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| Madam & Eve, courtesy of South African cartoonists Steven Francis and Rico |
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James Kimmel, Jr., researcher on violence, discovered that “your brain on grievance looks a lot like your brain on drugs.” In fact, brain imaging studies show that harboring a grievance (a perceived wrong or injustice, real or imagined) activates the same neural reward circuitry as narcotics.” Kimmel relates his findings in relation to Donald Trump:
Scientists [find] that in substance addiction, environmental cues such as being in a place where drugs are taken or meeting another person who takes drugs cause sharp surges of dopamine in crucial reward and habit regions of the brain, specifically, the nucleus accumbens and dorsal striatum. This triggers cravings in anticipation of experiencing pleasure and relief through intoxication. Recent studies show that cues such as experiencing or being reminded of a perceived wrong or injustice — a grievance — activate these same reward and habit regions of the brain, triggering cravings in anticipation of experiencing pleasure and relief through retaliation. To be clear, the retaliation doesn’t need to be physically violent—an unkind word, or tweet, can also be very gratifying.Hmmm. Explains a lot…except how to manage it.
Although these are new findings and the research in this area is not yet settled, what this suggests is that similar to the way people become addicted to drugs or gambling, people may also become addicted to seeking retribution against their enemies — revenge addiction. This may help explain why some people just can’t let go of their grievances long after others feel they should have moved on—and why some people resort to violence.
It’s worth asking whether this helps explain Trump’s fixation on his grievances and ways of exacting retribution for them. The hallmark of addiction is compulsive behavior despite harmful consequences. Trump’s unrelenting efforts to retaliate against those he believes have treated him unjustly (including, now, American voters) appear to be compulsive and uncontrollable. The harm this causes to himself and others is obvious but seems to have no deterrent effect. Reports suggest he has been doing this for much of his life. He seems powerless to stop. He also seems to derive a great deal of pleasure from it.
Alas, the recent election as “intervention” appears to have upped Trump’s pleasure in wreaking revenge.
Read, “What the Science of Addiction Tells Us About Trump“ >>
News blues…
South Africans are hosting a new variant of coronavirus, with “three mutations, which is an unusually high number for a new variant, and can bind more easily to receptors in the human body.” This. according to health minister Dr Zweli Mkhize, speaking at a briefing alongside top scientists including Prof Salim Abdool Karim and Prof Tulio de Oliveira.This “new highly transmissible variant is circulating widely — but it is not clear yet whether it is more severe than the original variants. Nevertheless, it has become the dominant one in the country's second coronavirus wave, and is “making young and previously healthy people severely ill”.
Healthy planet, anyone?
Mixed results of the pandemic. It cuts funding and volunteer numbers, rises awareness, and results in more people are rescuing more injured animals – and overwhelms systems.Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
A good time is planned for all!My mother will enjoy Christmas Day with my brother and his family. The Dog will enjoy Christmas Day at this house – her previous home.
I hope we can load The Dog (and the mother?) back into the car when it’s time to return them to the Care Center.
I expect my mother’s surging determination to escape the Care Center will be tempered by reality after she visits my brother and his family in their small house. Not only is the house small, the two bedrooms already are inhabited by my brother’s wife’s adult sons and an eight-year-old grandson – and a puppy. Imagine my mother and The Dog squeezed in there! (One hour, max, before mayhem breaks out!)
