Oppositional Differentiation

There's this process I've observed, which I'm tentatively naming 'oppositional differentiation'. It's a crucial player in the psychology of toddlers & adolescents. It is the act of defining differences between self & others by opposing the other. A constitutional commitment to being in opposition, most especially to authority figures. It is most evoked when authority figures attempt to impose upon the oppositional differentiator, & the very act of imposing may indeed be the evocateur of this personality mechanism. Certainly it seems that in escalating the imposition, escalation of the oppositional differentiation occurs.

This behavior is not the exclusive province of teens & toddlers, rather that is where it initially exhibits in the individual. I would suggest many of us have experience with individuals whose commitment to being argumentative exceeds the norm, most especially we notice those in whom the debating instinct has run amok. I would say that such individuals have gotten stuck in those phases of childhood where such argument skills were necessary to survive the muddled impingings of authority figures.

& of course, we see this tendency whenever we read thru the postings of commentary, whether email discussion groups, or the sections following most articles, blogs, news reports, & other media content online. Frequently the expression of oppositional difference is connected to anger & fear, just as often masking the motive provided by the anger & fear in the guise of 'rational argumentation'.

Duality

There is an implicit assumption that needs examining, and I'm just the woman to do the job. The fundamental operating assumption I'm interested in is that duality is some basic and pervasive characteristic of the universe.

By duality I mean that tendency to see things as existing as an either-or paradigm, a kind of binary form of dualism, or the more nuanced propensity to see things in terms of a continuum, from one end to the other, polar opposites, ostensibly. Dualisms placed in opposition to each other in an effort, all too often, to expand knowledge.

Here's some examples of commonly perceived inherent dualisms: homosexual versus heterosexual, male vs female, dominant vs submissive, strength vs weakness, power vs vulnerability . . . . once you start looking, you'll see them all over the place.

The problem is this. Humans are bilateral, it's an important tho' less-than-perceptible part of day-to-day cognition, and our brains are thus essentially bilateral. Bilaterality plays an important role in how cognition happens, and the fact that what comes out of our minds (the product of our brains) is heavily tinged by a dualistic bias should not be terribly surprising, nor ascribed much meaning beyond this obviousness.

As a happy little lay-student-acolyte of science I can tell you that while duality happens, it is not some special pattern of the universe, not some particularly-to-be-enshrined aspect of the 'true nature of reality.' & an assumption that somehow in holding some dualism whole in one's hands a truth is revealed can hide so much.

There's a handy-dandy way of visualizing this: The hard-core, black-vs-white dualism can be envisioned as a toggle-switch, like a light switch. On. Off. Those are the only choices. Oh so very binary and simple. The more nuanced dualism of a continuum is a needle-gauge tracing it's hesitant arc. I like to then blow this out to say we'd all be better served to think of our quantification choices as looking more like a rainbow orb, dark in the center, light on the outside, with all the colors of the light spectrum corresponding to a polar-coordinated spot . . . . . . . My modest attempt to push the conversation to a more complicated perspective . . . . .

A long time in the making . . . . . . .

Those who know me will say, it's about frickin' time . . . . . . . .

This blog is meant to be as much my journal as anything else. The title comes out of my belief that it's gettin' better all the time, that we journey into a glorious future, & that our best & brightest dreams can, & probably will, come true.

I started life pessimistic. Cynical. Bitter. I'm a woman, daughter of a hard-core feminist, & a passionate student of history. It was hard to be anything but negative as an adolescent; I sought after heroes of my own gender & found such pain & hardship, & the harshest of judgement passed down on women again & again . . . . . . . .

I've spent a lot of time being depressed in my life, & darkly angry. But, frankly, what a waste of time. It was presumably a necessary phase, but for some years now I've practiced at strengthening my inner pollyanna. I consider myself to be professionally optimistic. Anger is so boring, so old, so yesterday, so been-there-done-that.

Rather, what's interesting & new is positivity. Belief & hope in mankind, in our place on this planet, in this universe, of our possibilities & nobilities, even in the voluminous evidence of our perfidy . . . . . . . . . That's what I hope to draw on even when I'm in my most pessimistic of spaces . . .. . . .

Welcome to Radical Progress, a blog about stepping into our happy future . . . . . . .