Introduction
This is the third of a five-part series of posts that criticize a book that serves to oppress individuals, whether they have mental health problems or not.
Leftists rarely refer to the various ways in which working-class people and community members are oppressed by professionals; this is one of the reasons for their failure at the level of practice. They underestimate the various resources used to control workers and community members.
As I indicated in another post, I engaged in a partial critique of the book Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy by David Burns, M.D. (1999). This book is used by many psychologists and psychiatrists as a basis for the psychological technique called “mindfulness”–and with reason since Dr. Burns defines human problems independently of social context–quite convenient for the class of employers since the economic, social and political oppressive and exploitative contexts are thereby ignored–or rather suppressed.
The reason why I read the book was that I was required to see a psychologist as a condition of receiving disability benefits from the Manitoba Teachers Society (see A Worker’s Resistance to the Capitalist Government or State and Its Representatives, Part Ten). Mr. Alan Slusky, a psychologist in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, recommended the book and, in fact, it was supposed to be part of my “therapy”–bibliotherapy. According to Wikipedia:
Bibliotherapy is a creative arts therapies modality that involves storytelling or the reading of specific texts with the purpose of healing. It uses an individual’s relationship to the content of books and poetry and other written words as therapy. Bibliotherapy is often combined with writing therapy.
I refer occasionally to John Dewey’s philosophy of science. I also refer occasionally to my dissertation. My doctoral dissertation compared the philosophies of human nature of John Dewey (an :American philosopher of education and author of, among other books, Human Nature and Social Conduct: An Introduction to Social Psychology, Democracy and Education and Logic: The Theory of Inquiry) and Paulo Freire (a Brazilian philosopher of education and author, among other books, of Pedagogy of the Oppressed).
Critique of the Contents of the Book
Let us now turn to the contents of the book and some of my criticisms. My critical comments are usually either in square brackets or separate points :
List of the “Definitions of Cognitive Distortions”: [All could be categorized as ineffective thinking, and since schools are supposed to function to enable children and adolescents to think, would it not be rational to criticize schools for the evident lack of fulfilling such a function. After all, there seems to be an epidemic of depressed people, according to Burns. Does Burns criticize schools at all? Probably not. It is “all in your mind”—cognitive mind, that is. Human nature is pure thought, and feelings must follow suit—regardless of the history of people and their context.]
All-or-Nothing Thinking
Overgenralization
Mental Filter
Disqualifying the Positive
Jumping to Conclusions
Magnification and Minimization
Emotional Reasoning
Should Statements
Labeling and Mislabeling
Personalization
Mr. Burns then provides “definitions” of these different so-called cognitive distortions. I make comments on them as we proceed with this “scientific” presentation:
“Definitions of Cognitive Distortions: All-or-Nothing Thinking: This refers to your tendency to evaluate your personal qualities in extreme, black-or-white categories.” [Burns certainly has a tendency to evaluate depression in extreme, Black-or-white categories. Either you have cognitive distortions which lead to distorted emotions, or you do not. In any case, an indication of the improper functioning of schools, which are supposed to teach children and adolescents how to think (Dewey, How We Think, 1933).]
“This way of evaluating things is unrealistic because life is rarely completely one way or the other.” [In the first place, Burns implies that he knows what life is all about—he speaks as if he knows about the life process in general—its meaning. I doubt that. His views are anti-evolutionary, and it is theory of evolution which teaches us what life involves. Furthermore, Burns fails to qualify “life—like most apologists of capitalist relations. He identifies this particular social life in which we live with life in general—methodologically incompetent and socially apologetic of the current social relations of life. Finally, Burns has an implicit condescending view of his reader. He knows what life is about whereas his readers are ignorant of the real nature of life. Such arrogance.]
P. 33: “Over-generalization. [Burns certainly over-generalizes. The use of the adverb “always”—and italicizing it to boot. Modern philosophers have distinguished between “always” and “some(times)”. Burns needs to learn humility.]
P. 34: “Mental Filter. You pick out a negative detail in any situation and dwell on it exclusively, thus perceiving that the whole situation is negative.” [Another indication of the problem with schools. On the other hand, Burns’ lack of capacity to even refer to situations and his lack of capacity to dwell on them exclusively is an expression of his mental filtering.]
“When you are depressed, you wear a pair of eyeglasses with special lenses that filter out anything positive. All that you allow to enter your conscious mind is negative. Because you are not aware of this “filtering process,” you conclude that everything is negative. The technical name for this process is `selective abstraction.’ It is a bad habit that can cause you to suffer much needless anguish.”[ When you lack any critical spirit, you wear a pair of eyeglasses with special lenses that filter out anything negative. All that you allow to enter your conscious mind is positive. Because you are not aware of this `filtering process,’ you conclude that everything is positive. I have yet to see Burns refer to the kind of society in which we live and the pervasive oppression and exploitation that characterizes it. As for “habit”: it is a structure, and we need habits if we are to have the power to act at all in an effective manner.]
“Disqualifying the Positive: An even more spectacular mental illusion is the persistent tendency of some individuals to transform neutral or even positive experiences into negative ones.” [This view is something characteristic of those who simply discount other peoples’ feelings. Burns claims that the experience is positive. If, however, the experience is negative for the person experiencing it, then it is experienced as negative. This does not end the affair. The question then becomes: is the person warranted in judging the experience as negative under the circumstances? The person needs to learn to contextualize her experience—something which schools are notorious at not doing. By discounting the original way in which a person experiences the world, Burns is simply reducing the person to a being of pure knowledge—like schools. However, knowledge in a problematic situation is a result and not a point of departure. Another point: Depression may well require a change of situation since the person’s habits (response patterns) are formed in relation to determinate environments so that different response patterns may be able to be formed through a change in environment. From Dewey, Lectures on Psychological and Political Ethics, 1898, 139:
“We have extreme pathological cases where these moods become so fixed that a man cannot get outside of them. In cases of melancholia a man gets to dwelling on everything dark and gloomy and dwells on them so long that they come to possess his consciousness, and something like travel or a new occupation is required to get him out of it. A person who has a continuous depressed mood will unconsciously invent causes for it and thus lead to hallucinations.”
Dewey’s solution of a change in occupation or in travelling, however, does not address the pervasiveness of capitalist relations in modern society. He did, perhaps, realize its pervasiveness later in his life, though. In any case, rather than a change in occupation or in travelling, what might be required is—struggle against those who exploit or oppress her/him.]
[Another point: We could turn the tables and accuse Burns of doing the same thing, but from the opposite side: “An even more spectacular mental illusion is the persistent tendency of some individuals to transform neutral or even negative experiences into positive ones.” Burns simply want to ignore that people’s negative experiences may indeed be negative—and that it is the social situation that may require changing and not the “thoughts.”]
[Paulo Freire, in his Pedagogy of the Oppressed, noted that some people were resigned to their situation of oppression. From the point of view of those who oppressed them, this was a positive experience. From Freire’s point of view, it was a negative experience. Which was it?]
P. 36: “Jumping to Conclusions. You arbitrarily jump to a negative conclusion that are not justified by the facts of the situation.” [A problem of schools not performing their proper function. Since Burns has yet to refer to the fact of the situation for most people—the need to subordinate their will to employers if they are to obtain money—can he justify his conclusion that negative feelings are a result of negative thoughts, or cognitive distortion? How does he go about determining “what the facts of the situation are”? Has he ever questioned the legitimacy of the employer-employee relation in his practice? And should not the nature of this relation be taken into account when determining the “facts of the situation”? And the same with the hierarchical nature of schools. And the dictatorship in many families. Etc.]
“MIND READING: You make the assumption that other people are looking down on you, and you’re so convinced about this that you don’t even bother to check it out.” [Lack of inquiry—typical in schools. Also, there are many signals of how stupid we are—such as bad grades. A feeling of inferiority can have its objective ground and then extrapolated because it is experienced so frequently by certain classes of people—poorer people probably. Have there been studies on this?]
P. 37: “THE FORTUNE TELLER ERROR: It’s as if you had a crystal ball that foretold only misery for you. You imagine that something bad is about to happen, and you take this prediction as a fact even though it is unrealistic [my emphasis].” [Schools again—lack of experience in facing life’s problems—focus on “school problems.” The same problem as before: experience has led to persistent negation of plans, etc. And has Burns presented substantial evidence that such people are being unrealistic? Is he not being unrealistic in contending that only thoughts (without ever specifying what thoughts are, how they arise and how they function) cause depression?]
“Magnification and Minimization: Another thinking trap you might fall into is called “magnification” and “minimization,” but I like to think of it as the “binocular trick’* because you are either blowing things up out of proportion or shrinking them. Magnification commonly occurs when you
look at your own errors, fears, or imperfections and exaggerate their importance. … You’re looking at your faults through the end of the binoculars that makes them appear gigantic and grotesque…When you think about your strengths, you may do the opposite—look through the wrong end of the binoculars so that things look small and unimportant. If you magnify your imperfections and minimize your good points, you’re guaranteed to feel inferior.” .
[Again, contextualization is required—a function of proper thinking that remains undeveloped in schools.
“Emotional Reasoning: You take your emotions as evidence for the truth. …This kind of reasoning is misleading because your feelings reflect your thoughts and beliefs. [Where do beliefs originate? Are not beliefs social in origin in most cases?] If they are distorted—as is quite often the case [not always now? Which is it? Always or “quite often”?]—your emotions will have no validity.” [Note the difference between Dewey’s view and that of Burns. Dewey acknowledges the emotion as legitimate within the context as experienced. If the person can contextualize the emotion, then the emotion may then become judged as illegitimate. On the other hand, the emotion may also be judged legitimate—depending on the context. Schools often ignore emotions.
P . 39: “Should Statements: You try to motivate yourself by saying, `I should do this.…” These statements cause you to feel pressured and resentful.” [Why would a person respond in that manner on a consistent basis? What is Burns’ grounds for making such an assertion?]
“When you direct should statements toward others, you will usually feel frustrated.” [Is this a normal emotion for Burns or abnormal?]
[I guess we should not have any expectations of ourselves or of anyone else. Burns, of course, has one exception—we should be expected to have rational thoughts. He certainly continuously makes should statements about what others should do.]
“Labeling and Mislabeling: Personal labeling means creating a completely negative self-image based on your errors.” [Actually, labeling and mislabeling occur daily in schools. The “stupid people”—self-identified as such—for instance, attended power mechanics whereas the “smart people” attended secondary French in the school where I taught. This has a racial aspect since only Caucasians attended French (with one exception) whereas most of those who attended power mechanics were Aboriginals.]
P. 40: “Labeling yourself is not only self-defeating, it is irrational.” [Note the complete lack of reference to the realities of social hierarchy and the labeling effects of such social hierarchies. How is labeling “irrational” when there are many signs that certain people are inferior?]
“Your self cannot be equated with any one thing you do.” [Let us see. Children and adolescents are forced to attend schools for at least 5.5 hours a day. They are defined as students by those in power. Is it irrational to label oneself in those terms? The same applies when you become an employee.]
“Your life is a complex and ever-changing flow of thoughts, emotions, and actions.” [It is interesting that Burns explicitly now refers to three aspects of human life that form the organizational structure of Dewey’s work Psychology. However, Dewey also recognized that the economic structure played an important place in reproducing the life process. We could say that there are at least four general structures that organize the life process in modern capitalist society: the family, the school, the employer-employee relation and the capitalist state. A fifth could be added—friends, though that often is related to the other structures. Burns characterizes life in such general terms he is incapable of seeing how any specific kind of life is structured by such demands, which may pull a person in various and indeed opposite directions.]
P. 40: “When you label other people, you will invariably generate hostility. A common example is the boss who sees his occasionally irritable secretary as `an uncooperative bitch.’ [Note the implicit sexism here—men are not generally called `bitch,’ so the secretary is implicitly a woman and the boss is explicitly considered a man]. Because of this label, he resents her [now made explicit] and jumps at every chance to criticize her. She, in turn, labels him an `insensitive chauvinist’ and complains about him at every opportunity. So, around and around they go at each other’s throats, focusing on every weakness or imperfection as proof of the other’s worthlessness.” [It is interesting here that Burns does not even consider the unequal relation of power between the boss and the secretary. Such a lack of understanding of the situation. Consider my own case. My “boss”—the principal—writes an assessment that is inaccurate. And? Does it matter? I wrote a 30 page response. The MTS representative considered that the principal’s assessment reflected badly—on the principal. However, the MTS rep, when it came down to it, stated that it was “his” school. The MTS lawyer also indicated that even if I proved bias in the assessment, all that would happen is that I would have to be reassessed and that the intent of the superintendent to have my teaching even further micro-managed would proceed. Burns presents the situation as purely personal—not an unequal power relation. He decontextualizes the situation and strips it of what is distinctive about it—a relation of economic power of the “boss” over the employee. Such illogical thinking from the superlogical Burns.]
“Personalization: This distortion is the mother of guilt! You assume responsibility for a negative even when there is no basis for doing so. You arbitrarily conclude that what happened was your fault or reflects your inadequacy, even when you are not responsible for it.” [Why “arbitrarily”? This looks at the situation from a purely rationalist manner. Do not people have histories? What they may do that immediately seems arbitrary may in fact be reasonable given their history. Does Burns even consider the complex nature of human beings? That they have a history? That they are biographical beings? Hegel once wrote that it was very easy to judge (this is what Burns does when he uses the term “arbitrarily”) but much more difficult to understand. Burns’ understanding of human life seems to be thoroughly flawed. In any case, another problem which schools do not address adequately.]
P.48: In fact, your feelings, per se, don’t even count—except as a mirror of the way you are thinking.” This issue has already been addressed above. Burns, like schools, treat human beings as pure beings of thought. Feelings in schools do not count—only what is considered rational. How ethical.]
“What is the key to releasing yourself from your emotional prison? Simply this: Your thoughts create your emotions; therefore, your emotions cannot prove that your thoughts are accurate.” [This external view of the nature of cause will be addressed in another post. Burns’ “science” is positivistic and uncritical.]
P. 49: “I want to teach you to avoid painful feelings based on mental distortions, because they are neither valid nor desirable. I believe [no, Burns knows—mere belief is not enough] that once you have learned how to perceive life more realistically you will experience an enhanced emotional life with a greater appreciation for genuine sadness—which lacks distortion—as well as joy.” [Note the attribution of a false depression to most if not all of his patients. They do not really experience depression or sadness since they are distorting the true nature of their experiences. Only the true experience is real—not the false experience. This denigration of how people immediately experience the world in which we live is typical of rationalists, who reduce experience to pure cognition and knowledge. Enough said about this. Burns’ theory has many, many holes in it. The educator indeed needs to be educated.]
The Abolitionary 