A Theory of Everything # 11 'Animus Possession'
- Mark Stock
- 9 hours ago
- 4 min read
‘When the animus dominates a woman, it can distort her judgment and oppress her inner life.’
‘You wouldn’t like me in real life because I can be a real bitch.’
Those are Sally Mungall’s own words addressed to me during one particular session of ‘art therapy’ around November 2021.
Maybe she wanted to make herself seem less attractive, perhaps to moderate my strong feelings towards her. Maybe she didn’t want me holding on to such an idealistic version of her. Whatever the reason, it didn’t work. I simply replied that I wouldn’t mind, that I would still love her. Sally Mungall’s response was immediate frustration; she actually growled.
I took her word home with me and added it to the compilation of somewhat contradictory details about her. I have always avoided using such a derogatory word even when provoked. Indeed, I feel some discomfort simply contextually quoting it here. I had always understood that the word ‘bitch’ is really among the worst of gendered slurs but this was the first time that I was forced to account for a dictionary definition. I learned that ‘bitch’ applies to someone, typically a girl or woman, who is belligerent, unreasonable, malicious, controlling, aggressive, or dominant. Why then, would a professional mental healthcare worker, someone who you might expect to be the embodiment of conciliatory, benevolent attitudes, now succumb to such an appalling act of self-denigration?
A “bitch” is an unnecessarily mean woman, typically a bully, or simply used as an insult towards women.
‘a bitch is just a bully in a skirt’ – Mean Girls
But there are other layers of definition to consider. Modern feminism has reappropriated the word ’bitch’, applying new meanings that may connote a strong, independent, successful female.
Bitch has also been reappropriated by hip-hop culture where rappers use the adjective "bad bitch" to refer to an independent, confident, attractive woman. The term is used in a complimentary way, meaning the woman is desirable.
‘Does the word “bitch” automatically represent a woman? And, if so, does it automatically indicate a woman who is mean, unlikable, whorish, and independent in an “obnoxious” way? Or, is it possible that when a woman is referred to as a “bitch” that it can be seen as a “good thing?” That is, instead of being harmful and degrading what if “bitch” indicated a strong, self-confident woman – a term of empowerment? – HOW “BITCH” BECAME A GOOD THING – OR, AT LEAST NOT THAT BAD Aaron K. Celious, Department of Sociology, University of Michigan
Much later after I stumbled upon old footage on YouTube of a Channel 4 interview between journalist, and presenter, Cathy Newman and Canadian professor psychologist, Jordan Peterson I discovered fresh insight into the psychology of the word, ‘bitch’.
The interview from 16 January 2018 had gone viral over the internet. The transcript can be found here
Jordan Peterson, in a later interview with Geen Stijl, described Cathy Newman as being ‘animus possessed’. He went further, explaining Cathy Newman’s interview style as being completely driven by ‘power tactics, hierarchies and domination’ aspects more typically ascribed to modern feminism’s understanding of ‘negative masculinity’ or the ‘patriarchy’.
I now think I better understand Sally Mungall’s use of the self-descriptor, ‘bitch’.
I believe that Sally Mungall was animus possessed.
‘The anima and animus are inner contra sexual figures that express values opposite to the persona or conscious personality, and enliven the psyche.
‘They: Serve as compensatory figures to the main identity, and behave as inner personalities that exhibit the characteristics lacking in the outer, manifest, conscious personality and
Indicate two modes of being that operate in all people, regardless of gender. Men have an inner female figure, and women have an inner masculine figure.’
‘To understand how a person may come to be possessed by the anima/animus, the inner contra sexual figure, consider the anima/animus projection, stages of development, and unconscious tendencies.’
‘When the animus is displaced or overwhelms the female psyche the woman may exhibit masculine symptoms, “Know-it-all” and controlling behaviour, bullying, sadism, being loud and attention seeking etc.’
Practising psychotherapists in the West are becoming familiar with the emergence of the psychological problems that are affecting “liberated” women. A large number of women who are highly successful and competent in outer terms are plagued with a deep- rooted inner feeling of worthlessness, lack of value and inferiority. The conventional approach to this malaise has been to ascribe it to psychological overloading, ME or the necessity for these women to become yet more ambitious and striving. - Jasbinder Garnermann
A woman’s animus, her ‘inner man’, is strongly coloured by her experience of her personal father. Just as a man is apt to marry his ‘mother’, so to speak, so a woman is inclined to favour a man psychologically like her father, or, again, his opposite. - https://frithluton.com/articles/womans-animus-development/
‘In dealing with the problem of the animus the therapist will first have to deal with the father, since the main problem of the animus is constellated by the father-complex. The woman’s main task in this process is to redeem her personal father, or rather her inner relation to her father. By attempting to see her father in both his dark and light side she can get out of the trap of being caught in opposite sides of a spectrum which is what gives a complex its force. The dark side of the father consists of anger, lack of control and incompleteness, the positive side offers power, generosity and creativity. But as long as the woman is caught in an idealised/rejecting pole she will be disowning elements of her own psyche.’ - Rescuing the Feminine: The Problem of the Animus in Women Jasbinder Garnermann https://iahip.org/page-1076591
I have noticed the commonalities between the pejorative 'bitch' and the animus possession ie belligerence defined by the attiudes characterised by aggresiveness ( including passive aggresiveness ) dominance and 'controlling behaviour, bullying' behaviour. These are qualities either self-confessed by Sally Mungall or observed and felt by me. In the remaining parts of A Theory of Everything I will speculate on the reasons behind her self identity and how they shaped her attitudes and actions towards me during 'art therapy', correlating her pathology with my own. I will conclude this thesis with an examination of her failure to comply with the basic standards of ethics expected of a healthcare professional and the traumatic repercussions endured by me following her involvement of Hampshire Police.
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