In “Framework of Desire”, Ann Fausto-Sterling, answering the nature of homosexuality, analyzes several theories and approaches. The Genes vs. Choice Theory considers homosexuality as the result of a personal choice or the product of genes. According to the biological approach to homosexuality, masculinity and femininity are complex and changing. Moreover, homosexuality has multiple components (attraction, orientation, behavior, and self-identification). Therefore, we cannot relate gender and homosexuality. The social construct theory states that sexual desire is based on several categories. They include 1) early sexual experience that leads to positive or negative results to heterosexuality or homosexuality; 2) family dynamics; 3) gender roles in childhood. After analyzing the problems of each of the theories, the author concludes that there is a need for a collaborative effort from geneticists, neuroscientists, psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists, and humanists. She also offers dynamic-system theory as a prosperous one because it is complex, self-organizing, self-maintaining, and self-stabilizing.
Trauma and Healing is a fundamental text about understanding people who have experienced psychological trauma. As an example of the relationship between psychological trauma and human social behavior, the author states the following idea: “Traumatic events have primary effects not only on the psychological structures of the self but also on the systems of attachment and meaning that link individual and community. Traumatic events destroy the victim’s fundamental assumptions about the safety of the world, the positive value of the self, and the meaningful order of creation.”
Placing individual experience in a broader political framework, Judith Herman argues that psychological trauma is inseparable from its social and political context. Drawing on her research on child abuse, as well as extensive literature on combat veterans and victims of political terror, she shows parallels between personal horrors and public horrors.
The two videos on the origins and treatments of psychological trauma occurred to be thought-provoking. John Riga’s lecture shed light on the mechanisms of the cerebral cortex during the manifestation of paradoxical states caused by mental trauma. In the second video, Dr. Juda Ho told the audience about the variants of manifestations of mental trauma in everyday life; she also presented the ways of preventing the impact of stress once experienced on the human body. Both videos touched on many aspects of the problem and brought viewers closer to understanding the mental processes that underlie the experience of any mental trauma – in everyday life and large-scale catastrophic situations. The best contribution I could make to these materials is to distribute them on social networks to promote their popularization. The only thing I would like to add to the information in the videos is the explanation of how trauma affects the disorder in coordination between the conscious and the subconscious. In John Riga’s lecture, I would emphasize that under the name “Animal brain,” there is everything that relates to the level of the subconscious. I would explain the problems stated in videos to my family members, providing analogies between the examples from the videos and our everyday experiences. It could raise the question “Do I have any symptoms of a trauma that has been influencing my life?” and would encourage them to start therapy.
This is a story about a long and challenging path of healing with the help of psychotherapy, which becomes a severe test for a psychotherapist who is trying to solve the problem of a 5-year-old child. In A shining affliction, the author raises the question of how psychotherapy is sometimes able to influence the personality of therapists themselves. The story described by the author confirms the need for every practicing psychotherapist to have regular consultations so that they can minimize the influence of their patients’ experiences and reports on their mental state.