Victims, Survivors, Perpetrators

Not long ago I was faced with suppressing a feeling of deep hatred.  All these ugly feelings came to the surface and I had real difficulty in control my thoughts and my actions.  I was afraid that I would let my deep hatred rear its ugly head.  I might have said some nasty things, before I got in control again.

Where I became indifferent and asked the questions, I should, said the things that I should.

I started asking questions.  Why should I have these feelings?  After all it’s a long time ago that it happened.  I always managed before.  What was different now?

Everyone has ups and downs in life.  Life is hard if we let it be.  The question of being a survivor or a victim comes strongly to mind.

What happens in our past shapes us makes us stronger, better people.  I guess it all depends on how we handle the situation.  We can become bitter people, or we can use it and become more compassionate to others.

In life we do become victims, and those who do not survive being victims, end up taking their own lives.  Ultimately victims that manage to do get on with life are survivors.

Or victims move on and target others, keeping the cycle going. 

No there is more to this, than victims and survivor,

Being a victim means that the abuser has won, and the victim is left without any “power” and is “stuck” where she or he is. The only hope for the victim is not a revolution, or community accountability and care, but “a change in mentality.” This leads to victim blaming.

Many people prefer the word “survivor” to “victim” because “survivor” feels strong and proactive.  I understand this, but then I started thinking we need to honour and embrace weakness, vulnerability, and passivity as well, or else we end up blaming and invalidating victims, who do not feel strong some or most of the times. 

Society views victimhood as something that must be overcome.  When we are victimized, we are (sometimes) afforded a small allowance of time, space and resources in order to recover, limited and conditional exemptions from normal societal expectations and responsibilities, and are given a different set of expectations and responsibilities that we must live up (mainly focused around getting help, taking care of ourselves, and recovering).  “Healing is not optional, but is a mandatory process by which a “victim” is transformed into a “survivor”; the failure to successfully complete this transformation results in victim-blaming and sanctions.

 

To say that I was the victim, could be true, that I asked for what had happened and in order to survive this, I never dealt with it.  Like lots of things in my life, no time to break down, just the need to continue as nothing had happened.  Then the consequences of what happened when it became known to others would have been very bad.

What I really am getting at, is society has to take a stance.  It’s a sick society, that makes victims out of people. 

A lot of attention on is focused on the “victim” becoming the “survivor” and nothing is mentioned about the perpetrator.   Would it be true to say the perpetrator is a victim?

 

The cycle of the victim and the Perpetrator

http://wakeup-world.com/2015/05/18/transcending-the-victim-perpetrator-cycle-duality/

These two roles are opposite in nature, but yet they are mirror reflections of each other.

 

The Overt Perpetrator

The perpetrator motivation is power. The actions he takes to gain this perceived power are through dominating others. Be it physically or not, it is the act of overpowering, humiliating, and inflicting pain on another.

The Overt Perpetrator has an inner-victim and internal oppressor that is overcompensating for its powerlessness by acting outwardly domineering. This is rooted in trauma, as is the entire victim/perpetrator cycle. Therefore, each individual expression is also rooted in trauma

 

The Covert Perpetrator

The second form is the covert method of predator —the shadow-side of the overt predator. The Covert Perpetrator does not view himself as the predator; he operates from a state of victimhood where he justifies his motives and actions as necessary. This archetype rationalizes their predatory behavior as serving a cause or for self-preservation. The covert predator is more identified with his inner-victim even though both forms of perpetrator outwardly act from the place of his internal oppressor.

Likewise, the overt and covert victim both outwardly acts from their inner-victim.

 

The Overt Victim

The Overt Victim is identified with being powerless and helpless therefore cannot be responsible for his life. Because the overt victim believes he is helpless, he also perceives both the problems and the solutions to his life having to come from outside himself. This constant disempowerment can lead to habitually blaming and praising others for everything created in their world due to holding the belief that they do not have the power to create.

 

The Covert Victim

The Covert Victim holds the inverted beliefs of this; he believes everything is his fault. He is mostly identified with unworthiness and worthlessness.

The common denominator, that each form of expression shares is that they are all rooted in self-loathing.

The Victim/Perpetrator Cycle harbours unconscious hatred directed at the self for deeply held beliefs of being inadequate. The root cause of this self-loathing is from the deepest wound known to our species: Abandonment — the vague notion held in our collective psyche that we were left behind.

Even though we can be polarized to one of these archetypes, the victim/perpetrator energy takes turns fluctuating so it can be difficult to discern which aspect is being consciously or unconsciously played out. This is because their the same energy and only differ in degree, and the difference in degree means the actions taken to heal the cycle will each be in accordance to however severe of degree the experience is manifested.

For instance, in the case of a large-scale collective victimization of humanity, part of breaking the victim/perpetrator cycle – once the energetic theme is manifested to such a degree of brute physicality – is being able to identify each role in the dynamic and then before it can come to a neutral centre point for healing, the victim has to take back their power and refuse to be victimized anymore. This kind of mass catharsis and purging of the victim energy will not look very classy, but is absolutely necessary once it’s reached critical mass of oppression.

The trick is to not fall into the trap of combative dualism and become the perpetrator thus cycling in the pattern, rather than healing the cycle.

 

Transcending the cycle

 

Albert Einstein couldn’t have been more right when he stated that no problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it. When we are identified as a victim, our ability to create solutions is hindered because those solutions are being generated from the same level of consciousness that the problem was created on.

The cosmic catch-22 here is to honour your wounds by validating them and giving yourself as much unconditional acceptance as you have capacity to give yourself, while simultaneously taking full ownership of your unhealthy patterns and recognizing the parts you have played in these patterns.

The third character in this cycle is the Rescuer. This role can be used constructively, but even this too needs to eventually be integrated. In its exalted form, the rescuer is the aspect of ourselves that retrieves us from this cycle. The rescuer is born out of the necessity to correct this wounded pattern. If we use this character properly, it’s the part of ourselves that dives into the deep seas of our subconscious to observe what trauma imprinting is generating these dynamics within us.

This is alchemy in its truest sense; where we retrieve our abandoned, less desirable aspects that keep us stuck looping, and learn to accept them so unconditionally that we no longer perceive them as undesirable, shameful qualities that need to be buried and hidden, but rather as unpolished aspects of ourselves that we have the power to transmute through our acceptance. This is a radical act of self-love. When we nurture this relationship with ourselves, what we are really doing, loving ourselves, enough to liberate us from disempowering narratives and meet life as a co-creator.

[ Stand together. ]

Stand together.
Walk together.
Survive together.

If someone falls down
pick them up.
If you fall down
let someone pick you up.

Live together.
Bleed together.
Survive together.

If someone bleeds
give them your blood.
If you are bleeding
take someone's blood.

Love together.
Cry together.
Survive together.

If someone cry's
cheer them up.
If you cry
let someone cheer you up.

Stand, Live, Love.
Survive
Together.

Nobody has to be alone,
cancer is a disease.
It is not death.

Strength is shown
by how you deal
not by how you hide.

Show your strength
help others
show their strength.

Stand, Live, Love.
Survive
Together.