Power corrupted-- an attempt on psychometric viewing
Candlelight vigils, Dharna, Agitations, Riots.
A youth travels a hundreds of kilometres distance, leaving behind- his family , his jobs, his lifestyle, -- only to put scar on face of a publicly perceived corrupt top-cop, and a publicly perceived murderer father.
A feudal lord does not hesitate to honour-kill his own children for falling in love outside his choice. A lot of such episodes happen in India.
Who, in the above, do you think is mentally ill.??
In the first two cases, it appears to me that the first two are victims of a ‘corrupt’ system (by Corrupt , i only mean, ‘something which is not functioning well’, like your Computer’s hard drive, or a floppy drive, --when these become corrupt, it doesn’t mean they have taken a bribe.!)
In the last two cases, the ‘publicly perceived corrupt top-cop’ , ‘publicly perceived murderer father’ and the feudal lord are highlighted examples of corrupt mentality.
Recently I have started hitting on websites which are related with the matters of Philosophy, like the University of Maryland, Ask (dot) com, Wikipedia info on Philosophy related matter. I have also slowly tripped into reading about psychology, sociology, history and anthropology, and political science.
An imagination of being suppressed by a powerful human has troubled me also a lot from inside many number of times. Then , in an attempt to find back my inner peace, i have often sought refuge in the other imagination of seeing myself becoming friendly with that powerful human/position/chair and accepting his conditions, almost like becoming his slave.
At other occasions, more often when watching any classic Mithun Movies, say “Jaal”, where the theme lines have been the clichéd Bollywood theme of Poor-fighting- the-Rich, I have felt the hero within myself taking up the fight and killing and bashing away, even public bashing , as in Sunny Deol movies, of the corrupt leader who has hijacked away the full society with his immense power.
Then, the imagination has also run amok to assume the role of hapless official in power who is struggling to keep himself alive while the corrupt system around is trying to choke him to death.
Then, there have also been many an imagination of being the ‘Sarkar’ or the “Munna Bhai”, a powerful antithesis of corrupt man, who has immense power to bring about only his kind of benignant corruption in the society.
My room based, armchair researches have took me on internet links to read about ‘Human rights’ , the UN announced Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). To my surprise, the research gave me link to hit upon another very interesting link, which talked about how the previous link, which sound so beautifully appealing to me, was still not able to find acceptance from another group , who came up with their own Declaration of Human Rights..the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights ( based on Islamic Ideology, which had earlier charged the UDHR to be Zionist-Christian Attempt). To an even bigger surprise, I further came across another link which showed yet another unhappy group with the UDHR... this was the Asian Block, which then came up with its own Bangkok Declaration of Human Rights, in accordance with ‘Asian valvues’ !!!
Has any of ever pondered what are these “Asian Values”, and what relevance does it make with puzzles of my mind which I discuss above. Well, why should you? But I know for sure that I am not alone; many of us out there must be feeling the conflict in our thoughts which stem after reading about or experiencing the above situations. If not for my problem solving sake, then U might to required to reason and resolve it out for your own sake—peace of mind.
‘Asian Valves’ reading further took me show that Democracies that we all so often talk of, and love to call for in our systems are also of atleast three kinds, from the Political Science point of view. There is Liberal Democracy (e.g Norway, UK, US, France , etc) ; there is Socialist democracy, which is closely aligned with the features of ‘Asian values’ practised in countries like India, Singapore, Spain, Chile, etc. , and then Communist Freedoms (eg of China), and then again, Religious democracies e.g Pakistan, Vetican( may be), Bangledesh, and Indonesia, Malaysia, etc.
The revealing feature of Asian Values is that it is slightly authoritative than the Universal Values (sponsored by Liberal Democratic States). In this, an individual rights can be revoked for the general good the community or society, a feature which can be seen a Hollywood production “Hero” of Chinese-American Actor, Jet Li,. (this example of the movie was given that write-up itself).
I also noted that at one point it was mentioned that Amartya Sen is one of well-renowned critic of ‘Asian Values’. He is said to be heavily inclined towards the Universal Values, and thereby , towards the Liberal democracies.
I began to ponder over the possible arguments of that Argumentative Indian for his inclinations. I recalled a common a threadbare in our offices, “Boss is always Right”, and then , recalled some episodes of the highly popular teleserial ‘Mahabharat’. The Indian values, if they are to be based on Dharma, or the path of Righteousness, are likely to fall in conflict with Asian Value, manifested by “Boss is always Right’. Because, going by Bhagwad Geeta example, a man should not retreat from acting against his own bosses or fathers or forefathers( ‘pita’ and ‘pitamah’) of the sake of preserving Dharma or the Righteousness. Amartya Sen, i read, was a dual scholar, in both, Philosophy and also in Economics. It was his Human Development Theory , which is resultant genesis of his knowledge in these to subject , which brought his world-acclaim through the Noble Prize.
In my own thinking, i felt rather compelled to believe that were it not for the Islamic influences on India, and the later the British Influence, India, too, probably would have been a Liberal democracy only.
It is rather unique and intriguing to learn that despite being a ‘Socialist Democracy” , and society being mostly Feudalistic, our policy makers have officially endorsed on the UDHR, not the Bangkok Declaration, nor the Cairo Declaration, nor the Arab charter of Human Rights. Our intellectuals tend to show inclination towards the liberal democracies only, and probably derive inspiration from our very own religious scripture, for doing so.
Every individual is born as a self-centred human baby, concerned only about his welfare, his food and milk. Well , that’s nature. But, lesson in teaching psychology, showed that as the human grows , in general cases, his ‘area of concern’ begins to expand out, so much, until he no more remains a self-centred human. It is this growing ‘area of concern’ which finally attaches us to policy-matters of the State. It is then that we begin to feel the heat of system corruption, and feel irritated. Some individual get too close in their feelings to take up personal level action, perhaps the ones who , if well- groomed with philosophical thoughts on various subject matters, may become a good Libertarian. Some resort to group-actions only, the ones, who are good and potential Socialist.
I still continue to ponder over the psychological origins of Feudal, and the Slaves, the two negative side-extremes between which lie the Libertarians and the Socialists.
This quest,in one way, will also be useful to understand the core traits of a Leader and a Follower., which can then be applied in management lessons.
If it is the emotional energy which drives a feudal to act and behave by his own, as a leader, then maybe it may help understand the IQ related with the corresponding EQ of a feudal. Than can help understand the behaviour patterns.
That, in turn, may shed some understanding on why power corrupts...not just work ethics but the full IQ and psychology of the person who sees himself to be powerful.
A youth travels a hundreds of kilometres distance, leaving behind- his family , his jobs, his lifestyle, -- only to put scar on face of a publicly perceived corrupt top-cop, and a publicly perceived murderer father.
A feudal lord does not hesitate to honour-kill his own children for falling in love outside his choice. A lot of such episodes happen in India.
Who, in the above, do you think is mentally ill.??
In the first two cases, it appears to me that the first two are victims of a ‘corrupt’ system (by Corrupt , i only mean, ‘something which is not functioning well’, like your Computer’s hard drive, or a floppy drive, --when these become corrupt, it doesn’t mean they have taken a bribe.!)
In the last two cases, the ‘publicly perceived corrupt top-cop’ , ‘publicly perceived murderer father’ and the feudal lord are highlighted examples of corrupt mentality.
Recently I have started hitting on websites which are related with the matters of Philosophy, like the University of Maryland, Ask (dot) com, Wikipedia info on Philosophy related matter. I have also slowly tripped into reading about psychology, sociology, history and anthropology, and political science.
An imagination of being suppressed by a powerful human has troubled me also a lot from inside many number of times. Then , in an attempt to find back my inner peace, i have often sought refuge in the other imagination of seeing myself becoming friendly with that powerful human/position/chair and accepting his conditions, almost like becoming his slave.
At other occasions, more often when watching any classic Mithun Movies, say “Jaal”, where the theme lines have been the clichéd Bollywood theme of Poor-fighting- the-Rich, I have felt the hero within myself taking up the fight and killing and bashing away, even public bashing , as in Sunny Deol movies, of the corrupt leader who has hijacked away the full society with his immense power.
Then, the imagination has also run amok to assume the role of hapless official in power who is struggling to keep himself alive while the corrupt system around is trying to choke him to death.
Then, there have also been many an imagination of being the ‘Sarkar’ or the “Munna Bhai”, a powerful antithesis of corrupt man, who has immense power to bring about only his kind of benignant corruption in the society.
My room based, armchair researches have took me on internet links to read about ‘Human rights’ , the UN announced Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). To my surprise, the research gave me link to hit upon another very interesting link, which talked about how the previous link, which sound so beautifully appealing to me, was still not able to find acceptance from another group , who came up with their own Declaration of Human Rights..the Cairo Declaration of Human Rights ( based on Islamic Ideology, which had earlier charged the UDHR to be Zionist-Christian Attempt). To an even bigger surprise, I further came across another link which showed yet another unhappy group with the UDHR... this was the Asian Block, which then came up with its own Bangkok Declaration of Human Rights, in accordance with ‘Asian valvues’ !!!
Has any of ever pondered what are these “Asian Values”, and what relevance does it make with puzzles of my mind which I discuss above. Well, why should you? But I know for sure that I am not alone; many of us out there must be feeling the conflict in our thoughts which stem after reading about or experiencing the above situations. If not for my problem solving sake, then U might to required to reason and resolve it out for your own sake—peace of mind.
‘Asian Valves’ reading further took me show that Democracies that we all so often talk of, and love to call for in our systems are also of atleast three kinds, from the Political Science point of view. There is Liberal Democracy (e.g Norway, UK, US, France , etc) ; there is Socialist democracy, which is closely aligned with the features of ‘Asian values’ practised in countries like India, Singapore, Spain, Chile, etc. , and then Communist Freedoms (eg of China), and then again, Religious democracies e.g Pakistan, Vetican( may be), Bangledesh, and Indonesia, Malaysia, etc.
The revealing feature of Asian Values is that it is slightly authoritative than the Universal Values (sponsored by Liberal Democratic States). In this, an individual rights can be revoked for the general good the community or society, a feature which can be seen a Hollywood production “Hero” of Chinese-American Actor, Jet Li,. (this example of the movie was given that write-up itself).
I also noted that at one point it was mentioned that Amartya Sen is one of well-renowned critic of ‘Asian Values’. He is said to be heavily inclined towards the Universal Values, and thereby , towards the Liberal democracies.
I began to ponder over the possible arguments of that Argumentative Indian for his inclinations. I recalled a common a threadbare in our offices, “Boss is always Right”, and then , recalled some episodes of the highly popular teleserial ‘Mahabharat’. The Indian values, if they are to be based on Dharma, or the path of Righteousness, are likely to fall in conflict with Asian Value, manifested by “Boss is always Right’. Because, going by Bhagwad Geeta example, a man should not retreat from acting against his own bosses or fathers or forefathers( ‘pita’ and ‘pitamah’) of the sake of preserving Dharma or the Righteousness. Amartya Sen, i read, was a dual scholar, in both, Philosophy and also in Economics. It was his Human Development Theory , which is resultant genesis of his knowledge in these to subject , which brought his world-acclaim through the Noble Prize.
In my own thinking, i felt rather compelled to believe that were it not for the Islamic influences on India, and the later the British Influence, India, too, probably would have been a Liberal democracy only.
It is rather unique and intriguing to learn that despite being a ‘Socialist Democracy” , and society being mostly Feudalistic, our policy makers have officially endorsed on the UDHR, not the Bangkok Declaration, nor the Cairo Declaration, nor the Arab charter of Human Rights. Our intellectuals tend to show inclination towards the liberal democracies only, and probably derive inspiration from our very own religious scripture, for doing so.
Every individual is born as a self-centred human baby, concerned only about his welfare, his food and milk. Well , that’s nature. But, lesson in teaching psychology, showed that as the human grows , in general cases, his ‘area of concern’ begins to expand out, so much, until he no more remains a self-centred human. It is this growing ‘area of concern’ which finally attaches us to policy-matters of the State. It is then that we begin to feel the heat of system corruption, and feel irritated. Some individual get too close in their feelings to take up personal level action, perhaps the ones who , if well- groomed with philosophical thoughts on various subject matters, may become a good Libertarian. Some resort to group-actions only, the ones, who are good and potential Socialist.
I still continue to ponder over the psychological origins of Feudal, and the Slaves, the two negative side-extremes between which lie the Libertarians and the Socialists.
This quest,in one way, will also be useful to understand the core traits of a Leader and a Follower., which can then be applied in management lessons.
If it is the emotional energy which drives a feudal to act and behave by his own, as a leader, then maybe it may help understand the IQ related with the corresponding EQ of a feudal. Than can help understand the behaviour patterns.
That, in turn, may shed some understanding on why power corrupts...not just work ethics but the full IQ and psychology of the person who sees himself to be powerful.
Comments
Post a Comment