How to: bring an empire down

Ladies, if you want to bring an empire down, forget the guns, apparently all you need to do is corner your male workmates and show them a slip of lace. It was just then that I understood the powerful psychological weapon of having a petite woman torturer—the absolute loss of power and hope that goes with being interrogated by a woman is just too much, and they crack.

–From the blog of British surgeon Karen Woo, one of ten aid workers with the International Assistance Mission killed in August [2010] by the Taliban while providing medical care in northern Afghanistan.

http://harpers.org/archive/2010/10/0083129

The Dodo Bird Effect

Fortunately, all these paths [of psychological therapy] lead to the mountaintop, a miracle known to my profession as the Dodo Bird Effect: psychologist Saul Rosenzweig’s discovery, in 1936, that therapeutic orientation doesn’t matter because all orientations work. (Rosenzweig subtitled his paper “Everyone Has Won and All Must Have Prizes,” the verdict pronounced by the dodo in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.) The Dodo Bird Effect has been borne out by numerous studies since, with one elaboration. The single factor that makes a difference in outcome is faith: the patient must believe in the therapist, and the therapist must believe in his orientation. For therapy to work, both parties must have faith, sometimes against all reason, that their expedition will succeed.

http://harpers.org/archive/2010/09/0083100