Jeffrey Epstein and the Shadow within
A shocking wave of hiss swept across continents as news about the serial rapist Jeffrey Epstein disseminated on social media: a womanizer with affiliations to the most influential people across the world. People who once inspired hundreds of millions suddenly turned into devils for the crime they’re allegedly complicit in. Science mutated into sickness, academia into agony, and crowns into evil clowns.
The world wasn’t ready for this, but here it is. The trust in the human race is broken. No one is safe. We have become beasts. No, beasts would sit at our feet to master the art of cultivating connections, awakening the darkest parts of our being, and committing to something unbecoming of humans. What Hitler did openly, the gang of pedophiles did secretly. Both committed crimes; the latter only came a little later.
Well, I need to shut up, I think. Gyaan is everywhere. Information in every home. Human assessment of the paralyzing bomb is as intense as it could be. Yet the question remains: can humans, generally speaking, repeat such behavior, in whatever capacity, at any time, at any point?
Yes, to be precise. A lot of emphasis has been placed on the evil side of human beings time and again. Carl Jung’s concept of the shadow side of human personality best explains this possible tendency to go against the normal. The shadow is built upon the premise of repressed emotions and stories, forever alive beneath the apparent persona. The frequent outbursts of anguish we experience at times amaze us: the shadow trying to breathe by mutating into outer projections.
As layers and layers of what you once meant to do or say build up, the carrying capacity gets exhausted, and they burst like a volcano one day. This mode of human assessment by one of the greatest psychiatrists ever always amazes me.
Carl Jung hasn’t left the uncontrollable into oblivion; his concept of shadow integration is equally interesting. To become organically whole, the unconscious self and conscious self must be merged through deep work, meditation, dream analysis, and more. To make another case, the Freudian slip points to the fountain of buried emotions finding a way out.
Think of it this way: each one of us is a living bomb wandering the streets, capable of exploding into something horrible anytime, beyond our immediate control.
This phenomenon is corroborated by The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson. It throws light on human duality. The protagonist, an innocent scientist, modifies himself into a stark monster. The back-and-forth between the two - from rogue to scientist, from pure heart to corrupt soul - reflects the faces of the human race.
What he is afraid to do when he’s a scientist, he does wildly when he’s his altered image: drinking alcohol, engaging with prostitutes, becoming an extrovert without restraint. The craving to murder his former self to metamorphose into a monster should hammer home the idea that we retain some animal instincts, akin to a lion ripping apart deer in a forest.
That our psyche is more than meets the eye doesn’t translate into the impossibility to modify ourselves into whole human beings. Wholeness, achieved by reconciling with our forgotten selves, should be the primary goal of humanity. Bringing the unconscious contents into consciousness for compatibility and necessary integration opens our eyes to look at things from a broader perspective.
Or as Carl Jung put it, ‘the world hangs on a thin thread, and that thread is the psyche of man.’ Let it not descend into disorder.
Jeffery Epstein, or any other serial killer, rapist, abuser for that matter, is a living example of how humans can turn into complete fiends. His wealth and liberal environment enabled his behaviour - no doubt. But isn’t personal assessment in silence a necessity for the rest of us? Question.
