Unplay

Identity design, Unplay, 2014.

Based on the structures of trauma and power, Unplay the Shame and Blame Game provides a simple, easy-to-follow, four-point model for shifting from passive aggressive to healthy communications, resolving any conflict, internal or external, private or public, in domestic or foreign relations.

Watch how Unplay works:

Does your immediate personal response to hearing any perspective that disagrees with your own run along the spectrum of violence anywhere from, “Nuh-uh, that’s not true,” to shouting, swearing, threatening, or all the way to gunfire, insisting that the other person listen to your point of view?

Compressed spectrum of violence could be expanded with far more nuance, but acknowledges communication as what happens between two, replacing our either/or models.

That’s denial, a big red button warning you to stop, and try the opposite:

No matter how many times you insist on your point of view, does it ever change the opinion of the other person?

How far are you willing to go to force your will over any other?

Why? What are you hoping to accomplish?

Next examine the structure of power in your relationship.

Are you the President; the four-star general; the CEO; the boss; the Mayor; the head of household; a white, male, able-bodied, heterosexual property owner? Then however much you may feel personally out of control, you are structurally in the position of greater power in relation to your citizens; your troops; your company; your employees; the community who elected you to office; your wife and the other members of your household; in our white, Western, capital-worshipping world, impoverished and/or homo- or transsexual and/or physically challenged and/or female and/or people of color. Notice your position in relation to the other:

Unplay: passive aggressive communications between more and less powerful parties.

Abusive leadership only reveals its weaknesses anyway, acting out in rage thinly covering fear of the other, less powerful. Healthy leadership listens to the least of these, thereby balancing power:

Unplay: healthy communications between two healthy human beings.

Passive aggressive communication both hides and reveals trauma, as children pattern themselves after the communication style of unhealthy role models, themselves likely either unheard or openly abused as children. Unlike other communication models, Unplay works to resolve any conflict because it follows the structure of trauma:

Structure of trauma beginning from traumatic event.

Market research, testing the effectiveness of Unplay within the globally notoriously abusive Bundy clan, leading to many more opportunities to clinically observe the passive aggressive volvelle and practice Unplay within Idaho’s broken mental juridical health system, with Venn diagrams. My identity design process. Unplay analyzing communication failures within social services leading to violations of Washington law. Unplay applied to the business world. Deeper research in critical theories of identity, trauma, and the taboo available via interlibrary loan of my graduate research, Wild Child:

Detail of beeswax seal and letterpress printed gatefold enclosing ‘Honey’ essay from Wild Child, 2008, 26.5×28.5×6.5 cm. Title refers to le jeune fille sauvage, the creature that philosopher Giorgio Agamben describes at the border of difference between man [sic] and animal. Pigment ink jet and letterpress on Magnani Pescia, paste paper covers on museum boards, linen thread, exposed hemp cords, variable edition 6 signed and numbered, included in the collection at the University of Idaho Library, Moscow, unbound State of Idaho 2014 theft acquisition.

Up next:

• develop multimedia curricula for familial, business, psychotherapeutic, and criminal justice markets
• address flaws in current market models
• attract clients healthy enough to recognize that value of Unplay

If Unplay helps you resolve conflicts in your life, thank you for clicking on my last buck in the upper right column to contribute your support.