Power Disparity - a general overview, David Smail, Sarah Blatter Hrdy

An adult human is naturally enough more powerful than a human infant, a toddler or a child.

egalitarian cultures typically trust their children, they do not bully them

A healthy adult never exploits that power disparity to force the child to meet the perceived needs of the adult. A healthy adult uses that power disparity to care for the child, careful to meet the child's need, cognisant of the fact that the child's capacity for taking responsibility and taking action is a changing dynamic, one that is to be trusted and nurtured so that the child matures into a healthy adult.
A healthy adult would never leverage power over another in order to meet his or her perceived needs.
A healthy adult would never bully a child.
What kind of culture would generate adults who would bully a child?

Indian Residential Schools in Canada and America, a regime from the 1840s to the 1990s


Cultures that generate Power Hierarchies where superiority/inferiority values are normalised tend to be inequitable and violent.
Such cultures are innately exploitative. Such cultures generate a lot of trauma that is never resolved or healed.  Healthy parenting is made much more difficult within such cultures.
We have ample evidence that the way a hierarchy of power culture relates to a treats the children is symptomatic and traumatising, and that this intergenerational retraumatising is a leading factor in maintaining the hierarchy of power as a cult(are). The values of Power over others are internalised bye direct experience.
It is clear that these cultures are not expressions of optimal biological health for the human species.
Alloparenting.
A major behavioural separation between Primates and Hominims is that within Hominims the practice Alloparenting is widespread. 
Alloparenting is where the whole community shares in the care of the children, and other vulnerable members. Alloparenting means 'Other Parents'. Cultures where a child will have many Mothers, Fathers, Aunties and Uncles and older siblings and their friends who all share in the care of the child. Care is a lifelong practice.
'Mothers and Others' is a book positing the hypothesis that alloparenting is the dividing behavioural point between Primates and Hominins, or Monkeys, Apes and Humans. Well worth a read.
That behavioural difference is associated with or close correlates with the development of the much larger forebrain of the Hominims.
The natural healthy development of Emotional State Self Regulation is a staple of healthy relationships (and is not the same a suppression of emotions) requires activation of the fore brain - thoughtful, reflective, considered action oriented - to calm the emotional brain - because the emotional part of the brain, the amygdala and hippocampus part is reactive, sudden action oriented. This capacity is best learned in infancy, through an experiential dynamic of being cared for, all needs being met in a timely fashion.
The healthy person's emotional state is self regulated, which is key to healthy working relationships across a community of people who care for one another. 
We are human, after all, and we have moods, we can feel discomfort, pain, confusion, irritation because we are sensitive and we live within a dynamically changing environment. Accidents can happen, we can wake up out of sorts, we feel....  and being able to deal with those feelings, being able to respond rather than blindly react, is a sign of maturity. We call it emotional intelligence.
Emotional intelligence seeks to neutralise power disparities. Emotional blindness seeks to exploit power disparities.

David Smail writes about Power Disparity as a factor in human psychological distress. 
His website is off-line, however way back machine has archived it, and I found it very useful indeed, in bringing workable insight to the problems we are facing today with regards Power, Hierarchy, Psychological Distress and Human Unhappiness.
I have a number of his books in my small library.

David Smail - Biographical Note

Born 23.4.38 at Putney, London, David Smail studied philosophy and psychology at University College London, and was awarded a PhD in psychology there in 1965. 

He entered the National Health Service as a clinical psychologist in 1961, and in 1964 joined Tom Caine's psychology department at Claybury Hospital in Essex, which was at that time pioneering the 'therapeutic community' approach to the treatment of mental disorder. There followed a fruitful period of collaboration with Dr Caine, resulting in a number of research publications supporting therapeutic community methods. 

David Smail moved to Nottingham in 1968, where he remained as head of clinical psychology services until 1993. He retired fully from the NHS in 1998. He held the honorary post of Special Professor in Clinical Psychology at the University of Nottingham from 1979 until 2000. 

David died on 3 August 2014. The Guardian published an obituary available athttp://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/aug/17/david-smail 

David Small interview on Youtube.

Listen as Davis Smail explains some of his doubts about psychotherapy - short MP3, will pay on your devices player.

There is a War being Waged by Wealth as Power against all of us, irrespective of our amateur political leanings.

https://dwylcorneilius.blogspot.com/2022/01/why-oligarchy-are-at-war-against.html

The Fossil Fuel and Mining Oligarchy knew about Climate Disruption 50 years ago. Their own Scientists confirmed it. The Shareholders decided to deny the Science. They wanted to keep drilling, producing, maintain and increase consumption in order  to amass ever more Wealth as Power.

That makes them culpable for the avoidable harms they chose not to avoid.

That culpability also makes them liable for the costs of the harms caused, and other ancillary costs associated with all of this.

They KNOW this.

They understand that if ANY Democratic Legislature upholds, enforces or passes Laws to hold them accountable that they will lose their Wealth and more importantly, they will lose the Political Power as a Ruling Class Lobby.

This they have chosen to not cede.

They are therefore waging an all out war against Democratic Accountability.

Most ordinary people do not understand this because we are still fixated on the idea of Greed for Money rather than the matter of Wealth as Power, Wealth as a Ruling Lobby that dictates how society is to be run.

This war is a war against all of us, irrespective of our political leanings.

Solidarity is the only power we can exert. This they know and that is why they spend so much energy on dividing us......

When we build a rational solidarity, their Rule is over.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Thank you for reading this blog.

"Do what you love, it is your gift to universe."

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If we had been listening to the old, old peoples, we probably wouldn't be standing in this mess.

First People's
Axiom Poem

"If we had ever listened to   

the old, old peoples,

we would not be in this mess,

right now!"

I have been hearing the ancestors all my life,

heeding their call.

Others, born before me, and after,

have put me and kept me in this mess.

They call it civilisation.

Others, born before me, and after,

are doing their best to clean up this mess.

They call it living well.

"We are the forest, 

we are the rivers and the valleys, 

we are the weathered rocks, 

we are the trees, 

we are the roots and vines, 

the creatures are our neighbours, 

and we theirs.

living together, 

in a shared living space. 

we all nurture together. 

We are the food we eat. 

Knowing this, our intelligence, 

our sensitivity and 

our love is what makes us truly healthy human

in this place.."

We will tidy up the mess, if you let us.

We will help you heal, if you want to come home.

We will care for you, we will nurture you.

Oligarch, Pope, President or Prime Minister, Slave or Worker,

Your status not really matter,

Our intention is not sinister.

This is the generosity of ancient cultures,

Who have seen so much you do not know,

Calling to your heart and ears -

"Listen! We have much to show you,

and you have much laughter ahead,

when you heal the bully behaviour.

then you can safely rest your heart,
unworry your head.".

This is the generosity of ancient cultures,

Who have seen so much you do not know,

Calling to your heart and ears -

"Listen! We have much to show you,

and you have much growth and love ahead,

when you heal the bully behaviour.

then you can safely rest your heart, unworry your head"

whisper in their hearts :

"unhealthy behaviour is not a biological norm".

Now it is also a song...

  

Kindest regards

Corneilius

"Do what you love, it's Your Gift to Universe"

Thank you for reading this blog. All we need to do is be genuinely honest, responsive to the evidence we find, and ready to reassess when new evidence emerges. The rest is easier .