I lived, partially educated, happily deciding for myself how things worked, and then some alt-Right internet swine put me on to a couple of biology sorts of books and my mind exploded, I had an insight and a meltdown. A part of my dabbling in biology was that I learned that I was in interesting company for having had that experience, and maybe there’s a syndrome, but the person I heard it about and from was Robert Trivers. Of course nothing about me compares, except maybe the meltdown. I learned about him during that period, and not altogether in my right mind, I learned the great man had an email address, like a person.
That is Dr. Trivers, by all accounts, and I can corroborate: the most human of humans. He teased me a little, or at least gave me the leeway to tease myself, the first time I approached him it was late evening here on the west coast, so it was early morning on the other coast and he sounded a little intrigued by my idea, so I started talking to him, sending him updates and asking him questions, like I couldn’t figure out that there were a hundred tiers of learning between him and I. I sort of failed to notice he only answered the once. I should have moved on with my own learning and writing and just prayed for a chance to one day say to him, “Hey, I emailed you that one time, remember?”
But I was not well, I was manic and it seemed as though my dreams were coming true with his positive first hint. I forget how many things I sent him, blogs, partial blogs, looking for some feedback, somehow imagining his fan mail doesn’t arrive in truckloads, maybe half a dozen, maybe a dozen? Finally it was enough, he either felt the need to fend me off, or he saw my need, that’s more how he spoke, and he phoned me. He gave me solid, untheoretical advice on dealing with my mental struggles, and I did feel some real connection with that. He dismissed my insight in seven syllables, “Seems kinda wacky to me,” and if you’re talking to some nobody, that’s not saying anything, but when Bob says “to me,” then that’s a trip or several to the library. He’s already said it.
It’s not that I didn’t have the data, so much, it’s the usual, I just wasn’t processing it, and frankly, I’m a youngest, I may have a unique point of view, but I’m very much in the habit of asking for and getting help, if someone else knows, why don’t I just ask them and why don’t they just tell me? Again, I got grade twelve equivalency, and I’m going straight to the top, and the top can tell me, but I won’t get it, will I? I think I get it at the most basic level now. My theory is humans abuse their kids on purpose, that being a tough, capable troop defender is the very same thing as being as being a crazy, violent, asshole criminal, but I was talking about parents and children.
Basic social theory, social relatedness theory, has it that the person a child need fear the least is their parent, gene interest and all. Parents, in theory, would not threaten the lives of their own for conformity or such, that we all want our genes to survive and thrive. So I’m pestering Bob, ignorantly trying to refute his first theories, the ones that made him who he is, and who TF am I? (I wasn’t, I’m not refuting social relatedness theory, of course not. That just seemed to be blocking my refutation of child discipline and punishment in general.)
For one thing, I’m the same grandiose idiot I was two years ago, and also, not completely over my meltdown. So I think I have an answer!
My answer is, humans have “socialized” their child-rearing, child education.
We farm that shit out.
To less related adults in the modern world, or to less related children in the more aboriginal children’s group, thus working around social theory. Surely some later Trivers ideas are also involved, evolved deception and self-deception.
I’m not going to be looking Bob up again, I hear he’s out from Rutgers, where I had found him before, and I made a point of losing his phone number from when he called me, I didn’t want to have it if I was just going to keep getting crazier. I don’t think I am, and I’ve learned my lesson, but just in case . . . if anybody out there talks to him, maybe this response will be of interest . . . of course anyone else, perhaps from some tier between Trivers and my homegrown, daydreaming self, who would like to chime in, maybe correct me, maybe help me work this out . . .
Jeff
Oct. 31st., 2018
Abuse with an Excuse 
Dear Jeff,
Oh, I dunno, just because The Man thinks your theory is kinda wacky does not mean a single thing to me. All my adult life I lived The Man’s theory that anti dopamine drugs would “treat” schizophrenia, and where did it get me? The more they are of and with the sorts of things that we call fame and notoriety, the less I tend to want to agree with anyone. So the “wackier “ the theory, the better, in my book.
NOT that I consider your theory wacky in the least. Not in their sense. I wonder if you did not lead in your discussion with him such as I was, with some statement about how you don’t know anything but maybe this theory is genius? I dunno, again. All I do know is that your basic premise makes more sense to me, the former medical student, and the former “ill take your stupid antipsychotics if you just take care of me and don’t hurt me more…” but of course they Did hurt me, much more, and the AP drugs likely damaged my brain so much I might even now need them. But I refuse to call myself wacky and anyone who does is likely to be summarily left behind.
I love this punishment is abuse with an excuse idea, and I think it hold much more water which is to say fundamental truth than much of anything I have read or heard from the liars in the establishment of “science” blah blah blah. Do you have any idea how many of these “great academics” know little to nothing about what really matters? I’m sorry, but if you are grandiose then so am I, but I was also called grandiose for saying I had had three books published! So fuck their idiotic “wacky” and revel in their ignorance.
Calling it or you wacky was just a way to put you in your place, you see, because he knows your theory is more valid than anything he thought up, but without a doctorate he won’t take you seriously…alas.
You are not wacky. And neither is your theory. In my considered and not so humble opinion.
Love
Phoebe
pS it is a rare thing for me to get opinionated, right? Ha ha ha!
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I noticed that I forgot to write to the title, I forgot to kiss up to him – but in bio circles, he needs no introduction. And he knew better than I did what I needed, I think.
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aaand, yes, grandiose is good, up to a point. At a certain level of it I’m happy, and don’t have to pay for the happy time, and like that, it’s better than the down that comes when the grandiosity fails. A mild level of grandiose just means happy – which, another Trivers bit, people feeling like they’re right, like they’re some how better, somehow worth more than average, or more than the next guy, that’s a manifestation of the survival instinct. You’re supposed to have a preference or a bias for yourself, in the event of trouble or a fight.It’s like, one of the very basic self-deceptions. (For half of us, at least. LOL)
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Oh, I expect Bob is with you and me about psychiatry in general . . . I tried to say, that meant something,that “wacky” comment, and i think I see what he meant now . . . no, no, no, thanks for defending me,but this fellow wrote the book on being three times smarter than the establishment,and his battles with THEM have never ended. Look him up, you’ll love this dude. That’s my idol you’re talking about there.
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Okay, I will look him up! Did not mean to diss your idol, not at all…Or I did not understand how you felt. Anyhow hope things are looking a bit better? Maybe they are not, but it is good to keep blogging…Love ya,
Phoebe
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love you too
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Okay, the dude is cool. Just found this and it was enough to convince me:
“Unlike other renowned scientists, Robert Trivers has spent time behind bars, drove a getaway car for Huey P. Newton, and founded an armed group in Jamaica to protect gay men from mob violence. ”
WOW!
Phoebe
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Right? And I tell you, the inside of a Trivers book is the smartest place I’ve ever visited. I’m so high and so sad these days, long reads are sort of beyond me, but I started The Folly of Fools before it got too bad and it’s so ambitious and so smart, deceptions within deceptions . . . the main thrust of the idea is that we have evolved the ability to self-deceive, because then we do not show the signs of lying so much, costs fewer calories and such . . .
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and unlike others, perhaps, he bothered to call me.
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