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The Cluster B Society
https://www.city-journal.org/ ^ | Sep 24 2023 | Christopher F. Rufo

Posted on 08/23/2024 10:21:23 PM PDT by 11th_VA

There is a creeping sense that our society has turned upside-down. Healthy debate is replaced by activist hysterics. Speech is declared violence; violence is excused as speech. Masculinity is condemned as “toxic,” while men in dresses are celebrated in the public square. It feels as if we are in the midst of a society-wide mental breakdown.

… A strange new pattern of psychological dysfunction has infiltrated all our institutions, from humdrum bureaucracies to the highest offices. Wherever we turn, that creeping feeling sets in: our society is sick; our institutions are out of balance; our public life has been consumed by a cluster of disorders that appeal to our worst instincts …

Every historical period develops unique psychological characteristics that shape public life. After World War I, we had the “Lost Generation,” shell-shocked and disillusioned. In the mid-twentieth century, we entered the “Age of Anxiety,” characterized by a sense of existential dread in the face of the atomic bomb. And 50 years ago, we saw the rise of “the culture of narcissism,” which social critic Christopher Lasch described as a society obsessed with ego, desire, and self-image.

Today, we are witnessing the emergence of something new: the “Cluster B society.” Like the culture of narcissism, our digital age has distinct psychological traits, heavily influenced by the rise of personal pathologies and the power of social media. For this generation, the cameras are always on. The audience is always watching. And the old narcissism has transformed into frenzy, moral theatrics, emotional volatility, self-indulgence, and outbursts of violence.

Psychologists have captured the spirit of our modern culture in four specific psychopathologies that, together, make up the Cluster B personality disorders: the narcissist, the borderline, the histrionic, and the antisocial. (They also identify Cluster A and Cluster C groupings of personality disorders.) …

(Excerpt) Read more at city-journal.org ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Editorial
KEYWORDS: complementarianism; culture; disorders; dysfunction; essay; femaleleadership; feminism; mentalhealth; narcissism; pathologies; rufo; society; woke; wokeism
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Long read but very interesting if you like reading articles about the zeitgeist …
1 posted on 08/23/2024 10:21:23 PM PDT by 11th_VA
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To: AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Arthur Wildfire! March; Berosus; Bockscar; BraveMan; cardinal4; ...
Psychologists have captured the spirit of our modern culture in four specific psychopathologies that, together, make up the Cluster B personality disorders: the narcissist, the borderline, the histrionic, and the antisocial.

2 posted on 08/23/2024 10:44:33 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (Putin should skip ahead to where he kills himself in the bunker.)
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To: 11th_VA

Bookmarked for reading.


3 posted on 08/23/2024 10:47:35 PM PDT by NetAddicted (MAGA2024)
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To: 11th_VA
Everything in this article is duplicated by a Kennedy speech! If just a few days ago you were to tell me I'd be cheering on a Genuine Kennedy I'd have thought you mad! ....RFK speech on Trump support.(Don't worry, it's a transcript, you don't have to watch some talking head)
4 posted on 08/23/2024 10:49:31 PM PDT by Nateman (Democrats did not strive for fraud friendly voting merely to continue honest elections.)
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To: 11th_VA

I thought we were living in a Cluster F Society.


5 posted on 08/23/2024 11:58:43 PM PDT by who_would_fardels_bear (Kafka was an optimist.)
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To: Nateman
President Biden mocked Vladimir Putin’s 88% landslide in the Russian elections, observing that Putin and his party controlled the Russian press and that Putin prevented serious opponents from appearing on the ballot. But here in America, the DNC also prevented opponents from appearing on the ballot. And our television networks expose themselves as Democratic Party organs.

You're right - great speech by RFK...

6 posted on 08/24/2024 12:18:01 AM PDT by GOPJ (Kamala kisses up and punches down - cgbg * Walz put tampon dispensers in boys bathrooms...)
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To: who_would_fardels_bear

BINGO!!!


7 posted on 08/24/2024 2:14:32 AM PDT by Ann Archy (Abortion....... The HUMAN Sacrifice to the god of Convenience.)
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To: 11th_VA

Bookmark for later read.


8 posted on 08/24/2024 3:06:23 AM PDT by kelly4c
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To: 11th_VA
Healthy debate is replaced by activist hysterics. Speech is declared violence; violence is excused as speech. Masculinity is condemned as “toxic,” while men in dresses are celebrated in the public square.

Welcome to "1984"


40 years later...

9 posted on 08/24/2024 3:48:44 AM PDT by Elsie (Heck is where people, who don't believe in Gosh, think they are not going...)
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To: 11th_VA

A book I read about this came out about 10 years ago


10 posted on 08/24/2024 4:07:05 AM PDT by Chickensoup
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To: 11th_VA

Cluster F’ is more appropriate.


11 posted on 08/24/2024 4:22:42 AM PDT by maddog55 (The only thing systemic in America is the left's hatred of it!)
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To: 11th_VA

.bkmk


12 posted on 08/24/2024 5:01:08 AM PDT by sauropod ("This is a time when people reveal themselves for who they are." James O'Keefe Ne supra crepidam)
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To: Nateman

Thank you for that link.
Thoughts...well, he’s 70. The blessing of retrospect, and a body that’s calmed down a bit. I’ve always heeded my elders because, as Dad put it, “We know stuff.”
Seems like RFK finally “gets it.” Health matters, free speech matters, kids matter. We are being taxed into poverty, censored, and poisoned.
RFK is making a leap of faith to get behind DJT. It’s his only chance to put his agenda into practice and that agenda is simple: free speech, an end to the Ukraine war, and restoring American health. All three are at critical stage. Three crises.
And, I say when we find a Democrat who isn’t a woked-up socialist lunatic, we should welcome the chance to team up with them.


13 posted on 08/24/2024 5:34:43 AM PDT by Buttons12 ( )
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To: who_would_fardels_bear

14 posted on 08/24/2024 5:41:14 AM PDT by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: GOPJ
President Biden mocked Vladimir Putin’s 88% landslide in the Russian elections

Kommy got an incredible 99% of the delegate hive vote, with only 52 delegates casting their vote as "present", the only other option on the ballot. The Demonrat Party Central Committee is possessed by the evil ghost of the USSR.

15 posted on 08/24/2024 6:19:05 AM PDT by Reeses
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To: 11th_VA

Good article!


16 posted on 08/24/2024 6:54:57 AM PDT by ConservativeMind (Trump: Befuddling Democrats, Republicans, and the Media for the benefit of the US and all mankind.)
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To: 11th_VA

Oldie, but goodie. Female leadership is sometimes very good (e.g. Margaret Thatcher), but too often it is overly emotional and too maternal.


17 posted on 08/24/2024 8:09:36 AM PDT by DeweyCA ( )
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To: 11th_VA

Thanks for posting this.


18 posted on 08/24/2024 9:29:20 AM PDT by VanShuyten ("...that all the donkeys were dead. I know nothing as to the fate of the less valuable animals)
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To: 11th_VA

Golgafrinchan Ark Fleet B Ship transportees?


19 posted on 08/24/2024 11:07:21 AM PDT by skepsel ("A cat is more intelligent than people believe, and can be taught any crime", Mark Twain.)
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To: 11th_VA

An inevitable consequence of closing mental institutions decades ago. We have parents with mental illnesses breeding children with worse mental illnesses and have gone multiple generations doing so.


20 posted on 08/24/2024 11:46:21 AM PDT by T.B. Yoits
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