How to Combat Fear and Loathing in 2011

by Gina Simmons, Ph.D.

The late gonzo journalist Hunter Thompson once said, “Call on God, but row away from the rocks.” He wrote the drug-crazed romp, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, that inspired the title for this post. Fear and loathing grow during economic slumps. News reports of double-dip recessions, inflation, deflation, terrorism, war, crime and corruption whip up a frothy mess of fear and anxiety. When we read about hate crimes, terrorism and neighborhood bomb factories, we sometimes feel helpless and confused. Fear and helplessness often inspire us to look for someone or something to blame. We want a cause for our predicament and we want to know whose butt to kick.

Conservatives blamed homosexuals for hurricane Katrina. Political pundits blame illegal immigrants for our high unemployment rate. Democrats blame Republicans, and the G.O.P. accuses the liberals. We look for scapegoats to blame for everything from global warming to the economy. Crimes of hate often start with fear-based anger.

Fear and anxiety take their toll on the nervous system. Short-term stress, like the jitters you feel before giving a speech, can be good for you by boosting norephinephrine levels, fostering creative thought and memory formation. Long-term fear and anxiety, like the stress of living with an angry alcoholic, overworks the limbic system, hippocampus and amygdala. This bad stress can mess with memory formation, weaken the immune system, and increase risk for depression and anxiety.

Anger and stress management experts know that hostile thoughts like, “They’ve messed with me for the last time!” keep people hyper-alert and sensitive to attack. It compresses you into a wound-up, ready-to-pounce state of arousal. Over time this can threaten your mental health and well-being. In the short run it can feel good to blame others for our present problems. We take the heat off of ourselves and put it outside of our responsibility. Psychologists call this the defense mechanism of projection. Like a movie projector, we light up others with the movie we have in our own mind. We see our own inner fears and hostilities acted out by the feared other.

Unfortunately, anxiety and anger narrow our ability to think creatively, problem-solve and see clearly. Our survival depends on quick thinking, keen observation and good judgment. Instead of looking for someone to blame, claim responsibility for the problem. Taking responsibility empowers us to change what we must. For example, if you feel angry about the economy, your job, your finances, I suggest that you ask yourself these five questions:

• “What is my problem?”

• “What did I do that contributes to my problem?”

• “What did I neglect to do that contributes to this problem?”

• “What can I do now to improve the situation?”

• “Who can I enlist for support or information to help me improve the situation?”

Asking these five questions mobilizes your can-do spirit. The first question, “What is my problem?” helps you stop worrying about things that aren’t your concern. The next questions focus your thinking on solutions. In contrast, fear and loathing keep you in a steaming vat of helpless tension with nowhere to go but down.

So the next time you find yourself blaming unions, or management, the poor, immigrants, rich people, the government, take a deep-cleansing breath. Ask yourself the five questions. Feel your heart rate return to normal. The philosopher Plato wrote, “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” 2011 is a brand new year, rich with possibilities. Row. Row. Row.

The Tragic Life of Kelsey Smith-Briggs

by Diane Fanning

No matter what the circumstances, it is a tragic event when a 2 year old dies.  It's even worse when the child is murdered. Kelsey Smith-Briggs lost her life on October 11, 2005 at her home near Meeker, Oklahoma.

This death troubles me more than usual because of the many problems and questions that hang in the air more than five years later. My first concern is that the people hired by the state to look after the best interests of the children of Oklahoma, clearly did not perform their duty. No question about that since a judge awarded Kelsey's father more than half-a-million dollars because of their dereliction of duty.

There was no doubt in anyone's mind that Kelsey was being abused. The question was, by whom?  Her stepfather,  her father, her stepmother, her mother, her grandmothers? Did it all happen in one household or in multiple homes? The poor little girl suffered two broken legs and a broken collar bone in the year leading up to her death. 

Family members on both sides pointed the finger of blame at one another. The animosity between the two sides had escalated since Lance Briggs and Raye Dawn Smith had divorced before Kelsey was born. The Oklahoma Department of Human Services and Judge Craig Key could not sort out all the claims and counter-claims but transferred custody several times with varying of levels of visitation to the various parties. They never completely removed her from the situation where she was clearly in danger or reported her injuries to law enforcement.

Initially, the state charged stepfather Mike Porter (right) with first degree murder. Later, they added a charge of child sexual abuse. It all fit together.  The reports of suspicions injuries to Kelsey began at the same time that Porter entered her life. Prosecutors claimed that she died after Porter delivered a hard blow to her abdomen. Her mother Raye Dawn Smith was under suspicion but continued to cooperate with police, wanted an autopsy--although Porter objected--and hired a private investigator to look into her daughter's murder. 

At first, child neglect charges were expected to be filed against Raye Dawn. Filing a neglect complaint seemed reasonable to me. In another case, I felt that Rusty Yates should have been charged with child neglect when his wife Andrea drowned all five of their children. But he was not. 

This apparent legal bias baffles and disturbs me. Men are traditionally seen as the protectors of their families and, yet, fathers never seem to be held accountable when they do not fulfill that role. On the other hand, mothers are often charged with a crime for not protecting their child. The legal system does not place equal responsibility on both parents. A man is assumed free of blame while a woman is assumed guilty unless she loses her own life protecting her child.

Four months after the toddler's death, the state brought two charges against Raye Dawn (left): child neglect and enabling child abuse. But who committed the abuse? It seems logical to me that if you can determine who killed the little girl, it should lead you directly to the person responsible for her abuse. But no one has ever been convicted of Kelsey's murder; the state of Oklahoma has held no one responsible. 

The only person who testified that he witnessed multiple incidents of Kelsey's mother abusing her daughter--Mike Porter, the same person the state charged with murder. The prosecutor told the jurors that they knew Porter was responsible for the sexual abuse and murder of Kelsey but still he made a deal with the devil. Did they really think that an individual who sexually molested and murdered a 2-year-old child would tell the truth? Did they not realize he would lie to save himself?

Apparently. they did but didn't care. They made an offer: They'd drop the murder charge and give him a 30-year sentence if he would plead guilty to enabling child abuse and testify against Raye Dawn. Prosecutors allowed him to lie on the stand about his own involvement in the child's death, contradicting, in their closing arguments, his testimony. Aside from his testimony and the anecdote revealed by a suspiciously last-minute addition to the witness list, there was no evidence that Raye Dawn was the person who abused Kelsey. There was innuendo. There was circumstantial evidence.  But one thing was clear: Raye Dawn was not present when her daughter died.

The identical charge they placed against Raye Dawn was enabling child abuse. She was found guilty got a twenty-seven-year sentence.  Was there any proof that she was aware that Mike Porter abused her child? No. Even the Meeker police put the broken collarbone down as an accident. And the Department of Human Services report indicated that the broken legs were either caused by Raye Dawn or by Lance's parents. The judge ruled that there was no way to know who had committed the abuse.

The emotionally overwrought trial of Raye Dawn was filled with unanswered questions. If Raye Dawn is guilty only of sins of omission in not protecting her daughter, she has served enough time. If Mike Porter did, as the evidence indicates, sexually assault and murder the toddler, he should man-up and tell the truth for Kelsey's sake--to give that poor child a measure of justice denied to her by the courts and the prosecution. I don't see that happening. Parents in Oklahoma can only hope he doesn't live long enough to walk out of prison a free man.

This case has become such a tangle, it is impossible to be certain of much. Two things, in my mind, are without dispute: The system failed Kelsey when it did not protect from abuse and murder, and they failed her again when they denied her the justice of convicting her killer of murder.

When the Casey Anthony trial begins next year, you'll find daily updates of the case on Diane Fanning's blog, Writing is a Crime.