13.27 Judy’s Missives: The Importance of Being Heard - 5 July 2023 -

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Once again this week my curiosity got the better of me and I found myself wondering about how important it is to feel heard.

I was writing ‘le Bulletin’ France: Living with violence and racism [13.27.a] when it struck me that a lot of the people rioting were doing so to make themselves heard. Out of frustration and anger, they became more and more outraged that the authorities were not listening to them nor taking notice of their plight!

The recognition of being listened to is the response from another person that tells us that our feelings, actions, and intentions are meaningful. Who we are and what we say triggers other people's responses to us. That response and our connection to others remain vital to our psychological well-being.

And as Martin Luther King rightly said time.com/3838515/baltimore-riots-langua…:

“A riot is the language of the unheard.”

I started to feel that I could perhaps understand how the family and friends of Nahel M, felt (the boy of North African descent living in Nanterre, a suburb west of Paris).

Understand perhaps, but condone the violence, No!

Then I started to think more about the psychological causes of unrest.

In journals.sagepub.com I found The Social Psychology of the Black Lives Matter Meme and Movement which was helpful to my understanding.

…many social psychological studies show that it is a perceived pattern of racial bias against Black people as a group that makes specific incidents of police violence relevant to individuals who see themselves as vulnerable to similar bias and feel solidarity with the victims (e.g., see [1] and for a general discussion see [2] )

Then in thedmcclinic.ie I found an article that filled in a few of the psychological gaps in my thinking thedmcclinic.ie/blog-the-importance-of-…

“In the US, [during the unrest which followed after the death of George Floyd] some commentators [3] have suggested the violence on their streets stems from a deep sense of despair and helplessness that things never change.

Psychological research offers some support for this analysis. Where people don’t believe their appeals to authorities will be heard, protesters may be more likely to adopt violent methods of protest.

Under these circumstances, people think they have ‘nothing to lose’ [4]

It would be remiss of me to not add the voice of the office of The French President:

French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday met with hundreds of French officials to begin exploring the "deeper reasons" for the country's plunge into riots…

Their call for a "return to republican order" came after the home of the mayor of a Paris suburb was rammed with a burning car, prompting widespread outrage.

In an overnight tweet, [0n 5July] Macron thanked police, gendarmes and firefighters for their "extraordinary mobilisation in these recent nights", after meeting with police late Monday.

At the gathering of mayors, Macron was hoping to "start the painstaking, long-term work needed to understand the deeper reasons that led to these events", an official at the president's office said on france24.com/en/europe/20230704-france-…

The big question: Will this be sufficient for the rioters to feel that they’re being listened to? Well, that’s yet to be seen.

Please share your views, especially if you live in France as I’m always trying to get a deeper understanding of French thinking.

Merci Mille Fois

Judy (MacMahon)

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[1]
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0…; 
[2]
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0…).

[3] nytimes.com/2020/05/31/opinion/george-f… 

[4] “psycnet.apa.org/record/2011-07958-001