This blogpost is a continuation of a few of my FM blogs and a book review (see on this website as pre-requisite reading background): (1) "A Re-Invigorated Religiousity on the Planet: Ken Wilber's Book" (May 2, 2017), (2) amazon.com book review "Wilber Targets the Dysfunction(s) of Religiousity" (May 2, 2017), (3) "Wilber's Use (Biasing) of Terms: Initial Fearnalysis (May 3, 2017) and (4) "Ken Wilber's Basic Vocabulary of the 'Pathological'" (May 9, 2017). All these are in the service of my critical examination of his new book The Religion of Tomorrow (2017) which I believe will prove to be an extraordinary work of his, and mostly the best and readable book to "hit" hard at all of us to truly examine the "Dysfunctions" of religion, religiousity and spirituality as they have largely been constructed over the past couple thousand years. He is saying we need to up-grade seriously and quickly a whole lot of different aspects in this domain of human existence--and religion, religiousity and spirituality cover a lot of deep territory, always have in our ancient past and always will, according to Wilber.

The First Three Pages (of ROT)

Now, this blogpost will be short but will cut into something I believe is essential to "get" which most people "don't get" when they read Wilber's work (or, I'm willing to grant they may "get it" or at least "read it" in his words, and then they deny it and move on to others things that distract them from paying attention to what was just said). I'll go back, to my last FM blogpost for a moment, please read it, to reiterate how Wilber opened this new book (ROT) in the first 3 pp, with 98% rather positive, barely critical (not wrist slapping) discourse on "what a possible religion of tomorrow might look like" (p. 1). He then explains a bit why he'll apply his Integral Theory (or Integral Spirituality) critique to Buddhism as the exemplar, but with "no particular bias involved" he says. All the Great Traditions can learn from his critique of Buddhism. He goes on to describe nicely how one can remain "spiritual but not religious" if they choose, even after his critique is applied in the book, and that those who are religious believers in the Great Traditions may also go on worshipping their core credos, etc. He makes rooms for "exoteric" and "esoteric" teachings and so far by the top of p.3 he is still being very generous and positive and looking at our human potential and how we may best "radically free men and women from suffering" etc. But by the lower 1/3 of p. 3, all is about to walk over the edge... his discourse shifts, and it comes up at you without you barely recognizing it.

This is where he "hits," writing from what is the esoteric (mystic) perspective, or what I will later suggest is the Causal Stage (standpoint: see Chpt.13). Wilber is fully capable of delivering the cannon in the sense of 'blowing up the ark' and challenging the shit out of our complacency and niceness. This is where people of all stripes who read Wilber seem to largely ignore and deny once they have read it or heard it. But right there on the bottom 1/3 of the page... there is the sentence I quoted in my last FM blog which is most relevant to a fearanalysis of Wilber's work (and ROT specifically). This is where he goes into the core of Fear (actually, terror). This is where he espouses the universal truth found by many esoteric practitioners of the Great Traditions, across religions, outside of religions, and across cultures and time-space. He does, in my opinion begin to open up his own "fearanalysis" of the human condition (existence of a conscious being on planet Earth). Religiousity and spirituality have also been interested in their own "fearanalysis" of the human condition and how to help humans (supposedly) be truly and "radically free men and women" (to recite Wilber's words on p. 3).

So, page 3, the bottom 1/3, slides the reader (and their gravity of consciousness) over the waterfalls of the beautiful river they had been floating on in pages 1-2 of Wilber's Introduction to ROT. The quote includes a few things, you can see in my previous FM blog, or read the book (p. 3). Here's the essence of the esoteric findings Wilber is synthesizing in his own words as he contrasts "Great Liberation," "True Nature", "ultimate Reality itself" and "ultimate Freedom" (positive stuff- Absolute) with the barrier that all the religions and spiritual practices (supposedly) are battling against (of sorts)... and, the barrier he notes is "the terror-inducing limitations of ordinary life" (negativ stuff = relative). This ontological explication, philosophy/theory of Wilber's favor here is in all his work going back to 50 years ago, more or less. I have never seen him slip away from this quite existential sounding claim of the terror at the base of human experience on planet Earth in a body.

"Terror" in fearanalysis is extreme Fear. So, I prefer to call it Fear so as not to fall into a fear-based over-dramatization complex or interpretive frame making everything "extreme" (unfortunately, such a tendency is part of the pop-culture X-treme movements and trope of the day). I don't think Wilber is over-exaggerating and trying to be dramatic, in fact, he is being very calm in claiming this ontological experiential ground of human existence (i.e., the human condition in the relative world). I appreciate Wilber's objectivity in regard to the subjectivity of an intense affective (emotion) word like "terror" (or even, Fear). In fact, only 15 pages in the 800 page book have "terror" or "terrorism" on them. Yet, it is right there in the opening 3 pages, and it is there before the word "Fear" appears in the text too. I don't think this is an accident, and I do believe Wilber was not going to give a write-up in the Introduction on the esoteric dimension of findings of the human condition without a little conscious 'shock and awe' to wake-us-up, at least a little. It's the first "negative" thing he says in this book, and I'm so glad he did it. I could see this as Causal View (transpersonal perspective) he took on it. It is from a high-altitude and standing back making the subject an object, which is essential to the transformation of developmental stages, a point and principle of his entire teaching (see also Robert Kegan, in this regard in terms of developmental psychology). Consciousness, for Wilber has to encounter the world along a spectrum from simple to complex (systems)... and "fear" (or "terror") is at each level, and if it is not managed well then the whole system (and/or holon) will start to go pathological. The core of that theory is based on his juxtapositioning of Eros/Agape (Ascending Love, and Descending Love) contra Phobos/Thanatos (Ascending Fear, and Descending Fear). Granted, Wilber doesn't quite spell his ontological theory/philosophy out that clearly but it is there, and in future blogs I will argue that.

Point, being, to wrap up, the entire religion, religiousity and spirituality 'game' of pursuits and aims, you could say from a fearanalysis perspective, is all about Fear Management (or Terror Management)--and, this I have always seen as a major gift of Wilber's synthesis to us Earthlings, if we pay attention to the "terror-inducing" side of existence and not become allergic to it and concomitantly addicted to the Love-side. Note in a recent blog I give a reference to my article published in the International Journal of Critical Pedagogy (2017) as a critique of Paulo Freire's "radical love" concept which I show is not being used very radical because most all who use it (and Freire himself) are and were addicted to "love" and avoiding "fear" (or, archetypally, the Love-Fear Dynamic, as I call it). Again, I won't go into all those arguments for a revisioning ontology based on fearanalysis of a whole lot of literature including Wilber's. Now, my critique of where Wilber missed a good opportunity on p.3 (ROT) is his own Causal biased look at the human condition (i.e., esoterically). He didn't do a very good job of articulating the "terror-inducing" in an AQAL Matrix framing, rather he just (casually) jumps his discourse to this "negative" aspect of existence and does so coolly and collectively from the Causal level/stage (i.e., transpersonal)--which, I was delighted to see because it is a definite indicator of a transpersonal perspective of Fear Management at the core of the spectrum of consciousness, evolution, history, development.

Wilber's claim re: "terror-inducing" relative reality from a Causal level perspective (or View, as he is now calling stages)--is great, is high altitude Truth-- but inadequate to be really all that useful to most humans and where their center of gravity is at. It sets up what I have long written about as a Fearless Standpoint Theory (or Fear Management System 9a), and yet, isn't integral enough and thus won't undermine effectively "suffering" as all the Great Traditions strive for (supposedly). Yes, my friends, this is where the details come in. I won't articulate my critical integral theory of Fear Management/Education (see Fisher, 2010) [1], but what is important on p. 3 (ROT) is to see the thread, to feel the waterfall you just went over when "terror" was mentioned in Wilber's text. That begins to unthawing of the frozen ontological grip of terror (or, more accurately, what I call the 'Fear' Project and 'Fear' Matrix constructions). Wilber has always seen through The Matrix, you might say, and he focuses unfortunately, too much on the positive and the negative nearly never gets 'equal' attention (which would be an improvement). Yet, be clear, as I have seen in ROT, Wilber is highlighting "Dysfunctions" at all levels of the spectrum of consciousness (and in religion, religiousity and spirituality) like I have not seen him do so well. And, gosh, I haven't even read the book nearly at all. I don't skim over page after page of his texts. I study it in small pieces, and jump all around, looking for the important "pattern that connects" that I think will be really useful for us to better diagnose the "pathological." Then, can come the "cura" and "therapia"--which, from my perspective has to include Fear Management/Education. Now, to end, it is too bad, as I said, Wilber did not do an AQAL (basic) analysis of "terror-inducing" (or at least, a long end note when he used it on p.3)... one piece I would have added is that existentialists, following Ernest Becker's philosophy/theory of the human condition and evolution of culture, are now calling out how we have to come to terms with how "terror management theory" (TMT) [2] is exposing the deepest roots of the human dilemma (i.e., between Love-Fear as meta-motivations, and/or Growth-Defense, etc.)... and that would be the Lower Left quadrant input needed to bolster Wilber's Causal (Upper Left) claim on p. 3.

Okay, that's lots, and I realize it is a bit technical where I am going. Feel free to email me for clarifications. I also welcome your critiques and input. But whatever, you or I do, please let's not lose track of Wilber's Causal claim on p. 3 and what we humans are facing, and what religion, religiousity and spirituality have (esoterically) always had to deal with, and that is "How do we best manage terror/fear on this planet?" Folks, all the positive "psychotechnologies of consciousness transformation" (Wilber, 2017, p. 3) working toward the aim of the Absolute (e.g., archetypal Love) mentioned in this book (ROT) will only be 1/2 baked, and ineffective, if there isn't an 'equal' emphasis on study and practices of the Fear-side of things (i.e., AQAL fearanalysis of "terror-inducing" aspect of relative reality). It's annoying somewhat, to read in ROT, how much emphasis Wilber puts on the "positive" (see my last FM blog on this topic)--I said, it looks like his formula is to give only 12.5 % (1/8) of attention to the "negative" in his Shadow (work) part of the program. That is disasterous, if people follow such a formula. Terror/Fear management/education (as "Cleaning Up") are was too important everyday, at every moment, to avoid or limit to such a small amount of theorizing and practice. Next time, I will blog on how Wilber's actual text will tell a different story about how important it is to do Fear Management, than his simplistic formula (p. 264) and it goes way beyond how "Shadow" work is given attention in his explicit formula. So, stay tuned. And, I will continue to lament Wilber's progressive positive focus he seems to persist with since about 1997 onward (my less fav. of his works)... even in ROT he mentions he is developing a whole book on "Flourishing" (e.g., Seligman's positive psychology) interventions/practices for Integral followers... oh, my, this is definitely not going to cut it... why isn't he also developing a whole book on recognizing "Pathologies" and working directly with them... even, though, yes, I am well aware the positive and negative interventions (like via positiva and via negativa paths) are interrelated. He's doing it, with his colleagues, who want to be popular(ized), and marketable, that's why. Fear and Terror management/education is not as fun as Love and light and joy and flourishing, right?

Notes

1. Fisher, R. M. (2010). The world's fearlessness teachings: A critical integral theory of fear management/education for the 21st century. Lanham, MD: University Press of America.

2. See Wikipedia "Terror Management Theory"

In the last few FM blogs you'll see my conversation on Ken Wilber's new (Integral) book called The Relgion of Tommorow (2017). My interest has been to look at slowly (in pieces) doing some kind of introductory fearanalysis of his book (and his work overall as a philosopher offering a world/kosmic therapia).

I already picked up in the book's Index that "dysfunctions" is the word that gets the most sub-entries. Indeed, he devotes a lot of the main text to outlining the different dysfunctions (what can go wrong--i.e., pathological) at each state-stage of his complex spectrum of consciousness theory/philosophy.

In this short blog I want to quote from the book and then share my initial List of Basic Vocabulary of the "Pathological" (as I call it) in Wilber's book. I'll then say a few words after these two inserts:

(1) Quote from Religion of Tomorrow - "... the esoteric teachings [across all major religions throughout time, across cultures] were the 'inner teachings,' the 'secret teachings,' usually kept from the public [masses] and open only to individuals of exceptional quality and character [and commitment]. These teachings weren't merely mythic [as in exoteric teachings] stories and beliefs; they were psychotechnologies of consciousness transformation. By performing the specific practices and exercises, an individual could reach an actual awakening to his or her own True Nature, gaining a Great Liberation [from suffering] and ultimate Freedom from the terror-inducing limitations of ordinary life and a direct introduction to ultimate Reality itself. This Great Liberation was also known by various names...". (p. 3)

[Now, I am fascinated by this opening of this huge 800pp book by Wilber, though, it is also very consistent in most all his work I have read over 35 yrs... he has a theory he follows, from the Great Traditions of wisdom/religion, in which ordinary life and its consciousness, generally, is "terror-inducing" and limiting to the highest human potential. This is exactly where a fearanalysis ought to begin with examining Wilber's Integral philosophy/theory in terms of how it is informed by this kind of intense and ominous fear-talk, as I call it. Not that he is using this fear-talk in the quote to be overly-negative, nor fearmongering, as we see he balances the 'good' and not so good part of the story of human existence and the evolution of consciousness on earth, in humans (and perhaps other creatures too)... his claim is that all the esoteric (or mystical) practices, from meditation, to contemplation, and rituals of purification and transcendence etc.. are all dedicated to clarifying the problem of human existence that is limiting and causes suffering--and, as I read this quote, the problem is a Fear Problem (more accurately, the 'Fear' Problem, which in my more detailed analysis includes concepts like 'Fear' Project(ion) and 'Fear' Matrix--not that I will go into elaborating any of that here; read my other works; So, my point is that if you are reading and studying Wilber's work you better get the core of his project, yes, Enlightenment and Liberation and Awareness, etc. for sure, but also that only comes, as this book makes very clear by wide-open analysis of the Fear Problem of evolution's inevitable 'messy' way of growing and evolving in which "fear" is a major influence, and in fact, he goes so far to claim it is "terror" not mere fear--and, all that would require a whole critical analysis further than what I can go into; So, my other point is, Wilber's work is thus all about fear management (or terror management, if you will)--and, my last 27 years are focused on developing a holistic critical and integral approach to fear management/education on this planet--and, I thank Wilber for all the work he has done on synthesizing a whole lot of others' great work on this--yet, there is so much to still articulate as Wilber himself has underplayed, and/or remained non-cognizant of the Fear Problem in his own philosophy/theory--and, thus, any good integral theory has to be up-graded to really catch the significance of this all. Note, I am using fearanalysis to pull this out, but it also goes by another name Desh Subba created as "dephilosophy" based on the philosophy of fearism--see our book on that, as in other earlier blogposts and photos on this website]

Okay, I'll leave this and go to the List of "Pathological" (and/or like-pathological) in Wilber's vocabulary in this book (ROT)... this list is just a beginning, but it is awesome in scope and descriptive color, of which it is essential for any serious Wilberian to understand and be able to apply this vocabulary accurately and critically to at least Wilber's own philosophy and theorizing on development and evolution (and its problems)--that is, the Fear Problem itself--so, I am suggesting the basic vocabulary of Wilber's implicit articulation of the human universal Fear Problem is right here [note, non-italic terms are not in ROT but I think could be because Wilber has used them elsewhere... there are many other terms he has used in other works earlier too that I have not put in this list but will be added with time]:

(2)

Wilber ROT &  (Basic) “Pathological” Vocabulary

compiled by R. Michael Fisher (May 9, 2017)

 absence-

 absolutisms (quadrant)-

 aborted-

 addiction-

 alienation-

 allergy-

 amok (run)-

 attachment-

 avoid(ance)-

 Avoidance (Primordial)-

 Bad News (story)-

 banish(ed)-

 biased (thinking)-

 broken (consciousness)-

 bypass (spiritual)-

 catastrophe-

 conceal-

 confused-

 confusion-

 contraction (self-)-

 corrupt(ion)-

 crushed-

 dark face,

 dark side,

 death drive-

 defend(ing)-

 defense(s)-

 defense mechanisms-

 deformed (holon)-

 Demonic (trends)-

 denial-

 deranged-

 destruction-inducing-

 destructive (current)-

 [devolve]-

 disguised (forms)-

 disorders-

 dis-owning (drive)-

displaced-

 displacement-

 disrupted-

 disruption-

 disease-

dissociate(d)-

 dissociation-

distorted-

 distortion-

 domination-

 dominator (hierarchy)-

 domineering-

 dysfunction(s)-

 evil-

 excommunicated-

 facade(s)-

 fails (self)-

 false self-

 fear-

 fixated-

 fixation-

 fractured-

 fragment(ed)-

 fused (with)-

 gap-

 grasping-

 hankering-

 hate-driven-

 havoc (wreaking)-

 hidden (subject, lens)-

 “hole”-

 hurt-

 illness-

 immoral-

 immortality (addiction)-

 infect-

 insecurity-

 invade-

 irrational-

 Jonah complex-

 lack-

 less (“alive”)-

 lies-

 limited-

 loss (of faith)-

 malformation-

 marginalizing-

 meltdown (communion)-

 miscarriage (developmental)-

 misinterpretation-

 misreading-

 negated-

 negative-

 neurosis-

 numb-

 oppressed-

 oppression-

 overblown-

 [paranoiac]-

 partial-

 pathological-

 perforation (in consciousness)

 Phobos-

 prejudiced (thinking)-

 prevent-

 projected-

 project(ion)-

 projective (dysfunctions)-

 projects (immortality)-

 psychoses-

 psychotic-like-

 reduced-

 reduction(ism)-

 regress(ion)-

 repress(ed)-

 repression-

 resistance-

 [retro-]-

 security (needs)-

 shadow (material)-

 shame-

 split-off-

 stuck (to)-

 suicidal-

 terror(ized)-

 terrorism-

 Thanatos-

 therapeutic culture-

 toxic(ity)-

 trauma(tized)-

 twisted-

 uncorrected-

 unethical-

 unhealthy-

 unintegrated-

 victim mentality/culture-

 violence-

 wars-

 wrong (go)-

[Arguably, this vocabularly is based on a recognition in Wilber, consciously or not, of the "terror-laden" aspect of reality, that is, the fear-based aspect of reality, as humans experience it, consciously or unconsciously; so much more could be said about this, but it does raise the issue of Love-Fear as meta-motivational "forces" in the universe, if you will, which are all part of Wilber's major contribution to helping clarify and resolve the Fear Problem, and improvement fear management/education on this planet--before, not doing so adequate, really wipes us and a whole lot of other living systems off the face of the earth; we cannot ignore this any longer, we need as much fear-talk as love-talk, to put it simply in a nutshell--and, I pulled out this vocabulary from Wilber's work to get us talking about this other (shadowy, darker) side of the existence we live, and to not be seduced overly by the "transcendent" and "love n' light" consciousness talk that near totally dominates popular culture as it enters the "spiritual" (including human potential and new age)--okay, that's it for now]

The following article, just published in the International Journal of Critical Pedagogy (2017), I wrote as a critique of "radical love" (a la Paulo Freire) in critical pedagogy. It is entitled: "Radical Love: Is It Radical Enough?".

I introduce the dualistic (and sometimes) dialectical theory of Love vs. Fear and how Fearlessness is essential to the dialectic (even a trialectic) to make it effective in the current meta-context of the "culture of fear." Hope you enjoy it, and feel free to send me any comments [r.michaelfisher52 [at] gmail [dot] com.

REVIEWS: 

In near 2 years since my article was published, no one has made a peep about it. Which is too bad, I'm not impressed with critical pedagogues in that sense of being so silent. Anyways, one of my colleagues from my UBC days, a bright younger scholar, Dr. Kent denHeyer, Prof. of Education, at UofA in Edmonton, responded having recently read my article in IJCP (2017). He wrote me, 

Dr. Barbara Bickel, my life-partner, and co-founding member of FMning, sent me this e-mail to a few of her colleagues in Canada. She was fine with me posting it here:

Fearanalysis is a methodology I have developed decades ago and it is continually being refined (e.g., Google Scholar search will give you one version guidebook). In order to take Ken Wilber's work and put it through a fearanalysis one would have to do extensive research, which I do not have time for at the moment because of other writing projects. However, it is worthy reading the prior FM blog on his new book and my first discovery of what showed up in the book Index (i.e., for The Religion of Tomorrow, 2017). Today, I did a quick digital search for 9 terms (see Table 1) I am interested in particularly about the "shadow-side" (pathological analysis) of Wilber's overall project in 50 years or so of his research and writing as a now internationally recognized philosopher and psychology theorist (i.e., Integral Theory).

RESULTS

There are many things to analyze from Table 1 (also many limitations to this method of data collection of #'s of hits), but I will not try to do that all here in this first direct fearanalysis (blogpost). You can review the numbers and look for patterns yourself. A few highlights that 'pop' out from this table are: (a) use of fear explicitly shows a moderate to low number of times until a c. 100% jump in 2017 (ROT); (b) use of fearlessness is 0 across the sample; (c) use of courage very low and consistent across the sample; (d) use of positive and negative medium low use but somewhat consistent with a reversal of predominance of "negative" in 1977 (SOC), though not highly so; (e) use of pathology a definite trend (jumping up and down) with very low in 1977 to medium high in 1995 to a similar but slightly less in 2017; (f) use of shadow very high in 1977 with a big drop (c. 40%) in 1995 and c. 100% increase in 2017; (g) use of dysfunction is the most extreme change of all the 9 terms, showing 2017 it was his favored term for discussing various aspects of the more "darker"-side of his overal project work (this is my interest as a fearologist).

DISCUSSION

What am I 'snooping' for in such a preliminary (rough data set)? I look for patterns of increased or decreased use of concepts (i.e., those related to my interest and work re: fear and fearlessness overall). It is important to look (at least) at some of the most extreme differences showing up on Table 1. Wilber's use of "fearlessness" is exactly the opposite in frequency to mine over the decades. He doesn't engage the term, which is astounding to me as it is so important in any "liberation" and/or "enlightenment" discourse, for starters. But he also doesn't much engage "courage" either. Again, astounding (puzzling) because he does moderately engage the term "fear." My question to him and others analyzing this data is: How can one engage the term "fear" with moderate use explictly in one's major texts, and not engage either courage or fearlessness (or "fearless"). It's like there is a disconnect there for me or a 'gap' in Wilber's discourse and the discourses of "liberation" that he relies upon. I am looking just for this kind of bias and what seems problematic. For e.g., he has no theory of fear to fearlessness or fear and courage, for starters. Yet, why does he assert with his colleagues (in another book, Integral Life Practice, 2008) "ILP [Integral Life Practice, which Wilber is a co-founder of] is a free and fearless exploration of the terrain..." (p. 2)?

Moving on to the next thing I am snooping for is what I have long been critical of in Wilber's discourses and those who follow him and whom he relies upon often--the issue is for me potentially circulating around how Wilber has become so much more "positive" oriented overall in his text discourses. I am concerned (especially, since 1997 forward) he has dropped the darker analysis and edges of good critical/conflict theory and become more a functionalist thinker theorist (at least, partially so). Again, I am interested in the darker shadowy-side of his great analysis overall (which is still there in 2017). So, that is why I looked for the term "positive" and "negative" to compare (albeit, this is likely not very accurate to actual volume of page spaces on each of these aspects of his thinking and work). It turns out from this sample, and limited method, he is fairly balanced in use of the terms, and that's great (with a slight, interesting anomaly in 1977 where use of "negative" was for the first time higher than "positive" (so, that validated somewhat my hypothesis he was writing more on "negative" aspects of his overall project, that is, pathologicaly and shadowy aspects of what is 'broken' for example.

Even if it is good to see the (apparent) 'balance' of positive and negative, which I would expect from good Integral philosophy/theory (and Wilber himself), if I take a look at the 2017 (ROT) book, go to the Index, there is no term entry for "negative" and yet, go to "positive" and sure enough there are several pages as well as him promoting "Positive Psychology" movement (a la Seligman) as part of ILP work. I kept asking, so where is the "Negative Psychology" movement being promoted or even named? It's not. That's problematic and tips to the 'unbalanced' scales, or at least its a tendency I suspected in Wilber's biased discourse and use of terms like these. 

Next, I am fascinated by his frequency use of "pathology" over the years, which dramatically increased in this sample over time, which I am glad for. Both SES and ROT books are his two big tomes of great works (both 800 pp) and it is fairly consistent, more or less, that "pathology" gets used moderately often. So, this doesn't support (initially) my hypothesis in an obvious way re: Wilber is getting more positive. Most people can't stand the word pathology, nor spending time studying it. We generally avoid it (and fear it) and that's a whole other conversation about processes of denial, dissociation, and "fear" (i.e., fear of pathology itself; which is analogous to "fear of fear itself"). Typically, North American culture anyways tends to avoid these negative (sounding) terms (I am speaking mostly of popular culture and self-help psychology and human potential and new age discourses, but even beyond those too). Yet, now Wilber really gets me excited when he uses at the high to extremely high levels (relatively to other data collected) terms that are quite negative sounding: (a) "shadow" (i.e., shadow work, Jung's notion of Shadow, etc.) is 2nd highest amongst all the 9 terms and, (b) "dysfunction" is the very highest with an extreme valued-use by Wilber only in 2017.

I'll end the (initial) Discussion of this Table 1 here. Things to ponder in the future fearanalysis. I'll end with a Wilber (2017) quote pertinent to my own finding a way to embrace the best parts for building an integral theory of pathology. I refer to him here clarifying that he has several terms to show what his overall liberation project is about in terms of light commandments of sorts (praxis): "Growing Up," "Waking Up," and "Showing Up,"-- all 3 are the lighter 'positive' aspects or "demands" he places on anyone following his work and the path of which Integral Theory is taking... okay, fine, that's 75% of his liberation project, and what about the other 25% (at least, in Wilber's arrangement of priorities of praxis)--well, the other 4th aspect he calls "Cleaning Up" whereby he wrote, "shadow work involves the 'negative aspect' of Cleaning Up, emphasized by Integral Theory" (p. 264). But then he also clarifies on that same page that "Cleaning Up" has two major aspects, 50% of this ought to be on "Positive Psychology" (and like practices) whereby one focuses on their "strengths" and "what is working" already in their lives--to promote "thriving" or "flourishing" or "that which makes our lives better or happier" (pp. 264-65). You see when I read that kind of focus on positive (even, "Cleaning Up" is 50% positive work)--leaving overall in Wilber's project (according to this brief fearanalysis) a mere 12.5% on "negative aspect" (p. 264). Seriously, that's what the formula comes out to if you just examine this couple of pages of text, and what is sort of disconnective for me is that this privileging formula of Wilber's (albeit, I am putting % figures on it) is that it is right smack in the middle of the chapter 8 of the book "Shadow Work." Oh, my... this really needs more close examination... this really, looks off-balancing and not what Integral Theory ought to be about overall(?). Again, I am not going to get harsh in critiquing this book yet. I haven't done adequate checking out the facts and reading more, analyzing more.

This ought to create food for thought anyways...

Oh, one more cautionary on what is happening re: positive-bias in Integral Theory (a la Wilber). Listen to this quote from the same page (p. 265) where Wilber is basically promoting the "Positive Psychology" movement but beyond that he is promoting his philosophy (theory) of evolution which, for him, is looking like it (i.e., "Evolution" itself) is quite "negative"-- just listen to this quote from Wilber (which really needs nuanced challenging): "Evolution has tended to build into the brain a habit of looking for hazards and things that can signal danger or trouble; there is much less drive to notice things that are positive, that we should be grateful for, that make our lives better or happier." [he seems to be talking about a "fear habit" as 'negative' habit, is he not?; oh, and isn't this summary of "Evolution" itself positioned as 'positive' but from another perspective he is rather philosophically quite 'negative' in this construction--interesting, ironic?]

[wow! that is quite the claim, and seems quite inconsistent with Wilber-mid-career work on Integral Theory... something has really shifted, after 1995-96, in my estimate]

Indeed, Ken Wilber has always been my fav philosopher (psychological theorist and writer in the technical realm). His newest book (The Religion of Tomorrow: A Vision for the Future of the Great Traditions, a welcomed one by me is 800 pp and reminds me of when he let loose his intelligence and skills for synthesis in 1995 when he published his other 800 pp book (Sex, Ecology and Spirituality: The Spirit of Evolution).

I want to say only a few introductory remarks of why I care about his work (note: I am also always critical of it too). First, of the 3 endorsements on the jacket cover of The Religion of Tomorrow, one of them is by the very progressive Father Richard Rohr, Center for Action and Contemplation, he wrote, "Ken Wilber is today's greatest philosopher and both critic and friend to authentic religion, a true postmodern Thomas Aquinas." Wow. That's quite the statement by Rohr. I'm sure a whole lot of philosophers will really not be at all happy about it.

Anyways, also want to say I have only scanned a few pages, and mostly I studied the Index for about 2 hrs today as the book just arrived in the mail. Because I also create book Indexes for people's work and my own work, I am very sensitive to reading how an Index reflects really important things about where a book and/or an author is coming from. It's a bit like reading tea leaves, you might say. Anyways, my thrill (and surprise) in looking at the Index of The Religion of Tomorrow is that the entry title word that gets by far the most sub-entries is the term dysfunctions. What does Wilber mean by that? I'll get to that shortly, but first, let's get the gist of his reason for writing this book (well, there are many). I am convinced he wrote it because he knows that this world is pretty much fucked, and it won't be long before it is near unlivable, unless "religions" get their act together and up-grade to the knowledge available in the 21st century (including what science has to offer). Simply, he is saying we don't need to toss all religion, it merely needs to grow up. He more or says, all the great traditions of religions (E and W) are about 1000 years over due for a re-write. And, he is writing it because religions, and the nature of religiousity in human lives is major in influence. With so many around the world involved in religion(s) and religiousity (and/or spirituality) they can have an enormous impact on helping people either stay immature or mature-- "Grow Up" as Wilber says it in a very unique and complex way (i.e., developmentally, evolutionarily). I won't say more in this blogpost about that part of his agenda.

I realized in the book Index, that what most attracts me to Wilber's work, which I have followed since 1982 long before he started to become famous globally, is his diagnosis of pathologies at all levels and all complexities--of which he does so well as a philosopher and psychology theorist. His work is unsurpassed here, and his simple term (he has not used much before this new book) is dysfunctions. Cool, it is a systems thinker's word. It also has a bit of a clinical touch to it. I like that too. I am, as you may see in an earlier blog I wrote on advanced psychopathology of fear, very interested and specializing for years in pathology recognition, diagnosis and treatment--to use those rather blunt terms. It is a complex thing, pathology and who gets to "define" it and make "meaning" of it and how it can so easily, unfortunately, be used to attack people from power-elite positions (e.g., psychiatry at its worst). I won't go into that long discussion here. 

So, here's what I recognized cogently today. Wilber has two major projects in his tome of works. He has his evolutionary Enlightenment project of liberation of consciousness--something, familiar to the religious and spiritual types and discourses throughout human history. He wants people to "Grow Up" (keep learning and maturing) and finally to "Wake Up" (see through all illusions of what is Real). You can read Wilber to better understand the nuance of his version of the Enlightenment project (E. and W.).

Now, as cool and interesting as Wilber's Enlightenment project is, I have not always been so interested in all its anatomy of consciousness, and meditation practices in a traditional sense, etc. That's not so much been my path, though I can respect it too. What I really am specializing in, and always have been attracted to is his brilliant analysis of dysfunctions (pathologies, by any other name). His Integral approach to the pathological is essential to complement the more positive and "fun" stuff of looking at Enlightenment and liberation of consciousness. Though, of course they are intertwined. The pathological theorizing of Wilber is more on the "Shadow-side" of existence, and he has developed a very complex lexicon of terms that could be placed under "dysfunctions." Again, no term in the Index in his latest book is near close to the length and detail that is found under this term "dysfunctions." I love that emphasis and I will be writing more in later blogs about what this 1/2 of Wilber project is all about and how I have brought it in as a major (not only) contribution to how I approach the pathology of Fear ('fear'; the 'Fear' Project), etc.

So, I'm just giving you a heads up of some blogposts coming on linking Wilber's Integral theory (and philosophy) with my fear and fearlessness stuff... re: "dysfunctions" at all levels of Reality... not just simple "physical" or "psychological" as we normally understand thinking and imagining about "pathology" or "dysfunctions"-- this stuff is complex and really interesting, and if I do a good job, hopefully I can help you all understand Wilber's contribution to pathology (and immaturity that is prolonged) in the human and systems worlds...

Introduction

This long blog post involves questioning how my own work (e.g., fearanalysis) can contribute as a 'corrective' to the Gender and Sex Wars going on around the planet, particularly in the Western (post)modern world, and especially since the 19th century arising of the Women's Movement through to the waves of feminisms. I will rely heavily in this blog on my daughter's contribution to this topic, as she (Vanessa D. Fisher) has become a bit of an expert on Gender and Sex Wars. Also, note, "solution" is used very loosely here, because these wars are not easy to solve and not by one solution.

The challenge for me is important in that I ought to be able to say something significant to help assess the Gender and Sex Wars, because they are "wars" indeed if you actually take time to study them and what they are producing, some good and some not so good, results. They are arguably, and seemingly, essential conversations and debates, because humanity is working through a "crisis" in the gender and sex identifications, and roles, and the entire societies involved are going through this transitional difficult time because Traditional understandings (i.e., premodernist) and Modern understandings (i.e., modernist) are clashing severely and have for well over a hundred years but now since postmodern times (e.g., post-WWII, 1945 onward to present) we are facing Postmodern understandings and complexities around gender and sex, and the wars between these perspectives are severe. [Note: I include this war under the Culture Wars title used by many thinkers]. With wars there is going to be a lot of fears--and, the exacerbation point of the Fear Problem itself that has not been resolved, or not even been well enough acknowledged at the root of the wars, and here I'll focus on Sex and Gender Wars (conflicts).

I focus on this hot conflict today for several reasons, not the least of which is because of my daughter's involvement in them for over 10 years now as a public intellectual and activist in her own right, with her own youtube channel (see "Vanessa D. Fisher"). At age 33, my daughter has turned out, with my pride of course, to be an important voice in that debate about Gender and Sex going on. She is in the middle of conflict sorting out her own ways to make sense of it and add a compassionate response and potential guideposts to its resolution and healing, as well as directions for policy. She is also a critical thinker and writer, has taken several feminist courses since high school and through her undergraduate degree in Liberal Arts. At present, she is nearing the place of applying for law school. In fact, today, she told me she is going to visit Yale Law School to see it from the inside. This is a big step for a girl who was raised mostly in poverty borderline working class home, even though her mom and I were professional school teachers for a few years in her infant years. Later, after the divorce, she was raised by her mom, with her sister, and they lived on welfare until she left at age 16 and came and lived with Barbara an I and started a "new life." That little bio background may help you understand some of where Vanessa comes from, because she is going to be important in this blogpost. I will use her example of how to talk about feminism and women's issues in the Gender and Sex Wars debates of the day. She offers me an ongoing look, from a young person's view of this debate and her youthful wisdom is always something I learn from, even if I am also critical of her positions at times, or mostly I have extensions I would offer to her positions. Understand, also in biographical context, she was raised from 16 on, until she left home at 19 or so, by me and her step-mom (Barbara Bickel) as declared feminists ourselves. Vanessa learned from us, and she also "parted" to develop her own views, which I appreciate.

Brief Overview of My Work on Gender and Sex: Sexuality & Fearuality

First, before I share with you my interpretation of the substantial components of Vanessa's latest video channel presentation on "Were Women Historically Oppressed?"(Apr. 21, 2017), it may be useful for you to read some of my prior work on this topic of gender and sex, and activism and social movements. I am not an obvious "activist" to most who know me now. I have been more a traditional activist in the way long gone years in my late-teens and 20s especially. So, I am going to list in the end note here what blogposts I have published previously on the FM ning that are background and relevant to this topic today [1]. Those pieces are samples of my work and interest on this topic, if you want more, let me know and/or look on the internet. Bottomline, I approach gender and sex as the domain of "sexuality" in the largest sense of that term as an important dimension of being a living organism/system. Sexuality, for me, is equivalent in many ways, analogous to, "fearuality"--and, thus, the two of them together come down to my interest to see how "fear" plays an important role in sexuality and fearuality and how they interrelate in total human evolution and development. Of course, culture and politics and history all come in as well to shape sexuality just as they shape fearuality and the combination of the two dimensions of human experience.

Vanessa D. Fisher's Views

Now, to the substance of this blogpost, and Vanessa's contribution to this. Note, I have not had her edit anything I am writing here. We have had several conversations however, after her last video ("Were Women Historically Oppressed?") and before that we have always had good critical conversations on this topic. That said, she is much more a content expert, a young person's expert, than I am (at age 65). I have always told myself, and later to her face, "I am staying away from entering this topic." I continue to take that position, and do not wish to be an expert on gender and sex and the conflicts. However, I keep getting drawn into it, thanks to Barbara and Vanessa. So, on that, let me start my interpretation of what I think is so crucially important in Vanessa's response the question that she says is the most common one she gets asked by many people in her public exchanges (mostly on the Internet but also live). She gets asked by activists who are fighting on either side of the debates, the wars, to come out and take a stronger stand and not just "fence sit" in the middle. I can tell you that pisses Vanessa off because she feels she is taking a strong stand, but it just doesn't nicely fit the activists' stands on either/or sides of the war. I know Vanessa's personality since she was born, she is not one to be quiet with her opinion, nor her intelligence, nor her fiestiness. She is also not one who totally like to conform just because of its advantages, but this also has been a struggle for her growing up and even now, as it is for most people. We all are going to face the fear of non-conformity and the option to rather just conform and "not rock the boat" in our social and work worlds. Also, being a Libra, some astrologers tell me that makes her a "mediator" by inherent nature. I see that is her strength, and at times, in some situations, it is not likely her strength.

Her lastest video is one of a long series of many videos and blogs and interview podcasts she does. I highly recommend you check her out on the Internet and her social media work. She does all of this for free. She has been passionate and driven to help the world solve this problem, and other things. She knows my work on Fear and Fearlessness, somewhat, and knows where I stand and why I am doing my own interpretation which is somewhat different than hers. That said, I agree with so much, especially in her latest video where she says she refuses to answer the "purity test" question the binary activists throw at her: "Were Women Historically Oppressed?" Also, note, she often is referring to the gender and sex problems and wars as heated right now because of the strong and growing opposition of "Feminists" vs. "Men's Rights Activists" (MRA's) and others involved who may not fit those two sides, but fact is, those two opposing sides get all the media attention and hype. Vanessa has not wanted to play that binary game, although, she admits to being sensitive and empathetic to both sides, both have partial truths to share but both have their own "shadows to deal with" is a phrase I particularly like because I call that "shadow" (as do others) the pathological, neurotic, and wounded side--that is, the Fear-side of their perceptions, thoughts, actions and stances, politically and psychologically, etc. 

So, I would focus on the fearanalysis of Gender and Sex Wars, and I can tell you, no one really likes that I do that, not even Vanessa, though she wouldn't likely say that to me overtly, but it is just not her "flavor" of ice cream she likes to focus on in approach. That's not what I want to go into in this blogpost but it is worth mentioning.

Vanessa both accepts the concern behind the question ("purity test" as she called it in the video): "Were Women Historically Oppressed?" (now is a good time to watch her video)--and, she rejects the question. Her main reason for hating to answer this question, is it forces the discussion and her positioning into a binary that is imposed in the structuration, assumptions, and bias already in the question. She says she doesn't want to play into the "tribalism" of that forcing an answer in a way that then allows the activists asking the question to quickly label Vanessa's answer (or anyone's answer) as pro-feminist or pro-MRA (i.e., pro-men). And I agree with the forced and narrow binary of the question and the way labeling is made superficially and rigidly and it is like there is no room, flex or curiosity after that. The "victim-mentality" as Vanessa calls it in this debate (on both sides) has to do with feeling they can be then "safe" with Vanessa as an ally for their cause or not. The really disturbing part of activism ideology (binary forcing) is that it divides and conquers as its main strategy. I find that oppressive itself. Vanessa likewise, and no doubt others of you would too. The gender and sex wars is complicated, so is the question about oppression. Vanessa goes into that problematics in the video. I want to come back to Vanessa labeling this "tribalism" behind the agendas of these two camps in the war (which could be any kind of war). The tribalism is a way of organizing the world and discourse and rhetoric that looks for "right" and "wrong" "guilty and not-guilty" behind everything going on, especially in how people take a stand on some issue or problem. This divisive (philosophical dualism) is itself fear-based and oppressive when it is pressed with the pressure of the "purity test" --as you see is also the case when in many different issues of the day, "blood lines" are used to tell who is on who's side of a genocidal war or any other cultural/tribal label (could be race, ethnicity) etc., or color as in racism, etc. involving genetics. This is the old wars we know of, they are very destructive. Not that all things about tribal cultural life and consciousness and politics are "bad"--no, that is not what Vanessa or I am saying. We are merely saying, that in a 21st century context, in a postmodern world of complex problems and conflicts with globalization, with gender and sex identities evolving and roles of people changing ---such simple "purity tests" are made for another time and era, not now.

The "purity test" is a way to tell (as the activists may wish) if a person is a "denier" or not. From the generic feminist view (especially, radical side) the test is to tell how much one has sympathy for the female cause of vicitimization and of the 'holocaust' and atrocities against girls and women from the beginning of time--all, perpetuated by the Other (i.e., the boys and men of patriarchy)... the other side in the debate would also see if one is a "denier" just going in the other direction, as the MRA's often do in their radical forms of ideology and binary tribalism. Again, you can watch Vanessa's video, one or two times and I think she really gets this out and suggests better ways to go. To make this blogpost not too long, I call all this problematic "fearism-t" or a type of terrorization to conform that fits the agenda of any ideology. That's the problem of all ideologisms. They are fear-based, guilt-based, shame-based in entire structuration and always have been. Today, in the 21st century, and especially from the perspective of Fearlessness, these are not going to be useful. I also would argue they carry a retro-regressive rather than a true progressive agenda. But that's a long blogpost for another time.

Vanessa, is a good "integralist" thinker, a post-postmodern thinker, and she smells that ideological retro-regression and its violence based on fear--which is, as she says, based on wounds and shadows on both sides--where all the activists really want with you in their asking the question is to "objectify" you as "for or against" them, and that prevents the most important relationship and working through dialogically and otherwise the healing and communications needed in war zones. Again, that's a long blogpost for another time. Vanessa is offering in her work a non-fear-based intervention to the wars. I heartily support this, and of course, I would want to bring in a critical integral fear management systems (fearanalysis) to it all. I'll give a quickie summary. Tribalism as I mentioned above, when applied to a postmodern world, e.g., North American society overall, is going to be disasterous, and much of the old pre-modern tribalism and hurts still persist, including the war between Church and State, that W. Enlightenment tried to separate out using FMS-5 as the method, which was attempting to overcome FMS-4 and FMS-2 ... and, their limitations to deal with a more complex modern world. Then there is FMS-6 (postmodernism) attempting new strategies to overcome the "fear of the Other" (i.e., diversity problem)--and, feminists and MRA's for example, also use this FMS-6 as their main approach to dealing with fear and diversity and yet, when it comes into the gender and sex wars, and victimization and identity politics (too often) there is a hidden underbelly of pre-modern FMS-2 (tribalism) and FMS-4 (empirism) underneath trying to use "fear" against people by intimidating them to conform to the status quo (or to conform to the "gang" mentality and means of ideologies)...

Okay, that's a bit of my interpretation to wet your appetites, perhaps. The "Solution" promised, is really in Vanessa's response to the "purity test"--and, Vanessa is very wise I think on many levels in the way she handles the difficulty. I would take some different routes to handling it. I would start with a really good education for everyone on oppression history, philosophy, theory and praxis. That, most people, including Vanessa, just do not get in contemporary society and education. I would add, a good fear management/education is also needed, and also lacking. I would add, the integral perspective (theory) is also key, and Vanessa is most educated in that, as I introduced her to it in her late teens. Ultimately, the solution is to use "FMS-7" (what is called 2nd-tier in Spiral Dynamics Integral Theory). That is, "Fearlessness" theory to guide the "wars" to a less violent resolution.

Notes

1. See "My View on Social Movements" (Sept. 23, 2015), "New Social-Practical Philosophy for the World Soul" (Jan. 19, 2016), "Sex and Gender Wars: From Many Perspectives" (Feb. 12, 2016), "Women/Feminists: The Struggle Against Fear" (Dec. 18, 2016), and "Fearism and Feminism" (Jan. 9, 2017).

Introduction: Postmodern Concerns for Feariatry

It has long been my interest to study the large field of "pathology" from a systems perspective. That means, there are ways to identify "pathologies" within systems across the spectrum of complexity of evolution and development. In this sense, I have always been interested in a meta-theory of pathology.

But for now, in this blog I want to keep this short and somewhat uncomplicated with some basic ideas about "Fear" and how it has to be brought into the scope of Feariatry [1] and a general (meta-)theory of psychopathology, for example. I will mention before I make my key points, that "pathology" and "psychopathology" in general, although not particular contentious say 60 to 100 years ago, these terms no long enjoy such a stable status. There have been many attacks on their meaning and who gets to construct the meaning of "pathology" and make the judgments about it. This has huge implications to philosophy and psychology and all aspects of our societies and policies of health and so on. I won't be discussing that all here, but to say it is important to bring into our work on Feariatry especially, and less so Fearanalysis. The postmodern period since WWII and the philosophical turn to postmodernist thought (e.g., deconstructionism) is a big part of the contention and critique of theories and applications of the concepts of "pathology" and "psychopathology" especially. [Note: a topic for another time, is what I see as "fear of postmodernism" itself preventing a progressive Feariatry and 'Fear' Studies overall]

Problem of Pathologizing Fear to Naturalizing Fear

Okay, now to my main point. First, most writing on "fear" today is attempting to make it more "positive" in attributions than in prior eras, especially in the W. world. I think it is fair to move along this axis of re-adjustment of an overly "negative" attribution and pathologizing of the term and phenomena of "fear"--again, the problem becomes how do we define fear and then ought we attribute it to positive or negative evaluations, and on what philosophical, theoretical and empirical grounds do we make such assessments. This is a contested and complicated territory once one removes "fear" from being only an "emotion or feeling." This has been the direction of my work (and a few others). We are continually expanding the conceptualization of "fear" (see my last posting of a Photo of the 5 steps towards a critical literacy of Fear and Fearlessness on the FM ning).

I don't want to fall into the old discourses of pathologizing "fear" either, and so I and the philosophy of fearism work has attempted to keep Fear as a much more positive concept and phenomenon--and, much of this has led to valuation that says "fear is natural" and thus we really ought not get down on fear and pathologize it in all cases, or even most cases of its interplay with humans or animals etc. Fine, as that is to a point, there are strong arguments against naturalizing "fear" as a counter-balance to overly pathologizing "fear." I won't go into all that argumentation, as it is technical and beyond a brief blog on psychopathology of fear.

So, let's be clear of what a systems view of pathology of fear is (and, thus, how psychopathology fits). I see a system of pathology as potential in all living systems. This includes physiological (biological) pathologies, and on to emotional and psychological pathologies, to sociocultural pathologies over time and history. These pathological systems are totally interconnected, interrelated, and co-evolving. Basically, I am saying pathologies at one level --e.g., physiological can influence pathologies all the way up to the most complex sociocultural dimensions and visa versa. Everything affects everything, is the assumption in systems (holistic and integral) theory.

Anthropocene Pathologies Re-Calibrated: Analogy of CO2 and Fear Levels (toxicity)

I think historically, in the W. world at least, it is fair to say, in general there has been a movement from pathologizing fear to naturalizing fear, and now, my own work and others is beginning to critique that movement, and asking for another 21st century re-calibration and a return to more pathologizing of fear (e.g., fearism-t).

The key issue I have raised in the last year or two, is what happens when a positive valuation of "fear" as natural begins to weaken under criticism that conditions are changing so dramatically on planet earth and its systems, that there is some point (a turning point, or point of departure), perhaps, where "fear" is virtually engulfed in a pathological system and/or set of systems cascading into a pathological destructive cycling? The analogy, and metaphor, is that carbon dioxide (CO2) used to also be only seen as natural and thus positively valued in the living cycles of life and the planet (including temperature regulation of the atmosphere). Then, a turning point came in the Anthropocene era [2] when "CO2" was being constructed as a "pollutant" (toxin) to the atmosphere and was causing excessive warming of the earth and massively changing the earth's living viability. This was a crisis. It still is as many argue today under the banner of human-caused (anthropogenic) CO2 excess production, mainly from agricultural practices and especially from fossil fuel burning. In that geo-historical and physiological layer of Gaia (or earth system), indeed it is potentially useful to label CO2 levels as pathological.

The same can now be said, from a turning point, that "fear" is now a pollutant, a psychopathology (see fearism-t concept [3], a toxin, and is exacerbating major crises in living systems on the planet (and even non-living systems). All of the "fear" in excess due to human activity (thus, anthropogenic). Big problem. I have called this, in part, the Fear Problem (with capitals, as a "wicked problem" we have to figure out how to solve in the 21st century or likely it will destroy life as we know it on a massive global scale).

Now, the question becomes, how do we even talk about "fear" anymore, in a meaningful way, in the Anthropocene, that is, after this point of departure when "fear" is no longer safely represented as "natural" or "normal" because in it is argued it has become pathological? How should fear management/education on the planet adjust to this macro-shift in our very paradigm of thinking about and talking about "fear"? This, my friends, is exactly where my research is going and why we need a serious investigation ongoing into the psychopathology of fear, on a meta-theoretical axis.

Notes

1. Feariatry has been conceptualized as one of the pillars of a philosophy of fearism (a la Subba and Fisher)... and, there are several photos and blogs on the FM ning over the past year or so that you can learn more about this and/or just contact me if you are particularly interested. Also see the book, Fisher, R. M., and Subba, D. (2016). Philosophy of Fearism: A First East-West Dialogue. Australia: Xlibris.

2. A good definition of Anthropocene Era is found on wikipedia

3. Fearism-t - (toxic form of fearism) is defined by Fisher and Subba (2016), p. 157.

I have just written and published Technical Paper No. 64, entitled "Fearism" as an analysis of the literature of scholars in global migration studies. Below is the Abstract for this technical article:

Abstract

 Although terrorism was coined in the French Revolution over 200 years ago, fearism has emerged in scholarly and popular culture in the past 25 years, articulating a new critical perspective on the nature and role of fear. This is the first review study of scholars using “fearism” overall but with a focus on uses and misuses within the fields of global Migration, Ethnic and Citizenship Studies (MECS). The 13 MECS’s publications reviewed, with the first use of fearism in 2009, indicate discourses conform closely, yet with differences which require conceptual and theoretical clarification. MEC’s discourses suggest we ought to think critically about fearism as a postmodern complex concept, phenomena, analytic framework, discourse, rhetoric, ideology, imaginary and matrix, with historical, traumatic, sociopolitical and cultural implications for migration problematics in the 21^st century. Nearly 80% of the MECS’s authors, more or less, quoted and/or cited the same excerpt, that is, a 24-word definition of fearism (Fisher, 2006, 51). Unfortunately, the excerpt is a truncated definition, when the original definition is more complex and radical as contextualized by Fisher. This author recommends how to correct this truncated, often inaccurate, reading of Fisher’s original definition which MECS’s discourses tend to rely upon.  

  Keyword:  fearism, fear, fear management, hidden curriculum, migration

Any of you who have followed my work know that I am always looking for re-framing of the nature and role of Fear in history (histories). One of my favorite quotes in this regard, is one written by a political history scholar, Corey Robin (2004) [1]. I am always looking to shift focus on "fear" and put critical analysis on how we create knowledge about Fear. One of the main reasons for this shift is to try to get the 'talk about fear' into the public sphere and not so restricted, as it is, in the private domain (e.g., fear is in my body or mind, or fear is in my genes, or fear is in my problems and thus made for only my counselor or therapist or intimate others). I want to see Fear as part of regular public discourse, including public policy. More and more, slowly, I am finding others who are seeing this is an essential move if we are to ever adequately deal with the Fear Problem of evolution, history, and development itself. 

Robin, among a few others, have acknowledged that "fear" may be (in part) treated as a primal and powerful emotion, feeling, reaction to threat, etc. And, yet, to my delight, they are working to expand that imaginary intellectually so as to expand the conception of Fear in much broader and historical, sociopolitical contexts. Robin (2004) wrote,

"Fear arrives, as it did on 9/11, wrapped in layers of intellectual assumption, some woven centuries ago, that fashion our perception of and responses to it. As an item of public discussion, fear takes its shape from political and cultural elites [primarily], who take their cues from previous elites. Political fear, in other words, has a history, and to a surprising degree, it is a history of ideas. Knowing that history, we can see how our ideas have changed or not--enabling us to better assess [individually and collectively] our own ideas and change them if necessary." (p. 28).

I cannot think of a more worthwhile task on this planet than to critically assess and change our ideas about Fear. Thank you Dr. Corey Robin!

Note:

1. Robin, C. (2004). Fear: The history of a political idea. NY: Oxford University Press.

I have been re-reading Paulo Freire on "critical pedagogy" lately, as I was into it in my early 30s. I never leave this radical liberation model of education, of teaching and learning, with the "oppressed" in mind. And the oppressed, for Paulo Freire included the 'oppressors' as well because they are the worst case in being oppressed themselves by say "patriarchy" or any other name you want to give to the 'big bad problem' of domination-subordination (master-slave) relationality. I mean "worst case" because they are "blinded" by their power/privilege and thus enabled to "deny" they are oppressors and oppressed. They cause the worst damage to the whole system, not the typically identifiable "oppressed" and marginalized with very limited power/privilege in a society.

Finding A Fearlessness Center Again

I have an article about to come out soon in the International Journal of Critical Pedagogy (Spring, 2017) on some of my challenges to the critical pedagogy schools of thought and discourse in regard to how they have not really gone after the big bad problem of oppression in the way I think they need to. That is, the schools of critical philosophy, critical theory and critical pedagogy have largely ignored (or only very partially) addressed the Fear Problem (which, I am also calling many other things, but an interesting term of late is "paranoiaic paradigm" that has to be addressed). Or, as I wish to put it on this blogpost, these schools of thought and education, of which Four Arrows (aka Don Trent Jacobs) is also very critical of and yet also applauds, have ignored the 'loss of a center' in the sense of loss of 'sanity' and an ethical reference point for it --by which he and I  mean a "Fearlessness Center." Yes, there has always been a Fearlessness center or core foundation of all living systems, Natural, Cultural and Spiritual--at least, so the theory goes. He uses the Indigenous worldview as his basis for re-finding that 'Center' and I use many traditions of thought, basically under the rubric of the Fearlessness Movement. We are going to produce a lot more systematic work on this in the years to come.

I am going to post one of Four Arrows' fascinating early diagrams (1998), CAT-FAWN Connection, attempting a holistic model to show the need for a "Center(edness)" in all curriculum, that can call itself ethical and/or liberational (see below). Lot's more to be discussed of course, as this model isn't totally self explainable nor is the "Fearlessness Center" he and I are now writing about in various ways and it will show up in our new book in 2018 Fearless Engagement (Peter Lang Publishers). Anyways, something to think about.

Reference: Jacobs, D. T. (1998). Primal Awareness: A True Story of Survival, Transformation, and Awakening with the Raramuri Shamans of Mexico. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions.

There are many ways to walk the path of Fearlessness, and one way, more or less, is that of art, artworking, arting, and becoming an artist in your own way. Four Arrows', from an Indgenous worldivew perspective wrote, one of the best ways to stay in touch with Nature, especially when you don't always have a lot of access to natural areas, is to "Become an artist. It is taken for granted among primal peoples that creativity is everyone's birthright. Art should not be the prize of the wealthy or the exclusive domain of a few 'gifted' individuals" (Jacobs, 1998, p. 240).

I have mentioned on the FM ning a few times, Bracha L. Ettinger, my favorite artist/theorist these days, and with Barbara, we are always learning from her work which I think is going to some day be seen with the equivalent impact Sigmund Freud had on the world. Matrixial theory, is Ettinger's main contribution, and there is an excellent new interview from Dec. 16, 2016 in the New York Times (if you can believe it)... wow, this is great to have reach the shores of North America, as she is best known in Europe so far. The title of the interview is "Art in a Time of Atrocity: Ettinger and Evans".

I see Ettinger's deep analysis essential to guiding a sanity path of Fearlessness through a world more and more dominated by Fear.

Reference

Jacobs, D. T. (1998). Primal awareness: A true story of survival, transformation, and awakening with the Raramuri shamans of Mexico. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions.

Everyone please note that most of the new members signing up in "clumps" are all spam. I erase their content as fast as I am able. It comes and goes in spurts, and right now there is being a lot for a couple days. So do not engage with those new members on the ning.

If you haven't seen it already, I recommend watching the 70 min. interview of Dr. Noam Chomsky, Emeritus Professor at MIT, author of over 100 books, and critic--go to Democracy Now, Apr. 4, 2017. I have been following Chomsky's work for decades, off and on. He has written often about the "culture of fear" in various countries and the problems with it in terms of undermining civil societies.

In this latest interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now, Amy introduces a question from the viewers as she introduces it as a question about "Trump exploiting fear" and Chomsky answers (a repetitive analysis I have heard him say this several times over the past decade about America):

"[T]his is a very frightened country. For years, this has been probably the most frightened country in the world. It's also the safest country in the world. It's very easy to terrify people [here]."

------------

Let me say a few brief comments about this statement/observation. To say the least, I agree with Chomsky on the Fear Problem in the USA, and not that I agree America is the most "frightened country" but it is at least right up there in the top of them in the world, especially countries that are under dictatorships, I'd say they are more frightened. But one can't measure this so easily and no data is presented by Chomsky, only some 88 yrs of observations of being an American, and that counts! He's an astute and brilliant social critic of our times. His voice ought to be taken seriously. Yet, so disappointing amongst all his fans and they must be millions around the world, I do not hear any concentrated effort or advocacy of how to handle the Fear Problem, not even from Chomsky himself in terms of fear management/education strategies. That's what tends to gut his emphasis on America as "the most frightened country in the world." You can say this, and it may be plausible, as I say, I agree more or less, yet what is there to do about it directly. I mean to go to the source. Chomsky's general solution is just to have a more rational and civil democracy that works well, and the fear ought to decline. That's pretty much the operating assumption. It's no doubt partially true. However, my 28 years researching the Fear Problem (and "culture of fear" specifically) tells me that this will not be a solution, and it also will not happen without some major intervention (e.g., 'fear' vaccine) to turn America around in another direction away from this chronic frightened state--kind of like a general anxiety disorder on the scale of a whole country. That is pretty much Chomsky's diagnosis. I don't disagree basically and other critics of the "culture of fear" phenomenon has said as much for decades, e.g., the sociologist Barry Glassner amongst the more popular authors.

I have written about Chomsky a year ago. Fisher, R. M. (2016). In defense of fearism: The case of Noam Chomsky. Technical Paper No. 58. Carbondale, IL: In                    Search of Fearlessness Research Institute. I argued he would in all likelihood support the philosophy of fearism (at least my own theory of fearism)--because toxic fearism is like terrorism but works in the more subtle infrastructures of societies to create this chronically frightened (anxious) state, where as Chomsky says, it becomes "very easy to terrify people." So true. I have lived in the USA for 9 years and I feel it and see it among Americans. Now, I have gone out to make myself present here (Carbondale, IL) and reached out to many activist groups, to clergy to political leaders to non-profit organizations, to school system leaders, etc. And they have little to no interest in the Fear Problem, even when they sort of agree with me it is a big problem in the USA. This I have found empirically disturbing to see how they will not, on the whole, or in small groups, focus on the root of all the rest of their problems that makes them so susceptible to being "very easy to terrify." It is like they are so terrified as the 'normal' condition they also are so arrogant that they are "fine" and that they already know how to solve their social problems, etc. They must be in a state of denial and psychic numbing, as far as I can tell. Even Chomsky, will say the core of the problem is fear but he offers no other analysis, or insufficient analysis as I point out in my Technical Paper No. 58. And, I have always said, to Americans I meet and who are so quick to reject or just ignore my efforts to help them, that sure maybe you don't want to be a "connoisseur of fear" (as Four Arrows and Sam Keen and myself suggest) but could you at least consult with people like me, a fearologist, so that you get that expertise to help? No, they do not. I can tell you in all these years, they do not ask for it. This is the real Fear Problem, is when you know you are operating out of so much fear (and thank you Chomsky for calling it out), and you don't do anything substantially different to change it.

All I can say, is that Americans didn't get here over night. It has been part of their European history coming to America, part of their slave trade to build this country--all points that Chomsky has pointed to historically, as have others. The American "culture of fear" or "politics of fear" (e.g., Corey Robin's analysis) has a long intricate history that must be understood and taught in our school systems, and generally it is not, and only as so partial and then with no follow up in terms of teaching fear management/education in the radical ways I have suggested for nearly 3 decades. So, Four Arrows has said it recently in our work together that the Indigenous Peoples of the world, practicing the 'old ways' have a worldview where they are taught not to fear fear itself. This has never really been part of the non-Indigenous or Dominant worldview on the planet.

I'll leave this commentary with the comment that Chomsky threw into his interview (and the quote above): "It's the safest country in the world." Too bad he didn't give statistics for this, and too bad Amy didn't ask him about this. Let me explain where it is coming from, as far as I can tell, because when you read the quote as a whole it is so paradoxical and ironic, that the most frightened country is the most safest in the world, according to Chomsky. Many of the culture of fear theorists, and critics have said the same things (Glassner, Frank Furedi, Gavin DeBecker, etc.). So what is going on here? The argument of these  critics is that America has created the "safest" society but yet it is the most "frightened"--and, there is a real 'disconnect.' One indicator these critics give is that the rates of crime have gone done for decades but on surveys the population as a whole keeps saying that they have a higher "fear of crime." All the critics pin this problem down on how media creates this fear by exaggeration and repetition on TV and other sources of mass media, and they do so to "win" viewers to their programs because nothing gets attention like fear--as they say. It is part of the "economy of attention" as some scholars have called it. It is part of the "culture of fear"--and then, when you get government leaders, activists, and corporations using this economy of attention--that is, economy of fear to manipulate people's opinions--then, fear keeps going up, no matter even if the society is relatively safe and secure.

I agree with most of this "culture of fear" and "politics of fear" analysis to explain the 'disconnect.' It is a very troubling psychic and social state going on, and I have witnessed it here in the last 9 years. But more disturbing to me, is how Americans are so arrogant, and ignore-ant, as a whole, to actually attend to this Fear Problem 'disconnect.' I also am a critic that you can't use simple statistics on "safe" and "secure" to measure a society that is living in a post-traumatic condition and culture of fear as ongoing chronic context. There is always, says, Brian Massumi the cultural critic, a "low-grade fear" that isn't even normal anxiety or fear--it is like another phenomena we haven't easily been able to "name" or study. I have called it toxic fearism.

It would be great if someday, Chomsky and others like him, and the culture of fear critics will take my work seriously and engage with me, instead of deny we need a much better fear management/education that is systematic in all curricula.

Abstract

This rather technical blog is a first introductory sorting through my synthetical and fresh thoughts, though with a long history, of why I have never been happy with the locating of "fear" as (only) an emotion or feeling as typically found in our thinking (norms). The theories of affects, feelings, and emotions are many and diverse, yet for me they virtually all fall into the same, often unconscious biased framework, paradigm, or what can also be called a (Dominant) worldview. There are a few radical sources of fresh and alternative thinking/theorizing that have led me today to create a new category of awemotion to work along-side, if not dismantle, the hegemonic control of Fear and its meanings and definitions. I no longer think it very productive to liberation to continue to see fear as emotional; at least not without a serious correction to that referential frame of meaning and shaping of experience that goes with it typical of Psychology. People of all stripes, for the most part, cannot seem to think of Fear beyond it being imagined and classified within this Emotional Paradigm. I'll give an introduction to the difference between emotion and awemotion and offer a theoretical rationale for awemotion as the best way to understand Fear beyond the Emotional Paradigm, the latter, which is arguably buried in oppressive premises of a phallocentric and non-Indigenous understanding. Therein, I surmount the scaffolding (only briefly) here for a new theory of Fear which will better help us solve the Fear Problem. My gratitude here is to three contemporary critical thinkers, theorists, who have assisted my synthesis: Four Arrows, Bracha L. Ettinger and Desh Subba. 

Brief Introduction

This morning I awoke with one of the synthetical moments of the hypnopompic trance-state of consciousness (between waking and sleep). This has always been a most creative time, when my brain/mind system has had a good night of dreaming and rest, and re-integration of a lot of the complexities and inputs during the day prior, and during my entire life-time. The synthetical moment is like a bursting of a "damn" or "knot" in my thinking and processing of problems to solve.

The biggest problem to solve since 1989 [1] is how to convince humans to experience, perceive, respond and think about Fear (with capital) in an entirely different way than the norm. Four Arrows (aka Dr. Don Jacobs at the Leadership Studies Program, Fielding Graduate University) and myself have had an intense six years specifically talking about how to re-frame Fear from a trance-based learning (TBL) and Indigenous perspective. We are working on a book together entitled Fearless Engagement (to be published in 2018, Peter Lang publishing). He began using a capitalization of the term to set it apart from fear (with no capital, which is the norm) as defined and made meaning by what he called the Dominant worldview (contra the Indigenous worldview) [2]. I really like his framing of the Fear Problem (my term) within this Worldview Wars (see also Culture Wars, Paradigm Wars below). If "wars" is off-putting and sounds militarized, I assure you that is not how I see the battle/resistance going on for domination, re: the problem of hegemony of knowledge/power in the domain of Fear Studies. Yet, you can turn the conflict and use your own word(s) of which many in the recent Indigenous resistance movements are calling themselves "Water Protectors" while various actors, non-Indigenous and/or Indigenous backgrounds, call themselves "Water Warriors." In this sense, Four Arrows has preferred of late to call himself an Indigenous (Nature and Culture) protector rather than warrior. I label him and his work within the Sacred Warrior traditions from around the world, across cultures and through time. These are word(s) for you to consider but further delineation here would be a distraction.

Multiple Perspectives/Worldviews: Radicalizing the Theory of Emotion(s): Fear

This morning I wish to briefly introduce a parallel notion to Four Arrows' work and his naming of Fear [3], which intersects with his conceptualization and radicalization of Fear. I am referring to two other sources that, more or less, complement Four Arrows' work and my own on this subject. Also, notice that the focus of this blog is not to go into the practical applications of a radical theory of Fear but to show the initial revision required in the dominant theory of fear as we normally have been taught--and, taught to absorb rather than question critically. The Biomedical scientific model (or paradigm) is part of the Dominant (i.e., non-Indigenous) worldview--and is thus, the worldview of the "colonizer" of the Earth and Natural Systems and the destroyer of much of what had been Indigenous Traditional Knowledge.

The biomedical perspective, now Psychiatry and Psychology serving as its agents, continues to categorize "fear" as an emotion--and thus, always emotional. This has been heavily reinforced by technologies (e.g., MRI brain scan research into the neurobiology of fear). It has told us that that is the way to understand fear. It has told us we ought to be emotional and manage all the emotions (i.e., fear being only one, not special in any way, from the list of emotions). Note, I am not questioning that we may at times be "emotional" that is not the issue here, if you read on, the context for how emotionality is constructed and regulated by "Authority" is the issue in question. The theory of fear (Fear) is one way to get at this critique.

I began fearology long ago as a way to displace this unquestioned assumption of the Biomedical scientific model. When I found Desh Subba's work on a philosophy of fearism (he's from Nepal, now living in Hong Kong) writing about fear in such a new way, as he has since 1999, it floored me that he was doing so without having known about my work. We had so many overlapping ideas and thus wrote a book together in 2016 [4]. I'll never forget the awe I had when reading Subba's primary text on philosophy of fearism (2014) [5], where he offered, in chapter one, some 21 "Definitions" of fear. I had never seen such a diverse array of ways to understand fear. And I had been researching the topic for over a quarter century at that point. And what was so rare was that he didn't start off with the standard Biomedical definition (i.e., fear- is a feeling or emotion). Clear to me, he was articulating an understanding of fear that was complex, holistic, transdisciplinary and obviously non-Western. He was giving an Eastern worldview perspective to the topic that was completely refreshing. Turns out Subba has a very broad background as a journalist, philosopher, and best known for his many books of poetry and fiction. He is an artist in the largest sense. I resonated, and since have helped in re-translating some of his English translated works (originally written in Nepalese), because it is very difficult to read some of his work even with the English translations he has to date. I know it is very costly to get good translations and he is doing the best he can with very limited resources as he lives a very working class life in Hong Kong. Readers of the philosophy of fearism are growing, and I am very happy to be part of Subba's leadership in this area. However, this blogpost is not about his work either.

The third theorist I wish to engage very briefly who helped me come up with the specific term awemotion (pronounced ah-motion) [6], is the Israeli (living in France) artist, psychoanalyst, activist and matrixial theorist Bracha L. Ettinger. This woman has amazed me with her matrixial theory ever since Barbara Bickel (my partner) and I discovered her work in 2009-10. Barbara and I continue to study her largely feminist/feminine theory that offers an important re-correction to phallocentric theory (i.e., overly masculinized perspectives, psychologies, and those that typically accompany a pathological patriarchy) [7].

Ettinger's notion of "feminine" is very unique and complex in her matrixial theory (which she coined over 20 years ago). I will only tell you that it is non-gendered as a concept and proto-subjective (or transubjective). Much of her matrixial theorizing is based on her phenomenological investigations into her artworking processes as an artist, and her work in the psychoanalytical relationship, her motherhood, as well as the traumatic era of a post-Holocaust survivor connectivity as "Jewish" in general.

Barbara and I have really fallen in love with matrixial theory as we are both artist and it speaks to us on that aesthetic and poetic level, but also on the psychospiritual level; yet, her framework is all-encompassing (cosmic), based on the "womb" (not just physically speaking) and the "maternal" and the child-mother bonding (again, not only physical but on the psychical and spiritual dimensions of experiencing--and, one doesn't have to be only a biological mother to engage matrixial theory and the reality it attempts to "touch" that is so ignored in the phallocentric Dominant and Biomedical worldviews). Her work is not metaphysics, yet it crafts what feels like an entirely new feminine theology (worldview). She isn't attacking all of the masculinist worldivew but says it is incomplete and crippled because it has for a long time in human history ignored and or deleted the feminine--that is, the matrixial reality. Thus, we all have suffered under this regime of political power/knowledge exclusion--and led to us generally "fearing the feminine." Thus, she also has feminist objectives but matrixial feminism is interrelated with but very different than all other kinds of feminisms.

Does Ettinger have a unique Fear theory? Not overtly. Her work is therefore different from Four Arrows and Subba that way. Yet, I find lots of overlaps in the three theorists, of which I will not be going into here in this blogpost as it would take a long essay to ferret those similarities and differences out. Yet, her Fear theory exists when I study it and write about it and it is wonderfully liberating because it does not encast and mold the definition and meaning of fear (Fear) as only "emotional"--rather, Ettinger is specific to include that emotionality of Fear in matrixial theory but by no means does she rely on the phallocentric Biomedical perspective. She doesn't actually talk about emotions much at all. Her emphasis is on a much more contemporary philosophical and theoretical body of work, and varied schools of thought, that can best be called the "affective" schools. She always talks about affect--which includes, but transcends the limited meanings of emotion. Again, all that is too complex to go into here. 

Ettinger's Matrixial Relational Ecology

Ettinger's matrixial-based affect-focus to understand the dynamics of the human experience is proto-emotional, proto-aesthetic, and proto-ethical. Her primary affects are "awe and com-passion" as the basic unit-bond of the maternal subjective formation of the baby and mother (or, more generally, what she calls the non-I and I relational dynamic; which I would call the matrixial relational ecology). It is upon her notion of "awe" in particular that I am now considering seriously as a very unique way to add as a prefix (that is the matrixial feminine side) to emotion--thus, we get the synthesis of awemotion. Think of this as a relational ecological understanding of our primal foundational onto-epistemological way of being in the world--that is, prior to post-traumatization (i.e., woundedness, and fear-conditioning) [8].

Like Four Arrows Indigenous worldivew, or Subba's Eastern worldivew, Ettinger's Matrixial worldview do not privilege the understanding of Fear as emotional but rather as relational and better situated in the concepts of alertness, arousal and ultimately awe (and com-passion [9]). I recall Fr. Matthew Fox once preaching about how the term "fear of God" in the Bible in the old Hebrew actually means "awe of God." Anyways, Ettinger, I believe would argue, that these relationally (more truly matrixial feminine) terms offer a "natural" and healthy responsivity to all relations (i.e., self/Other) and thus ground the human experience ontologically in love and trust (again, her definitions of these terms are complicated and corrections to the phallocentric views). "Fear of the Other" (or strange) is not where human subjectification and identity-formation begin and/or mature from--at least, not in matrixial theory. 

The entire understanding of the emotional and empathy with it, as we've known, are being critically re-framed by Ettinger into awe and com-passion as the base rather than anxiety (i.e., fear) that undergird emotionality and empathy as we know them as norm conceptions and practices. The Western (Dominant) worldview has given us a 'picture' of reality and human experience as based primarily on anxiety (e.g., existentialism, and developmental object relations, early psychoanalysis, Judeo-Christianity, etc.). The anxiety or fear-based perspective to basic human subjectivity skews our orientation to the world (to Nature, to God, to Spirit) via what Ettinger would call "reactive" rather than "responsive"--and, most importantly, that makes the orientation flooded with an ongoing sense of the world (and our own bodies, and God) as "threat" and "traumatic" signalling. It leaves us with a bereft (if not pathological) and very skewed psychology (and Psychology Paradigm). It isn't a healing paradigm that's for sure. It is a coping paradigm. This is violent and killing us.

A new paradigm is available, of which Ettinger is one of the major theorist I draw upon for such a reconstruction. To be sure, the entire body of research and writing and education based on "emotion" (and the Emotional Paradigm) is being challenged--and, that goes the same for the Emotional Intelligence theory, models and pedagogy! Okay, I'll leave this here, understandably incomplete... I want to think a lot more about Ettinger's complex "proto-emotion" (i.e., proto-affects) of "awe and com-passion" as foundational to a new way of understanding Fear. I will say, rarely does she talk about "fear" directly, though when she has, I immediately resonate with a deep and enduring truth in her work, and it sounds like she is writing and thinking from a Fearlessness perspective. I love it. Yet, it will take awhile to unwind her thought and theory and show how matrixial theory is non-fear-based (because, for many reasons, at least, it is non-phallocentric based). At least, this is the critical theory of matrixial theory I am attracted to pursue, so as to produce a better critical theory and pedagogy for the world and our ways of doing fear management/education.

Until next time ... [feel free to email me and lets chat about any of this: r.michaelfisher52 [at] gmail.com]

Notes:

1. In late 1989, while living in Calgary, AB (my hometown), I had a transformative vision with a female partner, Catherine Sannuto, at the time, that led to my naming and leading the In Search of Fearlessness Project (a not-for-profit organization). I am grateful to my next partner, Barbara Bickel, who came into this project and has helped support my work since. I established the In Search of Fearlessness Research Institute in 1991 and remains the structure in which I publish my results (e.g., Technical Papers Series).

2. Probably the best up-dated summary of Four Arrows "point of departure theory" that articulates the conflict (Culture Wars, Paradigm Wars, Worldview Wars) between Indigenous and non-Indigenous perspectives is his book: Point of Departure: Returning to a More Authentic Worldview for Education and Survival. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing. I have written a book review on Amazon books, which will give you my early perception of the value of this approach he has taken, albeit, I am also critical and working to revise his views somewhat, yet keep their core intentions and wisdom in place.

3. Although Four Arrows had originally began using Fear (with the capital) in his doctoral research and his first major theoretical book on the topic (1998), he has not always been consistent in doing so and thus many of his readers do not often gather in the implication of how his view of Fear (based on many perspectives) is so unique from the norm view of fear (without the capital). See Jacobs, D. T. (1998). Primal Awareness: A True Story of Survival, Transformation, and Awakening with the Raramuri Shamans of Mexico. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions.

4. See Fisher, R.M., and Subba, D. (2016). Philosophy of Fearism: A First East-West Dialogue. Australia: Xlibris.

5. See Subba, D. (2014). Philosophy of Fearism: Life is Conducted, Directed and Controlled by the Fear. Australia: Xlibris.

6. The profound work of Erin Manning (also Brian Massumi) is also part of articulating my formation this new term awemotion; and also, the theory of Re-evaluation Co-Counseling (a la the late Harvey Jackins) has been influential, as a few others... however, I won't be going into their work here.

7. You can read and/or listen to Ettinger's work for yourself (e.g., Youtube) although, I caution that her work can be hard to grasp because it uses a complex scaffolding of theory and terms that take quite awhile to learn (not unlike psychoanalysis in general). For a much easier "in" to her work I suggest Fisher, R.M., and Bickel, B. (2015). Aesthetic Wit(h)nessing Within a Matrixial Imaginary. Canadian Review of Art Education, 42(1), 76-93.

8. This is complicated and not some "pure" or Ideal fantasy or potential phantasy that is disconnected from reality. Ettinger, like myself, show that the traumatic threads of historical woundness (unhealed) are continually circulating as traces, even in the unborn.

9. "Com-passion" is very different than an adult (or phallocentric) view of compassion. This has to be kept in mind if you want to understand the proto-ethical dimension of Ettinger's matrixial theory. This has a lot to do with the aesthetic dimension of experience of subjects and objects and the entire process of subjectification as Ettinger articulates it. For a simple description of this see Fisher and Bickel (2015) in relation to corrective matrixial theory of empathy. Psychology, at least in the West and modernity, has a very biased phallocentric view of empathy and Ettinger's work offers a great critique--and, likewise, I would add so does Four Arrows and Subba's work.

From: Time magazine (March 27, 2017), p. 24.

THIS IS THE WORLD young people live in today, through the eyes of an artist/cartoonist who perceives and creates images that depict often what is more in the "collective unconscious" (much like a good filmmaker), and yet we all know that we are living reality as something like this "dream" image that is depicted, as the arational space in which artists work. The image above can be interpreted in so many ways, and one of the reasons I liked it was it relates to my last blog on schooling and fear/anxiety (see below). How can educators, researchers, psychologists, pretend to make the study of "fear and learning" so clean cut and "scientific" and "statistical" when the lived reality of a child or adult going to school (in this cartoon by John Atkinson) a bit of a "nightmare" --even if an exaggerated one (dreams and nightmares exaggerate for a reason). Clearly, this is what it is like living in a post-traumatic culture and century, as several critical observers I have read speak about. I and others simply call it the everyday "culture of fear"... whatever the name, I like that we have pictures of this phenomenon, and that's why this art image is so important to reach the other-side of our rational brain and communicate what we often tend to deny and repress due to the predominance of the logical side of our brain that keeps busy and distracted in the everyday "conscious" world of affairs.

I see images like the above as not attempts to scare us most, but to wake us up to how scared we already are--and how we are living in a psychic numb state--which is definitely not healthy. We'd be much better to admit the fear(s) and work through them, as a good fear management/education would teach us how to do and not only teach us, would allow us to re-connect with our primal instincts of knowing how to manifest the spirit of Fearlessness in the face of Fear.

Once again, or rarely these days, I'll pick up a journal issue from the American Research Education Association. My life-partner is a member and receives their regular journal called Review of Educational Research. In the April 2017 issue [1], I scanned through Fong et al.'s paper "Psychosocial Factors and Community College Studies" a meta-analysis of data/studies. Okay, I am attracted to how they define psychosocial development, but it is typically pretty shallow and trapped almost completely within the framework of an individualistic "psychological" model/paradigm. The research they summarize is virtually about teaching and learning strategies and mostly about the individual learners characteristics and what they can do to worsen their learning outcomes and what they can do to improve them. Fair enough, this is important. But it all depends on what you are going to pull out of their psychosocial development that will really make a big difference, even a transformative difference, that's where I get critical of this research I see over and over again.

Let's look at the five broad areas these researchers take as likely most important in psychosocial development--and, remember they are focusing on how these relate to learning outcomes (i.e., primarily cognitive-behavioral psychology). So, they list the five, of which I am glad they list Fear (i.e., Anxiety): (1) motivation, self-perceptions, attributions, self-regulation, and anxiety. They discuss each one briefly before they do their huge meta-analysis of all the studies that involve these categories in some way, again, with focus on college student success. There's no big questioning about "success" in any sociological, cultural, historical or political context. Anyways, here is what they say about Anxiety:

Anxiety - "As the most widely studied academic emotion in the educational literature (Zeidner, 1998) [2], anxiety is not only conceptually distinct as a psychological factor but also highly prevalent in today's college campus culture and student population. Although some degree of stress [i.e., fear and anxiety] can indicate a healthy interest in the task and a response to appropriate task difficult, many students experience overwhelming amounts of anxiety that ultimately [negatively] affect their performance." (p. 395).

What is great about this is the up-front acknowledgement of the powerful negative role of anxiety/fear [3] in learning and successful performance, and that it has been obviously recognized by enough researchers and others in the field of Education to be "the most widely studied" of psychoemotional variables. Wow. Great. But then, after this great introductory sentence, and surely one could generalize that this finding on the major negative affective impact of fear for college students could easily be applied to K-12 schooling as well. I'm not up on the latest research, but I know as a professional educator for 40 years this is no surprise to education researchers and teachers. They know fear is crucial in educational learning successes and a whole lot of other things that go on in schooling environments/cultures, never mind society at large. But, I can tell you there is very little about this psychoemotional factor brought out into the common Education discourses, policies, practices. That aside, once I look a little deeper into this statement on anxiety, in the study, there is a disturbing finding of this large meta-analysis by Fong et al. (and, yes, it is related to statistical meta-analysis studies in general), these researchers admit in their Results section:

"We observed some differences as well between our review and Richardson et al.'s. Anxiety and stress were found to be consistently negatively associated with college achievement by Richardson et al. [4]; however, in the present meta-analysis, there were no significant [i.e., statistical] relationships between anxiety and achievement." (p. 414).

So, because their statistical meta-analysis did not pick-up any significant correlation of anxiety/fear to learning, guess what? They don't say another thing of any substance about this psychosocial domain--I would call Fear. Nope. They talk only about significant correlations issues, all the while I am asking yeah, but, what about the claim you made when you folks described "Anxiety" earlier in the article? If you re-read their statement (p. 395), again, so positive to me in admitting this is likely the most studied because it is the most powerful "academic emotion" recognized [5]. Yet, Fong et al., leave it behind and no new educative knowledge or ideas are shared about how to deal with this worst problem. It is astounding how 'blind' researchers can be. We spend our time on the less important, less worst problems in contemporary literature on education. That's the basic reality of Fong et al.'s study. Once more, Fear is side-lined to the shadows, and education as a whole does not progress, in my view. It regresses, and gets distracted. Okay, there are more problems in this study.

Besides both systematic reviews (meta-analyses), Fong et al., and Richardson, et al. being totally enwrapped in the limited world of Psychology discourse, and besides the problem of limiting (reducing) Fear to an "academic emotion" as if that can be restricted to academic concerns only, or even accurately--then, we see that this entire study does not study the "culture of fear" as an over-structure (meta-context) today in education but society in general. They ignore that, as likely is the case with most of the "success" interested studies in Education. Sure, they'll mention anxiety, but that's only a "variable" or "factor" not a context for these educational psychology folks. Big mistake. And, when I looked up in the references of Fong et al.'s article to who actually said that "anxiety is so important (i.e., the most widely studied academic emotion in the educational literature (Zeidner, 1998)) it turns out so problematic in that the Zeidner reference is a text on "test anxiety." All the focus is on cognitive achievement, behavioral outcomes and all within the context of "testing" achievement success. This is so disturbing because the Fong et al. study is on psychoemotional development, a notion they repeat in the article, and I agree it is so important. But "testing" is where the researchers go to find out how important anxiety/fear is. Wow, that is a big mistake. No wonder, they end up dissing Fear in their article, especially once it is not shown to be "statistically important"--etc. Also, it is disturbing to see their reference for the quote on the importance of anxiety/fear is now two decades old. What? They couldn't find a more up-to-date reference on Fear and learning? This is really not good scholarship, and it also shows how little they cared about this variable, they name "Anxiety" in psychosocial development. Typically, I have found educational psychology researchers to be very 'heady' people who love statistics and rational arguments--trying their best to get funding and credit for their "scientific" studies. And what gets lost in the mean-time beneath their own agendas, and their own fear of fear (to be frank)... very, disturbing for me as a fearologist to see this kind of research still filling major journals in education to this day. There has been such a major shift in American (Western) cultures in two decades, and anxiety/fear have to be looked at seriously in contextual ways of framing what is happening to our students in all schooling settings.

Oh, and I ought to finish this initial critique with how uneducational this education research continues to be. Let me quote Fong et al. again, with what they say about anxiety/fear management now [bold added for emphasis]:

"... many students experience overwhelming amounts of anxiety that ultimately [negatively] affect their performance.... To reduce the deleterious effects of anxiety on performance, anxiety requires management through a process of awareness, reflection, and control for students to analyze how their affective reactions to learning are manifesting and hindering their performance." (p. 395)

Added to this quote they note studies showing the negative associations overall between "anxiety and academic performance." Again, all psychological-individual based discussion here, including management strategies. Oh, to be fair, Fong et al., do say near the end of their article one of the limitations of this study is that it doesn't assess structural aspects of student learning (e.g., schools themselves, "college climate" and relationships,  organizations, structures, politics; see p. 416). However, that is tucked away as a caveat way to deep into and at the end of the article. Sorry, it doesn't cut it. The reality, is very clear what is being ignored virtually by Fong et al., and nearly every other researcher on student learning success. I want to know why the larger structural context(s) are ignored, not just acknowledged that it is ignored. We will never be able to address "many students experience overwhelming amounts of anxiety" as the real problem at the root of (most) all learning problems. We have known this intuitively as human beings since near the beginning of history. Tell me (tell us) something new would you please! Tell us something new about the nature and role of anxiety/fear, which you as researchers actually point out "anxiety [fear] is not only conceptually distinct as a psychological factor" --I agree, it is. But the article says nothing about why it is conceptually distinct. That is so disappointing. Again, we are not learning anything much new about this "most widely studied" (obviously, most important) factor. Again, your statistical analysis left it behind to be not seen, not conceptually distinct (aka important). This is so unacceptable research because we have the ethical imperative to actually help our students who are, as you admit, and research shows consistently, suffering "overwhelming amounts of anxiety." The construct "culture of fear" has to be taken into account, because "fear" is not an isolated phenomenon in education, learning, teaching. The current immigration (DACA) situation with so many students in the USA right now under the Trump administration being one driver of overwhelming fear of the vulnerable and yet it is bigger than that. I have documented this "culture of fear" and "education" literature some years ago (Fisher, 2011) [6]. If we are going to take the "social" seriously in "psychosocial" then we are obliged to always include a cultural/social context to any research on fear and learning/teaching.

I guess, I trust you all (including Fong et al.) will apply "self-regulated learning" to your own research and this article, and perhaps correct some things in future writing. Yes, I'd like you to "reflect" on what it is you are saying, think about what is important ethically--that is, in what is causing the major suffering (i.e., mental health issues)--and, especially, as you say in the article, anxiety/fear levels most negatively impact already susceptible ("primed") students--already "fearful" (p. 395). 

I hope you get lots of good feedback on this article: Dr. Carlton J. Fong, carlton.fong@utexas.edu

I also am glad to assist, if you wish re-thinking educational research that is actually truly educational for the real problems of student suffering (and, thus, their success as well. Feel free to contact me: Dr. R. Michael Fisher, r.michaelfisher52@gmail.com

Notes

1. Fong, C. J., Davis, C. W., Kim, Y., Kim, Y. W., Marriott, L., and Kim, S. Y. (2017). Psychosocial factors and community college student success: A meta-analytic investigation. Review of Educational Research, 87(2), 388-424.

2. Zeidner, M. (1998). Test anxiety: The state of the art. New York, NY: Plenum.

3. My 28 years of research on anxiety/fear shows there is overall no distinguishing "actual" or "important" difference between these two constructs, even if many researchers will disagree, and give me the simple (operational) definition they use in psychological research. And, by the way, this also applies to existential thinking, although, I would have to go into far too complex of a discussion about this to nuance special attention to existentialism. For a review of my own thought on this you can go to any of my publications, and precisely, see Fisher and Subba (2016), look up "anxiety" in the Subject Index for several references, and note the issue of definition (contra fear) on p. 20. Fisher, R. M., and Subba, D. (2016). Philosophy of fearism: A first East-West dialogue. Australia: Xlibris.

4. Richardson, M., Abraham, C., and Bond, R. (2012). Psychological correlates of university students' academic performance: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 138, 353-87.

5. Calling anxiety/fear only an "academic emotion" is also highly problematic, as my work continually has argued that we have to see "fear" as much more than an individual and psychological construct or "emotion." That emotion discourse is way to restricted, and insufficient to diagnose the Fear Problem on this planet (see Fisher and Subba, 2016).

6. Fisher, R. M. (2011). "Culture of fear" and education: An annotated bibliography, 1990-2011. Technical Paper No. 28 (2nd ed.). Carbondale, IL: In Search of Fearlessness Research Institute.

During the writing of my largest and most complex book, The World's Fearlessness Teachings: A Critical Integral Approach to Fear Management/Education for the 21st Century (2010), I was aware that maybe I ought to first be writing an even larger and more complex book called The World's Fear Teachings. This latter book seemed to be the logical precursor to The World's Fearlessness Teachings. Right? You ought to know about how "fear" is being constructed as a concept and being reproduced in some forms of information and knowledge--passed on to others and generations to follow. Then once you have a big book to understand about "fear" in this sense, you could then better be able to use and understand the big book of how to cure the Fear Problem and it would naturally be something like The World's Fearlessness Teachings as the road to liberation.

Well, all logic of that aside, it turned out when I was contemplating writing a big book on my 25 years of research and experience studying fear and fearlessness, that I just couldn't make up my mind which book was first. I actually started some drafts of The World's Fear Teachings but then, it seemed too complex and would take many years to complete, as I envisioned it. So I stopped that project. And one day had a shamanic experience 'on the table' with a registered shaman (shawoman) in a therapeutic treatment session and then did my own self-shamanic journey to explore what I ought to do. I knew I wanted to summarize my work for the past 1/4 of a century. The dream-vision and my later logical rationale "pushed" me in the direction to first write the "fearlessness" stuff. I don't regret that move. I wanted to show the world that there is a Fearlessness Movement and Spirit that is always already there and ready to handle all the Fear that is going on and has ever been going on. All we had to do is know more about it, that "spirit of fearlessness" as our cura if and when we were ready to make the choice to utilize its guidance. This simple idea for that first big book more or less came down to the findings of all my research up to that point, in a nutshell, which formed a dictum in The World's Fearlessness Teachings, that is, "When fear arises, so then does fearlessness."

It was a short and sweet, optimistic note. Here was the dictum that I would offer to the world in the early part of the 21st century, and I was curious as hell to see how the world would respond. Guess what? It didn't. Well, not much. Pretty pathetic response. I knew it was a great dictum but why was it not taking hold?

This blogpost is not about this question of the value or lack of up-take of The World's Fearlessness Teachings, which apparently is not as positive and as inspiring as I thought it was. The blogpost here is about the companion volume I never wrote, but am thinking of again, and thinking particularly how to go about it so it will be more "fun" to write and not a multi-year slog out of scholarly pages that no one will want to read. So, I thought I had a really cool idea, and that's what I want to share, and get your feedback on as well. But first a quote, from the Foreword to my first big book on fearlessness:

"Fisher offers a vision.... And he wisely insists that because the terrible curriculum of fear has been implanted in us at every level of our being, it must be addressed in an integral, holistic manner that existentially transforms not only individuals but also their cultures. What Fisher offers us, at both the personal and collective level, are some preliminary theoretical ways and practical means to transcend the matrix of fear and step out (as is our birthright) onto the bright landscape of a teleological optimism--one that lies at the heart of Fisher's profound, and profoundly healing, educational vision."  -Dr. Clifford Mayes, Professor, Educational Psychology, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, USA (p. x).

That endorsement is right on what my project is about, but this morning I am thinking maybe this companion volume to The World's Fearlessness Teachings will be just what is needed for the populations of the world to "wake up" and really get on the bandwagon to undermine the 'Fear' Matrix controlling us. Here's my little (big) idea for the companion book. It's title would be The Fear Bible.

Now, a little background before I say what would be in this book, The Fear Bible. First, I have been listening to artist-psychoanalyst and matrixial theorist Bracha L. Ettinger for a few weeks now (with Barbara) and we are so impressed once again at what she offers in way of a critique. The video we watched last night is entitled "Subject, Trust, and Carriance" (on Youtube). She takes apart the Bible discourses in a brilliant analysis of the (mis-)translations from the ancient Hebrew to Roman language and English. She does this showing virtually all the ways the (mis-)translation in English removes systematically any divine-feminine (Woman) from the text where it is really important stuff, and the divine-masculine (Man) is inserted. I won't give details, watch the video.

Point being, her matrixial feminine critical psychoanalysis is a "ground" platform to critique all the ways the paranoidal masculine has infiltrated the Western world, and the Abrahamic religious and cultural traditions and language (i.e., Discourse). In my way of looking at all this I want to do the same analogous thing with the Western world (especially), and show how "reality" has been (mis-)translated to us through texts, traditions and what Michel Foucault, the great philosopher/historian, called big 'D' Discourse. Discourse is the term for all the ways that ideas, and more than just ideas, flow through a civilization or culture in forms of information and then knowledge and then reproductions (e.g., cultural artifacts, architectures, teachings, etc.) of that Discourse.

I see a Discourse of Fear, has been flooding humanity for a long time. We don't know fully how to even recognize this. I want to show that there is a Fear Bible that has been written but is not actually written down in one book like the Bible--and, that's the big problem because we cannot at least have one source to go to to find out how we are being conditioned into one hegemonic Discourse on "reality" that is fear-based (even though, the Bible, may say it is love-based). So, I would research and write the Fear Bible as the book that I believe captures all the ways (and discourses) that are hegemonic in determining how we thinking about "Fear" (again, analogous to how the Bible is the book that captures (most) all the ways we in the West thinking about "God"). Get it? 

If I was to label my own philosophy that has captured (in a good way) my life since 1989, it would be to call it a "fearlessness philosophy." Now, today, I was thinking of some differences, initially, that ought to be distinguished between fearlessness philosophy (FP) and a philosophy of fearlessness (PF) [1].

First, I went on the internet and searched for fearlessness philosophy and that combination of terms, putting fearlessness before philosophy and as the identifier and inscription for a particular kind of philosophy, and found it is only used once in a publication, and that is by myself in 2007 [1]. All the 'near' hits on Google search related are all my publications and a couple of other authors who have not used this combination exactly. At some point, I'll search PF and no doubt there will be more people using this, although still likely not that many. Also, to keep in mind, there are authors/philosophers (especially in the East) who are very interested in a PF (perhaps even FP) but they haven't yet decided to put those two terms together. Okay, enough of that detail.

Now, to get down to my initial distinction of FP and PF, of which I prefer the former for various reasons (see below). I too have used both combinations over the 27 years of my study and writing. I also have other publications, with FP in them but the internet wouldn't have picked it up and/or some of my work is not published properly per se. Okay, now to PF - this more common phrasing is best to be used to describe when philosophy is applied to the topic "fearlessness" just as any philosophical investigation could be applied to any topic, like, for e.g., the "Philosophy of the Matrix" (which does exist, that is, when The Matrix sci-fi film trilogy by The Wachowski Bros. came out 1999-2003). This arrangement of terms is predictable in that a philosopher could (and they have) study the film using all their philosophy tools, by which they do not for a moment ask reflectively (or rarely might they) "Are the tools of philosophy as a discipline adequate to study The Matrix?" It is precisely, if you are an academic philosopher (or really any other kind of 'philosopher' even an amateur), such a reflective questioning that ought to be part n' parcel of any philosophical inquiry. Philosophy if it is anything substantive and important, always begins with questions about the nature of the methodology of knowing, the knower's capabilities, etc. in bringing them to a research, that is, a philosophical question or topic. Another, point, is to say, there is also a "Matrix philosophy" overlapping somewhat with a philosophy of the Matrix, but they are not the same necessarily. Matrix philosophy (analogous with FP) is when philosophy itself is intricately changed from its disciplinary canon or normal way of conceiving it and its methodologies and knowledges--thus, in this latter combination there is more attention given to the impact that The Matrix (as topic, or subject, or object) itself has on the philosophical tools (and/or philosophers) applied to studying it.

Okay, FP, now begins to look substantively different if you get some of this analogy I just went through. Indeed, FP posits from the beginning that "fearlessness" is not only a topic of study for philosophy (which is a good idea), but the dialectical relationship of the two components "philosophy" and "fearlessness" are in an irrevocable interplay, an intimacy of exchange, whereby it is expected (and assumed) there will be transformational set of findings from the process of bringing these two together. Whereas, in PF, there is no such expectation but rather the expectation and/or goal is that philosophy will make fearlessness more clear and knowable and so on. Science also operates this way, on this methodological and paradigmatic assumption, as if we had a "science of fearlessness" then you see the same operating procedures, more or less, in terms of the assumptions of relations of the discipline applied to the "object" of analysis. Whereby, FP reverses this as well (i.e., both/and). FP says that you ought to have the observer of the fearlessness equally "observed" and interrogated by "fearlessness." I know that can sound a bit strange at first. But really it is at the crux of this distinction I am making that everything shifts into the dialectical and transformative way of knowing and results of the inquiry ought to reflect this dialectical dynamic. Simply, in FP, there is a much greater demand on philosophy to actually 'become' fearlessness simultaneously, more or less, as philosophy studies fearlessness. Make sense?

There is a lot more I could go into regarding these distinctions, but this will do for a short initial blog on the topic. I am amazed I haven't written this out clearly enough over all these years, and I really ought to do a full technical paper on this. Soon. And, as well, now, I am sort of starting to see why there is no one else (apparently) on the planet throughout history using the term FP. It requires very rigorous parameters and a critical transformative dialectical framework to the inquiry. One could write a dissertation on this problem, of How Do I Perform an Adequate Study or Discipline Called "Fearlessness Philosophy"(?). I'd love to do that doctoral research, but maybe someone younger than I is better to be the one doing it. Let me know if you do. 

Note

1. This said, it is not a contradiction to my other claims to be working on and with the notion of a philosophy of fearism (a la Desh Subba). I am committed to both these strains of philosophy.

Notes

1. Fisher, R. M. (2007). Conceptualizing a fearlessness philosophy: Existential philosophy and a genealogy of fear management system-5. Technical Paper No. 23. Vancouver, BC: In Search of Fearlessness Research Institute.

As much as it is so important to acknowledge the nature and role of "fear" (complex as it is do define) in human affairs (e.g., philosophy of fearism) there is an equally important inquiry and education to be had in regard to how "fear" is not the only motivating, or even most powerful motivating force in human affairs. The basic philosophical and theoretical arguments are rich and complex, beyond the scope of this blog. However, I want to point out that if you wish to understand my own thinking on this topic then you really have to engage the feminine (feminist) matrixial gaze theory (i.e., matrixial theory) of Bracha L. Ettinger. She is a post-Lacanian psychoanalyst, theorist, artist, activist, and most importantly, as I have written about her and her work (often with Barbara Bickel), she is the next most powerful psychoanalytic thinker since Lacan, and before that, since Freud. And, the good news... she is working on an entirely new basis for the theories of human motivation, subjectivity (or what she prefers to call transubjectivity).

Barbara and I and a small group of artists Barbara knows have studied Ettinger's difficult texts some years ago. After that year long study online, it has been awhile and so Barbara and I took up recently to study her videos online for 40 days, attempting this as a practice. We'll be sharing and writing more on that later. But just to introduce you, if you haven't already been introduced to Ettinger and matrixial theory (a non-phallocentric theory) then I will give a link to an excellent lecture on YouTube below. To close off this short blog I want to say that I am ever-ongoing impressed by the depth and "truth" from her work in understanding human beings, and her aesthetical-ethical foundation for guiding a new way of being beyond a fear-based orientation to the world. Her linking of early-mother and child bonding (mostly, in the womb) is brilliant psychoanalysis in my view, and she is slowly being recognized in the field and beyond as an important theorist. At one point in the video (below) she says, that it is our nature in connection in the matrixial borderspace of the I and non-I (self and Other) that from the beginning we were unknowingly embraced in "fascination and awe and compassion" which is our natural state of recognition of the Other and which is the protoethical ground for any ethics, and she adds to this claim that such an awe and compassion in the earliest stages of subjectivity (largely unconscious) is a connection/recognition/co-emergence "before fear, guilt, shame, action, cognition, abjection and disgust." This is the primordial matrixial ground for a theory of fearlessness, in my words.

Go to YouTube video on Ettinger's lecture in 2010 at the European Graduate University, where she often teaches: "Aesthetics, Protoethics and Matrixial Subjectivity."