The old saying that you never get more trouble than you can handle only works for ordinary troubles. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), said to affect 3.5 percent of U.S. adults, is commonly associated with combat experiences, but also results from natural disasters, serious accidents, rape, or child abuse.
Collective Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD) occurs when an entire group suffers together from traumatic events or conditions. Terrible events exact a lasting toll. Genocide, famine, enslavement, or severe defeat in war may affect a population for generations, changing the entire culture.
A society may enter an endless cycle of revenge, or persecute outsiders, as the traumatized create trauma in others. After bubonic plague killed a third of Europe's population in the 14th century, Europeans succumbed to moral panics and conspiracy theories, leading to persecution and killings of Jews, Gypsies, heretics, and those suspected of being witches or plague-spreaders.
Another society may become completely demoralized, with widespread depression and alcoholism. Some traumatized cultures manage to heal themselves with art, or committees of reconciliation, or reforming unjust social structures. Meanwhile, certain individuals take advantage of social confusion to satisfy their own psychological needs: history's demagogues, paranoid fanatics, witch-hunters, dictators, and other manipulators.
We don't always recognize CPTSD. Over the past 40 years white working-class Americans have lost jobs and opportunities. Industries moved from the Rust Belt to the Sun Belt, then to Mexico, later China or automation. The digital revolution bypassed older folks without college degrees. They were hit hard by the 2008 recession. After a series of stresses, the group as a whole suffers from an opioid crisis and declining life expectancy.
Meanwhile, a new, powerful manipulator constantly pushes the buttons of fear and outrage in this group, amplifying prejudices and providing scapegoats. This digital demagogue combines a cable network with social media that use algorithms (mathematical formulas) to highlight intense emotions, turning them into trends. Tobin Smith (Fox News contributor for 14 years) claims this combination of forces reaches at least 100 million people a month, using fear as a business strategy.
It began with Rupert Murdoch, Australian media mogul, who first made his mark in the British gutter press with his sensational tabloids. Murdoch set up the Fox News Channel, hiring Roger Ailes, master of political attack ads, to design reality for viewers. Despite its name, the network doesn't deliver news so much as emotion-laden opinions and scripted debates. It's not about verifiable facts, it's about the powerful emotions of fear and anger.
The target audience is those very same older Americans who are falling behind, pitting them against other Americans who have likewise suffered from stagnant wages and growing economic inequality. It feels so good to blame others and to feel superior to them! Unfortunately, relieving stress in Group A results in more stress for Groups B and C.
Since the FCC ended the Fairness Doctrine in 1987, no longer requiring ideological balance on air, political polarization has increased greatly. Smith says that when Fox turned into the "Obama-Bashing Network" in 2009, viewership rose dramatically. Fox gets half its revenue not from advertising but from affiliate fees that cable companies pay them for their large audience.
Smith finally ended his long association with Fox News to write a tell-all book, "Foxocracy." He once thought of Fox as a game like pro wrestling, but later realized that many viewers actually believe the illusion--even the absurd conspiracy theories. Some watch Fox for many hours each day, with addiction leading to estrangement from loved ones. Another concern is that talking heads on Fox downplayed the coronavirus and overplayed the relatively few protesters who pressured local officials to re-open too soon.
Binge-watching stokes feelings of victimization, desires for revenge, and high levels of involuntary fight-or-
flight reflex, increasing the individuals' anxiety and stress. Similar manipulation of emotions is present, although in much lesser degree, on MSNBC and CNN. The 24-hour news model may itself be flawed.
Our country is dealing with a pandemic that has already killed more Americans than the Vietnam, Korean, and Iraq Wars put together. Unemployment is near an all-time high. The virus and economic disruption have deepened fault lines in our society--racial injustice, an inadequate health-care system, a ragged safety net. Stresses add up to trauma.
The question now is: Will we deal with our outsized problems with reason and compassion? Or will we be manipulated into scapegoating and fighting with our fellow Americans and the rest of the world as we sink into a travesty of the USA?
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Coralie Koonce is a writer living in Fayetteville. Her latest book is "Twelve Dispositions: A Field Guide to Humans."