Why do bad people run the world?
Written by Ben Boyang
I do believe we have gained much wisdom on our journey through modern history, but unfortunately those who have that wisdom are not able to implement it because they do not hold the reigns of power. Over time we have developed a system that rewards the worst of our impulses with status, success, wealth and control. That is because our system has been designed by those sorts of people, to suit themselves. If we love competition and individualism, the cut and thrust of politics, war and conflict, we will design a system around that, where we feel comfortable, and your sensitive, compassionate types feel decidedly uncomfortable.
The challenge is to first design a system that excludes the very worst humans from access to power., and then to figure out how to implement that system, against all the odds.
Modern humans have been around for some 2 or 3 hundred thousand years. Originally they lived in diverse groups, organised in a variety of ways. There was an abundance of abundance, so if you didn’t like the way your group was run, you could run away to a different place and start your own group, or you could join a nearby group.
About 15,000 years ago things began to change. Different groups started joining together, eventually forming cities. This development naturally put a lot of strain on ‘social cohesion.’ At first there was a lot of novel ways to maintain social cohesion, some more egalitarian and democratic than others. Over time, through much trial and error, societies found the most effective way to run things was by using the threat of violence and/or punishment to maintain order. Nowadays that time honoured method is universal throughout the modern world. It is taken as a given that social cohesion is maintained by fear of retribution.* This dominant system has engulfed at least 99% of the world’s population, but within the remaining 1% lies 99% of our cultural and political diversity. Of the 5,000 or so indigenous groups who still remain relatively untainted by modern society, each has their own unique way of doing things. You will find some use the threat of violence and punishment to maintain order, while others do not. Some are egalitarian, some hierarchical.
It has been noted by anthropologists that matriarchal societies tend to eschew the threat of violence and punishment in the home as a method of control, and that aversion to violence is carried through to the running of the society as a whole, but not necessarily extended to relations with other groups.
We are very fortunate that these indigenous groups have not been exterminated, despite our best efforts, for they embody hold up a window into other ways of dojng things that most of us find extremely difficult to even imagine. If we are to challenge our modus operandi of endless violence and cruelty, it is time to seek out the cache of wisdom held in trust by the last remaining people on earth who have not yet been swallowed up by the uniformity of our modern methods of mass control.
*Violence as the primary method of social control reached its zenith under Roman rule. The basic unit of society was the family, with the man as supreme ruler. He was given unfettered power over all below him: his wife, children, and slaves. He could kill them or torture them if he so desired, without breaking the law. Running society along similar lines as households was in those times, Rome was no different.
Modern western law is based primarily on Roman law. We have been winding back those male privileges ever since the fall of the Roman empire, with some limited success. In this day and age we make laws clearly stating that everyone is equal. But unfortunately far too many men hark back to ‘the good old days.’ After some 1600 years of reform, they still difficult to come to terms with their loss of legal supremacy.
Old habits die hard.
