Our early years define us. Thus the early years define Ian Austin, Boris Johnson, Adolf Hitler, Donald Trump or any other maggot in an apple. They have become what they are because of what happened to them when they were children.
When we get angry at liars and cheats it is a good thing. It suggests that our childhood experiences created for us personalities that would not accept dishonesty and corruption. From 2015 until 2019 many of us had hoped that decency would rise to the top. Sadly, it was the liars and the cheats who won out. We must though recognise that those liars and cheats are victims themselves. The decent are the lucky ones. They invariably don’t look back on their childhood with trepidation and a hollow feeling in their stomach unlike those who were bludgeoned with violence and expectation.
The song goes ‘there is a thin line between love and hate’. Well perhaps there is a thin line between wanting a Corbyn like figure to look to or a Johnson figure. Some of us have been lucky and some of us not so lucky.
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Let’s take this example. It is an extremely frustrating watch in which an obvious decent person is having to stand up to the lies on her own against two people who obviously do not want to admit to them.
Corbyn supporter Faiza Shaheen who said attacks on him were lies has been selected to stand for Labour again pic.twitter.com/7DjR64wZTC
— Ian Austin (@LordIanAustin) July 23, 2022
and is perfectly summed up by this tweet
She’s going to have a very difficult time. Barnett and Straw clearly on the same side and frustrated a Corbyn supporter has broken through. Good luck to her but you can tell already she’s unable to say what she’d like to. Don’t really know why she’d want to join Starmer’s LP.
— @artdecolady #StarmerOut #ItWasAScam (@Teresa_Peckham) July 24, 2022
I would not even begin to deconstruct the backgrounds of these three participants but we do need to ask ourselves how we become what we become.
There are many explanations as to why the right wing hate Jeremy Corbyn, ranging from being a direct threat to their hegemony to not having the qualities required to lead a country that has such an aggressive and embarrassing past. Where they may want someone to defend it, those who support Jeremy Corbyn want someone to clearly acknowledge the horrors and lies of the past and to go in a different direction. A more egalitarian and decent future.
However, one aspect that is often avoided is the view from a clinical psychologist. Understanding why a person sides with right wing ideologies over left wing ideologies can be explained by looking at the most impactful part of a person’s life. Their childhood and the relationships that existed therein.
Literature from psychology, sociology, behavioural genetics and political science suggests a multitude of contextual effects that may act to mediate or moderate the effects of personality on political ideology. A growing body of evidence suggests that there are inherent differences between people that affect their political ideology and behaviour. Research across literatures suggests that childhood experience has the ability to leave lasting psychological imprints as well as to interact with personality (Erikson 1968, Erikson 1963, Carver & Scheier 2000, Sameroff, Lewis & Miller 2000, Caspi et al. 2002, Caspi et al. 2003, Moran et al. 2011), with particular relevance to political ideology (Campbell 2006).
One of the leading clinical psychologists in the field of understanding how childhood determines our political ideologies later in life is Dorothy Rowe. In her book ‘Why We Lie’ she helps us to deconstruct those experiences that lead us to become who we are. She argues that we all have inner voices in our minds that act as an opposite to the other. This voice is with us from a very early age and evolves with us depending upon our experiences. Its role is to help us question risk, to make us feel guilty if our behaviour contravenes what is expected of us when impacting negatively on others and to offer solace… if the situation demands it. It forces us to question our thoughts and behaviour. The dual voice is not a problem as such unless we allow it to take over or we ignore it entirely. Then the balance goes and our behaviour becomes a threat to others as well as to ourselves.
If for example we were beaten at public school or by our parents on a regular basis the voices become tuned by those experiences as does our behaviour growing up in to adulthood. Since most children try to avoid being beaten or hit they create lies to avoid the beatings. Those lies do not just dissipate, they often follow us in to adulthood and become part of our personalities. Thus many politicians or client journalists who were subjected to violent childhoods will tell lies unashamedly even though the truth is all around us. We can choose to believe their lies to feel safer or we can challenge the lies and create conflict and sometimes hostility. We have to be brave and self confident to challenge which many, again linked to their childhood, may lack.
This is of course a simplified version for the benefit of this article but it is a fascinating exposition that I am only just beginning to get some understanding.
Take a very contemporary example, this time relating to Brexit. We were told it was going to be problem free experience by certain politicians who continue to deny that Brexit is the issue. They are surrounded by reality and yet they continue to lie. The reason is that it’s now a habit and also because their social conditioning may have given them a sense of superiority and a belief that enough people will believe them and fall for it. Just like when they lied and avoided beatings in their childhood. They are often proved right in this assertion and thus lying remains a key tool in their role.
The lies:
The reality:
The fact that reality has an omnipotence and the lies a pervasiveness becomes irrelevant especially if they have the power to use the lies for their own benefit.
Rowe explores why we lie and why we believe lies in a thorough and systematic way. We can apply this to the bringing down of Jeremy Corbyn. Some people chase decency and some people chase authoritarian personalities. It can be traced back to our childhoods. If we lived in an open and loving environment we are much more likely to be supportive of ideas that are solicitous and also desiring that in others. If our childhood was closed and dominating we are much more likely to seek oppressive figures that replicate our early years. Corbyn appeals to the former and the likes of Farage, Johnson and Trump appeal to the latter. Essentially any of these personalities without power are largely irrelevant to us. With power they can wreak havoc.
Until we find a way to break the cycle then liars and cheats will be amongst us and those who crave decency will be too often subordinated to more peripheral positions. Lies and cruelty will prevail far too often. It’s all about childhood.
Sources:
Personality, Childhood Experience, and Political Ideology
Jason Cridland
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