There is a sick theme running through all of this - or at least a clear attempt to involve some form of mental illness, and an attempt to bring in the people in white coats - well, at least psychologists if not psychiatrists.
Hey, I really, really don’t want to jump on the bandwagon and pour self-righteous scorn onto Iris Robinson. The woman has confessed to a recent affair within a 40 year marriage. Many commentators have been exercised by the apparent hypocrisy of the situation. She is a Protestant Christian who has been quite outspoken on the alleged sexual immorality of others - in particular of the gay community, calling homosexuality ‘vile’. It is not my place to judge - I, like her, am a fallible human being, capable of making big mistakes, and capable of not living up to my own standards at times. I can empathise with the shock, anger, and pain that her family, her friends, and she are going through at the moment. I have seen it enough in my life experience, and see it almost weekly in my work.
No, it is not the affair as such, or the apparent hypocrisy that has prompted me to write.
What has interested me is the religious and psychological overtones of the whole situation. Again, I need another careful caveat before coming to the point. Iris Robinson has talked about her mental illness and attempted suicide. A big part of me wants to applaud such honesty as both subjects would be considered embarrassingly taboo by many. And I am the last person to want to judge how true those claims about mental illness may or may not be. But regardless of Iris Robinson’s particular mental state, what does concern me is the apparent link between religion, sexual non-conformity, and mental illness that is emerging.
Like many Christians, Iris has been taking a very strong line on ’sexual immorality’ as she would call it, as defined by the bible. Part of the strength of that line may be from a genuine (if misguided or at least questionable) belief that she was speaking in the best interests of others. However, I suspect that a major strength of the line taken would be that because her god had allegedly said it in the ‘good’ book, that was sufficient authority to state a very clear barrier that should not be crossed.
There isn’t space here to go into the problems with the authenticity and the authority of the bible, but even leaving that material aside, there are two huge fundamental problems with her attempt to draw a firm line. The first is that it presumes that sexuality is straightforward whereas in fact it that it is much more complex than that for a number of people. People are born gay in the same way that people are born heterosexual. It isn’t an issue or morality but rather one of identity. There is an argument for saying that gay people should applauded for their courage to affirm their identity in a difficult environment rather than be vilified as evil. The second problem is that sexual attraction is an extremely powerful force and that even the ‘best’ of people fail to sometimes live up to their intentions. To be so dogmatic in condemning a large proportion of the human race seems inherently removed from reality, lacking in compassion for the human condition, and just wrong.
Hence the need to invoke the people in white coats (interesting how even Christians can invoke science and social science when it appears to support their case). It seemed from the reports, and from Iris Robinson’s own statement that her particular Christian background could only cope with the discrepancy between her outward position and her inner reality and subsequent actions by saying that there must have been mental illness involved. It seemed difficult for someone from her background to accept that any person who was mentally healthy would engage in sexually non-conformist behaviour. Again I state that I am in no position to know anything about Iris Robinson’s mental state, but I felt the need to protest against the implication that sexual non-conformity can only be accounted for by mental illness. Gay people do not need psychologists (as stated by Iris Robinson) and neither are the majority of people (even fervent Christian believers) who engage in non-conformist sexual activity mentally ill.
I wish the Robinson’s well and hope that they are allowed some time to lick their wounds in private and to rebuild their relationship. However, I also hope that this particular incident will cause her to reflect with more understanding and compassion on the human condition, and may help her realise that straightjacketed sexuality doesn’t work all the time for all people.
Having thought long and hard about my past Christian life and seen how it has influenced not only me but others, I feel that my own straight-jacketed blinkers have been removed at last by a strong presence.
This force/presence has been my own journey of thinking, of pain, experience, education, and most of all through the conversation,reading and learning through others, who also have been wrapped and smothered in “faith” and who has questioned their blanket of repression of feeling.
Inspite of what followers of the Bible try to do in their world of faith in one diety ie: God. The reality when faced with real living and pain, that “faith” simply does not address, will result in such actions such as the one being discussed.
I wonder if her thoughts on the subject have been swayed at all and whether her guilt at having “fallen” will lead to a further deterioration in her obvious and understandable fragile, mental state. Though of course the “forgiveness equation” should take care of that, the fallout of actual damage in trust and betrayel will take a lot longer for her family.
One ponders whether the cause of her mental fragility was indeed partly caused, at the very least, by the religion and code of expectation that she was supposed to follow. And that her own suppresion of needs and desires caused the end result ( the affair), of which she has been so condemed; by the very values she tried to uphold. ( If that makes any sense).
I hope this experience will make her look more compasionately at herself and with others whom she has criticised in the past. If it were all so very easy to choose the white instead of the darker road, we would all do it. However, what one tries to do and what one actually manages, even with the best intentions, can so easily be thrown off course by a whole host of circumstances.
Such circumstances is what you deal with, each day, upon each week with a detailed insight. And those situations throw people into searching for comforts and answers such as religion, or comfort and answers in the search for a fellow human beings love and companionship in an extra-marital affair, as one example.
A great and thought provoking post!
Usually in these cases I keep my mouth shut because what other people get up to is none of my business (even if they are public figures) and I really dislike reading that kind of stuff in the press. However, given that Mrs Robinson has chosen to speak publically about other people’s business, it does not see quite so inappropriate in this case. Although I still believe that two wrongs do not make a right.
I get very cross when people talk about any deviation from the sexual norm as being a sign of mental illness or something that can be cured. People are just different and more people would be different if society didn’t try to straitjacket us from birth. If it were fine to be gay or to have sex with who we wished at the time, then I’m sure more people would do it. And why not? Marriage is a religious convention and one that, in my opinion is seriously outdated and not at all suited to our long lifespans. Why should people have to suffer sexless marriages, feel that they cannot have sex with other people but still stay in a companionable relationship. People are forced to choose or be dishonest. So confining. If monogamous marriage suits people then fine, but that should be a decision for the couple involved, if not, then they should be free to do as they wish as long as they show respect for the feelings of others.
However, it strikes me that even for people like me, who take a free and easy view of relationships and choose not to be straitjacketed, even I see some deviations from the sexual norm as needing to be cured. Paedophiles for instance - even those people who just wish for a normal sexual relationship with a teenage girl - that doesn’t seem “right” to me because there are “victims” although clearly paedophiles do not see it that way. So really I am no different to Mrs Robinson, I have sexual practices I see as being signs of mental illness or needing a cure, and who’s to say that I am right and she is wrong?
But I have to say that I nearly threw up when I heard her husband say that most importantly she had sought and received the forgiveness of God. Surely if God existed S/he would have more important things to worry about than Mrs Robinson and her teenage lover?
onethoughtfulwoman
Interesting comments. I am glad that you feel that you have grown, despite the pain, and are able to evaluate ‘faith blinkers’ in the light of your experience.
You wrote: “One ponders whether the cause of her mental fragility was indeed partly caused, at the very least, by the religion and code of expectation that she was supposed to follow. And that her own suppresion of needs and desires caused the end result …” Interesting point. There is an argument for saying that the more people are obsessed by condemning sexual activity, the more they are likely to engage in it illicitly. There is certainly some evidence for this from the behaviour of some Catholic clergy and American TV evangelists.
Reluctant Blogger
I think there is a difference between two consenting adults choosing to engage in sexual activity, and between an adult exploiting another adult or child. Perhaps the key issue is not the nature of the sexual activity, but the mutuality of consent between two people able to make that consent. On that basis, I don’t find it difficult to condemn Mrs Robinson for her condemnation of others, while at the same time wanting to draw a line at paedophilia.
You wrote: “Surely if God existed S/he would have more important things to worry about than Mrs Robinson and her teenage lover?” Apparently not, according to the ‘good book’! She/he is also very concerned about what you eat/drink, how you have your hair, and what you do on Saturday afternoons. But I suppose if god exists, (s)he can cope with all that worry, and if female, would be the multi-tasker par excellence!
It wasn’t the “doing” I meant really, it was the “thinking” or “feeling”. I agree re the “doing” but that just makes the whole issue more scary and confusing actually.
Anyone who craves sex in a way that is not acceptable in the society in which they live - extra-marital, homosexual or paedophilia or whatever - cannot help their urges. That is what I believe. For me, due to the society in which I live and my own cultural non-religious background, I see extra-marital sex and homosexuality as perfectly acceptable and not a sign of anything involving wrong-doing or mental illness at all but paedophilia I find abhorrent. But that is not the case everywhere. In some societies, where underage marriages are acceptable - paedophilia is OK, but the other two aren’t. If you are a Christian like Mrs Robinson then presumably you are brought up to think all three of the sexual deviations I listed are unacceptable and evil and in need of a cure, seeking of forgiveness or whatever.
If you have sexual desires (whatever they are) and society does not enable you to express them, it is very difficult indeed. It is quite likely that that repression might lead to mental illness and irrational action. I certainly think I was close to the edge. The point I was trying to make in my usual incoherent over-wordy way is that I just can’t see that the feelings paedophiles have are any different to any other sexual urges - it is just society and culture that makes us see them differently. And I find that a scary thought - because how do we deal with them? How do they deal with their feelings? There are as many people downloading child porn as there are having illicit affairs. Are all these people evil?
In a sense we are as bad as Mrs Robinson if we condemn people for having these thoughts and feelings, that they cannot help. We can’t handle it so we label them as mentally ill or evil, just like she does.
Oh it is too confusing. I’m getting a headache!