017 - When Cultural Gaslighting Turns Deadly

The Gaslight Effect

WARNING! This episode includes discussions about sensitive topics including rape and violence and is intended for mature audiences.

On this episode, Dr. Robin Stern talks with Leslee Udwin.

Leslee is an actor, producer, director and now an education sytem change activist. She directed and produced the documentary film India's Daughter.

Robin and Leslee discuss the process Leslee went through to make this incredibly moving documentary about the brutal rape and death of a woman in India. Leslee conducted 31 hours of interviews with the perpetrators, and what she learned during this process led Leslee to create Think Equal, a non-profit organization dedicated to creating "the world's first holistic comprehensive Social and Emotional learning program."

Leslee also shares her deeply personal account of she herself being raped at the age of 18.

Robin points out that gaslighting often unfolds as part of an unequal social context, and Leslee discovered during the making of the film that her original thought that the rapists actions were the result of lack of education was not accurate. She realized that society had taught these people through social norms.

Robin states that people are not born gaslighters. They learn by observation and social learning, and hate is part of social learning.

Leslee feels that we must learn to be human together and we have to teach children to love before the age of six. The problem is bigger than each of us and we must band together against the "globalization of indifference."

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