The Falsely So-Called Science, Yet Popular Psychobabble: "Daddy Issues"

Part One

Falsely so-called science, and uniquely psychology, really psychobabble, proceeds from a requirement of meaninglessness.  When I write, meaninglessness, I know there is meaning, of course, but the pseudo-scientists need a blank canvass for their own lust.  They can assign their own meaning to any and every thing, like a rorschach ink blot, so that they are sovereign over existence.  A major component of this is "it's not my problem, I couldn't help it," because the convenient randomness leaves them only a victim.  This justifies past and predicts future bad behavior.  There are a multitude in number and in different varieties of maladies, ailments, syndromes, and disorders with a similar multitude in number and in different varieties of explanations and causes so that the sovereign individual can pick his own.  He becomes even a sympathetic figure because of the disorder, which becomes his new identity.

Scripture, on the other hand, speaks with authority about what is wrong and why.  The Bible sufficiently furnishes someone to every good work.  There is no temptation to sin for anyone about anything that God has not provided a way of escape.  Instead of turning to and listening to God, a person replaces God's authority with self-authority, and uses falsely so-called science to excuse a sin.  The "science" has become a higher pseudo-authority, quoted without a permission to challenge.  By replacing scripture, it replaces God and grants cover to the individual.  He gets a pass.

A syndrome, peer reviewed in a journal, absolves a victim of guilt.  When he does wrong, a debilitating malady explains it.  Victims are selective in their use of their infirmity like a child who isn't hungry until he's offered ice cream.  Greater expectations trigger a relapse.  Blame exacerbates the symptoms.  Another episode meets a suggestion of responsibility.  Victims are the perfect spokesmen for almost any issue because they can't be criticized.

I'm not saying there aren't challenges in this world because of the curse of sin on the creation and on people themselves.  I'm also not saying there aren't true victims.  Scripture says there is and everyone knows that by experience, which would be why Jesus taught to "count the cost," also represented by the tough experience of the sun beating down on a plant, which had no root in a rocky soil.

We have a state police officer in our church, and he's seen horrific fatal outcomes in car accidents.  He deals with regular, threatening confrontation and more.  I ask him how these experiences have left a mark on him and his thinking, especially with certain disorders that others claim from them.  He says they are not beyond the ability to face, because of his faith in Christ.  The greatest afflictions arise from drugs and alcohol a part of what they treat as self-medication.  The same state police officer said that in their classes on this subject matter, it was agreed that the measures used to mask the memories create bigger issues than the incidents that triggered them.

Special attention is paid to those who go through apparently traumatic events, when anyone living faces every day the trauma of the chaos of this world, arising from the detrimental effects of sin.  Everyone could claim any one of multiple causes for syndromes and disorder, and it's only getting worse.  Many varied events could be interpreted any number of ways to allow us to be victims:  rejection, failures, death, loneliness, isolation, disrespect, stress, castigation, fear, injustice, regret, boredom, illness, pain, hatred, sorrow, low metabolism, loss, and intolerance.  One could pick any one, several, or a unique mix of a few.

Jordan Peterson, a clinical pyschiatrist with thousands of hours, in his book, 12 Rules for Life, writes about what constitutes an "oppressed" or "disabled" people.  He asks (p. 316):

But who is disabled?  Is someone living with a parent with Alzheimer's disabled? If not, why not?

My wife and I are taking care of my parents, both type 2 diabetes and my father with advanced alzheimer's.  From the professional opinion of a PhD with decades of hours of clinical experience, I'm a victim to the level of a disabililty.  What do you think?

It's pathetic, but more than ever, especially millennials use status as a victim to gain attention.  They report the latest downturn and how they're attempting to cope.  They're having a hard time.  I'm not sure most people either believe them or care, but the strategy or technique multiplies.  It's an old scheme that God exposes in Ezekiel 18:1-4:

1 The word of the LORD came unto me again, saying, 2 What mean ye, that ye use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying,, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge? 3 As I live, saith the Lord GOD, ye shall not have occasion any more to use this proverb in Israel. 4 Behold, all souls are mine; as the soul of the father, so also the soul of the son is mine: the soul that sinneth, it shall die.

The same reference is made in Jeremiah 31:29-30:

29 In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children's teeth are set on edge. 30 But every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge.

The proverb represents the methodology of victimhood:  children say their teeth are set on edge because their fathers have eaten a sour grape.  The one doesn't follow from the other.  Of course, what God says is that it isn't someone else's fault; it's your fault.  The soul that sins, however, shall die.  A child is still responsible for his sin.

Daddy Issues

For this series on psychobabble, I'm starting with "Daddy Issues."  I've read that the specific terminology mainly applies to a daughter with her father.  It's used both ways though -- also with the son, and that's where I'll focus for this series.

I had never heard of such a thing as daddy issues growing up, or maybe I could have made some mileage from it, when my dad required of me what he did when I was a child.  I could have used it when I received God-ordained physical discipline, claim that he went too hard on me or humiliated me, when he either yelled at me or forced me to work   hard.  He judged me.  He pushed me.  Very often, I didn't feel acceptance.  I'm sure I could cook up some victimization out of all that.  Maybe it's too late.  In fact, I never had any of those feelings.

"Daddy Issues" are also known as "Father Complex" and "Father Hunger."  My phone sent me a short clip of a speech Harrison Ford gave to Sean Connery for a lifetime achievement award, and Connery had played Ford's father.  Ford said, "Our fathers, we endure them, we're tested by them, and then as we grow older, we gain a whole new level of respect and admiration for them."  The "endure" and "tested by" seem like where the daddy issues come.

Generally, as I've read, the daddy issue for a son is when he blames his issues as an adult on his relationship with his dad.  Someone wrote:  "It is typically defined by an inability to accept [his] own faults by projecting that onto [his] father."  Today psychiatrists and psychologists will agree with this, affirm it as truth.  A lot can also put a strain between the relationship of a son with his father, pointing at dad:  divorce, drunk, drugged, absent, non-stop cruelty, or even total permissiveness.

Problems for adults do trace back to original problems with parents, which is why the parent-child relationship is so emphasized by God in scripture.  Even if the parents didn't do everything God wanted them to do, the Jeremiah and Ezekiel passages above remind the next generation that it will give a direct account to God.  The New Testament characterizes apostasy in two different places as "disobedient to parents," not "parental irresponsibility."  Daddy issues can be what someone else wrote:

While many boys idolize their fathers, that can change once the teenage years arrive. That's the stage during which a young male is attempting to form his own identity. Rebellion against authority—often one's parents—is common, and clash often ensues. This, however, often changes as the son matures and comes to realize that he didn't, in fact, know everything, and begins to realize his father was right about a lot more than he'd realized as an adolescent.

Everything between either a father and a son or a father and a daughter must be tested by scripture.  If a dad follows God's Word and encourages a son or daughter to do the same, the daddy issue lies with the adult child.  If a dad doesn't obey the Bible, then the daddy issue is with daddy.  A father-child relationship is not irredeemable, but the terms for reconciliation are what God says in scripture.

Issues between a father and his children have a biblical solution, but the father and the children have to want to solve it according to scripture.  Both sides have to care.  Instead, however, in many cases having daddy issues is a convenient issue, like Absalom with David (2 Sam 13-18), to embrace something other than what God says in scripture.  A daddy issue claims a victim status that excuses someone who wants to do what he wants to do, which is violating God's Word.