dystopia.
You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one. Indeed, as
, who is literally facing jail time just for satirizing and speaking up against the totalitarian transhumanists in Germany, recently wrote:
“We need to talk to [them]… If we can’t get through to them, we’re probably screwed. And there is a window of opportunity to do that now. It’s not 2020 or 2021. The mass hysteria has worn off for a lot of people. I know, not all of them, but for some of them, a lot of them. Some of them are finally reachable.”
“Take a chance, talk to them, the ones you know, or used to know. Try to get through to them. Not the bug-eyed, fanatical, foaming-at-the-mouth types who can’t wait for the return of the ‘emergency measures’. The other ones … you know the ones I mean. The ones who want out. You can see it in their eyes. Take a chance. Talk to these people… People can be deprogrammed. Some of them can. And, at this point, we need all the help we can get.”
“Don’t try to convince them that you were right and they were wrong. Just shine a light on the road we’re on. Try to get them to recognize where we’re headed. Regardless of who was right and who was wrong about whatever, we are all going down this road together.”
I've noticed that those of us with trauma or chronic illness tend to suffer from significant negative self-talk, and self-doubt, while at the same time having a tendency to have rigidly, even righteously, held views and opinions which form part of our self-identity. We also appear to be more prone to being affected by other people's opinion of us or of our beliefs and values, and may more readily feel shamed, blamed, embarrassed, wronged when someone disagrees with us. Some of this might stem from not feeling seen and heard in our developmental years, and then since we live on the edge of threat-response stress states, are more easily pushed over that edge through feelings of not being seen and heard, or understood, later in life.
These observations have led me to develop a keen interest in words and language and intra- and inter-personal communication, and how these can impact on stress responses.
In this context, I kept coming across the strange word “dialectic”,
dialectic /ˌdʌɪəˈlɛktɪk/ the art of investigating or discussing the truth of opinion; inquiry into contradictions and their solution.
The use of this word, as I've been hearing it, and am wanting to use it (perhaps not entirely correctly), is for the sense of two or more people with different views coming or working together in the spirit of mutual exploration of the truths within each view and forming or synthesising new truths or better solutions and deeper understandings.
I sorely feel that our politics, science, academia, healthcare, media, social media, social justice, criminal justice systems, [and discussions of how to move these forward] could benefit from more of this “dialectic” style of problem solving, in which there are no winners apart from gleaning of deeper truths or understandings [as compared to the current debate-centric (argument based) way these systems are doing business, that consists of entrenched positions and trying to "win" (the argument or more people into taking a side) at any and all costs].
In terms of nervous system states, it feels to me that engaging in dialectic types of inquiry is more aligned to socially engaged and calm connected ventral vagus states, especially as each party is seen and heard, and there is nothing really to lose (not even the loss of face). I, for one, as someone who has major nervous system issues, would prefer to live in a society in which the “dialectic” (in the sense I am using or abusing the word here) is the norm, right down to how we conduct our personal relationships, rather than in the highly threat-response triggering, argument based debate-to-win tribalism of our current western culture.
I had the thought that there could be some applications of this to self-talk too. Indeed, I was pointed to Dialectical Behaviour Therapy - a form of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. I am currently reading up on DBT and so far like what I am seeing.
“Sample exercise: GIVE. Use the acronym GIVE to improve relationships and positive communication:
Gentle - don't attack, threaten, or judge others;
Interest - show interest with good listening skills (don't interrupt someone else to speak);
Validate - acknowledge the other person's thoughts and feelings;
Easy - try to have an easy attitude (smile often and be light-hearted).
Folks with trauma and chronic conditions could certainly benefit from more GIVE!
“The FAST skill is an important component for communication as it allows you to maintain your self-respect and requires you to be truthful about the problems (even if you are tactful about how you frame them) and not to sacrifice your values or integrity.
be Fair, no Apologies, Stick to values, be Truthful when spoken to by others and in our own internal self-talk!”
I was also pointed to Bohmian Dialogue, and Non-Violent Communication. The latter was inspired by psychotherapists Carl Roger’s person-centered therapy:
“frankness about one's emotional state;
the satisfaction of hearing others in a way that resonates for them;
the enriching and encouraging experience of creative, active, sensitive, accurate, empathic listening;
the deep value of congruence between one's own inner experience, one's conscious awareness, and one's communication;
the enlivening experience of unconditionally receiving love or appreciation and extending the same.”
Finally, something else I heard recently which has stayed with me:
“strong convictions, loosely held”,
i.e. being open to modifying even our most strongly held opinions in the face of new information, open minded to new ideas.
I have personal experience that the ways in which we communicate can impact on success or failure in persuading folks to join a cause. When I first started writing about health and wellness, it was in a very angry, polemic (argumentative), righteous, hubristic tone, in which I would call out the doctors and tell people the pharmaceutical drugs they were taking were evil. I reaped what I sowed, and got a lot of anger and push back in return, especially from the very people I was trying to help. No-one believed what I saying, nor had enough faith in it to actually try what I recommended. I was kicked out of numerous Parkinson’s Disease related facebook groups, for example.
As I became a calmer person myself, so the tone of my writing changed. Instead of railing against the medical establishment, I began to just simply ignore them, to calmly and humbly share what I was learning, to tell the story of my own trials and tribulations, to be honest about my own set-backs, to listen to feedback, to ask questions instead of laying down the law, to include humour, to be mischievous, and to provide alternatives and solutions which the medical realm are not able to offer, as opposed to just opposing the establishment at every turn.
This had the additional benefit that it attracted much more high quality constructive and considered comments on my articles, instead of shit storms. So the commentary began to considerably add value, improve the impact, and deepen the conversations. I also began to get wonderful and life affirming private feedback from folks who had actually tried what I proposed, and that this had changed their life. The people I was trying to help began to be grateful for my work, and I became very grateful for my readership.
When I began to realize the societal and cultural level implications of what I was learning about human health, and felt the need to branch out into writing social commentary, most of my readers gave me the benefit of the doubt, and stuck with me.
I feel this Substack is a testament to this, which is now just over a year old, gained 1700+ subscribers in that first year, and has from the outset had truly wonderful constructive and considered commentary from the readership, which greatly contribute significant added value to the articles themselves, for which I am truly grateful.
Thanks for this, Gary. Your post brings Socrates to mind: "The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new."
Really, really good, helping us to raise our thoughts, our gaze, to a higher realm get some practical help and have each other on the way. I loved this, thanks.