Do you have an instinctive aversion to mob psychology?
This one's for you.
Dear You,
Since I was a very little girl, I’ve believed deeply in the love contained in the hearts of individuals - while also having an acute awareness of and revulsion to mob psychology. I’ve never known whether this came from (a) being not personally bullied but a bit socially uneasy; (b) knowing that mobs had killed many of my family members in WWII; or (c) my temperament. Or maybe it was reinforced by the time in sleepaway camp, when I was 10, and watched a group of girls gang up on a kind and gentle counselor, jeering at her until she started crying and trying to run away.
In any event, this has always been a core feature of my psyche.
If you happen to feel the same way, this poem of defiance, by Les Murray (who was on the autism spectrum and had been bullied in school) is brilliant, emboldening, and for you:
Demo
No. Not from me. Never.
Not a step in your march.
not a vowel in your unison,
bray that shifts to bay.Banners sailing a street river,
power in advance of a vote,
go choke on these quatrain tablets.
I grant you no claim ever,not if you pushed the Christ Child
as President of Rock Candy Mountain
or yowled for the found Elixir
would your caste expectations snare me.Superhuman with accusation,
you would conscript me to a world
of people spat on, people hiding
ahead of oncoming poetry.Whatever class is your screen
I’m from several lower,
To your rigged fashions, I’m pariah.
Nothing a mob does is clean,not at first, not when slowed to a media,
not when police. The first demos I saw,
before placards, were against me,
alone, for two years, with chants,every day, with half-conciliatory
needling in between, and aloof
moral cowardice holding skirts away.
I learned your world order then.
If you love this poem as much as I do, and take strength from its unapologetic defiance, I’d love to know your favorite lines - and any other thoughts you have!
(I love this line: “I grant you no claim ever”).
‘Til next time,
xo Susan
I cannot even watch the scenes in movies or read them in fictional books. Bullying instantly makes me hyper-vigilant. I look forward to Dr. Amy Cuddy’s book and Bullies, Bystanders, and Bravehearts! She announced she was researching for this book at the same time I left a toxic workplace where I was being not only bullied, but harassed. I don’t want anyone to feel sorry for me. I share in case it may help another. I was always a very quiet and focused child, so I think people feared that and made up their own stories inside their heads of who I am or what I’ll do. My husband calls my grade school days “after-school special” as I was verbally abused & sometimes physically abused nearly daily. I’ve done some therapy which helped me reframe—“weird”, “quiet”, “snob”, and others were often used. What hurt the most throughout all my experiences are those that were spineless in defending me. Those I thought were friends or colleagues that I never expected the vitriol to come from. The rumors that were spread. Lies I believed for a long time.
I think anyone who stands out threatens the status quo/groupthink/order, so they try to beat you back into submission. It only made me more sensitive, compassionate, resilient, and wisdom. I’ve been told I’m an “old soul”, but what many don’t realize is I had been to hell and back several times before I reached double digits. I’m a survivor that has made mistakes and lives to share my lessons with others! Spin.
"nothing a mob does is clean" hit me like a punch in the gut. Even people with best intentions, in a large and restive crowd, can succumb to the mob mentality. I have a severe aversion to cruelty of any kind and a mob is diffuse, anonymous cruelty without having to bear full responsibility for what you do. Terrible.