Guest post: A cultural version of the Savior Complex
Originally a comment by Sastra on A policy vacuum filled with loonies.
I’m becoming more and more convinced that, due to a confluence of factors, modern society has become entangled in a cultural version of the Savior Complex. The psychologically exaggerated need to save other people has lead to the inadvertent creation of those who need saving: in this case, the Trans Child. Here the combined influence of Therapy Culture and nostalgia for civil rights battles seduces people into loving the pure and innocent Authentic Self suppressed by the Orthodox and bullied by Oppressors. These kids are vulnerable, weak, needy, hurt. They’re just like gay kids used to be in the bad old days. But they can save them! Today, in the here and now! All that’s needed is the courage to believe them, and to continue to believe them, despite whatever obstacles the “reasonable” may try to put in their path.
Psychologists point out that those with Savior Complex can often harm those they try to help by overestimating their capabilities, misdiagnosing the problem, and/or inhibiting the natural growth and development of the designated Victim. Again, that seems to apply here. Teachers deal closely with children; it’s especially easy for them to be seduced into a role of noble advocate rescuing their charges from an unfeeling world.
Sastra, well said.
I believe it also triggers its counterpart, the Need To be saved Complex.
It’s why we have trigger warnings, sensitivity readers, protection from contrary views, cancelling, erasures, and book burnings. It’s why Blue Collar workers worship the Trumps, Erdogans, et al.
Many of them are gay, of course:
I believe that many of the clinicians and others who have developed and promoted this system have been motivated, at least in part, by homophobia. Better to mutilate a child than to allow him or her to grow up as a healthy gay man or lesbian.
@ Night Crow
I don’t think homophobia motivates any TRA with a track record of being liberal. Same with misogyny. Those are most likely unintended results derived from a motivating narrative in which an innate Gender Identity has been successfully framed as the antidote to homophobia and misogyny.
What goes for us, goes for them. When we’re speaking to each other in Gender Critical forums there’s never a whiff of anticipation for gay people going back in the closet or women going back into the kitchen. Accusing us of that sort of conservative agenda makes no sense; it’s what we’re fighting against. And, by the same token, when the Trans Rights Activists get together and talk about their future plans, nothing about returning to the good old days of gender conformity comes up. They believe they’re liberating people from those restrictions.
It’s usually a safe bet to assume that, if both sides are accusing the other of wanting Horrible Thing X, neither side actually wants Horrible Thing X. Something else is going on.
What I think is happening instead is a kind of blindness, where people are so in love with a story they’re playing out that the larger picture with its reality checks isn’t registering. Or, perhaps, only starts to get clear slowly, over time, when rationalizations start sounding lamer and lamer.
“Funny how it almost feels like conversion therapy for gay kids, isn’t it? I mean, we KNOW that’s not it, right? Those kids are their true gender which makes them straight. But I can sort of see how someone else — someone new to all this, and without all our information and experience, of course — might think we’re turning gay kids straight. That’s wrong. But there’s a … resemblance. It’s almost disturbing.”
I hope I’m not harping on about this but it’s the Disney complex. Everyone is writing their own part in a trite, moralistic kid’s movie and then getting increasingly upset when other people don’t play to the script. I almost long for the days when every man saw himself as a cowboy and women were, well little more than set decoration. Almost! But, of course, the cowboy myth was just another saviour myth.