OMTimes Radio Archives

Riane Eisler – Nurturing Our Humanity: How Domination and Partnership Shape Our Brains, Lives & Future

Aired Thursday, September 19, 2019 at 4:00 PM PST / 7:00 PM EST

Everywhere we turn these days, from the news to books and movies, we are bombarded with the same hackneyed message: human nature is inherently bad… just look at all the senseless violence, greed, murder, rape, & war. We humans it seems are genetically wired, for selfish, cruel behavior. Or are we? Are violence, greed, domination and control really a fundamental and ineradicable part of “human nature?”

“Absolutely not,” says cultural historian, social systems scientist, and author Riane Eisler, whose international best seller, The Chalice and the Blade, has been hailed as the most important book since Origin of Species.

In her latest book, Nurturing Our Humanity: How Domination and Partnership Shape Our Brains, Lives and Future, Riane Eisler explains that” Neuroscience shows that the human brain is flexible. Through the interaction between genes and our lived experience, behavior patterns become woven into our individual and social fabric over time. To move toward the pro-social, cooperative, nurturing behavior that brain scans show we are inclined toward requires a shift from a system of “domination” to one of “partnership.”

Riane Eisler joins Sandie this week to upend age-old assumptions about human nature. Topics include:

• How research demonstrates that the tragic shootings of recent months and years may well stem from the impact of growing up in a “domination” culture or family that is held together by fear and force.

• Witnessing or experience violence causes significant stress and leaves a powerful psychic imprint on children, which in turn can lead to violent behaviour

• Neuroscience shows that caring behaviour is actually humanity’s default tendency

• The blueprint for ending domination and violence at home and in society at large, and weaving non-violent behaviour patterns into our individual and social fabric over time.

• And more…

RIANE EISLER is a social systems scientist, cultural historian, and attorney whose research, writing, and speaking has transformed the lives of people worldwide. She is President of the Center for Partnership Studies (CPS) and Editor-in-Chief of the Interdisciplinary Journal of Partnership Studies.

A refugee from Nazi Europe as a child, she has addressed the UN General Assembly, the US Department of State and Congressional Briefings, and authored over 500 articles published in outlets including The Christian Science Monitor, Human Rights Quarterly, and International Journal of Women’s Studies. Her book The Chalice and The Blade: Our History, Our Future is an international bestseller.

Connect her at: www.rianeeisler.com and www.centerforpartnership.org