One psychological technique that I have found useful in considering the
"sell out" and/or "compromise" problem for 60's people is the "Bounce-Back"
theory. This attitudinal approach was developed by the military after the
Korean War as an attempt to counteract the debilitating and fatal effects of
psychological "breaking" of prisoners. The "Bounce-Back" theory says that
after you break, sell out, or as Don Monderud called it in a previous post,
"Bend", you do not treat it as a final event but rather when you are
stronger and recovered from the mental or physical strain that caused the
"fall from grace" you bounce-back, renounce/recant/reform and get back into
the fight. Others involved (in the military case, other prisoners) must
support the bounce-back in order for it to work. The key involved is that
the "sell-out" is not viewed as a permanent fatal human flaw but as a
natural response to on overwhelming situation.
Lets look at Don's post (May 31, 2000) with this theory in mind. He says:
"I think we did what we could at the time and many of us took jobs and
raised families...lets face it, Reagan and his ilk mounted a huge reaction
and the revolution that we envisioned was stopped in its tracks...not
without a lot of bloodshed and jail time, let's not forget. We were up
against the most powerful nation in the world and it was either bend or
begin to blow things up...which didn't make sense to many of us...I've
railed and ranted, written...never feeling like I was doing enough, but
there you have it."
The bounce-back theory says that your ass is never kicked for good! You
recover, get up, forget the acts of breaking, are forgiven by your friends
and start over. The alternative was that prisoners gave up, curled up and
died. I am not saying that this scenario is valid for those who have
absolutely gone over to the other side but I think it does have application
to all of us who struggle to maintain our ideals and hopes. I berate myself
for not doing enough, for mistakes and misjudgments, for quitting some
battles too soon etc. etc. Then I think of what I can do today for Mumia,
for Peltier, for my Union, to support historical truths as I know them and
all the other ongoing projects. The important thing to remember is that you
are not bound by what happened yesterday or 30 years ago... today you can
BOUNCE BACK!
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