Misogyny, Dental Students & "the Good People"

     "Misogyny is the hatred or dislike of women or girls. Misogyny can be manifested in numerous ways, including sexual discrimination, denigration of women, violence against women, and sexual objectification of women. Misogyny can be found within many mythologies of the ancient world as well as various religions. In addition, various influential Western philosophers have been described as misogynistic." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misogyny

     Bruce MacKinnon's cartoon in the Jan 6, 2015 Chronicle Herald newspaper shows a female dentist and her male patient, wearing a Dal Dentistry 2015 shirt. They're both looking at his X-ray, while she tells him "No cavities, but we did find significant moral decay."

     Those of us who call for quick, severe punishment for these foolish men's online behavior are, like fundamentalist extremists, unable to self-regulate - unable to see, accept and appropriately manage our own deficiencies & emotional problems. At this level of hysteria, it's just a power struggle between "perps" who've been caught and "self-righteous" who've not yet been caught. It has nothing to do with morals, ethics, justice etc. and everything to do with widespread psychosocialspiritual immaturity.
     When we do mature out of adolescent / emerging-adult black-or-white thinking, we no longer see others as "evil" (or sexual objects) and ourselves as "good" (or 'gentlemen') ie no longer project our own shadow onto scapegoats. We see how all of us are both flawed and wise, in need of understanding, kindness, boundaries, and yes, at times corrective measures. But how should we discipline our own beloved children - no matter how terribly they've messed up? Our own children are not disposable sacrificial lambs. We'd want our own loved ones rehabilitated to become decent, mature, productive members of society. Treating each other like this actually models "morality."
     Colonialism in India, communism in Europe and apartheid in South Africa, with their millions of tortured murdered victims, were all dismantled without bloodshed. Dalhousie university will deal with these 13 emerging adults' online stupidity in a mature civilized manner.

Mindfulness, Identity & Wisdom in Emerging Adults

     "Exploring one’s self-identity is important for well-being, particularly among emerging adults. The nature of identity exploration depends on whether one uses an open, self-reflective informational identity style, an inflexible normative identity style, or an avoidant diffuse identity style.

     This study examined whether mindfulness is uniquely related to informational identity processing, self-reflective capacities, & wisdom. Canadian university students (N = 183; M age = 20.1) completed an online survey consisting of randomly presented measures of mindfulness, identity styles, identity commitment, self-reflection, insight, and wisdom.

     The results revealed that only the informational identity style was positively correlated with mindfulness, self-reflection, insight, and wisdom. In addition, the top 25% of wisdom scorers reported significantly higher scores on mindfulness, the informational style, identity commitment, self-reflection, and insight compared to lower wisdom scorers. 

 

• Informational Style – involves openness, self-exploration, & self-reflection
• Normative Style – conforming to the expectations of significant others
• Diffuse-Avoidant Style – avoidant of identity decisions
• Mindfulness - open, receptive, & nonjudgmental attention & awareness of present moment experience.
• Self-reflection – “the inspection & evaluation of one's thoughts, feelings & behavior”
• Insight – “the clarity of understanding of one's thoughts, feelings & behavior" 

• Wisdom – an integration of cognitive, affective, & reflective dimensions, which includes a deep understanding of life & diminished self-centeredness, as well as high levels of self-awareness, insight, & interpersonal understanding & caring." 

 

       Beaumont, S. L., & Pryor, T. (2013, May). The role of mindfulness in identity and wisdom among emerging adults. Poster presented at the First International Mindfulness Conference, Rome, Italy. 

 

 

Blindspots, Ethics & Evolution of consciousness

     A very self-assured young student had a conflict with an instructor. They were both convinced that the other was unprofessional. The student came to see me shortly after the incident, and was incensed at the instructor. I tried to soften his attitude, to help him behave more professionally at the time as well as in the future. This was part of my follow-up email to him:
     "I was suggesting you consider a softer approach in the future. The direct impact we can have on others' behavior is pretty minimal, while our own attitude sets the tone of our own (and others') lives. The question, 'would you rather be right or happy?' contains a lot. 
     Here's an old story of possible interest:        'A big burly samurai comes to the wise man and says, ‘Tell me the nature of heaven and hell.’ And the roshi looks him in the face and says; ‘Why should I tell a scruffy, disgusting, miserable slob like you?’ The samurai starts to get purple in the face, his hair starts to stand up, but the roshi won't stop, he keeps saying, ‘A miserable worm like you, do you think I should tell you anything?’ Consumed by rage, the samurai draws his sword, and he's just about to cut off the head of the roshi. Then the roshi says, ‘That's hell.’ The samurai, who is in fact a sensitive person, instantly gets it, that he just created his own hell; he was deep in hell. It was black and hot, filled with hatred, self-protection, anger, and resentment, so much so that he was going to kill this man. Tears fill his eyes and he starts to cry and he puts his palms together and the roshi says, ‘That's heaven’."

     And the young man's response? He emailed back that he preferred the following:
     "When somebody hits you, hit'em back harder" - Donald Trump

     Most students studying to become health-care professionals are not adults, but at best "emerging adults". They agree to professional codes of conduct, yet are, for the most part, simply not capable of relating to themselves, others, or ethical codes of conduct the way more mature people can. This is not immorality or amorality, simply an immature set of priorities / capacities, consistent with their immature stage of psychological / consciousness / moral / character development. AND, both dental and medical training have repeatedly been shown to NEGATIVELY impact normal maturation. Don't we need to improve on this?

Garden of Dreams, Kathmandu by Raewyn Bassett PhD   www.raewynbassett.com