Where Are We Headed? Part 7: Coordination, Leadership, Punishment

(L) woolly mammoth, Photo: Smithsonian Magazine (R) the New York Philharmonic, Photo: NY Times

by Mary W Maxwell, LLB

There aren’t many things you can do all alone. Humans act in coordination, and that coordination is guided by whatever ‘system’ is in place for their group. The US economic system works well for me as an individual, at least at the present time. Without ever having to plant a crop or raise chickens, I can eat what the market offers. There is a method by which my Retirement check appears monthly in the bank. I can pay a laborer to paint the house. Etc. Sure beats being a hunter-gatherer.

As to who is coordinating the market, the bank, the labor supply, I am basically ignorant. I grew up assuming that such things are “taken care of.” So far, I’ve lived for 77 years (from 1947 to today in 2024) with almost no anxiety about obtaining daily supplies, and no thought of bombs falling on my head.

This was based on an unspoken trust of intelligent leadership. Some appropriate persons will make the trains run on time, won’t they? Some ambitious business types will organize the distribution of goods in a way that satisfies their profit motive. Persons who like to be in the limelight will run for office and become Her Excellency the Governor, or His Honor Senator So-and-So. A military backbone will somehow develop to handle big, difficult tasks. Young lads will gladly sign up to it.

Oops

Oopsie-oops, times have changed. At this very moment I am in fear of Hurricane Milton, an attack on Iran that will start a nuclear war, a new bird flu or similar plandemic, a halt of transportation due to lack of gasoline, and new statutory laws that will dump the US Constitution overboard. (Ah, “a Republic, Madam, if you can keep it.”).

So now I look around to see what might be done to change this fearful situation. Right away I hear you say “Maybe nothing can be done because other people have interests that are opposed to yours and they will be able to block you at every turn.” Right. I’m aware of that. I fact it rings so true that I have to consciously hold back from giving in to it prematurely. As in, “Might as well give 1-800 CHECK-OUT a buzz. Thank God for painless suicide.”

Still, I was educated in Sociobiology in the 1970s (when it was a hot subject) and I like to look around to see what Nature is doing. Some species have innate problem-solving of their need to obtain and/or share resources. Our species, Homo sapiens, also has many innate features that have basically got us from dealing with the woolly mammoth to — how shall I put it — attending a concert at the New York Philharmonic. There ARE ways and means to overcome problems.

Religion

Over time, we invented two things that have eased our participation in the system: religion and law. We are born with a partially developed brain that aches to be taught stuff. Every achievement brings pride and joy, such as learning how to transport a cookie from the plate to the mouth.  If we do it wrong, someone will give a disapproving look and that will go straight to our emotions, These are called into service chemically, to great effect — they will make us try to improve our performance.

Both religion and law are cultural universals — every human society has created them. There is apparently an instinct to want to know how the world came to be. A religious leader provides an answer, even if that entails conjuring up a great fiction. Often this means establishing that there is a more or less invisible leader, a judge and provider. He is so wondrous that the though of Him evokes an emotion of admiration, and gratitude.

And right away we know He is better than us, and that we had better do as we are told in relation to him. Kneeling is mandatory? Fine. Sharing tasks with our siblings is required? Well, OK. Everybody else is doing it, so that in itself triggers camaraderie, and maybe some special pride. Virtue-signalling wasn’t invented just last year, you know. Sainthood is a goal for some.

Law

Ubi soietas, ibi jus. — “Where there is society, there is law.”

Law is sometimes indistinguishable from religion. Something up there tell you what is right and wrong. More importantly, it tells you if your neighbor is doing right or wrong. If wrong, you can control him with a dirty look. Or, if it comes to that, with a specific complaint, perhaps uttered in the presence of neighbors.

I am not sure if law always derives from an existing religion or if people make it up because it’s so obvious. Toddlers have been found to know when something “unfair” has happened and they want to fix it. The French scholar Frederick Bastiat defined law simply as justice. In other words, the purpose of having law is to fix injustice, whether among peers (“She stole my pen.”) or in relation to the social order. (“Drat, I have to pay tax.”)

That is not the whole story, biologically, however, as humans are also geared up to obey a boss, even if his understanding of the law book is off-kilter or is outrageous. But if he is very bad, we have recourse to public law. The term “common law” refers to the whole set of rulings that were made in cases. People readily understand that a judge can bring knowledge and wisdom to a situation.

Legal Crisis Today

Brother, have we got a problem! Over the last few decades, punishment went out of style for office holders. They can all get off scot-free. No matter how well written the law is, regarding government accountability, it is plainly not enforced. As this happened gradually, citizens simply “learned” the new way by exposure to it. I’ll bet, right now, if you asked a friend “Will that mayor be punished?” the friend will say “Of course not.”

It has also come to be acceptable that the upper class is untouchable by the law. Probably we are so naturally a bunch of worshippers of the rich and famous that we actually wouldn’t want them to be humiliated! “Please, we need our Bluebloods!”

Much worse, we have somehow been trained to think that the mafia — by definition a class of criminals — is bound to do what it must do to corrupt the whole system, for the sake of its survival!

The Hiddenness of Decision-Making

And all of that is nothing compared to the fact that our biggest decision makers are now able to avoid being identified. Apparently for several decades, a whole load of smart dealers has risen to the top and they run our elected leaders as puppets. If you wonder why Congress recently passed an unAmerican bill last month, on such-and-such a topic, it’s because they work for unAmericans.

I am not referring to Israel — although the number of standing ovations Congressmen recently gave to Netanyahu is indeed shocking, and telling. (It has to do with AIPAC gifts but also perhaps with blackmail and threats.) Instead, I’m referring to any unAmerican hidden boss. He or she may in fact be as American as apple pie, but has sold his/her soul.

It’s embarrassing that we do not know how this thing works. Our Constitution — the beloved parchment — would seem to have provided enough weaponry to deal with it, but the Founding Fathers had not encountered the power of mass media.

Talent

Today’s American culture was made on a drawing board. Local creativity gets thwarted. We are told what is real and we buy the whole shebang. This needs to be turned around, and pronto. Pull down the TV networks, and even the masters of the controlled Cyberspace.

Let creativity abound! Give awards to the oddballs who stick up for human values. Stop suppressing them! For heaven’s sake, get rid of the wholly illegal US Dept of Education. Return schooling to the schoolhouse and the schoolmarms — to the nuns, if you can find any. (Ah, the Sisters who worked for no pay!)

Since the huge US economic system is in a parlous state, let people try out smaller systems. It is a fact that helpfulness springs up when there is a bad situation. Folks who feel like contributing can  announce themselves by wearing an armband, or a purple hat, or whatever society will tolerate.  No doubt people can figure out how to go from wooly mammoth days to the local symphony orchestra.

Just this week, Arthur Firstenberg advised “Throw your cell phones away.” Gosh, I would never have thought of that. Would you? And why not scribble down one or two things you have thought of advising the nation. Go on. It won’t kill you.

Actually, it might kill you. People get bumped off all the time for being good. So that opens another subject matter, how to restore the central notion of punishment for wrong-doers. It can be done.

French society got past Robespierre’s right of terror, didn’t it? For a while there, peeps thought getting guillotined was the new normal.

They got over it.

Write a list of what we can get over.

Go on, shake a leg. Don’t give in to the ones at the top. They are a veritable panoply of jerks.