Well it's been a while and I haven't written anything. So here goes. I probably should have found something better to write about after the break that I had, but my life is fairly boring (so no inspiration there) and I've had no flashes of brilliance or realisation from any real philosophical or intelligent directions and so I discuss this.
I was recently told that I was incredibly distrustful and cynical. The actual words used as far as my memory goes were "Maybe one day we'll be able to get you over your distrust of everything". This followed the same person not being surprised by my ridicule of various administrative processes, bureaucracy and governmental processes in general. In my flawed memory, I replied, somewhat incorrectly that "I'm not distrustful of everything, just cynical of everyone's motives" which makes me sound overly paranoid. While I do have tendencies, I'm not that bad. Rather, this was yet another case of me opening my mouth too quickly and going with exaggeration instead of a carefully considered statement that was both poignant and insightful.
What I should have said instead was "I just don't trust the motives of anyone who holds some level of power". This, while still paranoid, at least leaves wriggle room and puts a limit on the statement. From there I would have to explain. So here goes my explanation.
Humans are by nature creatures that desire power above all else. The problem from there is inherent in the nature of power. Power puts you above at least one other. As a supervisor in your place of employment, you have some level of power and by default, you have been placed above some others. As your amount of power increases, so does the number of people who are by default under you. When you get a position of power in the government, you have essentially been placed over every person who is not you.
This, to me, is in itself a problem. I'm at heart an anarchist. I believe in the human ideal of self autonomy, at least on Earth. Before you say anything, I also believe in social responsibility. Put those two together and you get self autonomy that respects and aids others over most else. So I have a problem with anyone who can say that they have power over another if it isn't qualified with the strictest terms.
We see abuses of power every few minutes. Government employees who take bribes or kickbacks, employers who abuse their employees however they do that, teachers who punish students for imagined or false reasons. I could go on but the point is that power, as has been said many times, corrupts. The converse is also true; while power corrupts, power also attracts the corruptible. And so the story goes.
Now my next problem is that the ultimate goal of power is to either increase or retain the level of power that the holder has. If we have the corrupt and corruptible with this subconscious goal, then nothing that is done by these people can be trusted on any level as it will all (probably) come back to the retention of power.
A good example is tax cuts. No one will ever complain about tax cuts in a time of surplus, that doesn't make sense from anyone's point of view. But let's look at the intention. A Budget Surplus is a good thing to have, it means that everyone's doing well and if something bad happens, everything should be fine. So why give a tax cut if this is desirable? Because the people ask for it. So what does the government gain? The only thing is that the public view of the government in this case will increase. And what will that achieve? Come the next election, they'll get voted back in. That's why you only ever see tax cuts if the government is looking bad in the opinion polls, or in an election year.
Yes, that sounds like the words of a hardened cynic but I can see my point.
So yeah, I'm a cynic and getting me over that will probably take some work.
I was recently told that I was incredibly distrustful and cynical. The actual words used as far as my memory goes were "Maybe one day we'll be able to get you over your distrust of everything". This followed the same person not being surprised by my ridicule of various administrative processes, bureaucracy and governmental processes in general. In my flawed memory, I replied, somewhat incorrectly that "I'm not distrustful of everything, just cynical of everyone's motives" which makes me sound overly paranoid. While I do have tendencies, I'm not that bad. Rather, this was yet another case of me opening my mouth too quickly and going with exaggeration instead of a carefully considered statement that was both poignant and insightful.
What I should have said instead was "I just don't trust the motives of anyone who holds some level of power". This, while still paranoid, at least leaves wriggle room and puts a limit on the statement. From there I would have to explain. So here goes my explanation.
Humans are by nature creatures that desire power above all else. The problem from there is inherent in the nature of power. Power puts you above at least one other. As a supervisor in your place of employment, you have some level of power and by default, you have been placed above some others. As your amount of power increases, so does the number of people who are by default under you. When you get a position of power in the government, you have essentially been placed over every person who is not you.
This, to me, is in itself a problem. I'm at heart an anarchist. I believe in the human ideal of self autonomy, at least on Earth. Before you say anything, I also believe in social responsibility. Put those two together and you get self autonomy that respects and aids others over most else. So I have a problem with anyone who can say that they have power over another if it isn't qualified with the strictest terms.
We see abuses of power every few minutes. Government employees who take bribes or kickbacks, employers who abuse their employees however they do that, teachers who punish students for imagined or false reasons. I could go on but the point is that power, as has been said many times, corrupts. The converse is also true; while power corrupts, power also attracts the corruptible. And so the story goes.
Now my next problem is that the ultimate goal of power is to either increase or retain the level of power that the holder has. If we have the corrupt and corruptible with this subconscious goal, then nothing that is done by these people can be trusted on any level as it will all (probably) come back to the retention of power.
A good example is tax cuts. No one will ever complain about tax cuts in a time of surplus, that doesn't make sense from anyone's point of view. But let's look at the intention. A Budget Surplus is a good thing to have, it means that everyone's doing well and if something bad happens, everything should be fine. So why give a tax cut if this is desirable? Because the people ask for it. So what does the government gain? The only thing is that the public view of the government in this case will increase. And what will that achieve? Come the next election, they'll get voted back in. That's why you only ever see tax cuts if the government is looking bad in the opinion polls, or in an election year.
Yes, that sounds like the words of a hardened cynic but I can see my point.
So yeah, I'm a cynic and getting me over that will probably take some work.
