Tony Deyal Column…Binds, beards and blinds

Aug 11, 2008 Features / Columnists, News, Tony Deyal column

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“Have you stopped beating your wife?”  I asked the person across the table from me.  It had been a long and exhausting negotiating session.  Known, even famous, for his loquacity, the man had droned on and on ad nauseam. I took a mental break and started to check my emails, read the online newspapers, and generally tuned out.  I mentally returned to the meeting when he kept repeating, his voice increasing in volume: “Say ‘yes’ or ‘no’!  Say ‘yes’ or ‘no’!” 

Did I possess any special information that would have justified my question?  Yes, but not about whether he beat his wife or not. That was not the point I was making. 

I am sure that most women now, particularly if they are educated, know that they are protected under the domestic violence laws which make wife-beating a criminal offence.  It was the “yes” or “no” that did it.  I used the question about whether he had stopped beating his wife to illustrate a point that is fundamental to communications theory.

Essentially, regardless of what the lawyers think, or judges demand, or the courts mandate, there are some questions that cannot be answered by “Yes” or “No”.  “Have you stopped beating your wife?” is one of them if you’re not prone to felonious assault on your better half. 

For those who are, it is a perfectly normal question, the answer to which does not require more than “Yes” or “No”.  Fortunately, most of us do not fall within that category.

This type of question is called a “double-bind”.   There are two types of double-bind.  The first is a psychological impasse created when contradictory demands are made of an individual, such as a child or an employee, so that no matter which directive is followed, the response will be construed as incorrect.  The second is a situation in which a person must choose between equally unsatisfactory alternatives; a punishing and inescapable dilemma.

The first type of double-bind was explained by Paul Watzlawick, communications theorist (Answers.com): “A mother buys two neckties for her little boy, one green and one blue. The next day, the child is in a hurry to sport the green necktie. The mother: “So you don’t like the blue tie I gave you?” The next day the boy puts on the blue tie and draws the symmetrical response: “So you don’t like the green tie I gave you?” So, on the third day, the child tries to find a compromise solution in order to satisfy his mother’s two demands: he puts on the two ties together. And his mother comments: “You poor boy, you’re out of your mind. You’re going to drive me crazy.”

This paradoxical injunction, where the double-bind mechanism is particularly obvious, clearly shows the annihilating effects on the person at the receiving end.  All of us go through variations of this some time in our lives.”

The second meaning of “double-bind” — choosing between two unpalatable choices — is also common. The main man behind the double-bind theory was Gregory Bateson.  An elaborate joke was created to explain the double-bind. 

Bateson and his colleague, Jay Haley, went to visit a colleague in Phoenix, where they stopped at the National Park and took a walk.  They were so engrossed in their discussions on double-binds and schizophrenia they lost track of the time and the way.

Suddenly they found themselves face-to-face with a huge bear. Bateson climbed a tree and Haley sought shelter in a cave. 

Before Bateson could take stock of his situation, he saw Haley running out of the cave and almost into the bear that was now looking at Bateson speculatively.  Haley rushed back into the cave and then in seconds pelted back out, missing the other bear by an inch, and headed straight into the cave again only to re-emerge at speed. 

Bateson advised, “Why don’t you stay put in the cave?  You’re making this bear nervous.”  Haley, who was streaking out of the cave again, responded shrilly, “There’s another bear in here!”

The “New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy” looks at the double-bind posed by the novel “Catch 22” (1961) by the American author Joseph Heller: “Catch-22 is a provision in army regulations; it stipulates that a soldier’s request to be relieved from active duty can be accepted only if he is mentally unfit to fight. Any soldier, however, who has the sense to ask to be spared the horrors of war is obviously mentally sound, and therefore must stay to fight. 

Figuratively, a “Catch-22” is any absurd arrangement that puts a person in a double-bind: for example, a person can’t get a job without experience, but can’t get experience without a job.” 

In George Orwell’s 1984 there was the double-bind that if you want to have a successful revolution, you have to educate the masses; if you want to educate the masses, you must have a successful revolution. 

I grew up with a lot of double-binds in my life.  For instance, “I’m sure you didn’t brush your teeth?” leaves little room for “Yes” or “No” but it is peremptory and imperative when you go through the maternal gauntlet before heading off to school. 

At school, I found an interesting one.  There was this man named Henry, whose cry “Help the blind!” was shrill and plaintive enough to cause people to stop and put money into the battered felt hat which served as his collection plate — until one of the students took out a quarter and started waving it in a circle.  Henry started moving his hat round and round keeping pace and direction with the coin.

We didn’t know about “tunnel vision” in those days.  What we knew is that Henry was not what we called “blind”.  So every time we saw Henry after that we would put him in a double-bind by saying loudly, “Henry, you still pretending you blind?” 

* Tony Deyal was last seen trying to be spontaneous while watching a sign that said, “Ignore This Sign”.

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