Max

When I say recovered memory, I intend to refer to a specific therapy technique that is full stop no longer used by anyone at all credible in the field. ‘Body keeps the score’ is a very popular book for clinicians to recommend to patients, so while I haven’t read it I imagine it’s not promoting what I intended to refer to and likely isn’t especially controversial. Though, I would caution you that as it’s a book for popular audiences, the language contained within may not be the most technically precise—especially a decade plus after its first publication. With that said, I wouldn’t say my own perspective on memory and trauma is necessarily in opposition to what ‘Body keeps…’ is saying based on a quick summary I’m looking at.

deleted by creator

For whatever you may view the worth of this, as an until very recent psych researcher in a lab that focused on PTSD and specifically CSA—I finished grad school I wasn’t kicked out for my unorthodox beliefs or anything—I can tell you that is not the commonly held opinion by contemporary researchers and that those cases have not been meaningfully substantiated, despite the huge amount of evidence that would have to exist for the stories to be true, nor have similar events been seen in the following years—despite the Qanon movement’s popularity with local police forces which would seem to indicate willingness to accept these cases as possible and investigate them. My difficulty with accepting the satanic abuse at face value comes down to this, how are archeologists able to investigate and establish ritual sites from the megalithic era but no solid evidence for these major satanic rituals that occurred within the lives of many still living can be located, despite the significant public backing (including in the govt) that existed at the time and again more recently with Qanon to investigate?

Ultimately it’s not my place to say, but in my opinion, this theatrical stuff belies that the vast majority of abuse is committed by an individual known to the victim, not cults the victims and their families weren’t active members of, guys in vans handing out candy snatching kids off the street, or predators in online chat rooms.

None of this speaks to OP’s question about forgetting trauma, but the satanic cult abuse specifically to be clear.

It’s not clear but maybe. The satanic panic cult torture obsession of the 80s and 90s, where people with significant credentials were claiming individuals completely blocked out memories of experiencing torture rituals at the hands of satanic cabals was heavily reliant on the ‘recovered memory’ concept and all of that has been thoroughly discredited. Because of that embarrassment, there was an aversion to research on forgotten traumas for a bit. A more sober approach to researching these topics has followed more recently. Personally, with present evidence, I wouldn’t definitively come down on it one way or the other.

As someone who spent several years working at an arboretum (ie someone who frequently tended to gardens and lawns), I’m gonna challenge the folks claiming it’s because lawns are easier to care for. Keeping grass looking nice and uniform is difficult and resource intensive any place in the world, whereas a thoughtfully planted garden of local flora can require relatively little intervention. It’s all about how intensely you want to stick a middle finger up to Mother Nature and try to grow plants that don’t belong in the environment. Lawn grass doesn’t belong anywhere so it’s always a challenge.

As an absolute ground floor starting point, I’d suggest getting some 101 level textbooks of any non-explicitly Marxist intro political science course taught in a US university. That will introduce you to general topics and the unique language used in the field; you can read on specifics from there using other textbooks or sources given in the 101 books.