From: Andrew Phelps <math_anxiety@yahoo.com>

Subject: Re: [withholdapadues] APA Presidential Priorities

To: withholdapadues@yahoogroups.com

Date: Friday, March 5, 2010, 5:21 AM

 

Tuv:

I don't generally disagree with you, but here I don't think you have this quite right.

On Thu, 3/4/10, Tuv wrote:

IMO, "Positive Psychology" was created to be a cover for some of the torture psychologists. Of course there are many psychologists who have become involved with it that have nothing to do with torture or interrogations, but Seligman and friends found a way to cover their reputations in something shiny and innocent.

I think "Positive Psychology" was created because of an honest recognition that "Learned Helplessness" was having a negative social impact.  The exact interpretation of the calculation of Mr. Seligman is no doubt a matter of interest.

That is, historical interest as a "case study."

My sense is that for Seligman, redirection of his work to "positive psychology" was in effect a kind of naive social advocacy.  He neglected to engage the wide usage this approach has in justifying behavior management in mental health service delivery, and he created what is a patently phony kind of social advocacy.

A psychologist friend of mine teaches positive psychology to mental health "client/survivors."  He teaches it [a] to help them overcome the "learned helplessness" of the mental health system and [b] so they will EXPLAIN TO HIM how a positive path for "client/survivors" might be constructed. His background is in "labor studies" and he is an organizational psychologist and long-time community college psychology instructor.

In other words you need to do a deeper analysis there. The application of "ego psychology" is insufficient, as the issues relate to socialization of being.

Reminds me how much MKULTRA mind control psychology experiments were hidden behind the front of the "Human Ecology" Foundation.

The deeper psychology here is related to Zimbardo's concept of "heroism."  Should we create "heroes" in the Larry James style, by free-swinging moral manipulation as MKULTRA represented, using the residual dog-torture logic of "learned helplessness" in "appropriate" ways? Should we "sanitize" the way we create those role models, by attitude management, as Zimbardo advocates?

Or should we take a "labor" point of view and recognize that promoting dog torture and/or basement abuse dynamics is wrong?

 

Andrew Phelps