Admiration Doesn’t Have To Be Mad

“Paparazzi are the high-tech dogs of fame. But it must be admitted that we sent them into the tunnel, to nourish our own mysterious needs.” - Martin Amis in Time magazine

We have, if you follow the news, been through three weeks of grief and confusion and it probably does not surprise you that I want to make sense of it. But my motivation is mixed. I am interested in more than the phenomena of the “people’s princess” and “Saint Teresa.” I want to understand the psychology at the base of such phenomena. Is there a deadly combination of envy and love that leads us to attack or degrade those whom we admire?

I have been working with a small group trying to understand the sources of violence. The area of most interest to me centers on the work of Rene Girard. Girard’s work is too complex for me to summarize well here, so I will provide only my “quickie” version.

Humans in groups compare themselves to each other and the result is, in most cases, competition. The group establishes an informal standard of who has “it” and who does not, whatever “it” may be - the right sports shoe or the right style. The group admires, even loves the “it” but tension builds up as competition and comparison shift to envy. Sooner or later a desire builds to expose or attack the “it.” To maintain group cohesion, given such tension, sacrificial rituals are created and a victim is chosen. The victim can either be the person with “it” or a substitute scapegoat. The ancient meaning of the word victim is “to sacrifice.”

Criminals might steal or stalk “it,” but law-abiding humans must be more subtle.

They expose and magnify flaws, they set expectations too high, they ascribe morality to their position and immortality to the scapegoat or the person with the enviable “it.” Even those who don’t envy or compete don’t want to be diminished by those who have “it” so they collude in the breaking down of the “it.” Even those who love the “it” foster the exploitation through rumor and innuendo. I believe we prefer brilliance, whatever its human form, to be combined with observable pain.

Howard Gardner’s new book “Extraordinary Minds,” describes the elements of “it” that make a few people both unique and vulnerable. Gardener categorizes extraordinary people as Masters, Creators, Introspectors and Influencers. Some have more than one of these key abilities. The person who has “it” in one of these four forms literally glows with the intensity of his or her skill and commitment.

But, extraordinary people are often forced to live marginal lives. Mozart as a “master” died in poverty, Freud as a “creator” found little acceptance or respect from his academic colleagues. Virginia Woolf, an “introspector,” committed suicide and Gandhi, the “influencer” was assassinated by one of his own followers.

Influencers, the category that most fits Princess Diana and Mother Teresa, develop a shrewd sese of self, an awareness of their impact on others and their own changing goals.

The goals of Princess Diana and Mother Teresa, conscious or unconscious, were the breaking down of class barriers. Diana became a people’s princess once HRH had been stripped from her by the Queen. Mother Teresa worked with the poorest of the poor.

Diana offered compassion and confusion, style and vulnerability, beauty and pain. The drums of criticism beat constantly. She could not harness her own luminescence but she knew it was there.

Mother Teresa lived out her long extraordinary life. There was no sacrifice in the end because she had lived a life that few could envy, a story that few wanted to attack.

There are lessons for our own lives in the strengths and skills of extraordinary people. But, perhaps more important, if we do not understand our ambivalent response to them we cannot protect them from social sacrifice nor can we reap the immense potential for good of their gifts.

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Jennifer James The Spokesman-Review