Dr. Dalrymple informs us that he’s just begun blogging for Psychology Today. “Psychiatric Disorder: Against the idols of the age” is the name of his blog there, and he’s already written several posts which seem to touch on the intersection of psychology, current events and notable experiences from his own daily life — in keeping with his customary output then. In other words, more of the stuff we love!
The first post examines some interesting takeaways from the news that a woman has falsely claimed to be a relative of a victim of the Germanwings plane crash. Notice, for one thing, how easily she was believed:
She had only to claim to be a relative of the victim of the crash, that is to say to be a victim herself, to be believed. True enough, very few people would dare to commit such a fraud in this situation, so the company would not have been on its guard against such attempts; but there is also a general cultural atmosphere in which claims to victimhood are challenged, if ever at all, only very gingerly. This is because any such challenge can easily be parlayed by the supposed victim into further, or meta-, victimhood. Not to take someone at his word is to cause him further trauma.