Ethnic flooding therapy

[Vigilant]

"A phobia is a fear or anxiety that has been carried to extremes.A person with a phobia has such a compelling desire to avoid contact with a feared object or situation that it interferes with normal life.

Being exposed to the subject of the phobia causes a panic reaction of severe anxiety,sweating, and rapid heartbeat.A person with a phobia is aware that this intense fear is irrational but still feels anxiety that can be alleviated only by avoiding the feared object or situation.The need to do this may disrupt routines and limit the person's capacity to take part in new experiences.About 1 in 10 people in the UK has a phobia." page 552

"Phobias take many different forms,but they can be broadly divided into two types: simple and complex phobias.

Phobias specific to a single object,situation,or activity,such as a fear of spiders, heights,or air travel,are called simple phobias.For example,claustrophobia,a fear of enclosed spaces,is a simple phobia." 552

"More complicated phobias that have a number of component fears are described as complex phobias.Agoraphobia is an example of a complex phobia that involves multiple anxieties...

Social phobias are also classified as complex phobias.People with a social phobia have an overwhelming fear of embarassing themselves or of being humiliated in front of other people in social situations, such as when they are eating or speaking in public." 552

What are the symptons?
"Exposure to or simply thinking about the object,creature,or situation that generates the phobia leads to intense anxiety accompanied by:

• Dizziness and feeling faint.
• Palpitations
• Sweating and trembling.
• Nausea.
• Shortness of breath.

A factor that is common to every phobia is avoidance." 553

What might be done?
"Many simple phobias can be treated effectively using a form of behaviour therapy,such as desensitization.During treatment,a therapist gives support while you are safely and gradually exposed to the object or situation that you fear. Inevitably,you will experience some anxiety,but exposure is always kept within bearable limits...

A simple phobia often resolves itself as a person gets older.However, complex phobias...tend to persist unless they are treated.More than 9 in 10 people with agoraphobia are treated successfully with desensitization therapy." 553

These quotes are taken from The Complete Family Health Guide published by the British Medical Association.There are two types of phobias,simple and complex,and they have recognisable symptons and forms of treatment.

Desensitization therapy is discussed later in the book,along with another behaviour therapy known as 'flooding therapy'.

"Both desensitization and flooding are used to treat phobias. Desensitization involves gradually increasing exposure to the object or circumstance of the phobia and uses relaxation techniques to help you deal with the anxiety.For example,if you have agoraphobia, in early sessions you might walk just outside your house with a therapist.As sessions continue,you may try walking from the house to the end of the street with your therapist until,over time,you can travel alone without anxiety.

Flooding forces you to confront the focus of your fear directly for prolonged periods.You will be supported throughout by your therapist.After you have confronted the object or circumstance of your phobia,either gradually or in one step,the distress associated with it is reduced and may eventually disappear completely." 969

Interesting word that,flooding.When refugees began pouring into Ireland in the mid-90s,the press ran stories about a 'refugee flood'.The new anti-racist lobby criticized this as labelling and said it was xenophobic.The newspapers were actually using the word in its normal sense of a river overflowing its banks during heavy rains.However,there is also a phobia-therapy link because xenophobia is a phobia and flooding is a therapy.If indeed this is a factor then it deserves to be studied properly.

Xenophobia would be a complex phobia rather than a simple phobia,going by the definitions of the BMA.That is,it results from multiple anxieties.Fear of strangers or fear of displacement are possibly two of these. Theoretically anyway.But the symptons that accompany phobias - dizziness,palpitations,sweating - aren't present.Nobody has those sensations when faced with a Nigerian pushing a pram,or begging gypsies.So xenophobia isn't a mental disorder like other phobias.Perhaps it's a political disorder.

Assuming that there is such a thing as xenophobia,there are some problems in applying conventional therapies.For instance,it's doubtful whether flooding therapy can be applied to society as a whole: who is going to be the therapist?Further,the implicit assumption is that Ireland and other white countries benefit from ethnic flooding therapy,that 'confronting fears directly for prolonged periods' is therapeutic.If this is true,then there shouldn't be any limits on non-white immigration.And this is indeed the position of some immigration lobbyists.

The best way to defeat propaganda is to understand it.

[Gladstone]

Great thread.

The PC people use the language of someone experimenting on another with their projects (ie mass immigration), using the term "social experiment" to be exact and we are the ones being experimented upon. I don't want to even go into the type of mindset or arrogance that must go into that. This person is not a Pavlov dog.

[Vigilant]

More than a dozen phobias are listed in the Concise encyclopedia of psychology. One is xenophobia, defined as a 'fear of foreigners'. According to this book, two criteria differentiate phobias from rational fears:

First, phobias have an obsessive nature. A phobic individual is often compelled to dwell on the feared thing far more than is necessary under objective circumstances.

A second characteristic...concerns the way in which anxiety is handled. A phobia typically produces so high a level of anxiety that it is immobilising, preventing the person from acting in a way that could prove effective in alleviating the anxiety.

Obsessive here means dominating a person's routine, for instance by planning the day around avoiding dogs or closed spaces. It doesn't mean thinking a lot about an issue (I hope).

Yet it's hard to maintain this rational/irrational distinction when one considers life under the Bolsheviks where the fear of state terror was obsessive and immobilising. That was definitely a rational fear.

Even so, if xenophobia is a real phobia then it must be treatable by the techniques available to therapists:

Behavioral psychologists have developed an impressive armamentarium of techniques for treating phobia. Two of the widely used paradigms are systematic desensitization and flooding.

Systematic desensitization is a form of classical conditioning in which anxiety-evoking stimuli are paired with inhibitory responses, either through imagination or in real-life situations.

Flooding "is a method of treating phobias by rapid exposure in real life to the feared object or situation, maintaining maximum tolerable anxiety until it begins to diminish, then continuing closer exposure until the patient or client is comfortable in the situation which was previously feared." While it is considered a rapid method and effective, at least in the short term, it does expose the patient to high levels of anxiety, levels that some consider too high and possibly dangerous.

I haven't been able to find information on xenophobia therapy. However, the last paragraph is a good description of the effects of mass third world immigration on European societies, in my opinion. Anti-racists must believe it's therapeutic!

One further point worth mentioning is that flooding therapy (also called implosion therapy) can build up aversions as well as overcome them:

Implosion therapy A procedure in which the client is flooded with experiences of a particular kind to such a dramatic degree that he/she either (a) builds up a distinct aversion to them or (b) becomes numbed and no longer responds to them. Outcome (a) is what is hoped for in the use of the technique with habits that one wishes to break, e.g., smoking continuously cigarette after cigarette until the very sight or even thought of a cigarette makes one feel sick. Outcome (b) is the one planned for when the technique is used for phobic disorders where presentation of the phobic stimulus is continued until it no longer evokes the disabling anxiety. (Dictionary of psychology, by Arthur Reber)

This suggests that ethnic flooding therapy could just as easily cause what it's supposed to cure. Ambiguous, to say the least.