Silence, Shadow, and the Demand to Speak: A Jungian-Hillmanian Reflection on Our Political Moment
In times of crisis and injustice, it’s understandable to want others to speak up. Silence can feel like betrayal. But what happens when this desire becomes a demand—and when that demand becomes a test of worth, morality, or loyalty?
Carl Jung might suggest that what we’re seeing now is not just political urgency, but a vast collective confrontation with the Shadow—the dark, unacknowledged parts of ourselves that we prefer to see in and project onto others. When we insist that others publicly declare their stance, especially on social media, which is a space set aside for up by oligarchs to contain our grievances , we may be projecting our own inner conflict outward. Jung might ask: What is being stirred in you by another’s silence? What uncomfortable truth is being displaced by moral certainty?
James Hillman, with his deep reverence for soul and image, would remind us that the psyche resists reduction. He might caution that when every event is flattened into a binary of right and wrong, speech and silence, we lose contact with soul—the imaginal depths that live in paradox, nuance, and silence itself. He might say: Don’t mistake performative speech for transformation. Don’t confuse the ego’s urgency with the soul’s timing.
Hillman would likely point out the archetypes in play—the hero, the martyr, the persecutor—and invite us to see the drama unfolding not just in the streets or online, but in our inner psychic theatre. He would urge us to wonder: Which god are you serving when you demand that others speak? Justice? Approval? Fear?
From a soul-centered perspective, what we need now is not more shouting but more conferencing—not just debate or agreement, but deep interior dialogue. Conferencing invites us to sit with contradiction, to explore our projections, to befriend our own silence before policing another’s.
This isn’t a call to inaction. It’s a call to depth. To ask, before posting or demanding: What part of me is speaking? Who in me is demanding this? And who am I silencing inside myself in the process?
In a time of fiery urgency, silence is sometimes complicity. But other times, silence is where soul gathers itself. Not all witnessing is visible. Not all integrity performs! Go within before going without.