Conflict is not abuse : overstating harm, community responsibility, and the duty of repair

From intimate relationships to global politics, Sarah Schulman observes a continuum: that inflated accusations of harm are used to avoid accountability. Illuminating the difference between Conflict and Abuse, Schulman directly addresses our contemporary culture of scapegoating. This deep, brave, and bold work reveals how punishment replaces personal and collective self-criticism, and shows why difference is so often used to justify cruelty and shunning. Rooting the problem of escalation in negative group relationships, Schulman illuminates the ways cliques, communities, families, and religious, racial, and national groups bond through the refusal to change their self-concept. She illustrates how Supremacy behavior and Traumatized behavior resemble each other, through a shared inability to tolerate difference. This important and sure to be controversial book illuminates such contemporary and historical issues of personal, racial, and geo-political difference as tools of escalation towards injustice, exclusion, and punishment, whether the objects of dehumanization are other individuals in our families or communities, people with HIV, African Americans, or Palestinians. __Conflict Is Not Abuse__ is a searing rejection of the cultural phenomenon of blame, cruelty, and scapegoating, and how those in positions of power exacerbate and manipulate fear of the "other" to achieve their goals. **Sarah Schulman** is a novelist, nonfiction writer, playwright, screenwriter, journalist and AIDS historian, and the author of eighteen books. A Guggenheim and Fulbright Fellow, Sarah is a Distinguished Professor of the Humanities at the City University of New York, College of Staten Island. Her novels published by Arsenal include __Rat Bohemia__, __Empathy__, __After Delores__, and __The Mere Future__. She lives in New York. Title Page Copyright Dedication Contents Introduction | A Reparative Manifesto Methodology Facing and Dealing with Conflict Positive Change Can Happen Part One | The Conflicted Self and the Abusive State Chapter One | In Love: Conflict Is Not Abuse The Dangerous Flirt Email, Texts, and Negative Escalation Reductive Modes of Illogic Chapter Two | Abandoning the Personal: The State and the Production of Abuse Understanding Is More Important than Determining the Victim Authentic Relationships of Depth vs. Bonding by Bullying When the Community Encourages Overreaction False Accusations and the State Chapter Three | The Police and the Politics of Overstating Harm The Police as Arbiters of Relationships “Violence,” Violence, and the Harm of Misnaming Harm Calling the Police on Singular Incidents of Violence Calling the Police on Your Partner, When It’s Your Father Who Should Have Gone to Jail Chapter Four | HIV Criminalization in Canada: How the Richest Middle Class in the World Decided to Call the Police on HIV-Positive People in Order to Cover Up Their Racism, Guilt, and Anxiety about Sexuality and Their Supremacy-Based Investment in Punishment Privileges and Problem-Solving in the Canadian and US Contexts Think Twice Before Calling the Police The Racial Roots of Canaditan HIV Criminalization Viral Load and the State Being “Abused” Instead of Responsible as State Policy Criminalizing Human Experience Women as Monsters Crimes that Can’t Occur Claiming Abuse as an Excuse for Government Control Claims of Abuse as Assertions of Normativity In Conflict: Real Friends Don’t Let Friends Call the Police Part Two | The Impulse to Escalate Chapter Five | On Escalation Supremacy Ideology as a Refusal of Knowledge Traumatized Behavior: When Knowledge Becomes Unbearable Interrupting Escalation Before It Produces Tragedy Control is at the Center of Supremacy and Traumatized Behavior The Making of Monsters as Delusional Thinking The Cultural Habit of Acknowledging Distorted Thinking The Denial of Mental Illness Chapter Six | Manic Flight Reaction: Trigger + Shunning Trigger + Shunning #1: Manic Flight Reaction (Historical Psychoanalysis) Trigger + Shunning #2: Borderline Episode (Psychiatry and Pop Psychology) Trigger + Shunning #3: Fight, Flight, Freeze (Mindfulness, American Buddhism) Trigger + Shunning #4: Detaching with an Axe (Al-Anon) They All Agree: Delay and Accountable Community Chapter Seven | Queer Families, Compensatory Motherhood, and the Political Culture of Escalation Good Families Don’t Hurt Other People Rethinking the Family Ethic as a Form of Harm Reduction Queer Families and Supremacy Ideology Compensatory Motherhood and the Need to Blame Part Three | Supremacy/Trauma and the Justification of Injustice: The Israeli War on Gaza Chapter Eight | Watching Genocide Unfold in Real Time: Gaza through Facebook and Twitter, June 2 — July 23, 2014 The Strategy of False Accusation When We Need to Be “Abused,” the Truth Doesn’t Matter Conclusion | The Duty of Repair What’s So Impossible about Apologizing for Your Part? Feeling Better vs. Getting Better Acknowledgments Works Cited Citations by Page About the Author [this Work] Is A Searing Rejection Of The Cultural Phenomenon Of Blame, Cruelty, And Scapegoating, Revealing How Those In Positions Of Power Exacerbate And Manipulate Fear Of The 'other' To Avoid Facing Themselves--front Flap. Introduction: A Reparative Manifesto -- Part One. The Conflicted Self And The Abusive State. In Love : Conflict Is Not Abuse ; Abandoning The Personal : The State And The Production Of Abuse ; The Police And The Politics Of Overstating Harm ; Hiv Criminalization In Canada -- Part Two. The Impulse To Escalate. On Escalation ; Manic Flight Reaction : Trigger + Shunning ; Queer Families, Compensatory Motherhood, And The Political Culture Of Escalation -- Part Three. Supremacy/trauma And The Justification Of Injustice : The Israeli War On Gaza. Watching Genocide Unfold In Real Time ; The Duty Of Repair. Sarah Schulman. Includes Bibliographical References (pages 287-290). Issued Also In Electronic Format. Sarah Schulman illuminates the differences between Conflict and Abuse in this revelatory book that addresses the contemporary culture of scapegoating