Posted by Jan den Breejen on March 13, 2001 at 01:01:02:
Groucho Marx
The Avoidant (Sensitive Style) character is complex . Oldham's book describes the fear of unfamiliar situations and het idea that other people are hostile towards them. However the opposite can als be true. The perceived hostility can be a (paranoid-like) projection of the avoidant's own feelings of anger. And the fear being fear of the familiar; causing the avoidant to reject people. This mechanism is called 'defensive avoidance' in psychology. Defensive avoidance seems to find its roots in hostility and can be a way to handle fear of overfamiliarity. For many avoidants overfamiliarity breeds CONTEMPT. This principle is illustrated by the joke of the woman who tries to reintroduce romance into her marriage by dressing seductively only to have her husband say 'You are attractive, and I would sleep with you, if only you weren't my wife' The avoidant views all present company as defective compared to past or future company. They can REJECT contemporary things on the sometimes questionable grounds that they 'don't make/do things the way they used to, or will in an unspecified future'. They view fantasy as more alluring and having less foibles than real things; pornography being better than sex. No we can put the famous remark of Groucho Marx who says he DISMISS the country club that would have him as a member as they one he would never join. Avoidants can reject people in the bar they are visiting; saying that they are there only because there is something wrong with them.
Jan