Some bridge players for a whole stack of inexplicable reasons refuse to acknowledge their part or responsibility in getting poor scores. All blame is fully attributed to partner. This awful affliction has already been covered by me in my Nov 2009 post, where the Noti Butu Matia Syndrome described such a disorder in much greater detail.
However, a new and more disturbing variant of this syndrome has reared its ugly head, where the blame avoidance and blame transference games have suddenly reached unprecedented heights. Indeed, a victims of Inventa Excusiosis are under an overwhelming compulsion to invent any excuses whatsoever to shift blame away from themselves, by dumping it all onto their partners. Surpressing the unpalatable truths that they were solely at fault for the bidding cock-ups, and defensive blunders, they feel compelled to clutch at straws in a desperate last-ditch attempts to deny responsibility. Magical thinking instantly comes into play, as they frantically seek out the most amazing and fanciful excuses. The most common one is that an earlier error by partner was stilling praying on their mind, adversely affecting their ability to think straight.
As Leslie Shafer astutely pointed out in one of her excellent articles on new bridge slang, players often sit around after the game, discussing why they ended up with such wretched scores.....especially on hands which were seen as awkward and difficult to both bid and play. This required them to utilise all their blamestorming skills, very much in the same way as executives utilise their brainstorming skills to resolve problematic issues. However, what Leslie failed to recognise was that this form of behaviour is the classic symptom of this particular disorder. The irony of course is that if sufferers of Inventica Excusiosis applied half as much brain power to the actual bidding and play of the hands, they wouldn't need to be wasting their time and energy dredging up.....and dreaming up....the most appalling excuses afterwards.
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