RECONDITION: the dark side of REFORM.
“You can repeal all past history, but you can’t repeal human nature.” — Abraham Lincoln
When REFORM seems too difficult or impossible, it sometimes flips into a much more dangerous game of forcing people to bend and reshape themselves to a theoretical and unproven ideal. All social patterns act directly on positive and negative emotions — promising more relational safety or threatening it if we dare trespass. Failing at more positive REFORM, RECONDITION relies primarily on negative instruments: public shame, mockery, and the threat of ostracization to silence people into puppet-like compliance. These social torture tools work startlingly well on the majority of people in any group while only needing a slim minority to wield them. The few who refuse to shape themselves into an increasingly zealous party line get scapegoated. While the party line may be progressive, these tools are the same as those wielded by any fundamentalist religion or cult. But in this highly-charged middle space, they can more easily spiral into something more broadly destructive.