Scapegoat Receives Prison Sentence for Sodomizing an Ape. Again...
In biblical lore, Aaron selected a goat on behalf of the entire tribe, cast upon it the sins of all members, and so banished it lonely to the wild. The members of the tribe were then at great ease, having been freed from their cast-off sins—whatever those sins may take been.
Everyone felt amend, though they had neither identified their specific sins nor atoned for them. They had but agreed to hang them on the goat. If this spurious logic was obvious to anyone, it was not discussed. Why question an agreed-upon ways of making everyone feel better?
Now about that caprine animal. It was selected from the herd and sent along into the wilderness for reasons having to do with the sins of others. The goat had done nothing to merit banishment. But once the ashes were cold on the rituals of dispatching it, the goat establish itself alone in the wilderness, isolated from its herd, in unknown territory, of a sudden forced to fend for itself. It faced dangers from predators; difficulty finding food, sustenance, and shelter; and it lived the constantly woeful insecurity of a herd animal without a herd.
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This is the story of the scapegoat.
In dysfunctional families, for reasons similar to those Aaron devised, there can also exist a designated person selected for the part of scapegoat. In a family system, the selection process is less overt than Aaron'southward. It is washed more than by consensual and habitual shunning that becomes an unspoken code of behavior: ane person is chosen to acquit the brunt of any psychological discomfort experienced by the family unit as a whole. Information technology is justified by repeating the stories that create and and then reinforce the image of the scapegoat as being a person who is worthy of disdain and disparagement.
Like the strong caprine animal Aaron selected, the target of family scapegoating is also oft the strongest and healthiest member of the family. At commencement blush, this may sound counterintuitive. But think about information technology a little more. In Aaron'southward instance, there would be no group pleasure derived from banishing a weak beast who might easily die anyway, because that would not gratify the needs of the tribe to send off their sins on a robust vehicle, a potent goat who was upward to the task of bearing the burden. So information technology is in families: the targeted individual is often the nearly achieved. She—and for the purposes of narrative cohesion, our scapegoat is a female here—must exist strong enough to withstand the weight of the shunning voices which might easily and quickly topple a weaker person. The scapegoating would fail if the weight of the sins killed the goat before information technology could fifty-fifty get chased out of town. Catharsis is the goal. The goat needs to exist stiff enough to suffer in order that the tribe members practice not.
Just as the goat was clean-living despite existence sent to its lonely death, so is the human scapegoat innocent of all charges. She may not exist a perfect human being, but she is no different from anyone else in her range of faults. Information technology is not her character or her actions that have straight caused her adjournment. It is the mode her graphic symbol and her deportment, and often her accomplishments, accept been experienced by the dysfunctional family unit members, who for their ain unexamined reasons demand to dispel this person from the family realm in lodge to avoid looking into their ain consciences. They need to punish the scapegoat for provoking by her very existence the discomfort family members are feeling that is really a issue of their ain unresolved issues.
If you are beingness scapegoated in your family unit, please seek professional assist. Yous are non likely to exist able to intervene in a dysfunctional system that treats one of its own members in this way. You may continue to experience the futile attempts at explaining yourself. Yous may fail to understand the mode yous are beingness treated. Yous may brainstorm to doubt your own version of your life story. The toll is too high.
Can a human scapegoat die like the goat of yore? Maybe. If not physically, certainly emotionally. It is difficult for the scapegoat to believe that her family would care for her in this unconscionable mode if she were not guilty of some grave sin. She wracks her brain and her centre to understand, merely she cannot. The reasons she is given for being mistreated seem shallow, little, and incomplete. It is hard for her to believe these small-scale transgressions could warrant such heavy condemnation.
She begins to doubtfulness her own version of reality, since consensus in her own family supports a narrative dissimilar from her own near who she is and what she does or has done. She learns that if she tries to sort this out, she volition be accused of "playing the victim" or beingness selfish, or existence a "drama queen." She is able to concur to her noesis that this assessment and treatment are not right, until one day, utterly discouraged, she gives up. The full weight of the banishment settles upon her. She is alone. She doesn't try to understand or explicate anything anymore. She has moved into accepting a fate that makes no sense to her.
Good mental wellness at this point suggests she make her peace with leaving behind the family that fails her so completely. And if she is strong and well-supported with friends, she may be able to practice this. She will pay a lifelong price for sins she did non commit, however, because information technology is hard and painful to extract oneself from 1's family. It is counter to the most basic of human being needs for home, shelter, affiliation. It is a brutal and inexcusable undertaking for a family to scapegoat a member.
If you look at the research regarding the fate of individuals who accept been relentlessly bullied, y'all tin draw conclusions nigh what happens to scapegoated family unit members, for scapegoating is bullying with focused and long-term intensity. Some bullied children proceed to get bullies themselves. Some develop social skills to divert and challenge bullying, though the scars of having been bullied may insert themselves into their lives in many ways for many years to come. Others, nonetheless, do not survive, driven to suicide.
If you are existence scapegoated in your family, please seek professional person help. You are non likely to exist able to intervene in a dysfunctional system that treats i of its own members in this way. You may continue to experience the futile attempts at explaining yourself. You lot may neglect to empathise the style y'all are being treated. You lot may begin to dubiousness your own version of your life story. The price is likewise high. Delight notice a counselor who tin can aid you unravel the fictions that subvert the truth virtually your life and about who y'all are. Good counseling support can help free y'all from the binding ties of pain, guilt, and shame that you did not create and which are not justified.
You were not built-in to bear the sins of others any more than Aaron's goat was born for such a fate.
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Source: https://www.goodtherapy.org/blog/blameless-burden-scapegoating-in-dysfunctional-families-0130174
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