scapegoat

The Scapegoat by William Holman Hunt, 1854. Hunt had this framed in a picture with the quotations "Surely he hath borne our Griefs and carried our Sorrows; Yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of GOD and afflicted." (Isaiah 53:4) and "And the Goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a Land not inhabited." (Leviticus 16:22)

The scapegoat was a goat that was driven off into the wilderness as part of the ceremonies of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, in Judaism during the times of the Temple in Jerusalem. The rite is described in Leviticus 16.

The word is more widely used as a metaphor, referring to someone who is blamed for misfortunes, generally as a way of distracting attention from the real causes. Another term for scapegoat is fall guy.

Hebrew Bible

Azazel is the word translated as "scapegoat" in the King James Version of the Bible (Leviticus chapter 16). In 1611 King James' translators borrowed the word scapegoat from William Tyndale's translation from around 1530. Tyndale had translated azazel (the name of the cliff the goat was pushed over, or more likely the demon it was sent out to in the desert) as ez ozel - literally, "the goat that departs"; hence "the goat that escapes," or, for short, "(e)scape goat." Since this goat, with the sins of the people placed on it, is then sent over a cliff or driven into the wilderness to perish^[1], the word "scapegoat" has come to mean a person, often innocent, who is blamed and punished for the sins, crimes or sufferings of others.

Some modern scholars believe the "goat for Azazel" is sent away to the desert demon of that name, and that this is not the name of a cliff or mountain, nor of the man who takes it into the wilderness.

In fact, today in modern Hebrew Azazel is used derogatorily, as in lekh la-Azazel ("go to Azazel"), as in "go to hell".

Christianity

In Christian theology, the story of the scapegoat in Leviticus is interpreted as a symbolic prefiguration of the self-sacrifice of Jesus, who takes the sins of humanity on his own head, having been driven into the 'wilderness' outside the city by order of the high priests. Also see John 1:29 and Hebrews Chps. 9-10

A socio-religious theory

Controversial Christian anthropologist René Girard has provided a reconstruction of the scapegoat theory. In Girard's view, it is humankind, not God, who has the problem with violence. Humans are driven by desire for that which another has or wants (mimetic desire). This causes a triangulation of desire and results in conflict between the desiring parties. This mimetic contagion increases to a point where society is at risk; it is at this point that the scapegoat mechanism is triggered. This is the point where one person is singled out as the cause of the trouble and is expelled or killed by the group. This person is the scapegoat. Social order is restored as people are contented that they have solved the cause of their problems by removing the scapegoated individual, and the cycle begins again. Girard contends that this is what happened in the case of Jesus. The difference in this case, Girard believes, is that he was resurrected from the dead and shown to be innocent; humanity is thus made aware of its violent tendencies and the cycle is broken. Satan, who is seen to be manifested in the contagion, is cast out. Thus Girard's work is significant as a re-construction of the Christus Victor atonement theory.

Metaphor

When used as a metaphor, a scapegoat is someone selected to bear blame for a calamity. Scapegoating is the act of holding a person, group of people, or thing responsible for a multitude of problems. This is also known as a frameup. Scapegoats can also be referred to as patsies or whipping boys.

Political/sociological scapegoating

Scapegoating is an important tool of propaganda; the most famous example in recent history is the Jews being singled out in Nazi propaganda as the source of Germany's economic woes and political collapse.

Scapegoating is often more devastating when applied to a minority group as they are inherently less able to defend themselves. A tactic often employed is to characterize an entire group of individuals according to the unethical or immoral conduct of a small number of individuals belonging to that group, also known as guilt by association.

"Scapegoated" groups throughout history have included almost every imaginable group of people: adherents of different religions, people of different races or nations, people with different political beliefs, or people differing in behaviour from the majority. However, scapegoating may also be applied to organizations, such as governments, corporations, or various political groups.

In industrialised societies, scapegoating of traditional minority groups is increasingly frowned upon.

Mobbing is a form of sociological scapegoating which occurs in the workplace. From At The Mercy Of The Mob A summary of research on workplace mobbing by Kenneth Westhues, Prof. of Sociology University of Waterloo, published in OHS Canada, Canada's Occupational Health & Safety Magazine, Vol. 18, No. 8, December 2002, pp. 30-36.

"Scapegoating is an effective if temporary means of achieving group solidarity, when it cannot be achieved in a more constructive way. It is a turning inward, a diversion of energy away from serving nebulous external purposes toward the deliciously clear, specific goal of ruining a disliked co-worker's life. ... Mobbing can be understood as the stressor to beat all stressors. It is an impassioned, collective campaign by co-workers to exclude, punish, and humiliate a targeted worker. Initiated most often by a person in a position of power or influence, mobbing is a desperate urge to crush and eliminate the target. The urge travels through the workplace like a virus, infecting one person after another. The target comes to be viewed as absolutely abhorrent, with no redeeming qualities, outside the circle of acceptance and respectability, deserving only of contempt. As the campaign proceeds, a steadily larger range of hostile ploys and communications comes to be seen as legitimate."

Scapegoating in sports

In sports, scapegoats are common. In baseball, Bill Buckner is blamed for losing the 1986 World Series due to a critical error, and in Japan, the Hanshin Tigers blame the Curse of the Colonel on their repeated failure to win at the Japan Series.

In American football, Scott Norwood is blamed for losing the Super Bowl for the Buffalo Bills during Super Bowl XXV by missing the probable game winning field goal.

Andrés Escobar, a Colombian football (soccer) player, was shot dead after he scored an own goal that knocked his team out of the 1994 World Cup.

Marc-Andre Fleury, a Canadian ice hockey goalie is blamed for losing the 2004 World Junior Ice Hockey Championships gold medal game to the United States. As he came out of his net to clear the puck out of the defensive zone it bounced off Patrick O'Sullivan's leg and into the empty net.

In 2005, ESPN Classic created the series The Top 5 Reasons You Can't Blame..., in which it examines why the conceived scapegoat(s) should, in fact, not be held responsible.

Coincidentally, the Chicago Cubs' Curse of the Billy Goat involves a literal goat.

Scapegoating in psychoanalytic theory

Psychoanalytic theory holds that unwanted thoughts and feelings can be unconsciously projected onto another who becomes a scapegoat for one's own problems. This concept can be extended to projection by groups. In this case the chosen individual, or group, becomes the scapegoat for the group's problems. In other words, blaming another person or thing, for your own problems.

The Karpman Drama Triangle does a fine job of illustrating the Rescuer, Persecutor and Victim roles attendant in the scapegoating dynamic in any relationship of three or more people. SighKoBlahGrr's Rodger Garrett asserts that early life habituation to scapegoating can result in a paranoid interpersonal orientation with a likelihood of passive-aggressive personality traits in adolescence leading to unfortunate parataxical integrations (see Harry Stack Sullivan) between parents and teenagers.

If the scapegoating pattern continues into early adulthood, development towards healthy personal identity is likely to be compromised, with strong likelihood of histrionic, compensatory narcissistic, and/or obsessive-compulsive, as well as passive-aggressive traits. Fully-criterial personality disorders are likely, leading to severe, ego-protecting "affect management behaviors" including alcoholism, drug addiction and other substance and behavioral process disorders.

Scapegoating in ancient Greece

The ancient Greeks practiced a scapegoating rite in which a cripple or beggar or criminal (the pharmakos) was cast out of the community, either in response to a natural disaster (such as a plague, famine or an invasion) or in response to a calendrical crisis (such as the end of the year). The scholia refer to the pharmakos being killed, but many scholars reject this, and argue that the earliest evidence (the fragments of the iambic satirist Hipponax) only show the pharmakos being stoned, beaten and driven from the community.^[2],

See also

• Moral panic
• Hue and cry
• Witch-hunt
• Shooting the messenger
• Blame Canada

External links

• 'The Scapegoat' (1854), painting by William Holman Hunt
• Scapegoating in Group Analytic Theory (PDF files)

References

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