David McElroy

Almost none of the angry people shouting at each other online — about politics, social issues, religion, whatever — seem to have even the slightest interest in understanding the people they hate. They often even claim they don’t hate the others, but their actions say otherwise. Almost everything they say is for their allies, because what they’re saying is complete nonsense to their enemies. If you profoundly misunderstand your opponent — and if he profoundly misunderstands you — is it any wonder you each end up wanting to kill the other? If each group understood the other, things could be so different, because it’s hard to hate people you truly understand. We might even find solutions which allow people with radically different views of the world to live in peace, separate from one another but each with honest understanding of the other. But none of that is possible if you won’t even try to understand the people with whom you disagree.

I haven’t bought a copy of Mad magazine for decades, but it still hit me hard today to read that the humor magazine is dead. Although the owners will continue to republish material from the 67-year archives, no new material will be produced, except for an annual year-in-review issue. For teens of my era — almost exclusively guys, in my experience — Mad was a rebellious and subversive influence that broke the rules of our everyday lives. Mad was willing to make fun of pretty much anything, and it was a joyous sense of relief for those of us who felt repressed by a conformist culture around us. It wasn’t always funny, but when it was, it could be brilliant. The biggest single influence on my adult understanding of humor was the movie “Airplane!” but Mad magazine was a close second. Rest in peace, Alfred E. Neuman. It’s finally time to worry.

Why do we do negative things which we don’t want to do? Why do we repeat patterns in our lives that we desperately want to break? Psychologist Erin Leonard says it’s because we have an unconscious tendency to engage in “reenactments” of things from our past. Writing for Psychology Today, Leonard says we’re unconsciously drawn to things that are familiar. This leaves us engaging in relationships — over and over — with people who have characteristics which we consciously want to avoid, but which mirror something from our past relationships. We’re drawn to people and situations that allow us to relive things from our past. I’ve seen this in my own life and I suspect it’s because we’re trying — without realizing it — to relive a particular dynamic in a way that we believe will allow us to have a different outcome than the one from the past. But that normally just means choosing the same sort of person — someone who will hurt us or abandon us or abuse us. We believe we are making rational, conscious decisions for ourselves, but we’re often simply following an old script. Breaking free is difficult, and it requires a lot of courage to change.