Liza says:

> I'm interested to hear your own ideas about the questions you raised.

Man, if I'd known the answers I probably wouldn't have asked the questions!
:-) But seriously... My interests these days are less with physical aspects
of diets as the behavioral/ emotional/ psychological issues. What led me to
ask the questions is that it's pretty easy to work up a simple list of
earmarks or tipoffs that describes the type of behavior one finds in
extremists so you can see them coming a mile off. However, getting at the
motivations behind fanaticism or zealotry is more difficult, and I've been
mulling over these issues recently.

Something I've begun to wonder about in wrestling with this is if there is
really any one, single motivation, or set of motivations, that can
adequately describes what drives ALL fanatics. Maybe there is some
comprehensive analysis, but then again, maybe it might be more realistic to
view fanaticism as something of a hydrahead that's not so easily reducible
to a simple "formula." One thing you said, Liza, that I found interesting
was the observation that people may be driven in large part by very
personal motivations as much as by generic syndromes--such as the example
you gave of the child whose parent was an alcholic so they become a
crusader against it.

Anyway, here are a few ideas. In line with that specific example, I wonder
how many fanatics are driven by a sense of having been "wronged"? If you'll
listen to the themes in fanatics' tirades against the world, a lot of what
is implicit in them is a sense of injustice and righting wrongs. That
something is "wrong" with the world. (This could spring both from being
personally or repeatedly wronged early in life; or on another level, it
could also spring from a more philosophical problem with [not] simply
accepting life as it is in general--more on this below.)

But there are plenty of people who had good childhoods or who haven't had
too many hard knocks in life who still become fanatics. And I would bet
that most of us on this list have at one time or another been pretty
fanatical at one point before moderating and beginning to chill out. Myself
for example, I didn't realize how "normal" a childhood I had (two pretty
loving parents, a sister, the pet cat, etc., a relatively idyllic childhood
in a small town) until I started waking up to the fact that almost as often
as not, it seemed like the people around me came from some kind of
dysfunctional or otherwise weird family.

And yet even so, I too became pretty fanatical about a natural hygiene diet
when I first got into it. Of course, I didn't hit people over the head with
it except for defending myself and yakking a lot about it and going on a
few tirades with the person closest to me (my girlfriend). It certainly
didn't cause me to blame others for having caused a benighted world
undermining the whole human race or anything like that.

One thing I have gotten to wondering about, though, that seems as if it
could have been at least partially responsible for how it happened with me
is the whole idea of "human potential" and the drive to "be all we can be"
and excel. Fine in itself but it can be taken too far if you start becoming
too intolerant of what you already are, or decide to change something that
may not be too changeable. (Which again to some degree is based on
non-acceptance of who one is already, or at least a lack of balance or
realism (due to overidealism) about what is changeable and what isn't.) At
some point, you can begin to become such a perfectionist that even if you
don't have any particular beef with the outside world, you can start
becoming intolerant, if not of others, then of yourself. I know this was
probably a big part of why I became fanatical. It's only when you realize
you are being inhumane--particularly to yourself!--with all the rigid
demands for perfection and self-criticizing that you begin to mellow.
Simply to get some psychological breathing room and enjoy life more rather
than oppressing yourself all the time! <sweat, sweat, crack that whip!> :-)

Another thing that happened with me is that like a lot of fanatics (it's
possible this may be a universal with dietary fanatics, ignoring
skateboarders for the moment :-) ) I got into an us/them mentality probably
due to something of a superiority complex about what I had discovered that
separated me from other people to some degree. The us/them mentality
(rather than we/us) affects how you behave at a pretty fundamental level
when it comes to other people. (Also leads to the paranoia and conspiracy
theory stuff often seen with fanatics.)

Then with some people, becoming fanatical may have a lot to do with
identity issues, which brings up the question of self-esteem. If you don't
have a strong sense of who you are, then you'll tend to latch onto
something external to define yourself by.

But again, that may not cover everybody. Some people have a pretty good
sense of who they are, and still become fanatical. In fact they may have
such an overblown sense of self or their intellectual powers, that many
fanatics become extreme egotists. THEY have the answers, set themselves up
as examples as the ultimate proof their system works, etc., etc., everyone
ELSE should do what THEY do. The focus on self to the exclusion of really
listening or hearing others is one of the most telltale earmarks. (One
interesting question I haven't been able to answer yet is whether these
types of egotists were made that way by their fanaticism, or whether they
were that way to begin with and the fanaticism just brought it out.)

One thing that has really struck me that is a key to how fanatics behave
with other people--and may also have a lot to do with WHY they become
fanatical in the first place--is that they often are more enthused about
ideas than people. (At least this tends to be true for dietary
fanatics--not sure about others.) Behaviorwise, this shows in how they
don't "listen" to people (as you talked about Liza) and don't really see
the person's unique situation, but just keep on prescribing the same old
ideas like a parrot. Of course, the fanatic may have their circle of
friends and give lectures and talks and do health fairs and media
appearances and so forth, so they may in fact deal with people a lot. But
generally, their "love" for humanity is on an abstract or wide-enough scale
that they don't have to get too intimate or remain civil with the people
who disagree with them. On a person-to-person level, they are only civil
until you start disagreeing with them. So in the end, ideas win out over
people when push comes to shove. (I will state here, too, that I am someone
who is very skeptical of the idea of "universal love," and believe it is
more an abstraction than a reality. I tend to think love is manifested more
by actions in the personal sphere of the direct relationships in which one
is involved; and particularly telling about loving one truly is, is how
they behave when dealing with those whom they don't agree at the direct
person-to-person level.)

Another axis around which some of this may revolve is at a more fundamental
spiritual level. Existentially one can "accept" the world around them, or
reject it, say "yes" to life as it is, or "no" to life as it is and always
try to change it or rail against it. This basic "accept" or "reject" stance
affects everything about a person's relationships with what's around them.
Perhaps there is a sort of continuum here where on the one end you cannot
accept hardly anything about the world around you and you become psychotic.
Or you become a raving fundamentalist out to change everything around you.

On the other end, you can become so accepting of the world around you that
you can become something of what I call a "bastardized Taoist" :-) (I've
fallen into this trap myself) by so indiscriminately "going with the flow"
that you just let habits and inertia begin to take over your life. Putting
things on a continuum, or recognizing that there is a "dialectic" between
acceptance and change (something of a yin/yang relationship) guards against
the tendency to go to one extreme or the other. But clearly fanatics are
way out on one of the continuum, some more extreme than others.

Another thing on a completely different level could be that much of the
fanaticism we see today might be driven socially. Given the rate of
technological and social change, we are all living in the midst of a great
amount of uncertainty. If there is one thing fundamentalist/fanatic types
base their whole lives around and that characterizes the fundamentalist
mindset, it is the psychological need for certainty, which on a social
level springs out of fear of being able to manage one's life adequately.

Of course, there can be interior psychological reasons too. If you are
someone who takes an existential "no" rather than "yes" approach to life,
then any kind of change is experienced as psychologically unsettling (it
can be unsettling enough even if you are usually in the habit of embracing
life!), and you just want to shut it off, or shout it down, so as to
forever rise above the confusion. And you generally do that by finding some
psychological, philosophical, or personal anchor to latch onto to feel
certain of in the midst of change.

I am not sure yet what--if any one thing--is at the root of all this, or
what causes these various syndromes exactly or ties them all together.
Which is why I put the questions to the list. Maybe these musings will
precipitate some more discussion to lead to an "aha" moment. That's what
I'm looking for here.

--Ward Nicholson <[log in to unmask]>

P.S.

> I don't believe anyone - not anyone ever - starts out that way. I believe
> there is an inherent human nature, which is 100% benign, loving,
> cooperative, deeply connected to all other living things, caring, full of
> life and love and enthusiasm and a sense of their own power, and vastly
> intelligent.
> But I do believe that people get mightily screwed up, sometimes mighty
> fast, and that there are a bunch of oppressors and opportunists and
> exploiters and abusers out there.

Liza, I've also struggled with the idea of intentional evil for a long
time, and as the years go by am more inclined to say, okay, I'm willing to
accept that this can be, and the destrucive behavior of some people is not
just ignorance or warped thinking. (You give some very good examples.)
However, for me at least, this just pushes the question back one level: how
did people get that way to begin with? For example, your example of the
greedy head of a corporation knowingly and calculatingly doing what they
do. (Let's say, for instance, the tobacco companies spiking their cigs with
extra nicotine to addict more and more users). It's hard to believe they
started out that way as little kids. What would be interesting and helpful
is knowing the etiology of it all.