To Enjoy Powergame or to Deny Powergame is The Only Actual Axis of Conflicts around Identity
Every time I saw any anti-discrimination movement like #metoo or #blacklivesmatter online I always feel disgusted how the genuine voice of people who call for the right to live as a human being end up to the unproductive power game between group A and group B. The core thesis of any anti-discrimination movement should be pretty simple: don't kill people. Don't harm people, don't be rude to people without very serious reason like you yourself are in danger. And women, black, immigrants, or any kind of identity they have, they are people.
But this simple thesis is always messed up when somebody starts to say: "No! I declare my freedom to kill, harm, being rude to others who are inferior to me. This is freedom of an individual, it is a part of human rights to use the power you gained in competition. If you are superior, you can kill the inferiors!" Well, in more sophisticated and complex rhetoric actually.
And after all, nobody can maintain the simplest moral "be nice to people" that even 6-year-old boy can understand, and finally everybody starts to say "No, you're not superior, I AM superior to you!!"
Because actually nobody can say NO to such power game under the modern circumstance where, as @pv-p brilliantly summarized, our identity itself is fully integrated into the capitalist system. Competition is essential than moral because it is the very thing driving the capitalism and then our own life. This is the society - it would very extreme and simplified notion, but still, essentially, I think - where it is OK to kill people if you earn more. And a person who can earn more is - again extreme notion but - who can decide to kill people for money.
I won't say Communism or such kind of things are better than capitalism (‘cause communism is also a power game as itself)! Instead, beyond every ideology and identity politics, the ultimate axis of conflict is to actively enjoy such overall power game in our life or to deny power game at the essential base of our life. Nowadays I have kept thinking about it, and when I read @whatamIdoing's post saying he's uncomfortable about competition, I considered it would be worth to post my idea here on steemit.
Healthy competition indeed provides very good motivation for our life, but now it dominates the core of our life, mindest, and identity in very problematic and self-destructive way as the infinite power games.
I don't think every people should think like that, neither it is possible to deny or quit such power games overall.
I just want to be with people who can say NO to the power games as necessary, who can have a good conversation with others.
I’m glad to see you post your ideas and opinions :-)
I don’t know if there are many people who simply think it’s ok to kill people based on theirnpowerful position. They tend to use some ideology or ideal as an excuse for such poor behavior and lack of empathy (which can result in many undesirable things, including death) though. “Safety” or “freedom” are used as ideals to justify poor behavior. Many people here seem to believe that if we just rely on contracts, the problem will be solved, but then the contracts will become the excuse for such poor behavior.
I don’t see any real solution involving laws and regulation or AI taking care of these decisions for us. The only solution I see is placing empathy as an ultimate goal for all people, one that can cut through individual philosophy and ideals.
It’s a complicated issue.
I agree with your last paragraph 100%!
Thank you so much for your comment! I oversimplified and exaggerated situation on the post, but I actually think such ideological excuses can be the self-deceiving rhetoric that conceals the joy of abusing powers. Maybe I'm too cynical about people... Maybe some people simply too anxious or genuinely worry about their group's future, even though they don't notice or neglect their lack of empathy.
Some people around Blockchain including Steemit seem to have a too utopian view in regard to contracts, and I'm afraid it would end up with playing the same old stage with pre-WW2 utopists, who finally set up dystopia.
I'm just back from Italy and the recent shootings in Macerata and the fear-based politics being used by Berlusconi and others makes it clear to me that many people are afraid of black African consciousness and seek to suppress it. When I see the problems around Trump's staffers and his support of abuse of women, the horrible statements he made on Howard Stern, for example, I think the #metoo movement is important and needed today. In both of these cases we can't and shouldn't be silent.
So although I agree with you that often this debate devolves into a shouting match between "tribal" groups who refuse to understand each other, I also think there's a side that's legitimate, which seeks to give voices to the oppressed and seeks justice and truth, and there's a side which clings to white patriarchy and furthers the crimes committed by it. The "blood and soil" crowd are dangerous and ascendant and a lot of money is working overtime to end the post-WWII consensus, to break the world into competing ethnic zones and drive wedges between people based on class and gender. Admittedly you find violent responses from the progressive left as well, but overall I think, #blacklivesmatter is perhaps the most important movement operating today. I listened with interest to this ZeroSquared podcast about positive aspects of Trump's revealing of the fault lines in our culture. The guy raises the point that racism is entrenched and we arent all going to wake up and hold hands and defeat racism overnight. His point, which I think has merit, is that we dont want to live in a police state in which a large number of people are imprisoned and suffer from police violence. Its not about race, its about resisting the dehumanizing effects of state violence. Trump uses race and gender to divide us from each other. We have to grow up and see through his strategies, which obviously work as he was elected. We need to see that we are all together on this limited biosphere called Earth and we have to work together to make it a better place for our children. Sadly I worry we are moving in the opposite direction.