People seek refuge in the very power that injures them
Evidence
And it seems to me to be virtually a fundamental phenomenon of anthropology that people seek refuge in precisely the power that is causing them the injuries they suffer. Depth psychology even has a term for this: it is called `identification with the attacker’ . — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2486
It’s not so frightfully utopian at all, but I would rather simply say this to start with: … the difficulties because of which, in your theory, people seek out relief … the distress that drives people to seek out such forms of relief, derive precisely from the strain that is put upon them by institutions, namely by the organization of the world in forms that are alien to them and omnipotent over them … And it seems to me to be virtually a fundamental phenomenon of anthropology that people seek refuge in precisely the power that is causing them the injuries they suffer. Depth psychology even has a term for this: it is called `identification with the attacker’ … — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2486
Categorization
- DEFINE: Adorno glosses ‘identification with the attacker’, tying psychoanalytic theory to the broader Frankfurt theme of masses submitting to rulers
- XREF: Connects to Zamyatin’s ‘We’ and broader Critical Theory on internalized oppression; also Freudian defensive identification concept. — connects to: Persecuted victims reproduce the power they fear against others; Powerless peoples rationalize victimhood as providential accident — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 2443; Victims of oppression actively cope and adapt rather than only suffer damage (+2 more)
- corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 2486
Broader Connections
- Persecuted victims reproduce the power they fear against others
#expands(0.92) - People cling to hatred to postpone confronting underlying pain
#expands(0.85) — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Begin Again, 152 - People rationalize oppressive arrangements that harm them rather than protect their own interests
#exemplifies(0.85) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 2911 - Powerless peoples rationalize victimhood as providential accident
#corroborates(0.78) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 2443 - Victims of oppression actively cope and adapt rather than only suffer damage
#qualifies(0.75)