"You can make yourself feel better about yourself if you project your shadow side, if you project your own potential for evil onto someone else. By annihilating them and, therefore, your shadow, you bring yourself into some state of purity or reformation"
About this Quote
Beals is naming a dirty little psychological hack that shows up everywhere from tabloid pile-ons to geopolitical crusades: if you can’t stand what’s messy in you, outsource it. The “shadow side” language (Jung by way of pop-cultural self-help) gives a crisp frame to something we recognize instinctively: the relief that comes from turning inner conflict into an external enemy. Once the “evil” is over there, you get to feel clean over here.
What makes the line work is its escalation. It doesn’t stop at projection as mere misjudgment; it pushes into the hunger for “annihilating” the other person. That word choice drags the impulse out of polite morality and into the realm of purges, cancellations, witch hunts, and moral panics. The subtext is blunt: a lot of righteousness is less about justice than self-soothing. “Purity or reformation” isn’t offered as a noble goal; it’s framed as a psychologically purchased illusion, the emotional payoff of scapegoating.
As an actress, Beals isn’t delivering a policy memo; she’s speaking from the culture’s front lines, where identity, image, and blame are constantly rehearsed and performed. The quote reads like commentary on how narratives are built: villains are useful. They give the audience a shortcut to catharsis and the protagonist (or the public) a makeover without the hard work of self-interrogation. The sting is that the “shadow” never actually dies; it just changes targets.
What makes the line work is its escalation. It doesn’t stop at projection as mere misjudgment; it pushes into the hunger for “annihilating” the other person. That word choice drags the impulse out of polite morality and into the realm of purges, cancellations, witch hunts, and moral panics. The subtext is blunt: a lot of righteousness is less about justice than self-soothing. “Purity or reformation” isn’t offered as a noble goal; it’s framed as a psychologically purchased illusion, the emotional payoff of scapegoating.
As an actress, Beals isn’t delivering a policy memo; she’s speaking from the culture’s front lines, where identity, image, and blame are constantly rehearsed and performed. The quote reads like commentary on how narratives are built: villains are useful. They give the audience a shortcut to catharsis and the protagonist (or the public) a makeover without the hard work of self-interrogation. The sting is that the “shadow” never actually dies; it just changes targets.
Quote Details
| Topic | Ethics & Morality |
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