Detroit Women's conference

[DaveP]

This is a quote:-

"Everyone in Detroit had a story of struggle and hopes of success.
Holistic healer/coach Ginny Dodge from Rochester, Michigan, ran a seminar session on "how self-care fuels rebellion" - coaching conference attendees on how to stay mentally balanced when the drumbeat of Trump news makes them scared and angry.
She says much of her private practice post-election has been teaching her clients how to take negative emotions and use them to fuel activity and positive energy."

This is not what women used to be like
I think all this social networking (needing lots of friends and constant support ) is draining these women, how would they have coped in WW2?

DaveP

 

[tands]

German women probably had a fairly difficult time fighting hitler though.

 

[DaveP]

German women probably had a fairly difficult time fighting hitler though.

I think their job was to stay at home and breed the master race, the Nazis used slave labour for the work that women did for the Allies.

I think that advertising over the last 100 years and particularly since the 60's is to blame for the fragility of women's mental health nowadays.  Just as much effort and psychology is put into advertising as it was into propaganda during the war.  This has produced unrealistic "lifestyle" photos on every ad, posed by models, advertising promotes a lifestyle that is unattainable and out of reach for 99% of the population.  The outcome for sensitive souls is plummeting self-esteem , self harming, and anorexia.

DaveP

 

[fazer]

Looking at a changing world and thinking about the one our parents coped with create all kinds of internal dialogue .  I think about the dislike of historic leaders being removed because of the narrative from living in this modern worlds views. 

Watching airplanes collide with building,  a market crash in 2008 that mirrors 1929 and now thinking about surviving the Cold War to watch these oppressive country's want nuclear ICBMs to maintain their survival.  It feels like no matter how far we feel our side has progressed,  there will always be a world full of real fears that someone has to deal with.  There must be an app for that.

 

[fazer]

Advertising is the devils breath.  I worked in advertising as a post production engineer the last 15 years of my career.  I think it is the downfall of capitalism and when you talk about right and left wing news programs, the thing to keep in mind is that it's all about advertising to a known market group.  It's always really about the money and then maybe the message. 

 

[tands]

I don't see anything wrong with women having help dealing when they're scared and angry, Dave. Seems ungentlemanly for you to mock them about it, I have to say. What did you do in WWII?

 

[DaveP]

I don't see anything wrong with women having help dealing when they're scared and angry, Dave. Seems ungentlemanly for you to mock them about it, I have to say.

I'm not mocking them, I'm pointing out how far things have become unbalanced by modern lifestyle.  One of the unfortunate aspects of old age is being able to evaluate several eras and see the changes, with the possible exception of washing machines and dishwashers, nearly every innovation produces a downside and fresh victims.

DaveP

 

[rob_gould]

Hi Dave,

It's not clear from your quote  that Ginny Dodge had women only as the target audience for her seminar.

Is that something that you'd read but didn't share, or just an assumption that you made?

 

[DaveP]

Is that something that you'd read but didn't share, or just an assumption that you made?

Sorry Rob, this is the BBC link.  It was a women only conference.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-41862976

I put up the post because I could hardly believe what I read.

The fact that young women need therapy because Trump won is beyond my understanding.  Anyone who was more than a child in October 1962 knows what real fear is.  I posted the pics because those women have my admiration.

DaveP

 

[Tubetec]

I think its a fair point Dave raised about advertising which these days has a lot to do with social media too .
Id be inclined to think the young and vulnerable are more damaged by all of this than women per say.
you only have to look at the figures for various psychological conditions in younger groups withing the population .
Mental health services are seeing a massive rise in self harm in younger people in the last few years ,theres also an alarming trend in young males ending up with various forms of body dismorphia ,including anorexia .It all translates into a win win situation for big pharma ,with an ever growing segment of the population being placed on daily meds ,alot of who will remain medicated the rest of their lives ,its worth an absolute fortune and its at least part of the reason public healthcare systems are on their knees financially. Psychological and councilling services are either unavailable or cost crazy money ,so the meds get handed out like smarties at the first sign of trouble . I know everyone wont agree with me on this ,but meds simply paper over the cracks they do nothing to address the underlying issue ,theres also good evidence emerging now of negative longer term effects from the once a day happy pills ,of course we can never rely on the producers of the pills to give us the hard facts either ,ever increasing profits are their main goal ,and the shareholders wont take kindly to falling dividends either.

 

[DaveP]

I agree,

Despite what they say about the swinging 60's, drugs were just not available to the ordinary people back then, only the top of society ever had access to cocaine and heroin.  Grass became available from around 68 onwards in East London, it looked like chocolate squares.

My kids in the 90's asked me about ecstasy, they were amazed when I told them it was made by criminals, they had assumed because it was a tablet, that it was a kosher drug.  They had no idea that rat poison and scouring powder and any old crap were put in as a filler.  There are some regular grass users that have never been affected, but loads of kids have mental health issues now because of the stronger skunk available now.

DaveP 

 

[Tubetec]

Even though there might be a linkage between the newer modern strains of cannabis and some forms of psychological illness ,I think its way over played by the medical industry ,its an easy scape goat for them and it also means they get to dish out their own poisons instead .
In terms of the difference between weed now and long ago ,theres been alot of selective crossing of strains and even genetic modification of the dna of the plants to produce more THC ,one of the active ingredients in grass or hash , the wild strains which would have been common in the 60's had  a different balance of canabinoids ,which does affect the feeling the user experiences , the older strains typically having a more mellow stone ,the modern super strenght stuff being more edgy and trippy .
Ive been a smoker a long time and by far a more serious problem than the substance itself ,is the fact that people are potentially criminalised for taking it ,and they often get involved with serious criminals who run the vast majority of the wheeling and dealing in it . Some kids can end up in debt to hard core criminals cause often the stuff is given out on 'tic' or in other words on credit ,they plan to pass it on to their friends etc ,they end up smoking too much themselves ,and bang serious thugs have them by the soul.All this damage could be stopped dead if people were simply allowed to grow their own legally ,not to mention subversive and paramilitaries worldwide funding their opperations off the back of the drugs trade.

 

[shabtek]

Related to DavePs original post: women do not experience this phenomenon in a vacuum. I wager You are also affected by all the forces you mention--I know I am.

Strange world we live in does not require new-fangled grass to maintain. I posit that the pervasive mental dischord is not much a result of  chemical intake--though it may contribute significantly-the forces/products of technology and coincident first-world-person problems are remarkable to one with any basis for comparison.

I make this claim being chemically clean but still subject to the milieu: I may just be projecting in observing the world, but I would describe all people I 'know' as subject (by degrees) to these forces Dave mentions.

 

[mattiasNYC]

I have to admit I'm a bit perplexed by this.

First of all, I would probably not take the word of a "holistic healer" of what the state of the modern woman's psyche is. There's a not-so-small segment of the "health industry" made up by hacks and phonies that prey on people susceptible to it. They'll create this need if it isn't entirely there in the first place and it's in their interest to talk up the magnitude of this supposed issue.

(I suppose I should admit that I've never been to a "holistic healer" so I'm partially talking out of my fifth chakra right now)

Secondly, I don't really understand why this was pointed towards women. I mean, I have my suspicions about it, but I don't really know is what I'm saying. I agree that advertising is exacerbating a lot of issues in society (thanks Capitalism) but I also think this affects men as well.

Thirdly, if we do focus this on women though then I have to wonder what this juxtaposition is, between older and newer culture, and what it really means. I mean, if it's "stay at home and cook, clean and take care of the children" then of course there was less for women to "bother their pretty little heads with". But if you look at countries that were the most progressive in the 60's and until about the 90's (i.e. Scandinavia) you'll see that these 'liberated' women are probably more happy and have experienced far more fulfillment than women in other nations.

So the extent to which women now "suffer" could be put in a different light I think, namely that they're now just either more aware of or have the need to deal with issues that men dealt more with earlier. But I can't tell if that's a net negative really. I think it's a net positive. Just for reference: You would have to add the millions of black women who up until this change were pretty much the lowest forms of humans in US society. Before the civil rights movement and the women's movement their lives were certainly worse than they are now. To be crude - it's certainly better to suffer this emotional distress than risk dangling from a tree.

As for Trump: Well, there's now been a backlash against Weinstein, and as I pointed out in that thread Weinstein as well as others like Spacey have been accused of doing what Trump bragged about having done, and that man is now in the White House. Add to that the insistence of men to govern over women's bodies, cut funding for sex ed and access to contraceptives. There's been a change in tone for the harsher in the past year, a tone that plays up fear, hatred, violence etc. Rather than having a nice wholesome family where the president seemed to respect and cherish his wife we now have a narcissistic megalomaniac egotist spouting hatred. I think it's not out of the question that some feel incredibly 'down' because of this current climate.

 

[Tubetec]

Well said Matti,
I guess theres a small section of very bitter, ugly on the inside people get a lift from the verbal diahorea coming out of Trumps mouth . Most decent folk ,especially the ones who voted for him have be questioning the choice they made at this stage of the game .His comments about pussy grabbing were a disgrace , but then again if the family business was facillitating drinking whoring and gambling  it all adds up .

 

[rob_gould]

I have to admit I'm a bit perplexed by this.

First of all, I would probably not take the word of a "holistic healer" of what the state of the modern woman's psyche is. There's a not-so-small segment of the "health industry" made up by hacks and phonies that prey on people susceptible to it. They'll create this need if it isn't entirely there in the first place and it's in their interest to talk up the magnitude of this supposed issue.

(I suppose I should admit that I've never been to a "holistic healer" so I'm partially talking out of my fifth chakra right now)

Secondly, I don't really understand why this was pointed towards women. I mean, I have my suspicions about it, but I don't really know is what I'm saying. I agree that advertising is exacerbating a lot of issues in society (thanks Capitalism) but I also think this affects men as well.

Thirdly, if we do focus this on women though then I have to wonder what this juxtaposition is, between older and newer culture, and what it really means. I mean, if it's "stay at home and cook, clean and take care of the children" then of course there was less for women to "bother their pretty little heads with". But if you look at countries that were the most progressive in the 60's and until about the 90's (i.e. Scandinavia) you'll see that these 'liberated' women are probably more happy and have experienced far more fulfillment than women in other nations.

So the extent to which women now "suffer" could be put in a different light I think, namely that they're now just either more aware of or have the need to deal with issues that men dealt more with earlier. But I can't tell if that's a net negative really. I think it's a net positive. Just for reference: You would have to add the millions of black women who up until this change were pretty much the lowest forms of humans in US society. Before the civil rights movement and the women's movement their lives were certainly worse than they are now. To be crude - it's certainly better to suffer this emotional distress than risk dangling from a tree.

Yep - pretty much the post I wanted to write.  I'm glad I didn't attempt it last night after glasses of wine because it would have been considerably more stinging than this.

I appreciate there's a wide variety of demographics and viewpoints on this board, and we're all entitled to our own opinion - that's what keeps it interesting.  But! the reason I take issue with your post is simple Dave  : Why not ask a woman?  I just don't think that you, or I, or anyone on this board (99.9% men as far as I am aware) are qualified to speak on their behalf on this subject.  Surely they're better placed to provide their thoughts than us?!

 

[DaveP]

Why not ask a woman?  I just don't think that you, or I, or anyone on this board (99.9% men as far as I am aware) are qualified to speak on their behalf on this subject.  Surely they're better placed to provide their thoughts than us?!

Women are pretty open about their opinions, what with journalism, blogs and social media, they are not a secretive bunch.
Even a man can form an opinion from observation.
I feel that these women have lost a sense of proportion over Trump, no-one should need therapy because the wrong person got elected, it's immature.  The contrast with previous generations is very clear to me having known both.

Out mothers and grandmothers had far more concern over the rise of the Nazis in the late 30's, especially after Guernica and the threat of bombing and gas attacks.  Yes, there is a possibility of conflict with NK, but even Trump would not initiate this and suffer the casualties in south korea, the message from the US military shows that they understand the cost only too well.

I think it is extremely unlikely that Trump will be re-elected because the dems will probably get their act together and come up with a better candidate (although no-one on the horizon so far).  So at worst, Trump is a set back not the end of the world as we know it, and certainly not a reason to have therapy.

DaveP

 

[Tubetec]

Well when the top man seems to pass off serious sexual assault and abuse of power as casually as he did ,I think these womens anger towards him is very understandable . I also suspect there are many women that have suffered the indignity of sexual misconduct on behalf of a fellow male member of staff ,who simply cant afford to take the risk of complaining and possibly loosing their job because they have rents to pay and young mouths to feed .

I suppose this forum has a vast majority of male members ,and as such when were discussing these prickly subjects were missing out on the balance that a female perspective could bring to our discussions .It would be a good thing if more of our female members would share their opinions and maybe even stories of how they have personally been affected by misconduct and sexual harassment in the work place .

 

[DaveP]

Sexual harassment is quite another thing and is totally unacceptable period.

It happened to my wife on two occasions.  We consulted a solicitor about legal action  but declined to take it when it would have meant being in the local papers in a completely different climate than we are in today.  I completely understand todays women coming out out and piling on the pressure, because at the moment they have cover in numbers.

The second time she turned up for an interview with a banker in the city of London.  He looked at her but didn't speak, then the phone rang and his embarrassed secretary came in and said he wanted an 18-20 year old for an affair, there was no interview.  Back then my wife was a hot 40 year old, but on this occasion I was very grateful for some age discrimination.  I kept a close eye on this creep in the news and was relieved to see that he died around 5 years later.

What Trump did was an abuse of power and I'm sure he feels embarrassed about it now that the climate has changed.  One climate change he cannot deny.

DaveP

 

[mattiasNYC]

I think it is extremely unlikely that Trump will be re-elected because the dems will probably get their act together and come up with a better candidate (although no-one on the horizon so far).

I wouldn't count on it.

So at worst, Trump is a set back not the end of the world as we know it, and certainly not a reason to have therapy.

DaveP

But surely you can't speak for women though.