Social control
About human goodness...
08/09/08 13:57 Filed in: Human Nature | Philosophy
When I started to write about human nature, a major theme was whether humans either had the capacity or desire to make positive changes in their social, political, economic and physical worlds. I got badly tripped up on that one and there followed an endless debate about whether human nature is either good or bad. I take responsibility for that since I should have foreseen the interpretation that might have been placed on some of my words!
The arguments are meaningless since human behaviour might be perceived as good, bad, or millions of shades in-between, but that was not the point.
It was about whether humans wished for good in their world, but more than that, whether they had a desire, either individually or collectively, for better lives and consequently a better world. I concede in advance that “better” may mean different things to different people and social groups. To want other than better, or to want worse, would be pathological, if not psychopathic, and I don’t believe that the majority of humankind are pathological or psychopaths either.
Even those who are psychopaths frequently will offer altruistic and positive rationales for their psychopathic behaviour. Hitler started his invasion of other countries and his genocide of the Jews, and persecution of other social groups, such as homosexuals (the rationale for which came from psychiatrists among others) saying that he was acting in the cause of social good.
I believe that people do have an underlying desire for a better life. To suggest that people might desire worse lives, more killing, more wars, environmental damage that may threaten their survival, and the chance that their families, friends or children might die as a result of such eventualities would be completely pathological.
For any who say that there might be no worse or better, that things may remain the same; nothing ever remains in the same state, it will be better or worse.
The mighty military machine, political groups, trans- and multi-national corporations, the greedy and coercive may tell us that they too are acting in our best interests. They might deploy the media as a mass force for our conditioning; for stupefying and stultifying our powers of perception, feeling and thought; dumbing us down and numbing our ability to recognise that a naked emperor does not, in fact, wear any clothes!
But we too have the power to discriminate, to differentiate between truth and lies, to know that our happiness may not lie in more and more consumption to keep the rich, powerful and rich…to know that killing people is as undesirable as being killed, that wars risk the lives of our children and young people, that caring for our environment is as fundamentally important as caring for ourselves.
So I will write on about positive social change, as I believe that most people want and desire it. I do recognise that we may be told by the mass media, politicians, power groups and business elites that it is neither in our best interests to want it, and that we are impotent in a world that is best left to them to manage and control. I believe otherwise. I doubt if any mass media will be inviting me to express my views. So I’ll keep writing here…
The arguments are meaningless since human behaviour might be perceived as good, bad, or millions of shades in-between, but that was not the point.
It was about whether humans wished for good in their world, but more than that, whether they had a desire, either individually or collectively, for better lives and consequently a better world. I concede in advance that “better” may mean different things to different people and social groups. To want other than better, or to want worse, would be pathological, if not psychopathic, and I don’t believe that the majority of humankind are pathological or psychopaths either.
Even those who are psychopaths frequently will offer altruistic and positive rationales for their psychopathic behaviour. Hitler started his invasion of other countries and his genocide of the Jews, and persecution of other social groups, such as homosexuals (the rationale for which came from psychiatrists among others) saying that he was acting in the cause of social good.
I believe that people do have an underlying desire for a better life. To suggest that people might desire worse lives, more killing, more wars, environmental damage that may threaten their survival, and the chance that their families, friends or children might die as a result of such eventualities would be completely pathological.
For any who say that there might be no worse or better, that things may remain the same; nothing ever remains in the same state, it will be better or worse.
The mighty military machine, political groups, trans- and multi-national corporations, the greedy and coercive may tell us that they too are acting in our best interests. They might deploy the media as a mass force for our conditioning; for stupefying and stultifying our powers of perception, feeling and thought; dumbing us down and numbing our ability to recognise that a naked emperor does not, in fact, wear any clothes!
But we too have the power to discriminate, to differentiate between truth and lies, to know that our happiness may not lie in more and more consumption to keep the rich, powerful and rich…to know that killing people is as undesirable as being killed, that wars risk the lives of our children and young people, that caring for our environment is as fundamentally important as caring for ourselves.
So I will write on about positive social change, as I believe that most people want and desire it. I do recognise that we may be told by the mass media, politicians, power groups and business elites that it is neither in our best interests to want it, and that we are impotent in a world that is best left to them to manage and control. I believe otherwise. I doubt if any mass media will be inviting me to express my views. So I’ll keep writing here…
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