VICTIMS AND PERPETRATORS OF STOCKHOLM SYNDROME

 

Stockholm Captives All?

It was not until I met Mr Shibi Mohan, physiotherapist at the local Wellness Centre, I realised what physiotherapy actually meant. suffering from lumbar and cervical spondylosis, I would let myself be wired up to machines, that tickle and shock to relieve me of both pain and cash; pain temporarily and cash for good.

Most therapists I met before wore white coats, were suave and machine-beep controlled. They stuck probes at various places, switched on machines and left me to shake or heat as the machines desired. They reappeared when the machine beckoned them with beeps signalling end of each session.  A fortnight of shakes, I would leave with a lighter purse and a set of instructions on what to do, only to be back, there itself or at a new place, for the shakeup all over again. My ignorance or convenience of therapists, or both, I continued to suffer and they continued to earn.

Shibi is different. Operating from a lean-mean therapy room, visibly devoid of high-tech equipments, he helped me understand muscle groups and how they network to hold me up and move. He patiently relieved my hamstrings, focussed on strengthening weak areas and set out to incrementally build  my routines. A fortnight without painkillers and sciatica pains is ‘paradise regained’.

Its then I realised that what I underwent all these years in the name of physiotherapy was pain management; and I never complained! 

I knew what was required. Yet; why did I willingly agree only to be pain-managed? Why didn’t I ask the earlier therapists to get on with real physio – therapy? 

Accepting what was given even when I knew there could be better ways out? Another version of Stockholm Syndrome? Am I the only one like that?

Take a close look at yourself, your relationships and interpersonal transactions. May be you can identify the syndrome being played out in multifarious ways.

Stockholm syndrome impacts, influences and afflicts everybody; rich and poor, powerful and powerless, rulers and ruled, leaders and led alike. It's a deadly game that we all inflict as perpetrators and also suffer as victims, both at the same time.

Everyone a Stockholm captive of some sort?

The Origins

When Jan-Erik Olsson went inside Sveriges Kreditbanken, at Norrmalmstorg, Stockholm on 23 Aug 1973 with a submachine gun and took four hostages, he only wanted to rob. He did not think of scripting a psychological phenomenon, called Stockholm Syndrome. As the event unfolded and culminated, the hostages were released and Olsson was captured. Surprisingly, his hostages were reluctant to testify against him.

The syndrome is characterized by positive feelings of captives towards the captor and inability to perceive the captor as a threat. The fact that there existed no previous relationship between hostage and abductor and refusal of the hostages to cooperate with law enforcement authorities to book the perpetrator are the other characteristics.

The Paradox

Stockholm Syndrome is paradoxical because the victim, a captive and in great danger at the time of the event, develops an emotion contrary to the ones normally expected. It is important to understand that the psychological bond between the perpetrator and victim develops in situations like ‘hostage-taking’, where an intense imbalance of power clearly exists.

Though similar responses are observed in victims of kidnapping, sexual abuse, human trafficking, extremism, terrorism, socio - economic oppression, politically discriminative regimes, financial repression, religious persecution and even abusive relationships Stockholm Syndrome has not yet been included in the ‘Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders’, the American diagnostic tool for psychiatric illnesses and disorders. The syndrome remains a ‘contested mental disorder’ presumably due to lack of consistent body of academic research. 

Funny or laughable, it’s all over; yet it doesn’t generate enough data? Myopia epidemic afflicting academia?

Unrecognised Epidemic

The defining characteristics of the syndrome is presence of genuinely positive emotions of the victim towards the perpetrator despite demeaning or life threating situations, the victim suffers at the hands of perpetrator. What is often not understood and therefore not stated is the impact of physical proximity and time-duration the hostage spends with the captor. More intense the imbalance, longer and closer the confinement, more acute and deeper seems to be manifestations of the syndrome. Unfortunately, the syndrome is often viewed only in reference to physical hostage conditions.

What about abusive relationships, ideological, political and economic hostage situations? Every abusive or exploitative relation, is an existential imbalance in power, irrespective of nature of confinement and hence a classic setting for Stockholm syndrome. Look around us, exploitative and abusive relationships are in plenty. It is found within homes, workspaces, administrative machinery, ideologies and even in matters of faith.

History tells us of populations singing songs in praise of cruel despots, upholding, suffering and yet willingly extending the regimes’ cruelty upon itself? Longer the rule of the despot, louder and more widespread were the songs! Redemption from one ensured arrival of yet another, even more exploitative and repressive. We have seen crowds, once so deferential,  cheer in Iraq and Libya when their once revered rulers fell. Nothing changed for the better anyway!

Why would people who liberated themselves and seized the power of deciding their own destiny overwhelmingly hand it all over to someone who clearly undermines the very same values they fought for? Why would people flock and identify themselves with ideologies only to give away significant part of their earnings to fatten the overlords and discriminate one against another? Why would partners in relationships suffer and condone abusive atrocities?

It may be fear to start with. It could be survival instincts or coping mechanisms but it defiles dignity, defies logic and goes against the very basic tenets of existence in equality and liberty.

Look around us a little closer, Stockholm Syndrome is a raging epidemic and present in every aspect of life and in all sections of society. Yet, academics cannot find cases enough to gather data, sufficient enough, to prove or disprove its existence.

Poverty amidst plenty; a laughable paradox.

Deliverance?

While academics can continue to turn blind eyes citing inadequacy of data or debate to accept or reject existence of the syndrome, we cannot ignore the insights Erik Olsson himself provided. He is believed to have said in an interview;

“It was the hostages' fault. They did everything I told them to. If they hadn't, …. Why didn't any of them attack me? They made it hard to kill. They made us go on living together day after day, like goats, in that filth. There was nothing to do but get to know each other.”

Olsson’s credibility aside, his words carry a very serious message.  The onus of breaking free rests with the victim. It is often the hostage who willingly allows hostage like situation to continue. In a bid to sustain life, however demeaning it may be, they shun logic and truth and may even despise those preaching so. It is said that the initial opposition to the movement against slavery came from blacks themselves. Indian freedom struggles also have such examples.

It is the undeployed, underemployed power we have in ourselves that let us become hostages to individuals, ideologies, regimes or situations. It is we, who willingly wallow in the filth we create for ourselves, for whatever reasons. Each one of us is capable of redeeming the situation, but nobody does.

It takes knowledge and courage to turn the tables.

Meanwhile, let academia find solace in their lament of data drought.