> Especially in the irrelevant overblown form, nobody 50 years ago would even stoop down to mention as trauma...
The Monty Python "Four Yorkshiremen" sketch is 53 years old, a parody of old men apparently exaggerating their traumas.
The Monty Python "Four Yorkshiremen" sketch is 53 years old, a parody of old men apparently exaggerating their traumas.
So in both cases, they do the opposite of what I claimed people commonly stoop to today:
(a) presenting lesser, irrelevant issues and "slights" as "traumas"
(b) focusing on how traumatised they were by those (that is, playing the victim, not taking pride in overcoming them or at least pretending to be a tough survivor like the four Yorkshiremen).
But that's not the reality of trauma for many people. Some people are never going to be quaffing wine in a fancy restaurant and reminiscing with their aged school-chums. Some people will suffer evident psychological harm that they may never fully recover from.
The four yorkshiremen's tales centre on a factual recounting, not touching upon feelings or harm done or how the situation was dealt with. [it was presented in this way with the effect of parodying this attitude.]
I think this deserves the pushback you are getting. It has damaged generations, to not be able to talk about their subjective experiences of objective harm.
I think your attitude is selfish (in the sense that you're making it about yourself). It does you no harm for people to tell their stories, in their own terms. Why not let folks be?
Whereas there are people who don't do that? Who are OK with people talking about their traumas if they thing those people are faking it/overblown them?
You dressed the description up to make me sound like some exception. But I think everybody (except perhaps the totally indifferent) only accept others talking about their traumas if they believe those other are genuine and talk the truth. Else, they consider them hypocrites or liars or opportunists, and so on. Isn't that the case?
Let's make it perfectly clear what I mean:
(a) I'm totally fine with people talking about their real traumas as traumas
(b) I'm also totally fine with people talking about their real traumas as things they brushed off/soldiered through
(c) I believe many people have real traumas
(d) I believe many more overblow or make-up traumas to play the victims, score sympathy points, get a leverage, etc.
(e) I don't like the latter category - I consider them hypocrites, and I think they cheapen real trauma for everybody
(f) I use my own opinion to consider who belongs to (a) and is legit or who belongs to (e) and is thus a hypocrite. What's the alternative? Taking whatever everybody says as necessarily true even if I have doubts about their honesty or history?
(g) who am I to judge other people's stories? Well, I'm the arbiter of my opinion. Shouldn't I judge for myself (including whether another is a hypocrite or not)?
But that (the parent's example) is not what I claimed people didn't do 50 years ago. If anything, it's the opposite.
In the "four workshiremen" sketch they take pride in their traumas/harsh situations that they went through, and compete to exaggerate even greater traumatic/harsh situations. Today many people exaggreate irrelevant slights as traumas, and do so in order play the victim, not the tough survivor.
You ever wonder how trauma is passed through generations? Because of the premise you are saying: people in denial about a trauma they experienced. They assume the shitty experiences they had are normal and then repeat the same acts that were visited upon them.
In my reading about cptsd during my counseling (uh oh, am I playing a victim?) one of the most common thoughts identified in childhood trauma is downplaying the severity and assuming it is common. That leads to people not seeking treatment.
Try showing some compassion and assume good faith.
That would be a very valid critique - but only if I had said anything of the sort.
I never said that "people who speak about their trauma are only doing it to play victim", as if it's somehow impossible to speak about trauma and not doy to play victim.
What I said that people today (meaning, lots of people today, which is neither the same as "everybody", nor even the same as "everybody who talks about trauma") overblow insignifant "traumas" to play the victim.
There are, of course, also people with real traumas (real abuse, parent loss, and so on). Those, by definition, don't have to overblow BS "traumas", and, by extension, are not those I criticized.
So, I can't really answer your points, any other way, expect to say that they don't actually respond to what I did say.
You don’t get to decide what is and isn’t trauma. You aren’t the arbiter of what is trauma.
Respect what people say or just keep your thoughts to yourself. It’s not hard.