Posted by alexandra_k on January 1, 2015, at 18:47:44
In reply to Re: wrecked the bar, posted by alexandra_k on January 1, 2015, at 18:18:00
I remember being absolutely fascinated by the mind...
Perhaps it started out with the whole God thing... With a phase of not really believing - but really, really, really, really, really wanting to believe. With not saying I was a Christian... With not being saved... Because I didn't feel I could be in good conscience. Because I thought that people who were saved / were Christians (really properly in their hearts) didn't smoke and swear and so on. But I wasn't prepared to give those things up. But I couldn't deal with being a hypocrite... And I read the whole bible... And I really really really really really tried to believe... But I couldn't quite...
And then I did get saved. And stuff. And felt bad for being such a hypocrite / such a bad christian. And then the hypocracy I saw in the church with so very many people being really very bad christians in so very many ways (adultery and child abuse and alcohol and...)
And then I didn't want to believe... But I felt so very much guilt. And it was like I still believed with my heart even though I had rejected the whole idea of God with my head.
And I was really interested in that... In the relationship between emotion and belief and action and in how... F*ck*ng slow some of that can be to catch up to alterations in one of those...
Spiritual things used to freak me out, too. Ghosts. Haunted houses. The usual nonsense. Telepathy. Supernatural phenomenon. UFO's. The x-files... I didn't rationally believe, but I was emotionally terrified. And then I wasn't sure whether there might actual be rational reason to believe.
Then things a bit more 'real'. The idea of psychopaths / sociopaths who are only pleasant to the world but who do horrible things hidden away. About whether there could really be people like that. About whether x or y or z might actually be like that... About the idea of multiple personalities... And split brain people who grab this with one hand but push that with the other... All the... 'popular science' cool... Fascinating... Stuff... I was really taken by it... And I needed to sort it out to my own satisfaction.
What did I want? Probably a job that doesn't exist. Thank you TV. Some kind of a psychology person... Some kind of... Genuine knowledge / understanding of what was going on with the mind... Yeah. Yeah...
Something psychoanalytic... A deeper understanding of human psychology... The sort of deeper understanding / insight you see on TV sometimes... In a more psychologically complex novel...
I still do feel the force of that. But the job description... Doesn't really exist. Was the biggest myth of all... Only exists in TV and in novels... In the occasional journal article that people write to immortalise their clients in flattering ways (how much is that worth!!!) And I feel some kind of... Squeemishness... At... Some kind of... Well... Things are starting to blend back to belief in ghosts and UFO's... The unassailable authority ones parents had when one was, like, two years old.
I wonder how many kids out there want to be forensic pathologists or whatever whatever... Because of TV shows with made up jobs... Where people get to do the 'best' / 'funnest' parts of so very many other jobs... Doctor and lawyer and police detective and computer scientist and burglar and so on... Unemployed... With all the free time these people get... Sigh...
My ranting... Could be taken for good lawyering... For reals. I mean... It sounds like some kind of a joke... But it isn't. it is about mounting a case... An insurmountable case a number of reasons that compel the jury or the judge or whatever to agree... I'm good at staying however many steps ahead. At anticipating likely objections... And counter-objections... And counter-counter objections. I'm pretty quick to see that that line of reasoning will be aborted several moves down the track so better leave that line alone... This other line over here is much more promising and after 3 or 4 counters and counter-responses - I win!
And this whole idea of framing... Of framing being crucial. Of how there isn't any objective truth or fact of the matter for the things that are most important... And I do have some understanding of human psychology and the things that people find so very hard to tease apart... E.g., confusing liking with innocence and so on...
I, uh, would make a good lawyer. Yeah.
But I kind of feel... I wish I could employ those skills in advocating for my patients.
But probably the health system doesn't want that. Sigh.
It would be kinda fun to go after big tobacco etc... In theory, I mean. In practice... It would be reading and writing reading and writing so some actor can have their (scripted) day in court.
Yawn.
Parts of Boston Legal were pretty good. The show peaked around season three. One good season. Where Schore (and others) were, in fact, brilliant. Then... What happened? The writers change? The election got close and someone decided to use the show to rant political ideology. Over and over and over. No originality. No brilliance. It never recovered. Them winning cases that were implausible. Them not being able to distinguish the idea of brilliant lawyering from winning. How it isn't about winning or losing... How it is about how you play the game... What you do with the cards you have got...
I was amazed at how... Human things were here. When I had my day in court. Technically... The judge isn't allowed to consider anything that isn't brought before them by the lawyer. Because we don't have an inquisitorial legal system. So if you have a sh*t lawyer who doesn't raise things that are relevant then the judge isn't allowed to consider those things. In my case... The judge used her ability to put 2 and 2 together (which my lawyer lacked) and her summation of my case was... Well... The most charitable thing to say was that it was just a tad synthetic. Which was just as well since my lawyer couldn't manage to raise all of the relevant points that I clearly laid out / gifted to her in writing several weeks in advance of the actual court appearance. I mean... I got her to send me a copy of the Word file she was going to submit and all she really needed to do was 'accept changes' ffs...
Probably she had too many cases...
That is what needs to change... We need to get better at letting people work from home etc. We need to get better at letting people have less people on their workload. We need to get better at assessing the elusive *quality* of care...
Why do we put our faith in psychopathic economists??
poster:alexandra_k
thread:1058481
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20141123/msgs/1074689.html