Mel+Gibson

Mel Gibson By: Joseph Saleeba

** //Biography// **  Mel Columcille Gerard Gibson, born on January 3, 1956, in Peekskill, New York, grew up as a middle child of eleven kids. Though born in the United States, in 1968, at the age of twelve he and his family relocated to Australia and settled north of Sydney as a result of his father winning a lawsuit settlement from a serious work-related injury. His father, originally from Australia, worked hard in America for his family and always dreamt of returning to his homeland. After moving, Mel attended St. Leo’s College, where Australian students bullied him mercilessly because of his American accent. People recognized him as a rebel for revolting against the Christian brothers’ ‘repressive regime’. A short biographical article states that his authority figures “whacked him around for smoking, fighting, not following their stupid rules” (Wills, 2). His father later withdrew Mel from the religious institution and instead enrolled him in a state school. At this point, the young Mel Gibson had dealt with much rejection from his classmates. He began greatly displaying his insecurities, conforming to a typical ‘Aussie bloke’, partaking in their average drinking and fighting behavior.  Although Mel exhibited these extroverted aspects of his personality, most described it as simply a mask of his ‘true self’. Many remember him as a typically shy individual, preoccupied by the pressure of fitting in. And although he appeared in a number of high school plays and always seemed passionate about acting, he went to work at an orange juice bottling company after graduating. After contemplating priesthood and journalism, Mel Gibson had no idea of what he wanted to do with his life. Finally, his sister decided for him; submitting an application to join the National Institute of Dramatic Arts, at the University of New South Wales. The school accepted Mel and he decided to attend.  Rejection continued in Mel’s life when he did not take his academics seriously and so suffered the disapproval of his more scholarly colleagues. He grew out his hair and beard and distanced himself from his family. His lack of focus became clear when he moved out of his home and in with three other men his age. After this first stage of crisis, he began to exhibit the flair and enthusiasm associated with theatre. Initially, Mel Gibson struggled with a case of terrible stage fright, even causing him to sit down during his first ever performance. Eventually, he conquered this fear and landed his first important role, Romeo, in a performance of Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo & Juliet’ at the University. In 1976, Mel went on to release his major debut //Mad Max//, which people claim earned him the spotlight. From then on, Mel Columcille Gerard Gibson rose to stardom and although he gained an insurmountable amount of fame and fortune, it seems that the rejection he faced in early life may have drastically influenced his personality development.

//Behavioral Perspective//  A behavioral perspective of one’s personality explores how environmental stimuli can influence the manner of one’s behavior. This operates under the assumption that an assured series of events that reinforce specific behaviors condition certain individuals to those specific actions. In the case of Mel Gibson, one may clearly perceive the manner of his personality using a behaviorist standpoint. His consistent abnormal behavior resulted from the constant impact of the people that surrounded him during his peak of success in Hollywood. Comparing Mr. Gibson’s actions to Skinner’s principle of Operant Conditioning, one can see how he shifts his behavior to truly reflect his new “friends” and the new lifestyle of stardom they reinforced. Through this approach, a behaviorist method of analyzing Mel’s personality appears in his heavy drinking. Mel’s consistent alcoholism and neglect for his work and family resulted from his manipulated environment, as well as his difficulty to remain grounded amongst manipulation. His movie-star colleagues introduced him to the party-hardy Hollywood lifestyle and encouraged his participation. The occasional event parties began to stage an attitude that carried over into his everyday life because to him, alcohol meant acceptance. As an American growing up in Australia, children taunted and rejected him for his English accent; making him feel unwanted and unaccepted. As an upcoming movie star and director, the lifestyle directly affected him even more than the usual human due to his lack of social interactions in the past.  The idea of acknowledgment to Mel Gibson in Hollywood meant partying and drinking heavily to fit in. His new environment, out of Australia, and new scenario finally granted him the privilege of admiration and acceptance for his true self. As a result, his newfound obsession with this idea of approval led him to allow his new peers, and his new environment in itself, to take control of his behavior and in the larger part, his personality as a whole. He altered his behavior due to the misconception that partying and drinking brought the positive reinforcement of appreciation and support. To an extent, his actions began to define him as a person. It influenced his professional as well as his family life. In regards to his work, according to an online biographical source, “...the shoot was marked by some serious drinking sessions. When away from his family… Mel would hit the sauce with abandon. It was reported that, on one occasion, he got into another bar brawl and was so badly bruised they had to change the order of shooting” (Wills, 4). His sense of obligation disintegrated as he realized the benefits of his fame. As the ‘Law of Effect’ describes, because he suffered no negative consequence from his behavior, due to his prominence, his response to a stimulus //strengthened// even with lesser forms of that stimulus. In his case, the parties that he attended serve as the stimulus of his actions, while the response appears in his endeavors at such occasions, whether presenting himself as an eloquent guest or (in his case) a drunken mess. His binge drinking developed into an even larger issue later in his career, when cops arrested him in 2006 on drunk-driving charges. As the connection to the response grew with the promoting of his success through these increasingly excessive Hollywood parties, his intolerable behavior continued to skyrocket. As a result, now novel stimuli such as casual events and smaller get-togethers trigger his foolish actions because he feels the necessity to uphold, to what he feels is, his social standing. His struggle with fitting in as a child strongly influenced his spiral down hill later in life. The lack of a childhood social life combined with such an ideal lifestyle later in life led him to his unstable personality and his violent outcries for attention. Also, the distance between him and his family strongly impacted his outcome. He surrounded himself with people who never truly cared about him or his wellbeing. Without any true ties to any relationship, he grasped onto his only hope, which came in the form of alcoholism.

 A psychoanalytic perspective assumes that the development of our personality derives from a series of unconscious drives and desires. This theory analyzes the unconscious conflicts causing the patient's symptoms and character problems. Mel Gibson definitely shows signs of subconscious conflict. For example, the Freudian approach in many ways explains his number of explosive rants and tyrants over the phone to his, now ex-wife, Oksana Grigorieva. These phone calls seem a little insane, and so by approaching them with a psychoanalytic point of view, one may find that perhaps occurrences of his childhood determined this unconscious force and drove him to this unusual behavior. A reported phone call quotes Mel ranting, “Shut the f* up! You should just f*ing smile and blow me! ..Because I deserve it” (radaronline.com). Relating to the notion of the unconscious drives and motives, Freud’s idea of latent sexual frustration serves as an explanation for Mel’s strong, abrasive choice of speech towards the woman he supposedly loves. Obviously subconsciously the man is not sexually satisfied and this stems to a number of his behavioral issues. The underlying meaning behind his language denotes the primal urges and cravings of the unusually high ID structural aspect of his personality. His violent outbursts show further appearance that he lacks a stable processing ego, or balance in that of his structural model of personality between his ID and his superego.  Mel Gibson’s libido, or psychosexual energy seems to control the underlying tension and basis of his motivations. The core of his personality looks as though it operates on the motivation of selfishness; where he seems tied to the ‘pleasure’ principle of operation. The various audio taped examples between he and his wife demonstrate that clearly the structure of his personality builds upon primitive desires, drives, and emotions. Since he falls higher on the libido spectrum as having a higher ID, it appears as though his psychosexual energy fixates on the phallic stage, where, more specifically, his conflict of overt sexual behavior comes across as socially unacceptable. This reinforces the notion that his narcissistic attitude toward his wife reveals his acute sense of vanity brought on by his intense professional career. Throughout his adolescence, Mr. Gibson felt neglected by his peers and as a result he did not experience the important aspects of maturity at the same rate as other children his age. This fact of immaturity explains his fixation at the phallic stage, where his juvenile behavior stems from his lack of social experience. More on that matter, as a result of having a poor social childhood thus leading to an immature development of psyche; along with the evident narcissism and his primary focus of seeking out pleasure through overt sexual behavior, Mel Gibson shows clear signs of falling into none-other than the phallic stage when psychoanalytically evaluating the development of his personality.
 * //Psychoanalytic Perspective// **

//Discussion//  Both the behaviorist and the psychoanalytic theories of analyzing one’s personality development fit to describe that of Mel Gibson. The behaviorist approach illustrates a clear resemblance between his environment and his personality. His personality as child reflected the way his fellow peers treated him, and as he shifts to his professional career the celebrity persona becomes his personality. Acting in a way that resembles what his famous peers expected of him in the Hollywood environment brought him comfort in a lifestyle of alcoholism. Throughout his entire life, he mirrors his behavior to reflect the environment around him. As an outcast in Australia, he broke the rules at school and he distanced himself from the people who cared about him, such as his family. While his growth as a star transitioned his personality into one of a typical celebrity. As his fame grew, his partying and overall neglect for the positive things in life continued to increase as well. His environment and his actions go hand in hand no matter what stage of life one looks to assess.  The psychoanalytic approach strongly demonstrates the structural model of his personality. Especially as seen with his ex-wife, Mel reacts mainly on the <span style="font-family: 'Palatino Linotype','Book Antiqua',Palatino,serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 21px;">principle of pleasure; thus his pursuit of relief in the ID structure forms the basis to his behavior in his overall lifestyle. Such impulsive reactions must result from all sorts of unconscious drives and desires in order for his course of actions to seem remotely justifiable, at least. Mel released a vast amount of sexual frustration over the phone to his ex-wife, showing a certain inability to contain his subconscious thoughts. These outbursts highly reflect the latent inner conflicts, so through the psychoanalytic perspective, one can see the direct relation between the two. Out of the eight major perspectives on personality development discussed in class, the theories of behaviorists and psychoanalysts definitely suit the important aspects of Mel Gibson’s behavior and personal growth the best out of all of them. These two theories accurately describe the major portions of his habits, relationships, career, and how his environment as well as his inner desires affected these important factors of his overall personality.

<span style="font-family: 'Palatino Linotype','Book Antiqua',Palatino,serif; font-size: 25px; line-height: 38px;">**__//References://__** <span style="font-family: 'Palatino Linotype','Book Antiqua',Palatino,serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 38px;">Exclusive Audio Tapings of Mel Gibson (and ex-wife, Oksana Grigorieva): <span style="font-family: 'Palatino Linotype','Book Antiqua',Palatino,serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 38px; text-indent: 0.5in;">(http://www.radaronline.com/exclusives/2010/07/exclusive-audio-out-control-mel-gibson-says-hell-burn-down-house-after-demanding). <span style="font-family: 'Palatino Linotype','Book Antiqua',Palatino,serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 38px;">Friedman, H.S., Schustack, M. W. (2009). //Personality: Classic Theories and Modern Research//, 4th Edition. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon. <span style="font-family: 'Palatino Linotype','Book Antiqua',Palatino,serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 38px;">Interview on //BBC Worldwide// (2007). <span style="font-family: 'Palatino Linotype','Book Antiqua',Palatino,serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 38px;">Wills, Dominic. (2006). Mel Gibson Biography. //TalkTalk//. Retrieved from: <span style="font-family: 'Palatino Linotype','Book Antiqua',Palatino,serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 38px; text-indent: 0.5in;">(http://www.talktalk.co.uk/entertainment/film/biography/artist/mel-gibson/biography/81?page=2).