Where Reason Ends

Deborah Venable

06/23/06

 

Ever wonder why such ignorance can exist in a world brimming with knowledge and facts?  Ever wonder why, no matter how hard you try or how many facts you cite, some people cannot be convinced of the most important truths?  Ever wonder how the most far-fetched conspiracy theories, void of all reason, can be embraced by some of the most intellectual among us?  (These same people are also prone to quote, “seeing is believing” when asked to take simple Christian beliefs on faith alone.) 

 

In order to come to grip with some of these things, I did a little research recently, and guess what?  There is a logical reason for these phenomena, and it fits perfectly with the modern philosophy of diagnosing us all as sufferers of one illness or another.  The aforementioned examples are all suffering from a psychological illness – psychological scotoma.  Scotomisation, if you will, takes over where reason ends. 

 

No, I haven’t made all this up.  The word “scotoma” originates in the field of optics and ophthalmologic medicine, and it means blind spot – a spot in the field of vision that is literally gone.  Plug it in as a psychological term and, well, as you can see, the sky’s the limit!  Although in psychological terms it means not only that which is missing because we refuse to “see” it, but can also mean that we “see” that which may not be there, simply because we choose to.  (My research did not specifically make a definite correlation with “faith” here, but I feel relatively comfortable doing it myself.) 

 

The term was probably first used in a psychological sense by the French psychiatrist Rene Laforgue (1894-1962).  In 1925 he wrote a letter to Sigmund Freud in which he said, “scotomisation corresponds to the wish that is infantile. . . not to acknowledge the external world but to put the ego itself into its place. . .” 

 

While Laforgue was referring to repression and denial of schizophrenics at the time, the observations can certainly be applied in a more general sense nowadays.  In other words, we are a lot “sicker” society now.  Another psychiatrist, R.D. Laing (1927-1989) described scotomisation as psychologically denying the existence of anything seen but denied by choice so that it cannot be believed.  Explained further as, “our ability to develop selective blind spots regarding certain kinds of emotional or anxiety-producing events”, Laing interestingly sums scotomisation up as an “ability” that is actually a psychological illness. 

 

The possibilities are too numerous!  This is obviously an epidemic of gigantic proportions already!  Hell, this even qualifies as a pandemic I’ll bet.  Everybody is affected all over the globe.  How does it feel to be psychologically ill?  I know I fit the mold every time I simply refuse to believe that there are so many arrogant, stupid people in the world.  I’m sick and I know it!

 

My mind chooses not to believe that so many citizens in the greatest country on earth could hate their country so much that they do everything in their power to destroy her.  That it is easier to believe I can reason with such folks, (hence I try to do just that day after day), is proof that I’m just not facing reality.  Why can’t I see the reason in comparing acts of war on the battlefield with murder?  Obviously the news media thinks that it is much more important to sensationalize the arrest of 7 or 8 U.S. soldiers for murdering one yet to be proved innocent Iraqi than to report the details of the brutality carried out on two other soldiers by terrorists after they were abducted and disarmed.  It seems easier for some to ignore the “innocent until proven guilty” rights of the former and rationalize the “cause” for the latter as retribution for us getting another real bad guy out of the gene pool.  My God, this is where reason ends!

 

And then there is Mount Soledad in San Diego.  Why oh why can’t I see the reason for desecrating this monument to fallen U.S. soldiers by removing the universally accepted symbol of sacrifice from this site?  The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals can see it.  The one atheist that originally complained years ago obviously saw it.  The countless individuals who read the “separation” clause in the Constitution that isn’t there, (obviously due to my illness), certainly see it.  Why can’t I see the reason?  If I am not alone in my illness, perhaps you would consider reading up on this situation here and meet me where reason ends - here to tell the president just how sick you are!

 

 

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