Nearly every day someone says to me, “I'm sick of hearing victims whine.” Aren't we all? Taking responsibility for our lives has finally come of age. Those who pretend that they are always innocent victims just rub us the wrong way. If we turn away from them, we feel guilty. And sometimes we should not turn away because the victim is truly crying for help.
The book, "The Celestine Prophecy" called victimhood the "Poor Me" control drama. It said that victims like to make us feel responsible for them. This clearly represents the victimhood that we want to eliminate, what I have labeled the victimhood advantage. It has become a serious power game. Sadly, it is game that works because it plays on people's guilt. But like any game, once exposed, it loses power.
The very notion of victimhood comes from a collective belief in a false duality-based world where there are victims and perpetrators or heroes, good and evil, etc. It produces great drama; but sadly, it has bled into our reality. The good and evil world is merely an illusion held together by beliefs. It is not the truth; but for most people, it is reality. If we let go of our beliefs in this false world or illusion, it disappears.
If we hold the illusory view of life in our mind, we are asking for victimhood experiences. It is part of the perspective. Expecting a different experience is like jumping off the roof of your house and expecting it not to hurt when you hit the ground.
The illusory perspective was born when the patriarchal point of view came into power thousands of years ago. Everyone plays games in the illusion: win and lose, good and evil, dominance and submission, or right and wrong. This is the world of our false self; our True Self doesn’t play games.
In the illusion, the male or authority roles strive to win, be right, be good, and dominate; the female or subordinate roles are considered weak, evil, or wrong. In the realm of the True Self, masculine and feminine are equal in power.
Within the illusory perspective of life, there is legitimate victimhood. It is very important that we can discriminate between legitimate victimhood and the power game before reacting to a situation. Knowing the difference also helps us clean up our own mind and life.
Only a person in a feminine role can be a legitimate victim. If a parent beats their child, the child is a victim because a child is generally perceived as having no authority in their parent's world. They can't just leave their home or fight back.
An authority figure, however, cannot be a legitimate victim. This is where all the confusion occurs. The authority fulfills the masculine role. In the illusory view of the world (where the notion of victim and perpetrator exists), the masculine role has the power. When someone in the power position claims to have been victimized, they have played a false victimhood advantage card, and we do not want to fall for their game.
Authority figures that play the victim role are often angry and bitter, some love conflict; but they hide it well with a kind social mask. They attract opposition. Examples of this are movie stars that pretend to be victimized by the paparazzi or politicians who act like their opponent is bullying them. These people are in masculine roles; they pretend to be victims on the outside when they are really asking for the opposition on the inside. They don’t deserve our sympathy; in fact, our sympathy perpetuates their game.
People do not oppose loving authority figures; why would they? A truly loving authority offers win-win opportunities for everyone involved.
Authorities come at all levels -- parents, teachers, government leaders, policemen, bosses, gurus, and clergy are all authorities to others. If the authority gets bullied, they probably have no damn business in that job or role. They deserve to be fired, not rewarded or compensated.
But people, including those in the justice system, are so incredibly confused by victims. They often punish or reward the wrong person because the ancient wisdom about masculine and feminine roles in the illusion was hidden from the masses.
Here is another very controversial example. Recently there was a YouTube video of a female school bus monitor who was bullied by some of the students on the bus. People took her side because that was what we have been trained to do. But she was in the position of authority. When you take an authority position, you don’t get to claim victimhood.
It was clear in the video that she was not capable of handling the position. She was simply wrong for the job. People felt so sorry for her that they sent her hundreds of thousands of dollars. But, she didn't deserve the compensation. She was not a legitimate victim. Her job was to keep order on that bus, and she didn't do it. Incompetent doesn't mean she was bad. She was probably trained to be a nice or meek person as a child. Her programming simply made her wrong for the job. It also put the children in danger.
I remember the first time I felt anxiety around a whining victim. I was a young adult visiting my mother-in-law. She really milked the victimhood advantage. She'd talk for hours about her illnesses and bad people who screwed her, and her family made her the center of attention. This is common in certain cultures, but to me it was appalling. She was the matriarch of the family, the authority. I would simply pull out a book and start reading; she had plenty of others listening to her every word.
One day my husband said to me, "Who do you think you are? You are so rude to my mother." But I was not rude; I saw her using the victimhood advantage like a professional. I asked him, “Which is more rude? To whine for two hours about your problems and expect people to listen to you or to simply pull out a book and ignore the show. How is she ever going to change her life if you all feed her victimhood perspective by rewarding her for it?" To my husband, she was the victim of my rudeness. In truth, she was bullying everyone in the room as she claimed her victimhood advantage.
Where did we get this social convention that says it is polite to sit and listen to people whine? The truth is that our thoughts matter, and whining just perpetuates our problems. In fact, psychology is now proving that we spread thoughts or beliefs (memes) like germs when we share our victimhood stories with conviction. Other people start to get our problems.
A truly win-win solution is to stop the conversation before it gets too far down the toilet. But, people feel guilty for not listening to the victims. That is why my husband and his siblings were listening to his mother. They felt guilty if they ignored her. The potential guilt for not listening was simply greater than the pain of listening.
We all want to support people who are true victims; but we must look at each situation with clarity and an attitude of win-win. The key is to determine who is in the masculine position or role of authority, who is in power, and recognize that the one in power can only be a perpetrator even if they look like a victim. They are always the cause, and sometimes you have to pull away the curtain of illusion to see that.
Knowing real versus fake victimhood helps us know where to stand in a situation, a conflict, and where to just back off and go read. Most of us have been trained to support the victimhood advantage. When we undo our mental programming, we know who to help and who is simply crying wolf. We see the false prophets with ease. And, best of all, we no longer have to listen to ineffective whining.
This article is continued in Part II.
Cathy Eck has a Ph.D. in esoteric studies and has devoted the last twenty years to studying the teachings of the ancient mystery schools. Her research organization is Gateway to Gold. You can learn more about her work at http://gatewaytogold.com and http://nolabelsnolies.com.