Showing posts with label Nick Duffell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nick Duffell. Show all posts

Nick Duffell | Trauma, Abandonment and Privilege | Legalise Freedom Radio | Feb. 4, 2017 

Source: legalise-freedom.com, woundedleaders.co.uk, boardingschoolsurvivors.co.uk, The Making of Them documentary



Nick Duffell discusses his book Trauma, Abandonment and Privilege – A Guide to Therapeutic Work with Boarding School Survivors.

The book uses the term ‘survivors’ because the effect on adults of being sent away to board in childhood and the problems associated with boarding, although downplayed and even denied, can be emotionally and psychologically devastating. Survivors often describe their time at boarding school and its aftermath using terms such as neglect, betrayal, grief, rage, abuse, confusion, sadness, helplessness, loneliness, and anger.

From predominantly upper and upper middle class families, achievements in boarder’s professional lives – in business, politics, or some combination thereof – marginalize and all too often destroy their personal lives, particularly their intimate relationships. These effects can also be passed on from generation to generation. The result is a distant, dysfunctional elite boasting a constellation of achievements and accolades, generally handed down by an entrenched establishment of their predecessors and peers drawn from the same self-perpetuating pool.

To the rest of society they can appear arrogant, emotionally-detached, cold and calculating, and yet with a sense of entitlement born of egos both overblown and brittle. Unfortunately, they often end up in positions of power and influence where their psycho-dramas can manifest in attitudes, actions, practices, and policies which have profound, far-reaching effects on the lives of others. However lofty their titles and positions, at heart they’re frightened little children who never grew up. Until we fully understand the trauma and abandonment, and see the so-called privilege as it really is – a life of resentment, frustration, and emptiness – we will fail to truly face the source of so many profound problems. - legalise-freedom.com,

Nick Duffell | Wounded Leaders | Legalise Freedom Radio | Aug. 29, 2014

Source: legalise-freedom.com, woundedleaders.co.uk, boardingschoolsurvivors.co.uk, The Making of Them documentary



Nick Duffell discusses his book Wounded Leaders: British Elitism and the Entitlement Illusion.

In an age when America elected its first black president and the Middle East stirred with popular uprising, Britons were again content to elect the products of their elitist Public Schools. But, their grooming for power aside, does such an education produce excellence – or expertise in self-deception and duplicity? The early 21st Century gives us some clues. Tony Blair maintained his façade of inner conviction but lost the nation through blind allegiance to the Establishment. David Cameron let his boyish mask of caring sincerity slip to reveal a bully’s attitude beneath his meritocratic pretence. A bicycle in Downing Street highlighted a deep-seated problem in Britain: a divided society caught in the enduring trance of the Entitlement Illusion.

Duffell argues that the British national obsession with sending the children of the well-heeled away to school has a major impact on our society, our institutions and our attitudes. He proposes that a cherished national character ideal, eschewing vulnerability and practising a normalised covert hostility based on bullying in the dorm adversely affects even those who did not have such an education.

This specific culture of elitism, protected by financial interests and the “It never did me any harm” syndrome, means that Britain is unlikely to foster the kind of leadership necessary in our world of increasing complexity, which needs cooperative global solutions. But worse, new scientific evidence shows that this hyper-rational training leaves its devotees trapped within the confines of an inflexible mind, beset with functional defects. Through the lens of the British case, Duffell presents a perspective on the universal defects of untempered rationality and proposes a revised model of leadership more fit for the uncertain future our world faces. -Legalise-Freedom.com
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