Blaming the victim

I'm sitting at a table in a restaurant during Happy Hour with some classmates -- all of them acquaintances at best -- when one of counseling psych majors announces the following:

"I believe that people choose the life they are born into, and that they do so because they have some kind of lesson they need to learn."

This isn't the first time I've heard someone express that opinion. Normally, I sit quietly, but this time I replied, I don't believe that at all.

She looked a bit offended, so I didn't pursue the discussion. But if I had, this is what I would said to said "counselor-in-training":

I sure as shit hope you don't ever tell your clients crap like that. There are many ways to look at the idea -- all of them fantastical and absurd, in my opinion -- but one of them is that the individual human is *ultimately responsible* for the circumstances of their birth: their biological construction, their socioeconomic status, their parents and family situation. EVERYTHING.

In that way of thinking, this planet is populated by millions of children who were born into poverty, don't get an education, even experience famine ... because they CHOSE to do so.

And four year old girls molested by a neighbor knew what they were getting into when they chose the body in which they would be born.

Some apparently also chose really beautiful forms, while others, myself included, decided to choose average forms? Some of us chose to be brainy, while others chose to be intellectually deprived.

If this is all so, what's up with those who got to be brainy, beautiful, mentally healthy and rich? Because I do think those people exist (more or less). And if I actually had a CHOICE -- as in, I could've had all that -- why the hell didn't I choose that?

It doesn't make any sense.

And it puts the ultimate responsibility of everything that occurs in someone's life at their own feet because they made a choice to be born into those circumstances. Give me a fucking break. But more importantly, give the people who've got really SHITTY LIVES a fucking break.

I know there's a deeper philosphy at play here, and I'm well aware of what it is. But I still think it's a really dumb fucking idea. And I don't think suggesting to clients that they chose the misery in their lives from the moment of their birth has any therapeutic value whatsoever.

But I didn't say anything of the sort. All the teaching students would've stared at me while nervously fiddling the crucifixes hanging 'round their necks. And if the teacher's (flattering but weird) comments about my "directness" in class discussion are any indication, I've already done enough work on those people.

Still, though, to my colleague I say, Keep that idiotic belief to yourself when you're doing therapy.

(And, yes, to myself I ask: Just what about this is bothering me so? Perhaps we'll here more on that later. But I can't imagine any "soul-searching" (ha!) on this topic is going to change my opinion.