Human Trafficking: A Battle in the Depth of Darkness

Read more: Human Trafficking: A Battle in the Depth of Darkness

Fighting the Good Fight Against the Unconscious

“There is no fate that cannot be surmounted by scorn.” –Albert Camus

Here’s  a maddening thought:  as we speak, there are obscure psychological processes going on in your mind the nature of which is completely mysterious to you.  In our age of scientific certainty, this is what is most irritating about the unconscious:  we start from a position of profound ignorance, we don’t know what approach to take, and more often than not we’re completely in the dark as to its workings.

Even its name is negative.  All our scientific striving aims for a ever sharper focus on the specifics of knowledge, and yet we define a great deal of what goes on in our own minds by what we don’t know.  But the interesting question, and this is a question rightly rich in embedded clauses, is:  how do we know that what we don’t know constitutes the unconscious, provided that we didn’t know it in the first place?  The answer lies in those intensely satisfying Eureka! moments that accompany the sudden emergence of a well-constituted piece of insight in our minds.  We know that the unconscious is largely unknown to us precisely because of the parts of it that become known in our experience.  Oftentimes it feels as if something awesomely influential has emerged, that something complete and put-together, has made itself known on our mental scene, and we are right to exclaim:  I didn’t know this existed!

We see instances of the unmasking of unconscious elements whenever we go through a tough challenge and discover the unknown flaw in our reasoning that was keeping us back, or whenever we discover  an insight that radically reconstitutes our

Read more: Fighting the Good Fight Against the Unconscious

Is Slavery Making a Comeback in America?

Former Journalist Wants World to Wake Up to Slavery Crisis

A woman was recently sentenced to 140 years in prison after using two Nigerian immigrants as personal unpaid servants in her luxury home in Atlanta, Georgia. A few days later, two Ukrainian brothers were convicted of smuggling desperate villagers into the United States to work long hours, cleaning retail stores and office buildings at little or no pay. The prosecuting U.S. attorney in Philadelphia, Daniel Velez, said it was “modern-day slavery. It’s hiding in plain sight.”

However, according to a woman who lived through the racial prejudice, segregation and slavery in post World War II Europe, the slavery crisis in the modern world is far greater than that.

“Anyone who thinks slavery died when America abolished it in the 1800s has a shock coming to them,” said Lucia Mann, whose mother was a sex slave and a WWII concentration camp survivor.  Mann, a former journalist and author of Rented Silence, a novel about slavery and racial prejudice based on her life experiences and those of other persecuted souls she witnessed says,

Read more: Is Slavery Making a Comeback in America?

War Games

After my post about Bin Laden’s death, writer Charles Hale commented, “I haven’t thought this one through but it seems to me the world has become one big sporting event where there’s always one winner, one loser, and millions of fans cheering each side on. Further, the terms used to describe sporting events are often militaristic in nature–blitz, warrior mentality, fight to the death, in the trenches, etc.–and the news programs constantly describe the news with sports metaphors. There is little difference, it appears, between nationalistic fervor and sports fanaticism. They seem to be born of the same mentality. When I watch crowds chanting USA USA, I don’t know if I’m watching the US playing Russia in hockey, a political convention or a news event; it seems they are all one and the same now.”

This meaty insight got me thinking about the psychological and spiritual implications of our intense attachments to our teams, clans, countries and religions. What’s this all about? Is there no difference between nationalistic fervor and sports fanaticism? And if not, is this good or bad?

As mammals, humans share the drives for self-preservation and species-preservation with all mammals. Composed of the instincts for nurturance, activity, and sex, these basic motivations create a powerful dependence on our families and a compulsion to protect them and their territory. Loyalty blended with fierce determination to protect and defend is a recipe for survival that has served us and other predatory mammals like wolves, bears and lions exceedingly well.

Jung said humans also have instincts for reflection and creativity. These account not only for our having reached the top of the food chain, but also for a “higher” level of awareness and yearning which has spawned egos, logical thinking, moral codes, justice systems and religions.

We have the capacity to be as aware of our basic drives as we are of our values, and we can use this awareness to benefit everyone’s team. But if our egos cannot see our shadows — our unconscious

Read more: War Games