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Mini: Victim vs. Warrior · Why We Do What We Do

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Speaker 1: You're listening to Why we Do what we Do. Welcome
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Speaker 1: to Why We Do what we Do Mini. I'm your
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Speaker 1: host Abraham and I'm your host Shane. We are a
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Speaker 1: psychology podcast. We talk about the things that humans and
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Speaker 1: non human animals do and understand the contextual features about
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Speaker 1: why they do them. And this is a mini which
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Speaker 1: means we do a quick dive into a topic and
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Speaker 1: then get out of there. So I'm not going to
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Speaker 1: preamble a whole lot, but in this one, we're going
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Speaker 1: to be talking about an idea kind of that has
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Speaker 1: made its way into a sort of popular zeitgeist. I'll
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Speaker 1: get into that in a moment, but I will start
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Speaker 1: by saying, if you enjoy what you hear today, if
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Speaker 1: you're a returning person or you're here for the first time, welcome.
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Speaker 1: I hope that you enjoy what you hear today. And
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Speaker 1: on Patreon. You can pick up some merch leave us
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Speaker 1: a rating and a review, like subscribe to a friend,
1:01
Speaker 1: and I'll talk more about those at the end of
1:03
Speaker 1: this discussion. I think that's all I have to say
1:06
Speaker 1: before we dive into our topic, because we kind of
1:07
Speaker 1: got a decent amount to unpack here, and I'd like
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Speaker 1: to make sure we don't go too far over time.
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Speaker 1: We try and do these in like fifteen minutes ish
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Speaker 1: or less if we can, which we've accomplished several times,
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Speaker 1: but have also gone way over that at least a
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Speaker 1: couple of times. Yeah, we do our best. I forgetting
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Speaker 1: any preamble stuff. Are we ready to start?
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Speaker 2: No, let's do it.
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Speaker 1: Okay. There are some ideas that introduce an oversimplified idea
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Speaker 1: that sparks an emotional reaction and provokes action in many people.
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Speaker 1: That is the case here. This could potentially be a
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Speaker 1: full length episode, but I'm not really sure. I want
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Speaker 1: to give it that much time and attention, but I
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Speaker 1: also want to address it. So many feels like the
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Speaker 1: perfect place to address this. So we are going to
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Speaker 1: be talking about an idea that is this that there
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Speaker 1: is such a thing as a victim mindset and a
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Speaker 1: warrior mindset, and those are the two types of mindsets.
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Speaker 2: Yes, yes, says yes, yes. So there's this general idea
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Speaker 2: that there are victim mindsets and warrior mindsets and that
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Speaker 2: these meaningfully influence your personality and behaviors. And I think
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Speaker 2: it's really important to point out this is actually fairly
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Speaker 2: complex and means different things to different people. It would
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Speaker 2: be helpful if we could come down as either in
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Speaker 2: support of or against an idea, but the reality is
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Speaker 2: that people are complicated and that trying to distill these
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Speaker 2: complexities into dichotomies is misleading in foolish. Yes, this is
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Speaker 2: us going to take potshots at the idea that there
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Speaker 2: is such a dichotomy as victim mindset or warrior mindset,
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Speaker 2: because everything is non binary. But we're going to unpack
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Speaker 2: that as we go in this short amount of time.
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Speaker 1: I also want to start with the fact that there
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Speaker 1: is basically little or no scholarly research on this, and
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Speaker 1: kind of I think, nor should they be, cause it's
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Speaker 1: kind of dumb. We do need to define our terms.
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Speaker 1: But what this does mean with this, because there's not
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Speaker 1: really much in the way of scholarly work, which again,
2:53
Speaker 1: let's keep it that way. Yeah, it means that the
2:55
Speaker 1: definition that we do have is more or less supplied
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Speaker 1: by bloggers with opinions and not by people who do
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Speaker 1: thinking professionally nor recreationally.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, fair, that's actually really I got not
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Speaker 2: that to that. It's so good, all right, let's.
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Speaker 1: Start by defining our terms.
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Speaker 2: So the victim mindset is generally characterized as failing to
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Speaker 2: take responsibility. It's blaming other people for your failings, making excuses,
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Speaker 2: failing to stand up for things that you believe in
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Speaker 2: or know to be right, not challenging people, and refusing
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Speaker 2: to admit your flaws.
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Speaker 1: We also saw some characterization around this that includes victims
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Speaker 1: as being reactive, defensive, non assertive, highly sensitive, taking things personally,
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Speaker 1: accepting mediocrity, believing that they lack control, and believing that
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Speaker 1: everything is either a blessing or a curse. What's kind
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Speaker 1: of ironic about this in the space is you will
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Speaker 1: find that the vocal majority of the people who push
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Speaker 1: this idea. I think I didn't collect any data, but
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Speaker 1: it seems like where I hear this idea crop up
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Speaker 1: the most is in sort of conservative circles. This whole
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Speaker 1: victim versus warrior mindset thing comes up there. And what's
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Speaker 1: crazy or what's kind of funny and ironic about this?
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Speaker 1: I think, or maybe just coincidental. No, it's ironic. It's good.
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Speaker 1: Is that if we were to describe someone who is
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Speaker 1: not accepting their failings, they're making excuses, they are not
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Speaker 1: challenging people. They refuse to admit their flaws. They're defensive,
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Speaker 1: their sensitive. They take thing's personality. That is describing Donald
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Speaker 1: Trump to a t ye like I have. Don't know
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Speaker 1: if I've ever seen a better profile character representation of
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Speaker 1: Donald Trump than that. So it's kind of funny that
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Speaker 1: people who run in conservative circles. I guess they have
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Speaker 1: this orientation to this as being a thing. Yeah, I'm like, wow,
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Speaker 1: that describes the leader you elected very very well, very
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Speaker 1: much a victim mindset there always.
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Speaker 2: So the warrior mindset then is taking responsibility, admitting fault,
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Speaker 2: working hard to overcome obstacles, always driving for perfection, focusing
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Speaker 2: on taking action, asserting dominance, calling people out, being aggressive,
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Speaker 2: and taking firm stances on things.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the sort of general idea here. Now I
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Speaker 1: found we found a couple of sources that allude to
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Speaker 1: inspiration for this idea. I had trouble tracking down like
5:15
Speaker 1: a primary starting point. But there are a couple of
5:18
Speaker 1: books that were published in the late nineties early two thousands.
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Speaker 1: So one was called Unleash The Warrior Within Developed the
5:25
Speaker 1: focus discipline, confidence, and courage, that's the title. It felt
5:29
Speaker 1: like it was incomplete sentence, but that's the title. This
5:32
Speaker 1: is originally published in two thousand by former Navy seal
5:36
Speaker 1: Richard machiwiks Macawicks maybe, who was also a Buddhist apparently,
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Speaker 1: which I thought was really interesting. The other was called
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Speaker 1: The Four Agreements, A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom. This
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Speaker 1: was published in nineteen ninety seven my Mexican author Don
5:54
Speaker 1: Miguel Ruiz, and it was inspired by the Toltec teachings
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Speaker 1: on how to improve one's life. I did not look
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Speaker 1: into those for the purposes of this. I wanted to
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Speaker 1: get into a topic. But his four agreements essentially boil
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Speaker 1: down to one, be impeccable with your word. Two, don't
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Speaker 1: take anything personally. Three don't make assumptions, and four always
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Speaker 1: do your best. As sort of the ideas here, and
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Speaker 1: I think you can hear those and feel like that's
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Speaker 1: got merit. I can appreciate that, and I would say
6:22
Speaker 1: you're not wrong, and that's again why we sort of
6:24
Speaker 1: get into the nuance here. Yeah.
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Speaker 2: It's interesting though that this book didn't talk about the
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Speaker 2: fifth agreement, which is adds. So we were just talking
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Speaker 2: about kind of these mindsets and we just finished up
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Speaker 2: with Don Miguel Ruiz's arguments, and I think we can
6:44
Speaker 2: kind of talk about how this might be helpful or
6:46
Speaker 2: and how this might not be helpful. So how's what
6:48
Speaker 2: we're talking about helpful at all? Well, the general idea
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Speaker 2: of taking responsibility can be therapeutic and can be useful.
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Speaker 2: You get empower people to make choices that allow them
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Speaker 2: to live in line with their values, particularly when those
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Speaker 2: choices might be challenging or difficult.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, the warrior mindset this idea here. It's been employed
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Speaker 1: to help people with disabilities seek and achieve independence, find
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Speaker 1: opportunities to push themselves to not allow their disability to
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Speaker 1: prevent them from living the life that they want to have.
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Speaker 1: Actually read in one of these blogged places where I
7:17
Speaker 1: was looking into this someone who was very inspired by
7:20
Speaker 1: their brother who was born with the disability, who like
7:22
Speaker 1: would not let that hold them down. This kid was
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Speaker 1: just like he was determined to work within the realm
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Speaker 1: of his disability to accomplish things and be successful and
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Speaker 1: all that, and he was really inspired by his drive
7:35
Speaker 1: to his ambition to like go out in the world
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Speaker 1: and like really makes you know he was just he
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Speaker 1: wanted to live in line with his ambition that was
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Speaker 1: really great for him. And I think that's a cool
7:45
Speaker 1: idea to help people just feel empowered to make those
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Speaker 1: kind of choices. And it's like, you don't have to
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Speaker 1: be an ambitious person to have your life mean something.
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Speaker 1: But like what I would advocate is that people at
7:55
Speaker 1: least feel empowered to live a life that they want
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Speaker 1: to have. Right.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely, I've known the people who always blame others for
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Speaker 2: their failings, who never take responsibility for their actions and mistakes,
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Speaker 2: who never seem willing to learn in these situations Donald Trump,
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Speaker 2: and it is frustrating to deal with and often we
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Speaker 2: don't prefer to be around these people that just can't
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Speaker 2: accept any sort of feedback whatsoever about anything at all.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, I've definitely known people like this personally, let alone
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Speaker 1: sending them run the office. But yeah, anyway, there is also,
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Speaker 1: of course, where this idea of the victim versus a
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Speaker 1: warrior mindset starts to fall apart. I sort of identified
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Speaker 1: three general holes in this idea. So first, there are
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Speaker 1: some basic logical problems with this idea, as we alluded
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Speaker 1: to it before in our intro here, Attempting to separate
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Speaker 1: all of the human experience into two ways of being
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Speaker 1: is useless. To put it very nicely, it's useless.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yea yeah. Now, some sources on that suggested
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Speaker 2: that there is a there is a survivor mindset and
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Speaker 2: a fighter mindset in addition to warrior and victims. So
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Speaker 2: that makes four mindsets instead of two mindset. So it's
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Speaker 2: so nice to humans are so simple that we only
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Speaker 2: need four mindsets. But this implicitly underscores the failings of
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Speaker 2: this idea, which is that there are a lot of
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Speaker 2: ways to be besides warrior and victim. So you've got warrior,
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Speaker 2: survivor fighter victim that could be additional folds to this
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Speaker 2: quote unquote theory or idea, if you.
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Speaker 1: Will, and many beyond that. And further, there are different
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Speaker 1: ways to be in different situations. Some situations might call
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Speaker 1: for one mindset, why others call for a different mindset,
9:26
Speaker 1: again acknowledging that there are lots of ways to be,
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Speaker 1: not just those two, and most likely people oscillate through
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Speaker 1: different ways of being throughout their day, in different situations
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Speaker 1: and across different experiences. We must move on for time
9:40
Speaker 1: from this, but I think the important point here is
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Speaker 1: that there is an infinite number of ways to be infinite,
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Speaker 1: not just too Yes, Like, there's a lot of a
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Speaker 1: lot of different ways that this shows up and try
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Speaker 1: to lump them into those two categories is very silly
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Speaker 1: and foolish. It's so silly. Now.
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Speaker 2: The second issue here, the second hole, is that this
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Speaker 2: is conceptually derelic The basic argument proponents of this idea
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Speaker 2: build upon is that one mindset affects your thoughts and feelings.
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Speaker 2: Two thoughts and feelings shape your behaviors, and three your
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Speaker 2: actions circle back and affect your mindset. Essentially, in this view,
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Speaker 2: behavior originates from beliefs, and we know that to be untrue,
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Speaker 2: Like we know where behavior comes from.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, this whole thing is just incorrect thoughts. First of all,
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Speaker 1: thoughts and feelings are behavior behavior, and when we talk
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Speaker 1: about behavior, it is shaped by its interaction with the environment.
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Speaker 1: It's not linear. But if you wanted to try and
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Speaker 1: choose a catalyst starting point in the nonlinear, complicated network
10:37
Speaker 1: of variables that affects behavior, the closest thing probably goes
10:41
Speaker 1: something like this. The environment creates the opportunity for behavior. Two,
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Speaker 1: the behavior happens in that context. Three the outcomes of
10:50
Speaker 1: those actions shape future actions. Four we start to form
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Speaker 1: a mindset loosely speaking, based on these experiences, which is
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Speaker 1: to say, basically completely backward from the proposed direction that
11:02
Speaker 1: this is supposed to go, and that was like their
11:03
Speaker 1: proposed direction. They're like, your arsenal is your mindset that
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Speaker 1: shapes who you are. I'm like, nope, you got it
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Speaker 1: backwards right exactly.
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Speaker 2: And now we can loosely translate the idea of the
11:13
Speaker 2: power of mindsets to correspond to the fact that our
11:16
Speaker 2: language about who we are and what happens to us
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Speaker 2: becomes an important piece of our habitual behavior pattern and
11:21
Speaker 2: that changing that language can facilitate a changing that pattern.
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Speaker 2: But changing ideas, the very fact that people choose to
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Speaker 2: write about this at all reveals that it doesn't start
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Speaker 2: with a mindset. It starts from external forces, the feedback loop,
11:34
Speaker 2: that is, the interaction with the environment and other people,
11:36
Speaker 2: not within ourselves. Like we start seeing that coming from outside,
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Speaker 2: external forces that act upon us and change and influence
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Speaker 2: the way that we think, which is again behavior.
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Speaker 1: And it's kind of ironic that they're like, it starts
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Speaker 1: with your mindset, and then they try and tell you
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Speaker 1: to start that way. I'm like, hold on, if you
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Speaker 1: think you can tell someone to start with their mindset
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Speaker 1: that you believe that their mindset can start externally with
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Speaker 1: you telling them that, which which means you admit inherently
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Speaker 1: that has to start from an external point exactly, not
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Speaker 1: an eternal one. So it is a contradictory position to
12:08
Speaker 1: even be taking at all. Or else they're just accepting
12:12
Speaker 1: that their willingness to preach this as masturbatory and that
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Speaker 1: it will have no effect, right, is kind of the
12:18
Speaker 1: alternative there, So all right, So those are the first
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Speaker 1: two things. Third is that if you read the writings
12:24
Speaker 1: on this long enough at least an theyse sort of
12:26
Speaker 1: blog posts and places where this tends to show up
12:29
Speaker 1: again in sort of these conservative circles. Sometimes even just
12:32
Speaker 1: within the first paragraph, it becomes obvious there's really a
12:35
Speaker 1: clear agenda here for these people, and it's a fairly
12:38
Speaker 1: toxic one. Right.
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Speaker 2: The warrior mentality reported in these spaces seems to focus
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Speaker 2: much more on the aggression and assertiveness pieces rather than
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Speaker 2: taking the responsibility pieces, because you know, many times people
12:49
Speaker 2: who are like they enjoy being aggressive or like intimidating,
12:53
Speaker 2: they don't really like taking responsibility for their actions, right, No,
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Speaker 2: and so most most or all of them refer to
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Speaker 2: combat and or as the natural state of the world
13:02
Speaker 2: where everything is a zero sum game and you either
13:05
Speaker 2: win or lose. And Greg Graffin, Doctor Greg Graffin already
13:08
Speaker 2: talks about this. Competition for resources is a constant thing.
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Speaker 2: But competition does not equal combat, and competition does not
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Speaker 2: equal war. Everybody should read Greg Graffin's books about this
13:20
Speaker 2: very important.
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Speaker 1: Again, Ironically, they seem to preach responsibility while also blaming
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Speaker 1: others who present themselves as victims. So they're either sure,
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Speaker 1: they're like personal responsibility except for except for me, doesn't
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Speaker 1: apply to me because it's your fault, you.
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Speaker 2: Know, right, right or right.
13:38
Speaker 1: They also seem to see asking help as a failing
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Speaker 1: and a weakness, and honestly, asking for help is one
13:43
Speaker 1: of humankind's greatest strengths. The reason that we are as
13:47
Speaker 1: successful of a species as we are is because we
13:50
Speaker 1: help each other, is because of collaboration. Yeah.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely, And this approach seems to promote the idea of
13:55
Speaker 2: bullying in lack of compassion. So one dissertation that we
13:58
Speaker 2: found has a correlation between what they described as quote
14:01
Speaker 2: warrior archetypes and domestic violence, So like there's actually like,
14:06
Speaker 2: there's also another another study too that came out in
14:08
Speaker 2: behavior analysis that talked about warrior culture and how warrior
14:12
Speaker 2: culture actually is directly correlated with increasing rates of police brutality.
14:17
Speaker 2: That makes sense, so it's it's all there, right, So
14:20
Speaker 2: it reveals an implied analogy in their logic, which means
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Speaker 2: that warrior is the victim as masculinity is the femininity.
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Speaker 2: This has never stated explicitly, but it appears to be
14:30
Speaker 2: kind of the general subtext that we find across all
14:33
Speaker 2: these writings, and.
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Speaker 1: They'd probably deny it, but honestly, like that is how
14:37
Speaker 1: this appears, Like this is sort of how the dichotomy
14:39
Speaker 1: is sort of made. So anyway, this is long, like
14:43
Speaker 1: we're past time now for us to wrap this all up,
14:45
Speaker 1: which means we need to get going. So in conclusion here,
14:48
Speaker 1: I think there's there is some nuance the idea of
14:50
Speaker 1: taking personal responsibility with im viewing a sense of integrity,
14:54
Speaker 1: trying your best, being honest in your words, like this
14:57
Speaker 1: can be legitimate guidance to help people pursue a life
15:00
Speaker 1: in line with their own values. And so it's like
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Speaker 1: the ideas embedded in the originality of this I think
15:06
Speaker 1: are good The problem is that people latching onto this
15:10
Speaker 1: metaphor of warrior and having that then means something very
15:13
Speaker 1: specific that seems like it's actually kind of outside of
15:16
Speaker 1: what maybe was intended to mean.
15:18
Speaker 2: Right, So the idea appears to have been co opted
15:20
Speaker 2: to justify things like violence and bigotry. Right, it is nuanced,
15:23
Speaker 2: and there is maybe some utility here, But maybe we
15:27
Speaker 2: throw out the metaphor and try something else. If it's
15:29
Speaker 2: effectively used to inspire aggression and prevents people from treating
15:32
Speaker 2: one another with compassion, like, it doesn't seem to be
15:35
Speaker 2: the value that the majority of people really want, and
15:38
Speaker 2: not the value that would benefit a thriving society. So
15:43
Speaker 2: I do think that it's valuable to kind of drop
15:45
Speaker 2: the victim warrior mindset and just talk about like good
15:49
Speaker 2: pro social behaviors that would benefit everybody at large.
15:53
Speaker 1: There we go, Yes, I like that. So yeah, I
15:55
Speaker 1: think if you have people, if you find yourself using
15:57
Speaker 1: this and you're talking about that victim warrior mindset, check
16:01
Speaker 1: yourself and maybe be willing to challenge those people. I think,
16:04
Speaker 1: first of all, trying to separate it into that dichotomy
16:06
Speaker 1: very foolish. I think that's dumb. It's a very well
16:08
Speaker 1: the first time I heard this is like, what a
16:10
Speaker 1: weird way to try and separate like ways of slight
16:14
Speaker 1: into that specific dichotomy. Also, like that feels like there's
16:17
Speaker 1: an agenda, right, and there is, like it is fairly
16:20
Speaker 1: clear that exists. So anyway, that's what I have to
16:23
Speaker 1: say about that. It's not that it's inherently bad or good.
16:25
Speaker 1: I think that there is potentially some utility there. I
16:27
Speaker 1: don't particularly find the metaphor of warrior or victim to
16:31
Speaker 1: be very helpful, and what they seem to be prescribing,
16:33
Speaker 1: i'd probably just replace them with some better words, right,
16:36
Speaker 1: But that's where we currently find ourselves, and that's how
16:38
Speaker 1: I would conclude that.
16:39
Speaker 2: I think that's perfect.
16:40
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17:26
Speaker 1: We like hearing that as well. I think that is it.
17:29
Speaker 1: Am I missing things? No?
17:31
Speaker 2: I think that covers all of it.
17:32
Speaker 1: Yeah. Thank you to my team and people for helping
17:34
Speaker 1: make this happen. Thank you for recording with me today, Shane.
17:36
Speaker 1: Thank you everyone for listening. This is Abraham, This is Shane,
17:39
Speaker 1: Why we do what we do? Mini is out.
17:42
Speaker 2: Bye.
17:43
Speaker 1: You've been listening to Why We Do what We Do.
17:46
Speaker 2: You can learn more about this and other episodes by
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17:54
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