Fluid Dynamics

As promised, Coyote now holds forth on the subject of psychology and bodily fluids.

Coyote has been wondering why urine, and the haunted house where urine is being stockpiled, have frequently been mentioned in the Denver public square.  Here are three possibilities:

1. The scarecrow theory.  The use of urine as a weapon, and especially the urine haunted house, are a fabricated straw man, falsely building up the protesters as crazy in order to easily discredit them.  If they only had a brain.

2. The Iraq build-up theory.  Like Bush's preparation for war in Iraq, urine propaganda is a deliberate falsification of the protester's intentions and a demonization of the protester's character, for the purpose of preparing the citizenry for war.

3. The innocent imagination theory.  Law enforcement is legitimately worried about what might happen, and without malice, are prone to believe speculation and fantasies about what might occur.  Rumors, therefore, are naively built into truth.

Coyote believes there is probably some truth to all of these.  These are objective reasons why bodily fluids have attained a prominent place in public discourse.  But Coyote, being a psychological canine, is much more interested in the subjective reasons why bodily fluids seem so important.  Please indulge Coyote as he engages in some psychological speculation.

For both Freudians and Jungians, urine and feces symbolically represent the unconscious. What we flush away and turn our nose from, what we call stinky and yucky, are symbolically those parts of ourselves that we don't feel able to deal with.  These crappy parts of ourselves we put in our unconscious, hoping they will remain quiet, and that we will smell good.  But, of course, what we try to keep hidden always shouts for attention.  And Coyote believes that is exactly what is happening with the public fixation on bodily fluids.   

There is a lot of crappy and stinking stuff going on.  On both sides.  Both police and protesters have feelings of suspicion, lack of trust, paranoia, hatred, and violence towards each other.  I have talked to both sides and I hear the same story.  It is ugly.  But it also, given this tense situation, very understandable and very human.  Coyote suggests that everyone just be honest with this dark, stinky, stuff.  Don't flush it out of consciousness, don't attribute it to the other side, just own it.  Admit that this is who I am, and that this is who we are.  Very hard to do, but incredibly important to do.

If both sides could do this, then the weird and absurd stories about stockpiling urine would probably disappear.  The stinky and ugly are shouting for attention in crazy ways (urine filled houses) because nobody is owning their own craziness.  If law enforcement could admit that there are a lot of ugly sentiments in the ranks, that police are edgy and scared about what is coming, and that some officers are angry and just might start something bad, if they owned their own crap, then they wouldn't have to make up stories about crap.   And if the protesters could admit that there are a lot of ugly feelings among their people, and that everyone is on edge and worried about what will happen in the streets, and that some of their own are loose cannons who might just start a riot, if they owned their own crap, then they would be less likely to have crappy stories made up about them.  

In the mutual unconscious process that is the drama of police and protesters, both sides are responsible for stinky craziness, however it comes out, and in whatever stories it manifests itself.  On either side.  This is the great mystery of group unconscious process.  

Coyote reminds us, we never make ourselves smell good by insisting that the scapegoat is over there.  

CoyoteJ