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CHAPTER 16: DEFENSE MECHANISMS - ADAPTIVE & MALADAPTIVE PYSHCOLOGICAL FUNCTIONING

DEFENSIVE COMPLAINTS

Complaining about one’s marriage, job, family or relationship varies from person to person. With regard to marriage, it may be a signal to try and salvage a sick relationship. For others, it may become a message that their marriage is over. Complaining may also serve a chronically rigid defensive function. For instance, there are spouses who will complain about their partner throughout life and they will never consider repairing or ending their marriage.

Keeping the psychological focus upon one’s partner will keep the spotlight away from the complainer. By avoiding the spotlight, spouses adopt an immunity from having anything to do with their marital decline. You will find a similar principle among adults who suffer from chronic job dissatisfaction and they refuse to internalize the psychological discipline associated with career change. Some politicians are immune from playing a role in our social decline.

You will also find defensive complaints among individuals who demand they be treated with respect in life. They do not want any bumps in the road. Their defensive posturing helps them assume a lofty position in life where they should never be betrayed. This entitled avoidance is linked to their special immunity from having to experience any prolonged psychological pain.

You will also find defensive complaints among those who oppose the following foundational principles: “One nation under God” or “We are endowed by our creator.” Defensive complainers can also be suspicious of everyday Americans who go to church just as Americans were suspicious of minorities in our past. Some want to take Christ out of Christmas and others have succeeded in discontinuing the traditional relationship that has existed between the Boy Scouts and our military. Over meddling in the traditions of others is somewhat like the needless opposition you find in divorce.

Judges who legislate from the bench are also defensive complainers. They impose their personalities upon Americans without having to follow the Constitution and rules of government. Spouses who manufacture the needless chaos in divorce also are immune from adhering to traditional rules or principles of decency.

These judges have passionate drives to over control others which is a psychological motive found in cultures and nations where the rule of law has no value. Adults who manufacture domestic violence abhor the notion that their partner may discover their individual liberties and unique sense of identity.

Journalism is another discipline where you will find defensive complaints. Minor problems are exaggerated. Election results are analyzed with snap judgments or with unfounded paranoia. At times, you find a “doom and gloom” attitude among journalists who defensively complain. Their personalities surpass objectivity, fairness and curiosity found in higher order journalism. Just as a spouse can insidiously demoralize their partner with their defensive complaining, journalists can do the same to their consumers.

Defensive complaints say a great deal about adult maturation and personality. One should always be suspicious when an individual never complains in life. These individuals may be painfully shy or they may fear being punished by a parent or partner if they do complain about their relationship. Complaining may be the first step associated with accepting one’s marriage is in trouble. Or, as previously mentioned, complaining may offer an adult high levels of protection as they insidiously diminish the personality of their partner.

Psychological discipline means having the courage to examine how one’s own personality contributes to their marital decline. It also involves having the courage to examine how a partner’s personality is shaping their marriage. Without psychological discipline, it is much easer to go through life complaining about one’s spouse while remaining blameless.

Maturing adults examine their complaints. This maturational examination is adaptive in terms of linking complaints to new insights and solutions. Adults on the verge of maturing commonly feel isolated and they forget that finding solutions has defined human evolution in terms of both good and evil. They also tend to forget that researchers and military leaders are still very preoccupied with finding solutions today.

Finding more mature ways of doing business in a relationship will frequently challenge its stability. While dating, some adults may surprisingly end a relationship because they fear the mature features of their partner’s personality. In other words, a mature partner may challenge or threaten their questionable marital motives.

DEFENSIVE COMPLAINTS IN POLITICS

In order to understand political complaining, it is important to remember that a percentage of divorced Republicans and Democrats will spend the rest of their lives dealing with an angry ex-spouse who will make their lives miserable. Domestic realities are needlessly complicated and children may suffer the most. The same dynamic can be found in low level political rhetoric where citizens suffer from the self absorbed chaos that is manufactured by political leaders. This chaos may lead to low voter turnout.

Complaining has its merits only if it is associated with honorable change. When highly educated politicians resort to low level political rhetoric, it is fair to assume they are either hiding their solutions or they have none. If physicians and researchers complained without having some link to adaptation, science would lose its evolutionary momentum.

The same principle can be found in journalism where it is common to find defensive complaining with no adaptive solutions. You will also find this dynamic in the work place where bully bosses drive off good employees. Ex-spouses who are angry for a lifetime never find adaptive solutions that will help them mature beyond their divorce and anger. Foreign leaders who defensively complain about the United States may be preserving their own power while stabilizing their own social decay.

Primitive complaining may lead to anger and may later escalate to apathetic rage. You find apathetic rage in domestic violence, terrorism, low level political rhetoric and biased journalism. With apathetic rage, individuals have no regard for the long term consequences of their self absorbed motives.

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