Survivors of conflict - notes
Survivors of conflict are forever shaped by their experiences
1. Shaped through desensitisation or hypersensitisation. • PTSD (HS) – Soldiers in war – endure incredible hardship, come home to unrelated, normal life yet cannot move past their experiences.
• Steven Sotloff – Beheaded by ISIS - "paying the price" for U.S. military intervention. – As a Western society, our reaction to this beheading is substantial, one of horror and anger. It is worldwide news and all know about it. In contrast, those in Syria enduring the war and conflict are exposed to these kinds of summary executions regularly, and have desensitised to the point that an acceptance of both the war and this violence has occurred, resulting in a change in their perception where they view their world and society in a different way as a result of the conflict around them. (Survivors become desensitised)
2. The perception an individual has of a conflict, decides whether it shapes their experiences. • *Survivors
3. In some cases (i.e. minor conflicts), people are not shaped by their experiences. • Link to Quiet American – Phuong will continue on with her life regardless of the outcome of the conflict between Pyle and Fowler. Phuong is an allegory for Vietnam as a whole, and just as Vietnam could continue to exist without the influence of the western powers, Phoung too could continue with her life even after Pyle’s death (as seen when she goes back to Fowler). The conflict does not ‘shape’ her life, it just slightly alters the course of it, had the conflict not occurred she would still move on with her life in much the same way.
1. Shaped through desensitisation or hypersensitisation. • PTSD (HS) – Soldiers in war – endure incredible hardship, come home to unrelated, normal life yet cannot move past their experiences.
• Steven Sotloff – Beheaded by ISIS - "paying the price" for U.S. military intervention. – As a Western society, our reaction to this beheading is substantial, one of horror and anger. It is worldwide news and all know about it. In contrast, those in Syria enduring the war and conflict are exposed to these kinds of summary executions regularly, and have desensitised to the point that an acceptance of both the war and this violence has occurred, resulting in a change in their perception where they view their world and society in a different way as a result of the conflict around them. (Survivors become desensitised)
2. The perception an individual has of a conflict, decides whether it shapes their experiences. • *Survivors
3. In some cases (i.e. minor conflicts), people are not shaped by their experiences. • Link to Quiet American – Phuong will continue on with her life regardless of the outcome of the conflict between Pyle and Fowler. Phuong is an allegory for Vietnam as a whole, and just as Vietnam could continue to exist without the influence of the western powers, Phoung too could continue with her life even after Pyle’s death (as seen when she goes back to Fowler). The conflict does not ‘shape’ her life, it just slightly alters the course of it, had the conflict not occurred she would still move on with her life in much the same way.