Humphries Mark
Can Hist Rev. 2010;91(3):503-31. doi: 10.3138/chr.91.3.503.
War is an inherently traumatizing experience, and during the First World War more than 15,000 Canadian soldiers were diagnosed with some form of war-related psychological wounds. Many more went unrecognized. Yet the very act of seeking an escape from the battlefield or applying for a postwar pension for psychological traumas transgressed masculine norms that required men to be aggressive, self-reliant, and un-emotional. Using newly available archival records, contemporary medical periodicals, doctors' notes, and patient interview transcripts, this paper examines two crises that arose from this conflict between idealized masculinity and the emotional reality of war trauma. The first came on the battlefield in 1916 when, in some cases, almost half the soldiers evacuated from the front were said to be suffering from emotional breakdowns. The second came later, during the Great Depression, when a significant number of veterans began to seek compensation for their psychological injuries. In both crises, doctors working in the service of the state constructed trauma as evidence of deviance, in order to parry a larger challenge to masculine ideals. In creating this link between war trauma and deviance, they reinforced a residual conception of welfare that used tests of morals and means to determine who was deserving or undeserving of state assistance. At a time when the Canadian welfare state was being transformed in response to the needs of veterans and their families, doctors' denial that "real men" could legitimately exhibit psychosomatic symptoms in combat meant that thousands of legitimately traumatized veterans were left uncompensated by the state and were constructed as inferior, feminized men.
战争本质上是一种创伤性经历，在第一次世界大战期间，超过15000名加拿大士兵被诊断患有某种形式的与战争相关的心理创伤。还有更多人未被识别出来。然而，试图逃离战场或申请战后心理创伤抚恤金的行为却违背了男性规范，这些规范要求男性要有攻击性、自力更生且不情绪化。本文利用新获取的档案记录、当代医学期刊、医生笔记以及患者访谈记录，审视了理想化男性气质与战争创伤情感现实之间的冲突引发的两场危机。第一场危机发生在1916年的战场上，在某些情况下，据说从前线撤离的士兵中几乎有一半患有精神崩溃。第二场危机发生在后来的大萧条时期，当时大量退伍军人开始为他们的心理创伤寻求赔偿。在这两场危机中，为国家服务的医生将创伤构建为越轨的证据，以应对对男性理想的更大挑战。在建立战争创伤与越轨之间的这种联系时，他们强化了一种残余的福利观念，即通过道德和经济状况测试来确定谁应得或不应得国家援助。在加拿大福利国家因退伍军人及其家庭的需求而转型之际，医生否认“真正的男人”在战斗中会合法地表现出身心症状，这意味着成千上万遭受合法创伤的退伍军人未得到国家赔偿，并被构建为低等的、女性化的男性。
