Andrew Lobaczewski - Political Ponerology: A Science on the Nature of Evil Adjusted for Political Purposes

expected. They became more resourceful in practical life mat-

ters and were able to offer others good advice. Unfortunately,

the number of persons whom a psychotherapist could trust

adequately was very limited.

A similar effect should be attained on a macrosocial scale,

something technically feasible under present conditions. At

such an operational scale, it will liberate spontaneous interac-

tion among such enlightened individuals and the social multi-

plication of therapeutic phenomena. The latter will then create

a qualitatively new and most probably rather stormy social

reaction; we should be prepared for this in order to calm it

down. Finally, this will bring an overall feeling of relaxation

and a triumph of proper science over evil; this cannot be ne-

gated by any verbalistic means, and physical force also be-

comes meaningless. Using measures so different from anything

utilized before will engender an “end of an era” feeling during

which this macrosocial phenomenon was able to emerge and

develop, but is now dying. That would be accompanied by a

sensation of well-being on the part of normal people.

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Within this suggested global psychotherapy, additional ob-

jectified material in the form of a naturalistic understanding of

the phenomenon constitutes the keystone material; this book

has therefore collected the most essential data the author was

able to obtain and to present here in a partially simplified ap-

proach. This no doubt does not represent the entirety of the

knowledge needed; further supplementation will be necessary.

On the other hand, I have devoted less attention to methods,

since this would constitute a manifold duplication of those

kinds of therapies many specialists already know and use in

their practice.

The purpose of this activity will be letting the world regain

its capacity to make use of healthy common sense and to rein-

tegrate world views based on scientifically objectified and ap-

propriately popularized data. The consciousness thus created

would be far more appropriate to the reality which was misun-

derstood until recently; as a result, man will become more sen-

sible in practical activity, more independent and resourceful in

solving life’s problems, and he will feel safer. This task is noth-

ing new; it constitutes a good psychotherapist’s daily bread.

The problem is technical rather than theoretical, namely how to

disseminate such sorely needed influences throughout the

globe.

~~~

Every psychotherapist must be prepared for difficulties

caused by the psychological resistance derived from persistent

attitudes and convictions whose lack of foundation becomes

revealed in the course of work. Particularly in the case of a

numerous group of people, these resistances become more

demonstratively manifest; however, among the members of

such a group we also find allies who help us break down these

resistances. In order to visualize this, let us revert once more to

the N. family example, wherein a dozen or so persons collabo-

rated in abusing a pleasant and intelligent thirteen-year-old

scapegoat.

When I explained to the uncles and aunts that they had been

under the influence of a psychologically abnormal person for

years, accepting her delusional world as real and participating

(with perceived honor) in her vindictiveness to the boy who

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was allegedly to blame for her failures, including those which

occurred years before his birth, the shock temporarily stifled

their indignation. There was no subsequent attack, probably

because this took place in my office of the public health service

and I was protected by the white coat I would usually don

whenever I did not feel completely safe. I thus suffered only

verbal threats. A week later, however, they started returning

one by one, pale and rueful; albeit with difficulty, they did

offer their cooperation in helping to repair the family situation

and the future of this unfortunate boy.

Many people suffer an inevitable shock and react with op-

position, protest, and disintegration of their human personality

when informed of such a state of affairs, namely that they have

been under the spellbinding and traumatizing influence of a

macrosocial pathological phenomenon, regardless of whether

they were followers or opponents thereof. Many people are

awakened to anxious protest by the fact that the ideology they

either condemned or somehow accepted, but considered a guid-

ing factor, is now being treated as something secondary in im-

portance.

The noisiest protests will come from those who consider

themselves fair because they condemned this macrosocial phe-

nomenon with literary talent and raised voices, utilizing the

name derived from its most current ideology, as well as making

excessive use of moralizing interpretations with regard to

pathological phenomena. Forcing them to an apperception of a

correct understanding of the pathocracy will be quite a Sisy-

phean labor, since they would have to become conscious of the

fact that their efforts largely served goals which were the oppo-

site of their intentions. Especially if they engaged in such ac-

tivities professionally, it is more practical to avoid liberating

their aggressions; one could even consider such generally eld-

erly people too old for therapy.

Transforming the world view of people living in countries

with normal man’s systems proves a more troublesome task,

since they are much more egotistically attached to the imagin-

ings suggested to them since childhood, making it more diffi-

cult for them to reconcile themselves with the fact that there are

matters which their natural conceptual system cannot assimi-

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late. They also lack the specific experience available to people

who have lived under pathocratic rule for years. We must

therefore expect resistance and attack on the part of people

protecting their livelihoods and positions as well as defending

their personalities from a vexatious disintegration. Refraining

from such estrangement, we have to count on the accordant

reactions of the majority.

The acceptance of such psychotherapy will be different in

countries where societies of normal people have already been

created, offering solid resistance to pathocratic rule. Many

years of experience, practical familiarity with the phenomenon,

and psychological immunization there long ago produced fer-

tile ground for sowing the seeds of objective truth and natural-

istic comprehension. An explanation of the essence of macro-

social phenomenon will be treated like delayed psychotherapy

which should regrettably have been served much earlier (that

would have enabled the patient to avoid many errors) but is

nevertheless useful because it provides order and relaxation

and permits subsequent reasoned action. Such data, accepted

via a rather painful process there, will be associated with the

experience already possessed. There will be no egoistically or

egotistically inspired protests in that world. The value of an

objective view will be appreciated much more rapidly, since it

ensures a basis for reasoned activity. Soon thereafter, the feel-

ing of realism in apprehending the surrounding world, followed

by a sense of humor, would begin to compensate these people

for the experience they have survived, namely the disintegra-

tion of their human personalities caused by such therapy.

This disintegration of the prior world view structure will

create a temporary feeling of an unpleasant void. Therapists

well know the consequent responsibility of filling this void as

quickly as possible with material more credible and trustworthy

than the contents which were disabused, thus helping to avoid

primitive methods of personality reintegration. In practice, it is

best to minimize patient anxiety by making advance promises

that appropriately objectified material will be furnished in the

form of truthful data. This promise must then be kept, partially

anticipating the appearance of disintegrative states. I have suc-

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287

cessfully tested this technique on individual patients and would

advise its implementation on a mass scale as safe and effective.

For the people who have already developed natural psycho-

logical immunity, their increased resistance to the pathocracy’s

destructive influence upon their personalities, gained due to a

consciousness of pathocracy’s essence, may be of lesser sig-

nificance, but still not without value, since it leads to an ame-

liorated immunization quality at a less burdensome cost in

terms of nervous tension. However, for those hesitant people

who constitute the part of well-adjusted members of the new

middle class, immunizing activities furnished by an awareness

of the pathological nature of the phenomenon may tip their

attitudinal scale in the direction of decency.

The second key aspect of such operations that should be

considered is the influence of such enlightening behavior upon

the personalities of the pathocrats themselves.

In the course of individual psychotherapy, we tend to avoid

making patients aware of permanent aberrations, especially

when we have reason to believe that they are conditioned by

hereditary factors. Psychotherapists, however, are guided by

the consciousness of this condition’s existence in their decision

making. Only in the case of the results of slight brain-tissue

lesions do we decide to make the patient aware of this, so as to

help him elaborate a better tolerance of his difficulties and to

abrogate unnecessary fears. Regarding psychopathic individu-

als, we treat their deviations by means of tactful allusive lan-

guage, bearing in mind that they have a kind of self-

knowledge, and we proceed with the techniques of behavior

modification to correct their personalities, keeping the interests

of society in mind as well.

As far as operations on the macrosocial scale, it will of

course not be feasible to retain these latter cautious tactics of

activity. Traumatizing the pathocrats will be unavoidable to a

certain extent, and even intentional and morally justified in the

interests of peace on earth. Similarly, however, our attitude

must be defined by an acceptance of biological and psycho-

logical facts; renouncing any morally or emotionally charged

interpretation of their psychological deviations. In undertaking

such work, we must consider the good of society to be para-

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mount; nevertheless, we must not abandon our psychotherapeu-

tic attitude and refrain from punishing those whose guilt we are

unable to evaluate. Should we forget this, we would increase

the risk of their uncontrolled reaction, which could bring about

a world catastrophe.

At the same time, we should not nourish exaggerated fears,

for example, that such public enlightenment activities will pro-