Anger and Other Feelings - Part 1

It's been said:

Anger is a "secondary" emotion...something that makes us feel powerful when we are feeling vulnerable. Any time you are feeling angry, if you drill down you will find something triggered that anger and that trigger will invariably be something that hurt or disappointed, &/or frightened you. Sadness makes us feel vulnerable...anger makes us feel powerful...and we therefore we do not feel vulnerable. If we are not in an emotional place in our lives where we feel safe to experience vulnerable emotions, then anger is our go-to feeling.

When you feel safe to be vulnerable, when you can experience the feelings of hurt and disappointment without feeling unsafe, you will find you experience less and less anger.

The above statement is complete nonsense. Specifically, the statement is reflective of in inadequate understanding of the mind, reflects the generalization of a specific therapeutic technique for anger management, as a statement of truth to the whole of psychological understanding, and the generalization of this technique perpetuates an ontology that focuses on abuse perpetrators and discounts abuse victims. It is an ontology of abuse.

The idea that anger is secondary attempts to impose a superficial and now outdated understanding of psychology -- the Cognitive Theory.  A more accurate depiction of the human mind is held within the Constructivist model.  The time has come not to absorb the Constructivist model within the cognitive theory, but to formulate a Constucivist hypothesis to compete with and replace the Cognitive Theory.

There is no evidence of the secondary nature of emotions. There is no hierarchy of emotions.  The mind has multiple constructs or slices  that are differentiated as thoughts, emotions, images, tactile-feelings, scents. These exist discretely in the mind and have little or no meaning on their own. There is no hierarchy with regard to these slices or constructs. These constructs have connections to other constructs of the same and/or different types and originating and/or manifesting at the same and/or different times. It is the connections that give the constructs meaning as entities, forms, structures or gestalts..

 For example there may be an anger slice that is connected to an image (simple example) of a person. Or sadness related to the image of the person at certain points in times and all times and connected to a specific thought. These constructs or slices and their connections form a specific event structure or gestalt. Gestalts and constructs get imprinted and thus become memories.  But there is no hierarchy there are feelings, images, scents, time and thoughts and the connections that form a remembered construct or a gestalt. These the gestalts and constructs are all individual slices differentiated by their connections, capacity, type and intensity. The gestalts themselves have no hierarchy. Each and any can be brought into consciousness where they have the focus.

 As Cognitive Theory is replaced by a Constructivist Theory, modalities of therapy will have to be replaced based on the more accurate view of how the mind functions provided by the Constructivist model and recent gains in the understanding of trauma, including the work of survivors of trauma in group settings like Survivors of Incest Anonymous.

Emotions as differentiated from thoughts or images exist in the mind without the need for external experience to implant them. They exist with their capacities (potential for depth intensity degree) or don't exist from conception. though that emotions exist as constructs or slices and are not dependent on a linear or hierarchical sequence which would be necessary to prove the secondary nature of any emotion.

To thus falsely  label anger as secondary emotion has specific consequences for the survivor of childhood sexual abuse. First it discounts the survivor. It  discounts the survivor's experience.  Who the survivor is.

Anger is a perfectly normal and primary response to the evil of Childhood Sexual Abuse and in fact all types of abuse. that was perpetrated on the survivor. To label the anger associated with incest or other abusive experiences as secondary is an attempt to diminish the importance of the event and the negative effect on the survivor -- the corruption of self and EGO, the invasions of boundaries etc. It is an attempt to ease the responsibility of the perpetrator by inserting a primary emotion -- not anger -- between the survivor, the event, the perpetrator and the perfectly normal response of anger. It is an attempt to guilt and shame the survivor for feeling angry. It is an attempt to mitigate diminish the survivor by saying he/she has no right to be angry -- its just secondary --.when it would in fact be abnormal for the survivor not to experience angry as a primary attachment to the events of incest childhood Sexual Abuse and in fact all other forms of abuse. It diminishes the seriousness and the evil of the abusive event(s). Thus diminishing the survivor and elevating the perpetrator.

To render anger as secondary needing a primary emotion between the event and the anger is also yet another of the million ways pop-psychologists tell the survivor to "just get over it" -- the abuse. ”It wasn't that bad, nothing to be angry about, you’re hurt that’s all." Therapists who are grounded in sound psychological principles people who understand psychology, do not discount survivors of abuse in this manner. They understand and support the survivor in the primary nature of their anger saying, of course you're angry, who wouldn't be, you have every right to be angry, it is perfectly normal for you to be angry." In fact this provides for a good assessment that can be used to determine a good therapist from a bad therapist. In the initial meeting tell them about your abuse and asses their response. Tell them about your anger and gauge their response. If they even hint at your anger being secondary proceed no further with them.

 To insert an emotion between the abusive event  and the anger is refelects an abnormal response to an anger producing event and is in fact a therapeutic technique rather than an actual modle of the human mind. that has to be practiced by those who have anger issues.

There is no research to support that anger or any other emotion occurs in a secondary manner. 

Therapies based on Cognitive Theory are ineffective because they are often applied based on flawed or incomplete assessments due to an inadequate understanding of the mind provided by the cognitive theory.  Additionally, therapies based on the Cognitive view, and the language associated with them have broken free from the psychological realm and made their way into popular psychology and have become accepted as "fact" within society.  Taken in totality this permeation of flawed theory and false therapies and beliefs promote an ontology that is detrimental to the survivors of traumatic abuse, and thus support traumatic abuse. Traumatic abuse includes Child abuse, Childhood sexual abuse, and domestic violence.

People with anger management issues act on the anger in ways that are inappropriate and harmful. The necessity of anger management is itself an argument against the idea that anger is secondary. If anger were truly a secondary emotion then people would act initially from the primary emotion not the anger. That fact that people need anger management therapy, logically it follows that they are acting from their first, initial or primary feeling the emotion of anger.  It is from anger management therapy that the above statement originated.

The therapy itself provides a mechanism, a technique for those with anger management issues to pause and evaluate their anger thus rendering by virtue of the therapy or technique anger to the role of a secondary emotion. The technique itself is not sufficient to prove that anger is secondary. In fact it is a technique to overcome the primary nature of anger by those who act their anger in ways that are destructive or harmful. It is the pause before acting that is the essential of the therapy not the rendering of anger to a secondary role which is the effect of the therapy not the reality of how the mind works. Like many things in psychology that have been popularized the anger management technique has been used adopted in popular thought as the way in which the mind works and thus adopted across the board as a truth. Again there is no evidence that this anger management technique portrays an actual reality of how the mind works and seeing it thus does a disservice to those of us who do not have anger management issues.

People who are provided with anger management therapy fall into to two basic categories, those who express their anger verbally in appropriate ways and those who are perpetrators of domestic violence.  Both instances are abusive, but the latter represents a seriousness that anger management techniques are insufficient to address. The reason anger management techniques are insufficient when addressing domestic violence is that the therapy ignores the motivation for the abuse and the pay-off the pleasure the abuser gets from doing violence to another person.  Someone who has an anger management issue addresses the primary emotion of anger in a verbal expression toward the object of the anger. A perpetrator of domestic violence takes some sort of pleasure in physically harming and thus traumatizing another human being. There is no therapy that will remove this pleasure motivation, thus domestic violence falls under the category of evil not a psychological issue and engages in evil the perpetration of domestic violence because that is who they are.  Science may or may not one day be able to uncover and remove and thus treat those who take pleasure in hurting others -- the definition of evil.

Like many things in psychology that have been accepted on a popular basis this technique has been built on as if it were a real depiction of how the human mind works rather than what i is a therapeutic for disordered individuals. therefore it is not the therapeutic that has been adopted into popular culture and built on but an inaccurate depiction of the technique as a model for how the normal human mind works. Unfortunately, there are many who call themselves therapists who have been taken in my this fallacy and pass it on to their clients as if it were scientific truth. Such is the nature of psychology in this country that a limited concept is adopted by popular culture and then accepted by the practitioners and passed on to clients as if it were supported by the science of psychology it is not. It is supported by a popular misconception of how the human mind works.

It doesn't help that therapy in question fits nicely into a cognitive linear perspective.

As mentioned above, people who have anger management issues need a therapeutic that allows them to pause before acting. These people need to pause between the feeling of anger and the expression of that feeling -- the action. The person with the anger management problem is encouraged to stop and question why they are angry, but this doesn't prove that anger is secondary. What it proves is that people with anger management issues need to stop when angry before they act and one way of doing this is to analyze their anger. Pausing for any reason, even to analyze why they are angry slows them down long enough so they don’t act on the anger impulses. It is a technique not a proof that anger is secondary. Ironically it is often perpetrators who are treated for anger management, as if their propensity to abuse others were simply an anger management issue.  The nature of abuse is much deeper than simply anger management. Treating the perpetrator by providing them with a technique to control the anger impulse ignores these deeper issues.  These include the motivation for acting out anger in the first place,as well as the pay-off or pleasure that abusers get from abusing other people.

Further treating the abuser for anger impulse control gives focus, and control to the abuser. These two aspects are part of the abusers motivation in the first place. Focusing on the abuser and giving them control ignores the damage done to the survivor. It is this damage done to the survivor that provides the abuser with his/her payoff or pleasure in the first place. This is the deeper nature of abuse. Focusing on the abuser, giving the abuser control and ignoring the true nature of abuse diminishes the survivor and actually perpetuates abuse in all its forms.

Ontologically, focuses attention on the perpetrator, ignoring the issues of motivation and pleasure payoff, discounting and minimizing and survivor's issues reflects a culture that supports  perpetration and abuse. It is no wonder that abuse continues and grows. Rendering anger as a secondary emotion, is one example of a culture that focuses attention on the perpetrator, ignores the survivor, and thus perpetuates and supports abuse while feigning to be against abuse.

I am a survivor. I am angry.  I will not forgive and far from hurting me,  my anger empowers me and will drive change in a society that tolerates abuse and supports the "poor sick" perpetrator.