This blog is about learning to understand all of our feelings and learning to consciously face, feel, and experience all of our feelings within the context of our own childhood. Everything we become and everything that happens to us is connected to childhood. Not every victim becomes an abuser, but every abuser was once a victim of abuse. These are facts. Violence is not genetic; it’s learned. https://sylvieshene.blogspot.com/2014/08/a-dance-to-freedom-book-reviews.html
Saturday, December 26, 2015
Better Alone Than Being a Scapegoat
I Haven't Had Sex for Over 10 Years
Comments from the sharing on Facebook of the article above
H: God bless all the Pamela Stephenson Connolly of this world. She is right. So, women who think no marriage, no children, career, career, think twice. Beyond 30-35 without a man, who throw the garbage out, water the garden, replace the light bulbs, open the letters from the Tax Department and deal with them and 1 daughter and 1 son almost ready to go to college, should be a difficult life. M, is this a backward conception of a woman life from a backward African male?I tell this all the time to young females in the family and they always say yes, of course, uncle. I know they will not do it ...
Sylvie: Sad to say, but I'm very close to the 10 years mark, but I don't care, I will not settle unless I connect with someone at all levels, in mind, body, and soul, if I ever meet a man that I connect with at all levels, then it will be really special! Until then I just take care of myself.
H: Sylvie! I was just provoking M. Of course, the choice is free.
G: It's the moment. A moment when men are in crisis because there is no longer space in this world for being a ''''man'''' and women are in crisis because their genetic idea of a ''''man''''isn't what they want at all, and most of all because we are becoming incapable of socializing, with all the implications of the word, so we resort to facebook
M: H, now and I am fresh and clean to respond. I totally agree with Pamela Stephenson. The saddest women and men today are those who have reached a good level of awareness, this includes a sense of self-respect for the themselves and others. They also have a sense of responsibility. They are intelligent not necessarily highly educated. They too realise the loss of identity in roles diffused among both sexes and I couldn't agree more with George (thank you George you coined it right!). At 60+ I still hope to meet someone I can fully relate to and protect each other. Life is give and take, I look back at my life and sadly note it has been mostly give and give but would love to experience the warmth of security from a good partner with all their imperfections, I have mine too.... just some basic intentions that connect. It is difficult, many people are so screwed up. But I know where this person might be certainly not in Italy!
Sylvie: Very well said, M. I see the chances of meeting a man that has explored their own history and taken responsibility for their own childhood repression very slim. Most people are chasing illusions to distract them from having to face and feel their own childhood repression. And unconsciously and compulsively are looking for a scapegoat to transfer their disowned repressed emotions to temporarily and superficially alleviate their own childhood repression. I will never allow anyone to make me their scapegoat. The sociopaths at my last job tried very hard to make me pay for the crimes against them when little children. And for their own adult crimes against their own children. I lost my job, but they didn't make me their scapegoat.
M: Well framed S! I have experienced this both at work and private life. But I am grateful I had the strength and ability to defend myself despite a few 'broken bones'. Start by taking distance and their illusions already crumble.
Sylvie: I’m sorry M:, you too experienced being the scapegoat of others. When we are born into the role of scapegoat is very hard to break free from. It has taken me most of my life to break free from the scapegoat role I was born into. Glad you too broke free! Congratulations! And enjoy your freedom AND never let anyone steal it from you.
To read more about my experiences with the mob of sociopaths or narcissists at my last job read my blog Experienced Knowledge
Thursday, July 17, 2025
The Scapegoat’s Truth: Fame, Repression, and the Price of Denial
1. A Glimpse Behind the Mask: Mary Lou Retton’s Arrest
Yesterday, I saw a somber video of Olympic gymnast Mary Lou Retton being arrested for drunk driving. She was wearing an oxygen mask, unable to breathe on her own. As the police handcuffed her, she kept repeating: "Please don’t, I’m an Olympic gold medalist."
I remember her from the '80s. She was on top of the world. Now, she’s a ghost of that image—struggling to breathe, clinging to a past title that couldn’t save her from her own pain. It’s yet another example that fame and money don’t save you. Only freedom does.
Throughout my life, I never aspired to be rich or famous. I just wanted to own my home and to be free. Freedom has always been my only goal.
2. The Addicted Society: Why Repression Always Backfires
In my book A Dance to Freedom, I wrote:
“Repressing our fears and our anger always results in a backlash. We never know when it’s going to come, or how it will manifest itself, but it’ll definitely show up to fuck with us.”
Overachievers like Mary Lou Retton often try to prove their worth through medals, accolades, and public admiration. But those shiny symbols are often rooted in pain—in the desperate attempt to win the love and approval their parents could never give them.
“Athletes who take performance-enhancing drugs, workaholics who burn the midnight oil... actresses who sleep with people just to get the part—are all examples of how the perversion of idealization can get people into trouble.” (A Dance to Freedom)
As Alice Miller wrote, this is the life of "millions of people, brilliant, unconscious, running for the gold... and never feeling their sadness or rage about their parents who couldn’t love them as they were."
3. The Gifted Child and the Scapegoat: A Family Mirror for Humanity
Karen Hao recently spoke again about Sam Altman, the head of OpenAI, and how his sister Ann—the family scapegoat—is now homeless and struggling with mental health issues. I know this dynamic too well. In my own family, the “gifted” children received all the resources while I got the crumbs. If I hadn’t walked away, I could be in Ann’s place.
“The scapegoat carries the unspoken truth of the entire family system. They’re punished not because they lie, but because they won’t lie.”
That’s why I’ve been attacked so viciously. My presence exposes the truth.
At the community where I worked for nine and a half years before publishing my book, everyone loved me—until they realized my smile wasn’t fake like theirs. I had written a book exposing the lies and illusions of society, and suddenly I wasn’t "one of them."
They called me into HR meetings to provoke a reaction. My boss, who later died by suicide, tried to rattle me with lies. One HR woman asked me, "Where were you educated?" I said, "I’m self-educated." They tried every trick in the book to get me to self-destruct. But I stayed grounded. One resident asked how I was doing, and I smiled and replied, "I’m still standing."
Eventually, they fired me over the phone. I was at Discount Tires, getting new tires for my car. They left a voicemail saying not to return or I’d be escorted off the property. I knew it was their final trap—to bait me into a reaction they could criminalize. I never went back. I walked away with my dignity intact. I stayed free.
4. The Therapists, the Gurus, and the Cult of Comfort
In a letter to one of my readers, I warned him:
We have to become an enlightened witness to the child we once were, still inside us, and give her/him the love and attention that we deserved but never got if we want to be free.
Most people avoid this path. They surround themselves with therapists, gurus, or communities who bring a comforting meal to their prison cell—right when they had a chance to escape. As Alice Miller wrote:
“The prisoner may comfort himself with his food and shelter and thus miss his chance and stay in prison.”
5. The Global Stage: From Family Drama to Fascist Tech Power
Trump's new "Big Beautiful Bill" gives billions in contracts to OpenAI and Elon Musk—and grants them total freedom to operate without oversight. It’s the gifted child rewarded again, while humanity, the scapegoat, is set up to suffer.
We are ruled by repressed children playing with dangerous toys.
As Alice Miller wrote:
“Addiction is an attempt by a person in despair, who is not allowed to be in despair, to get rid of his or her memory, to forget his or her plight.”
6. The Only Way Out: The Dance to Freedom
I read recently that over 70% of Americans are on prescription drugs. Most people live in a fog of distraction and repression. As I wrote in A Dance to Freedom:
“We’re constantly told to let go of the past and live in the present moment. This is the exact opposite of what we need to do.”
To truly be present, we must confront the past. We must feel what we were never allowed to feel.
“The truth is always positive, no matter how much it hurts, because, without an awareness of our truth, we can’t truly heal.”
Healing doesn’t come from therapists or programs. It comes from self-confrontation. From walking alone through the fire. From finally saying: I see what was done to me. I feel the pain. And I will not betray myself anymore.
“When a mind is truly free, it can never be captured again.”
And that is why, no matter how much money or power they have, they will never win.
Blog post by Sylvie Shene – inspired by the wisdom of Alice Miller, and the courage to feel.
Sunday, February 23, 2014
True Love Endures the Truth
Yes, I have no doubt Alice Miller’s life was shortened, because so many psychopaths exploited her to make a name for themselves and use her as a scapegoat or poisonous container. And what sadness me the most right now, is that psychopaths like BR, DM and others like them that are exploiting her son’s anger at her to make a name for themselves and use Alice Miller as their scapegoat or poisonous container, just like a psychiatric doctor exploited my anger at my family when I was 17 to sexually abused me to feed his sexual deviance.
Saturday, February 24, 2018
Better Alone than in Bad Company
Just like Alice Miller wrote to one of her readers: "Thank you very much for sending us this important quote. We don’t know if it was actually said by Jesus or invented by Mathiew. Both is possible. In any case, to me, it is a pure invitation to hypocrisy and lie, it flies in the face of the laws of life. If as adult you try to love a person who hates and hurt you-you are betraying your body that will suffer because of this.
Monday, August 27, 2012
Daniel Mackler and Barbara Rogers came up in a very interesting conversation
Sylvie: Yes I read it... the issues between him and his mother are understandable, because his mother had not made her discoveries until he was an adult, so he was affected by his own childhood like the rest of us, but that does not take away from the discoveries Alice made later on and the great books she left for us to help us resolve our own repression. If you have read all of her books, you will see that she shares her pain of not being able to be there for her son when he was little, and she apologizes to him. Hopefully, one day he can resolve his own repression and be free, if he has not already.
Alice has never hurt us in any way. Still, Daniel Mackler and others like him are hurting the public by creating a smoke screen to hide the truth and facts from themselves and others, like Sigmund Freud, did with their crazy theories to protect parents and hide behind, so they did not have to face and feel their own painful truths.
Daniel Mackler and others like him work very hard to suppress Alice Miller's books from reaching more people because they are afraid of being exposed by her books.
It makes me sad to see people exploiting Alice and her son and doing personal attacks towards Alice, making her their scapegoat for the wrongs done to them by their own parents.
Our issues are with our parents, not with Alice. Alice was a human being like the rest of us and made mistakes in her personal life, like we all have, but she was an honest and sincere woman who focused on facts. Have you read the Preface to the Revised Edition of 1997 of the Book “Breaking Down the Wall of Silence”
Alice Miller's behavior was not abusive towards her daughter. But I think Daniel was being extremely abusive to Alice Miller with his character assassination of her. Her daughter was not just a gift to Alice Miller for being the catalyst of her awakening, but a gift to all of us as well, because without her daughter, she probably would never have written her books in the way she did. I would still be living in isolation or dead. I don’t think I could have lived with my feelings and perceptions all alone much longer without her books, and for that, I am very grateful that her daughter was born.
Alice Miller has been the most heroic pioneer person in our world, who stood for truth and facts, exposing the lies and hypocrisy of society; of course, she was human and made mistakes like the rest of us, but she was always honest, authentic, genuine and when she noticed a mistake of hers she was honest and sincere and she only deserves our compassion, understanding, gratitude and not our judgments, projections, and transferences; this guy is a perfectionist that lives in denial of his imperfections and limitations; projecting himself into Alice Miller and if someone is abusive is him. Enjoying a child’s affection and innocence is not abusive at all, unless we take advantage of those qualities for our own cruel and selfish reasons, and Alice Miller was far from being cruel and selfish in any way.
Sylvie Imelda Shene: Sabina, I agree with most of what you are saying about sex and when a person becomes fully conscious, they naturally become abstinent from sex, but not by choice, but because it’s nearly impossible to find another conscious partner at the same level. Telling unconscious people not to have sex is not realistic and does not work, and the author of this book seems to have a problem even with masturbation! Why should a person not enjoy his/her body? Was he not allowed to enjoy his own body as a little boy? The purpose of life is to have fun in balance without hurting ourselves or others, to be enjoyed, and shared. For us to become free to enjoy life in the present moment, we must face our history and feel our repressed feelings, at our own pace. We must face the pain in our lives. The only way out is through it. Nothing in the external world, no religion, no job, no geographical travel or move, no relationship, and no amount of money can save us from the pain of our past. Until we walk through our pain, we will keep reenacting, repeating, and recreating our past in the present moment. Dr. Alice Miller, in her book, The Truth Will Set You Free: Overcoming Emotional Blindness and Finding Your True Adult Self, says: “The past always catches up with us, in our relationships with other people and especially with our children.” The only way to release the pain is to face it, articulate it, and feel it as it arises. If we can feel it, we can heal it. I know sometimes the pain can be overwhelming, and we need to take a break from it by going to work, taking care of ourselves, and some distractions of safe fun, but we must take time to face, be, and articulate our pain and feel it as it arises until it is gone. Because pretty much every person on the planet has been abused and traumatized to a degree by parental and societal ignorance, pain comes into everyone’s life. The suffering comes because we run, avoid, repress, and deny our pain. If we don’t acknowledge and take responsibility for our wounds, but instead we deny and repress them, the wounds inflicted on us, we will inflict those same wounds on others and the next generation. I wonder if the author was extremely sexually abused as a child and now wants to repress his sexuality and of his readers – what we repress will find expression in a very dysfunctional way and will harm us and others even more. All religions have been trying to repress people’s sexuality. The author sounds preachy like the very extreme religious people that use strong, harsh language that is guilt-inducing, and we have seen that religion’s guilt-inducing has gotten us. I wonder if one of his parents was a preacher -- Children that are preached to, learn to preach -- Maybe his parents were highly critical of him and used strong, harsh language and made him feel guilty, and now unconsciously he is extremely critical and passing this guilt to his readers.
Sylvie Imelda Shene: I also stand by my words that this book is confusing, and if something is confusing is also abusive to me. Saying that this book is the continuation of Alice Miller’s work is a big lie, even if people are not aware and can’t see the hidden lie. Alice Miller’s work is so much ahead of this book. DM’s book is so tinted with morality and so manipulative that it brings back old memories in my mind when I was living with my religious fanatic and manipulative older sisters, who tried so hard to push down my throat their beliefs and morality. The letter written to Alice Miller, linked below, articulates what I believe Daniel Mackler's book aims to do for its readers.
http://www.alice-miller.com/readersmail_en.php?lang=en&nid=2371&grp=1108
Sylvie Imelda Shene: I am very aware that I cannot open the eyes of people who don’t want to see and feel, and if people choose to believe in lies, it is their problem. Just like Alice Miller confirmed in her answer to my letter in the link below:
From Alice Miller am@.com> Subject: Re: Saying the truth or being loyal To: s@.com Date: Sunday, November 9, 2008, 1:21 AM
AM: Thank you for your letter. I am sorry that my answer to your previous letter didn't appear on the website under your text. I wrote: "Congratulations on your understanding. You are right, you can't make someone see who DOESN'T WANT to see." Alice Miller wrote this message
http://www.alice-miller.com/readersmail_en.php?lang=en&nid=2337&grp=1108
Sylvie Imelda Shene: I am not going to comment here anymore, because I am very aware I cannot make people see and feel what they are not ready to see and feel, and if they would rather believe in lies, there is nothing I can do but walk away. When someone is trying to confuse you consciously or unconsciously, it is abuse, even if people can’t see it as such.
Sylvie Imelda Shene: I have to clarify the phrase that seems to have created confusion “'If something is confusing to me it is abusive to me' I should have said if someone is telling me a lie consciously or unconsciously it’s abusive to me, because lies are always confusing and abusive, of course, there are a lot of things in this world that I don’t understand and are not abusive, but lies are always abusive no matter who says them and how nice they sound.
S’s Letter
S, I think it's important that I mention what I witnessed happening at the DM's book discussion http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/note.php?note_id=471710483293
You were agreeing with me, but the moment Daniel Mackler showed up and shared his opinion, which of course has the right to do so, you moved right to his side and apologized to him for disagreeing with him, and your misunderstanding and my question was -- why does she have the need to do that? Maybe she still carries the fear of her parents and now someone symbolizing her parents, in this case, Daniel Mackler, and like when she was a little girl would not dare to rebel against her parents for fear of punishment and repressed her true feelings in order to please her parents and be the "good girl" her parents desired, now, in her adult life this internalized fear of her parents is still keeping her from staying true to herself. You know this happened to me also on a discussion board a year or so ago at amazon.com on the topic of spanking was harmful to children. Most people there were pro-spanking, and I felt the need to comment and expose their ignorance, and of course, these very unconscious people started to personally attack me right away, they called me the B word, radical, and all kinds of things, you name it! One poster that identified himself as being a Psychiatric doctor took my side at first, and of course temporally I felt better that I was not alone anymore against those very mean unconscious people, but the moment the pro-spanking people started to direct their anger at him accusing him of being radical and lunatic because only a lunatic would be at Sylvie's side! The next day, he took the pro-spanking side, agreeing with them that my comment was too radical. Below is the comment I used to re-post over and over again, which they thought was too radical and could not stand, triggering them the most. I now understand and see very well these psychological mechanisms, and it did not affect me much that this doctor, one day, was on my side and the next day, like a scared little boy, took the abuser's side. A professional doctor should have dealt with his own fear and learned how to handle transference. I thought of the little child going to his office with his parents, and one day he takes the child's side. Still, in the moment the parent starts transferring their anger onto him, he leaves the child alone. He takes the parents' side, causing much damage to a child, who, one day, feels like somebody is on his side, but a day later, finds himself again abandoned in an emotional desert island all alone. Children have no way of understanding that the reason this person abandoned them was also because of his internalized fears of his own parents. This is why people who go out offering help to others without experiencing, understanding, and walking through their own fears first will unconsciously and compulsively pass their psychological virus into others under the disguise of help, and this is very damaging to people who are still wounded, especially to children.
Amazon.com post: These people are so "SMART" that they don't see that the more they mention my name and project themselves into me, the more they make themselves look bad. Keep making yourselves look bad, ignorant, and very dark people.
People who idealize their childhood and parents will keep having limitless cravings for scapegoats on whom they can avenge themselves for the fears and anxieties of childhood without having to re-experience those fears. DEFENSELESS LITTLE CHILDREN MAKE PERFECT SCAPEGOATS FOR THEM, COWARDS. Pro-spanking people suffer and secretly enjoy seeing others suffer too, otherwise, why would they fight so hard for the parents' right to spank their innocent children, when children misbehave is never the child's fault, but the parents' fault, and if someone needs a spanking, it would be the parents. Children are like sponges or antennas that absorb all of what their parents repressed. What parents repress, children express. So, if you don't like what you see in your children, look within yourself and take responsibility for all that is repressed in you. Your children will change without you having to do much. And what is so sad for me is that most of these pro-spanking, hypocrites, cowards hide behind "God" to do their evil work. Read the article "How Evil is Born anew with every new generation" in the link below:
http://www.alice-miller.com/articles_en.php?lang=en&nid=47&grp=11
It's so sad that in the 21st century, people are still debating if it's ok to spank a child. In the 21st century, everyone should know the dangers of spanking children, and every person in power should be doing everything to make sure every child is protected from harm. Would we be debating today if slavery of black people or any other race is ok? Fortunately, it is common knowledge that slavery of another race is cruel and ignorant. Why can human beings see that doing it to children is even more cruel, ignorant, and very dangerous? Most people's objective is not freedom for themselves and others. Most people's objective is to one day have their own slaves. The easiest way to have your own slaves is to give birth to them because our society does nothing to protect children in the first years of life, the most critical years of a person's life." Poisonous Pedagogy The pedagogical conviction that one must bring a child into line from the outset has its origin in the need to split off the disquieting parts of the inner self and project them onto an available object. The child's great plasticity, flexibility, defenselessness, and availability made it the ideal object for this projection. The enemy within can, at last, be hunted down on the outside. Peace advocates are becoming increasingly aware of the role played by these mechanisms, but until it is clearly recognized that they can be traced back to methods of child raising, little can be done to oppose them. For children who have grown up being assailed for qualities the parents hate in themselves, can hardly wait to assign these qualities to someone else so they can once again regard themselves as good, "moral," noble, and altruistic. Such projections can easily become part of any Weltanschauung." Alice Miller "THE CHILD AS POISON CONTAINER The main psychological mechanism that operates in all child abuse involves using children as what I have termed poison containers--receptacles into which adults project disowned parts of their psyches, so they can control these feelings in another body without danger to themselves. In good parenting, the child uses the caretaker as a poison container, much as it earlier used the mother's placenta as a poison container for cleansing its polluted blood. A good mother reacts with calming actions to the cries of a baby and helps it "detoxify² its dangerous emotions. But when an immature mother's baby cries, she cannot stand the screaming and strikes out at the child. As one battering mother put it, "I have never felt loved all my life. When the baby was born, I thought he would love me. When he cried, it meant he didn't love me. So I hit him.² Rather than the child being able to use the parent to detoxify its fears and anger, the parent instead injects his or her bad feelings into the child and uses it to cleanse his or herself of depression and anger."
http://www.psychohistory.com/htm/05_history.html
---Then they accused me of violating Alice Miller's copyright, and I assure them that she did not mind me distributing her literature freely. One morning, I woke up thinking I bet they wrote to Alice Miller to complain about me violating her copyright, and I went to her website to the readers' mail page. Sure enough, I found the following letter when I saw the letter with the title "Respecting the copyright" and I knew right away it was about me and I clicked on it with excitement to read Alice Miller's answer.
"Respecting the copyright, Saturday, October 31, 2009
Dear Ms. Miller,
On a "no-spank" thread on Amazon, one of your readers has copied and pasted pages upon pages of your work. One of the copies was of a webpage you allow people to copy and re-post in its entirety, but most of the content seems to end with an "all rights reserved" copyright. In some cases, the person is even copy/pasting the works of your fellow authors and attributing your website, which might not exactly rub them the right way.
We've been concerned about her zeal for copy/paste of copyrighted works for some time, but responsibility dictates that, since the poster has failed to see the legal and moral issues, we should at the very least alert you of this.
AM: Thank you for your letter and the link. I opened it and found a discussion led very respectfully by Sylvie Shene, who seems to understand much about the dangers of spanking that produce, besides other things, ignorant parents in the future. Of course, the Internet allows everybody to show themselves, their emotional insights as well as their emotional blindness (like "I was very much beaten, but I turned out very well"). But I didn't find an example of anybody using my name for a text that I have NOT written. Did I miss anything? If you did find this kind of abuse, of disrespecting my copyright, please let me know."
This letter is no longer available on Alice Miller's website. I believe the coward who wrote it asked her to remove it because I had copied and pasted it into the amazon.com thread with the following comment and a link to it: To the person that wrote to Dr. Alice Miller, did her answer put your concerns to rest? It's so funny to witness the extent to which the pro-spanking people go to stop me from sharing the enlightened information here. They tried to break me, but that did not work, because you can not break what's not breakable anymore! Would not it be easier to put me on your ignore list? What are you afraid of? Afraid your children might come here? Become enlightened and be able to see through your lies and illusions. This just shows how conniving some pro-spanking people are. The next morning, I clicked on the link from the Amazon.com thread to see if it was working, and the letter was no longer available on her website. This person did not like Alice Miller's response, and he/she asked her to remove it because when people clicked on the link, they could see for themselves their desperation. Later, they accused me of fabricating this letter myself! All my life, I have stood alone against the liars and cowards in this world, and it felt so good to have Alice Miller stand on my side. I never had anyone before stand on my side like that. I have no words to express how happy I felt to know I was not alone anymore.
Alice Miller has been the only person who has truly been on my side.
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=458883030451
Saturday, October 29, 2022
Halloween
When you set a new standard on how you expect to be treated, you'll be surprised at those who disappear from your life. It's a hard pill to swallow, when you realise how many people benefited from your lack of self-love and boundaries. It's also a great way to filter your circle.
“Sadism is not an infectious disease that strikes a person all of a sudden. It has a long prehistory in childhood and always originates in the desperate fantasies of a child who is searching for a way out of a hopeless situation.
An American professor, for example, has been conducting experiments for years with brain transplants. In an interview with the magazine Tele, he reports that he has already succeeded in replacing the brain of one monkey with that of another. He does not doubt that in the foreseeable future it will be possible to do the same thing with human beings.
From the book: “For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Child-Rearing and the Roots of Violence” By Alice Miller
https://sylvieshene.blogspot.com/2013/07/repressed-anger-is-very-dangerous.html?m=1

