The "Cure" for PTSD: A Road From Dehumanization to Humanism Through Cynicism

    Even though my question seems pretty obvious I am trying to avoid that human point of view that would make it obvious and try to answer in the most trafalmadorian type of way possible for a human. I'm trying to avoid the emotion that tells us to cry when we loose a loved or witness the crudeness of war...however as simple as it may seem it is not, when touching a topic that impacts as hard as WWII (and the holocaust that comes to the top of my mind when I refer to this topic) in which i my self should feel humanized by the tear inducing memory of my murdered relatives. This happened because it was ment to be, the British will always make the decision to light-up Dresden based on the idea that it would shorten the war and eradicate the "army camps" there, the British will always make that mistake. If this will always happen like it did and nothing you did would ever stop it, because, in fact, you didn't stop it. To me this, even do cynical, may be a huge factor to tell someone with PTSD and it may help him cope with it because they will loose any sense of blaim or remorse.

    Even though this does not solve the whole problem, it brings up the possible "cure" to PTSD and other disorders caused by dehumanization. The real problem with dehumanization is that when it leaves a little shred of humanity that helplessly fights to regain control and vanish humanity...that's what causes PTSD. As I said on a previous blog cynicism is not an opposite of humanism, it even may be a step closer from dehumanization to humanism. While humanism values life a lot and dehumanization despises life, cynicism doesn't give it any transcendent value because it pictures life as something fleeting and there to serve it's purpose nothing more...its somehow stoic. Vonnegut as well has PTSD and he uses Billy to help him cope with his issues to this I must ask. What is Billy? Billy is a cynics, the Trafalmadorians are cynics and Vonnegut is using cynicism to cope with his own trauma. These kids are raised to treasure life and be kind and merciful but when they (still kids) are sent to dehumanize each other and witness (even commit) attroucious crimes then this is just jumping to the other extreme with no middle ground, cynicism is that middle ground

    Hemmingway being a perfect example for my case (as well as Vonnegut) found his peace with life and his own PTSD which he forcefully expresses with no fear, to the point of not fearing death however not wanting it, thats what cynicism is and thats how it helps. The word cure falls in ridicule when we see that both of these men were hopeless alcoholics but the bottle is again just another "cure" because for a sickness as devastating like PTSD there is no solution, the best you can do is keep it from driving you completely mad and hollow...just a shell with horrid war memories.

Victims Being Victims

    In every conflict there is always a victim, in war there are always victims but who are these victims exactly? After reading Cristina Serrano's "Who's the Real Victim?",  I myself started questioning who were the victims of war. The obvious victims like the physically and emotionaly cripled, the people with loved one's killed or houses destroyed or lifes taken way or many other things caused by destruction were checked on my victim list however the more I resoned every thing on earth was on my list. In a war with enough magnitude the effects of war come to affect everyone in differnt ways turning any one involved into a victim just that they are not all victims of the same things. Either from suffering or from dehumanization no matter wht you are in a war, if you are involved in it somehow you are a victim. The leader a victim of lack of diplomacy and responsability, the soldier is a victim of that leader and the enemy leader and the civilians are victims of the soldiers and leaders. War has enough victimisation to go around and its all a cycle that hurts any way you look at it, it depends on how far you want to go with the logic, the environment a victim of the country's industrialization and the whole world for the polution caused.

    If you look at war this way it seems even more wrong so in a way the real victims are the things inside us that tell us what will be beneficial and what would not be. Things as pure and taken for granted like logic and common sense and things as kind like mercy and humanity get victimised by rage, greed and dehumanization.

A Measurement of Humanity

   Humanity may be viewed as something abstract and undefined however form my point of view humanity is the individual or collective value of life and what the giving or taking of a life means to you. War being the individual and collective loss of humanity is where humanity in one's self is best measured. War is the loss of humanity however it's still a part of us humans and it occurs when our instinct over powers our humanity. Lazzaro is a perfect example of a torn man with almost no humanity left since for him taking a life isn't such a big deal, he might even like it or consider it "sweet". On the other hand Billy goes crazy, this is a huge factor that proves how deeply humanistic Billy was. When he witnesses the major collective loss of humanity during war, his spirit weakenss and since he has such a humanistic view of life that know faces such unhuman actions he losses his mind.

    Understanding humanity and why is it so unhuman is hard if you are on any of the far sides like Lazzaro or pre-war Billy, however post war, PTSD Billy has a cinical way of viewing humanity that serves a a middle ground since its almost emotionally-unatached kind of objective, with out despaising or resenting humanity. Thats were relativism, the Trafalmadorians ideology and fourth dimension fit, they are the very complex, and mind-bottling grey are on humanism. This middle ground may be hard to understand and cope with to some because most people are on either extreme, wartorn people thinks it's all "bullshit" and the people that have never witnessed something unhuman thinks it' cinical and horrible and that life is priceless and the most sacred and that the striping of a person's life is totally unthinkable.

When your Sanity Becomes a Casualty of War

   "War may induce side effects like alcoholism, nausea and life long trauma, check with your doctor before going to war". If war had a caution label thats what it should read. Aside from losing limbs or acctually dying, soldiers that have experienced war in its most unhuman way tend to also losse their sanity. Such disorders like PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) and the Gulf Syndrome are names for having lost your mind in war and recieving one of war's most unhealeble wounds. Normally these diseases start bending your sanity when a person experiences something disturbin and horrible such as war, causing trauma in that person's psique. after deep denial and self destructive existential issues the mind lets go of the last bits of sanity. When I stopped looking at Billy Piligrim like if it was more a symbol than a man I realized that he may not be the introspective guy after all. When I came to this partial conclusion I thought, in an undermining tone, that Billy was just a poor crazy person having alucinations of time travel and aliens.

   Almost inmediately I recognized how shallow my observations were and felt pitty for Billy because really he is just trying to cope with his trauma and existential issues, even if it takes aliens, which is actually fairly common since to deal with trauma an external entity with a little fiction (religion) may help ease the wound. This is a pretty accurate portraing of PTSD by Vonnegut, however, since he himself is a veteran that witnessed one of the most horifing scenes of WWII it might go a little deeper. Billy might be a representation of Vonnegut's own trauma and it would also wouldn't be a surprise if vonnegut himself might have a still present PTSD himself.

War...Bummer

  War is a phenomena were people tend to do things they would have never even thought of doing in normal live by a sudden dehumanization that can't really be explained. Survival and duty might sometimes be a reason why people loss their humanity in a blink of an eye, however there are times were the cruelty being done would seem to overcome these reasons but then a deeper, possibly irreversible dehumanization takes place. Extreme denial and self justification take over at first and can even drive you to insanity but when you find yourselves at the brink of turning back you become indifferent, indifferent to your crimes because it was either that or going crazy, or doing whats right which most of the time the sense of right and wrong gets lost in the process. Your indifference will not stand out as much and you will not give it that much importance since the what surrounds you is as well indifferent and the society that surround you acts the same so you can't feel how terrible you have become. Its when war ends and which ever side wins or losses you survive and enter a new world that is sick and repulsed by war because they know its nothing but pain...that's when you realize that you are a monster and you will always be, its branded in you and no matter how much you drink, cry in your sleep or remember it so vividly you could swear you are there it won't work cause your last shreds of humanity vanished with your indifference of other human lives. As Martin Luther King once said "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter".

Trafalmadorian Meet and Greet

    How would the Trafalmadorians react if they saw our childish behavior during a war? During Billy's capture fake notions of victory and empowerment filled the sauerkraut-eating German soldiers as well as Wild Bob had reflected on hope and an unrealistic, everything will be alright attitude. Not forgetting the typical loss of attitude when in a compromising situation and a realization that reality hits hard of Weary that as a consequence has been spat on and is now sobbing like a 2 year-old and not like a musketeer. If a race that saw things in its raw, unemotional way would see us in this state, they may fall into confusion, pity, condescendingly and even frustration. We are always emotionally immature, damaged and self-centered... I think that's why we laugh when somebody falls. When we are hurt we wish to hurt just because of a ridiculous grudge that we make up because of instint and lack of perspective. If the Trafalmadorians would see this I think they would say, "really!?!?!?". 

So it Goes VS. The Three Musketeers

   After seeing Billy's view on life and relativity we go back and see its opposite, a humanistic, naive and emotionally driven way of seeing life and its value. Weary, Billy's "partner" is an 18 year-old kid who hasn't even fired his gun, after being left behind by the two actual soldiers Weary's fantasy of friendship and bravery vanishes. Full of emotion and inmatureness weary beats Billy, this represents his innocence and how emotions blind his view on life and the actual life and their current situation, war. War is definitely no place for emotional and optimistic, corny view that Weary has on life, however it sets a perfect contrast.

    Most of the war movies, stories, video games and books are based on victory and epicness opposed to horror or value of life which come along but are never the main theme. This is the complete opposite of actual war in which only dumb, naive kids like Weary think about things like that. In the opening night of "Saving Private Ryan"a group of WWII veterans were invited, the opening scene of the soldiers landing in the beach while being gunned down by a turret was so real that some of the veterans actually left the theatre, even with the happy ending and the final victory the veterans did not enjoy the movie. We sugar coat war with these factors and forget how horrible it is. On the other hand we have the "so it goes" that is the other far side of looking at loss of lives, the ideology claims they are relative however that's why I think Vonnegut makes aliens say this, because its unhumanistic...no human would ever say lives do not matter.

Life's Relativity in War

    The Trafalmadorians are introduced to Billy as a modernistic race with a non-humanistic perspective in a time period were it is the most uncommon to find it in, war. Having relativity as their main philosophy just like Einstein and his "Relativity of Space and Time", however they go beyond and not only think time as being relative and non-linear but also life and emotions. This frames a black-and-white contrast between their ideology and the general, humanistic consensus of a world at war. The impact on Billy by the Trafalmadorians is noticeable by the way he acts in the book with a numbness and an indifferent manner. The simple fact that he was kidnapped in the day of his wedding means that the things that seem important in an emotional level are relative. In a way I think this is way for Vonnegut to express his alcohol-numbed pain and give his traumatic experience less importance so in a way its less traumatic.

Objectivity VS. Emotion

     The battle of Dresden is  famous battle that started to signal the decay and defeat of the third Reich, Dresden was bombed because of a last resort of the British Air Force that still remains as one of the most polemic war actions., since it destroyed one of the most culturally relevant cities in Germany. Vonnegut was there as a POW when Dresden was bombed, that's how he escaped...no one rescued him. The fact that Vonnegut wasn't rescued I think has a lot to do with his way of writing since there isn't a single hint of patriotism in the war books I've read ("Mother Night" and "Slaughter House-Five"). As well his writing seems very objective and even unemotional sometimes, this is uncommon in war books since most of the ones written from personal experience look to highlight the gore, pain and triumph that comes with a war. This also might work to prove that Billy isn't Vonnegut since Billy's parts aren't written with this emotion of a man scared by war, either this or Kurt Vonnegut is completely at peace with what scared him. The trip to Dresden with the Guggenheim money might have helped since he visited were it all went down and with the support of other scared men, however there are still some hints of the psychological wounds the war left him like his drinking problem and his sleepless nights, even sometimes both together. How can a POW experience one of WWII's most cruel and horrible bombings and write about it so casually?

Reading blog on "The Perfect Life" by John Koethe

   A very cinical piece that reminds me of the phrase "ignorance is bliss". Koethe portraus a perfect life as one lived on denial and on vague and simple conformity and being pleased with life in a general unprofound world. When the pleased person starts peeling of its shades of denial then things start to crumble. Desilusions and dissapointments come with a greater analysis of ones life, when we start to disconform and seek meaning to our simple conformist lifes is when we realize how unperfect are lives, our world and even ourselfs are. Simply not questioning existentiality and living a simple in-the-moment life we might come to be pleased with it and even consider it perfect....if this is good or bad is a question remaining.