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Globalization: The Age of Psychological Neoteny
http://www.laurakkerr.com/2014/02/20...gical-neoteny/“The excessive use of video games and online porn in pursuit of the next thing is creating a generation of risk-averse guys who are unable (and unwilling) to navigate the complexities and risks inherent to real-life relationships, school, and employment.”
Ouch. It seems in the Age of Psychological Neoteny men are the only juvenile adults. Yet psychological neoteny, if it is occurring, certainly impacts both sexes.
How is some men’s predilection for online escapism psychologically different from some women’s obsessive pursuit of the beauty and fashion standards found in magazines, movies, and online media? When women seek Botox, collagen injections, and other youth-enhancing procedures to look like teen models or the latest film siren, are they not also resisting growing up, if not old? Perhaps female neoteny is less interesting. It’s socially acceptable for women to pursue eternal youth, especially if it means we are more seductive and financially dependent as a result of our efforts.
Psychological immaturity does seem rampant these days, and Crichton’s description of neoteny as causing ‘a pervasive emotional and spiritual shallowness’ seems all too real. But is psychological neoteny in the twenty-first century limited to only wayward men who have moved back home and whittle away time by playing video games and watching porn? I don’t think so. Rather, I imagine these men’s actions exist on a continuum with many other strategies for dealing with the psychological overwhelm that is a common response to what journalist Thomas Friedman called “Globalization 3.0.” Since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the expansion of the Internet across the globe, we have had to rapidly adapt to being aware of the lives of many people we will never have contact with, nevertheless we know intimate details from their lives. We can even be more influenced by these virtual-world strangers than the real people we experience around us. Certainly, we are sometimes inspired by our exposure to other peoples’ lives via the Internet, as well as a marketplace that promises unlimited possibility. Yet there are two formidable problems with this new world economy:
we have all become exceedingly familiar with the luxurious lifestyles and vast opportunities available to the rich and famous; and,
there exists a profoundly unequal distribution of wealth in which only a limited few actually attain lives of luxury, if even a middle class way of life.
Granted, throughout the history of civilization there have been extreme differences in wealth. What perhaps makes the current situation different from the past is how our fantasies and imaginations are being exploited, and in ways that actually assure that inequality continues, if not increases.
Rather than challenging a fundamentally unequal system, more often efforts are spent imagining how to experience the spoils of wealth, including the sense of power that wealth brings. Although there are rumblings about the death of the American Dream, the current round of globalization succeeds because people can easily use the Internet and other forms of media as fodder for fantasizing about being the exception to the rule. However, when we fill ourselves with fantasies of a perfect self and ideal life, we risk becoming what Francis Moore Lappé called “selfish little accumulators,” chiseling away at Earth’s precious resources as well as our own limited financial capital and time.
But many cannot afford to shop for the coveted self-image or lifestyle, which often is really about acquiring emotional states, such as a sense of superiority, or the avoidance of painful emotions such as envy. Superiority and envy are two emotions commonly stirred by hierarchical societies, along with feelings of shame for not attaining greater status. And I think that when a person is plagued by these emotions, and pursues fantasies of perfection, it’s a sign of emotional dependency on the capitalistic system.
When I think of young men, in the prime of their lives, getting lost in imaginal worlds, I wonder if they feel they have no chance at the American Dream, that they are exhausted by the quest to create a real-world identity, and have discovered they can get just as much satisfaction out of their imaginal escapes — at least until reality comes breaking through.
The choice of fantasy over reality is actually a relatively common defense against chronically traumatizing conditions. And much research has shown that chronic stress results from exposure to extreme disparities of wealth. (See The Status Syndrome: How Social Standing Affects Our Health and Longevity) Less research, however, has shown why we not only tolerate economic systems that propagate disparities in wealth and power, but also become dependent on such disparities to fuel fantasy worlds that rarely come to fruition, and often cause longing, dissatisfaction, and hopelessness.
These emotional responses are also common to children of neglectful or abusive parents. Ironically, while many exposed to neglect or abuse can grow up too quickly, becoming proficient at taking care of themselves and others, there are often unresolved emotional dependency needs. Later relationships, rather than based on interrelatedness and mutual dependency, can be characterized by attempts to seek fulfillment of these unmet emotional needs that stem from the earliest years of life.
Globalization’s Requires Our Psychological Immaturity
While many factors contribute to the expansion of a globalized marketplace, I am most interested in how globalization stunts emotional growth, creating conditions of emotional dependency that have us wasting so much time in fantasy worlds driven more by products and experiences we can buy than by authentic desires and needs.
If we look at the inception of globalization, going back to colonization and the enslavement of people of color, not only were they often physically beaten into submission, their polytheistic beliefs systems were also attacked, along with the myths and rituals that contributed to social cohesion and guided growth over the lifespan. Without their spiritual beliefs, they were more susceptible to psychological and spiritual dependency on the colonizers.
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Originally Posted by Midnight Phantom
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