[Mermaid]The following is from Eric Berne's terribly outdated (but
entertaining) book, Games People Play. I hope some of you will find it
entertaining and/or interesting and/or useful.
<begin excerpt>
Games People Play, Eric Berne(c)1964.
page 159-162
Wooden Leg
Thesis: The most dramatic form of "Wooden Leg" is "The Plea of Insanity."
This may be translated into transactional terms as follows: "What do you
expect of someone as emotionally disturbed as I am-that I would refrain from
killing people?" To which the jury is asked to reply: "Certainly not, we
would hardly impose that restriction on you!" The "Plea of Insanity," played
as a legal game, is acceptable to American culture and is different from the
almost universally respected principle that an individual may be suffering
from a psychosis so profound that no reasonable person would expect him to
be responsible for his actions. In Japan drunkenness, and in Russia war-time
military service, are accepted as excuses for evading responsibility for all
kinds of outrageous behaviour(according to this writer's information).
The thesis of "Wooden Leg" is, "What do you expect of a man with a wooden
leg?" Put that way, of course, no one would expect anything of a man with a
wooden leg except that he should steer his own wheel chair. On the other
hand, during World War II there was a man with a wooden leg who used to give
demonstrations of jitterbug dancing, and very competent jitterbug dancing,
at Army Hospital amputation centers. There are blind men who practice law
and hold political offices(one such is currently mayor of the writer's home
town), deaf men who practice psychiatry and handless men who can use a
typewriter.
As long as someone with a real, exaggerated or even imaginary disability is
content with his lot, perhaps no one should interfere. But the moment he
presents himself for psychiatric treatment, the question arises if he is
using his life to his own best advantage, and if he can rise above his
disability. In this country, the therapist will be working in opposition to
a large mass of educated public opinion. Even the close relatives of the
patient who complained most loudly about the inconveniences caused by his
infirmity, may eventually turn on the therapist if the patient makes
definitive progress. This is readily understandable to a game analyst, but
it makes his task no less difficult. All the people who were playing "I'm
Only Trying to Help You" are threatened by the impending disruption of the
game if the patient shows signs of striking out on his own, and sometimes
they use almost incredible measures to terminate the treatment.
Both sides are illustrated by the case of the stuttering client of Miss
Black's, mentioned in the discussion of the game "Indigence." This man
played a classical form of "Wooden Leg". He was unable to find employment,
which he correctly attributed to the fact that he was a stutterer, since the
only career that interested him, he said, was that of a salesman. As a free
citizen he had a right to seek employment in whatever field he chose, but as
a stutterer, his choice raised some questions as to the purity of his
motives. The reaction of the helpful agency when Miss Black attempted to
break up this game was very unfavorable to her.
"Wooden Leg" is especially pernicious in clinical practice, because the
patient may find a therapist who plays the same game with the same plea, so
that progress is impossible. This is relatively easy to arrange in the case
of the "Ideological Plea," "What do you expect of a man who lives in a
society like ours?" One patient combined this with the "Psychosomatic Plea,"
"What do you expect of a man with psychosomatic symptoms?" He found a
succession of therapists who would accept one plea but not the other, so
that none of them either made him feel comfortable in his current position
by accepting both pleas, or budged him from it by rejecting both. Thus he
proved that psychiatry couldnt help people.
Some of the pleas which patients use to excuse symptomatic behaviour are
colds, head injuries, situational stress, the stress of modern living,
American culture and the economic system. A literate player has no
difficulty in finding authorities to support him. "I drink because I'm
Irish." "This wouldn't happen if lived in Russia or Tahiti." The fact is
that patients in mental hospitals in Russia or Tahiti are very similar to
those in American state hospitals. Special pleas of "If It Weren't For Them"
or "They Let Me Down" should always be evaluated very carefully in clinical
practice-and also in social research projects.
Slightly more sophisticated are such pleas as: What do you expect of a man
who (a) comes from a broken home (b) is neurotic (c) is in analysis or (d)
is suffering from a disease known as alcoholism? These are topped by, "If I
stop doing this I wont be able to analyse it, and then I'll never get
better."
The obverse of "Wooden Leg" is "Rickshaw," with the thesis, "If they only
had (rickshaws) (duckbill platypuses) (girls who spoke ancient Egyptian)
around this town, I never would have got into this mess.
Antithesis: Anti-"Wooden Leg" is not difficult if the therapist can
distinguish clearly between his own Parent and Adult, and if the theraputic
aim is explicitly understood by both parties.
On the Parental side, he can either be a "good" Parent or a "harsh" one. As
a "good" Parent he can accept the patient's plea, especially if it fits in
with his own viewpoints, perhaps with the rationalization that people are
not responsible for their actions until they completed their therapy. As a
"harsh" Parent he can reject the plea and engage in a contest of will with
the patient. Both of these attitudes are already familiar to the "Wooden
Leg" player, and he knows how to extract the maximum satisfactions from each
of them.
As an Adult, the therapist declines both these opportunities. When the
patient asks, "What do you expect of a neurotic?" (or whatever plea he is
using at the moment) the reply is "I dont expect anything. The question is,
what do you expect of yourself?" The only demand he makes is that the
patient give a serious answer to this question, and the only concession he
makes is to allow the patient a reasonable length of time to answer it:
anywhere from six weeks to six months, depending on the relationship between
them and the patient's previous preparation.
<end excerpt>
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