by Skald
Ive been accused of "having a problem with authority". But thats not quite true. The truth is, I dont even understand the concept of authority. It baffles me that people give more weight to other people than to themselves. It baffles me that they trust other people's judgement more than their own.
Many people seem to place importance on arbitrary titles... such as "boss", "president", "teacher", "student", "client". I do my best to pay lip-service to these roles... but at heart I just see people. I dont see much difference between the "boss" and the "employee". Or the teacher and student.
In the end, I instinctively feel I have the right to do whatever I want to do. How can anyone be more of an "authority" on my life than me? How can I expect them to know what is best for me?
Deference to authority strikes me as infantile... a failure to advance beyond childhood. Obedient people are emotional retards who never learned to take responsibility for their own lives. They disguise their infantile state with appeals to "morality", "patriotism", "responsibility", "maturity", etc. But at heart they are cowards or simpletons.
They love to quote "them".... "the experts". They live by "conventional wisdom"....... by the accepted "rules" of society or media. And they trust these sources more than their own experience. They love to say things like, "you cant do that"... or "you must do this".
Its not only a tragic stance on life... its vaguely pathetic. Where do all these rules come from? And why do so many accept them without question?
Simply put, there are no authorities. No one knows better than you. And no one is better than you. The concept of authority is, at its root, a demeaning one.... a lie... a control mechanism and nothing more.
Recognize no authority but your own.
1 comment:
I think that organized religion is largely responsible for instilling this status quo type of thinking, that submission and deference to authority is virtuous. It's no wonder that church and state (theocracy) have been one and the same for the greater part of the last 5,000 years.
This phenomenon is very much a product of western civilization, where the "one's in charge" can be traced back to families who claimed a "divine" right to rule, and continue to rule through system's of social control perpetuated to disempower people into being obedient "slaves", "consumers", "employees","citizens", "peasants", or whatever you want to call those in subjection. There's nothing new about this accept that maybe the boundaries of control have grown larger.
It's very good to speak of such things but unfortunately I think that just like in Plato's Allegory of the Cave the "majority" of people won't listen because having been raised in captivity for so long so to speak, most are unwilling to let go of their pre-conceptions and indoctrination. As in the movie "The Matrix", most people when given the choice of taking the red or blue pill, would rather choose the blue pill.
Nevertheless, keep writing because as this site and its audience attests, there are at least some people who are willing to listen...and who are walking or dancing to the beat of a different drummer.
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