Category: Understanding Page 1 of 3

**GUEST POST**

BY ERIC ANDERSON

Don’t part with your illusions: when they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live. — Mark Twain

The latest plague to sweep our planet has seen me thinking hard about Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. And I’ve concluded that, for roughly the past decade, I’ve been viewing myself with the 20/20 vision that only the truly delusional are capable. I honestly thought that I had attained the stage in my life that Maslow dubbed “self-actualization.” I haven’t. And if you think you have, well, you’re delusional too.

For those unfamiliar with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, a bit of context. Maslow set out his theory in a paper published in 1943 titled “A Theory of Human Motivation.” In it, he describes a five layer pyramid of ascending human needs beginning with the most basic like clean air and water, food, sleep, and intercourse, of course, because none of would even be here if we didn’t procreate. We’re intrinsically motivated to satisfy these first level needs, and once satisfied, our motivation to action matures to the next level — safety. Once we feel safe, our motivation turns to interpersonal needs. Those satisfied, we seek confirmation of social status from ourselves and others. Finally, we reach the pinnacle where we express the motivations society generally ascribes to what it really means to be human.

I say “what it really means to be human” because we can find examples throughout the social animal world of the four previous motivations. But, are you self-actualized? Are you, really human? Or, just another animal hanging on by your fingernails to a precarious simulacrum of humanity? Only recently, I’ve come to understand it’s the latter. I’ve come to understand we are only as self-actualized as the society we live in allows us to be.

It’s an easy mistake to make when times are good. When happenstance allows one to focus on “individuality.” But let’s break the pyramid down from the top. I can honestly say there is little about me during this pandemic that is feeling particularly creative. Little thought to my ego. True, I’m lucky to be loved, and, in turn, have others in my life that I love. But, as an abstract concept? Or, being motivated to “belong” to anything outside of my family? No — I can’t say that I’m too interested. Rather, I’m stuck squarely at making sure my family and loved ones are safe.

This is the society we live in. This is the society our “best and brightest” have engineered. It is the opposite of resilient, and therefore, the opposite of safe and dependable. As a result, the daily energy I could be exerting toward creativity, spontaneity, and problem solving instead goes into making sure myself and my family are safeguarded against being deprived of their most basic needs. And, as such, it is only logical to conclude that in order to attain self-actualization, I must be prepared to exist as an individual wholly independent from the “system” we’ve created. Everything I need for the survival of my family must exist at arms length. Remember that basic necessity of of sleep? Well, without these assurances in place, I really don’t.

Our world’s systems, despite the many labels we place upon them such as capitalism, socialism, or any number of theologisms is really little more than precaritism. This isn’t a new insight. The “precariat” is a term that has been thrown about in certain circles for some time now. However, it is typically reserved for the poor. But please, show me a self-actualized billionaire and I’ll show you a frightened effete building a bunker in New Zealand.

It took this pandemic to remove the blinders from my eyes. The rich aren’t building bunkers because of Covid-19. They’re building them, perhaps, because of global warming. Or, perhaps mass insurrection. Maybe an asteroid? The point being, those society deems most worthy of attaining the holy grail of self-actualization feel, deep in their bones, that one butterfly flapping its wings in just the right place and time will bring this entire charade to the ground.

The world we live in has never been one of anything more than basic animal motivations. And so I conclude, the ability to attain self-actualization isn’t what it means to be human — the ability to lie to ourselves is. Delusion, get behind me.

Last year, the New York Times had a profile of two people marrying: one 98, the other 94. They met in gym, they’re both active and happy despite their age.

What is their “secret?”

“People always ask what it is that keeps us young,” Mr. Mann said. “Of course, one part of it is medical science, but the bigger part is that we live worry-free lives; we do not let anything we cannot control bother us in the least.”

All times are bad times. Bad stuff is happening to a lot of people, somewhere in the world, and in your country. Oh, some times are worse times: the An-Lushan rebellion, say. WWII. The Great Depression. The Sea-People invasions that destroyed almost all civilization in the Europe and the Middle East, and so on. The Congo today.

And it may be that, as a species, we have a big one coming down the line. I’ve seen reasonable scenarios where climate change and ecological collapse get bad in less than a decade. I’ve seen scenarios where it takes a hundred years. My current over/under is about 40 years from now and has been for a long time. The science is creeping towards shorter and shorter numbers. (40 years is about where I expect us to start losing continental coastal cities.)

There are a variety of other problems, economic, technological, social, and political, and they are going to be aggravated by our environmental issues, though environmental issues may also make some of the worst stuff unlikely, or destroy bad civilizational choices like panopticon societies. (China is definitely going to have one. In certain cities, it almost does alread–held back only by the technical problem of way too much information. Other societies will too, the UK isn’t far behind in London.)

So it is entirely rational, in one sense, to despair for the future. Lots of bad shit coming down the pike, and anyone who takes their blinders off and looks can see it.

But it is not rational to despair and become depressed because of stuff you do not control.

And you do not control the environment, the economy, or politics.

You are one of seven billion people, and unless you are part of an elite of maybe 1,000 people, you have no real power. Maybe you’re part of the million or so people who have power locally. If so, use it well to help your locale. But even then, you aren’t stopping the big forces coming down the line; all you can do is prepare somewhat better and for more people.

Your responsibility can never be more or less than your power. Look at how much power you have over anything, including yourself, and that is the extent of your responsibility. Even when it comes to yourself, your power is not infinite. You don’t, for example, have direct control over your thoughts and feelings, though through various methods you have some indirect control and ability to slowly change the preponderance.

A clear recognition of what you can control and what you cannot control; of the exact extent of your power, allows you to relax. You don’t control it, don’t sweat it.

Of course this is easier said than done. It is unlikely that you can change to be that way overnight. But you can change to be that way over time, in part by simply remembering that worrying about things you don’t control is pointless.

Relax.

And remember, death and suffering are not optional. They happen to everyone. The schedule has some flex–when you die and suffer, but only some. You may have some influence over the amount of both, but other suffering will happen completely out of the blue, taking you by surprise.

Relax.

That which you cannot control, you should not care about. That doesn’t mean pain won’t happen, it means you won’t add to it with worry and self-blame. You didn’t cause climate change. You may be the proximate cause of your suffering or death, but you did not invent either suffering or death. So—

Relax.

Everything ends. Everything. Nothing is eternal.

This is, however, as true of everything bad as everything good.

And remember also that the good is always around too. Food that tastes good and satisfies. Love. Beauty. The satisfaction of a soft bed (hopefully). The good times pass and return, just as the bad times do.

And everyone dies, and everything ends, and in that is freedom.

Your worry hurts you and helps no one else. By all means do things. If you can make a difference, and want to, go ahead. But once that all is done—

Don’t worry and be happy.

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Walk with me a while and imagine you are mad. Crazy. Insane. It’s an interesting sort of insanity–you see the world as something other than it is. You are dead convinced that people are out to get you, but these people have almost no means to harm you and fear your retaliation greatly, because you’re a powerful person and they are weak.

You believe that you are hale and hearty; but in fact you’re ghastly, obese and ill. You think you’re rich, but in fact you’re poor. You think you have the best doctor around, but in fact your doctor is worse than almost every other doctor and charges 50 percent more than them. You think you’re tough, and you certainly haven’t let the fact that two ninety pound weaklings seem to be able to stand up to you get in the way of that.

You think that you have the most advanced technological toys, that what you have is the best, and once you did, but these days everyone else seems to have more advanced stuff.

The illness goes deeper though, a deep decay in your brain. The parts of your brain that make most of the decisions for your body think everything is wonderful. They seem only able to take in sensations from the taste buds these days, and for the last thirty years you’ve been on a rich diet. So they think everything’s great. Your once lean body, packed with muscles, has been replaced by a flaccid one, paunchy and fat, but somehow the key parts of your brain don’t know that. They don’t feel your sore back, they don’t hear the broken down breathing, and they don’t see the gut hanging over your belt.

The you I’m referring to, as I’m sure many have figured out by now, is the US. For years, I’ve been writing for the US and observing it carefully, and I’ve found it one of the most interesting problems I’ve encountered in my life. Because America and Americans are very unpredictable. Now, of course, the first thing I thought was, “It’s me,” and in a sense, that’s true.

But here’s the thing: I have a very good record of predicting what will happen in Somalia, or Afghanistan, or Iraq. And when I get it wrong, I can look back and easily figure out why. Yet, I’ve never visited any of those countries and, really, I know very little about them. On the other hand, I grew up imbibing American media, know American history well, have visited America a number of times and spent eight years in jobs that required me to deal with multiple Americans daily.

Odd. Very odd. And something I’ve discussed with other foreign observers of American society and politics.

The first clue to what was wrong came around the time of the Iraq war. It was obvious, dead obvious, to everyone outside of the US and to US citizens who were spending a lot of time parsing news, that the war was a joke and that Saddam had no nukes and was no threat to the US. Most Americans, however, didn’t get that. The reason, of course, was propaganda.

Fair enough. Every country whips its citizens into war hysteria with propaganda. But what was truly remarkable wasn’t that, it was that somehow the majority of Americans, over 70 percent, thought that Iraq was behind 9/11. Iraq, of course, had nothing to do with 9/11. Nothing.

Remarkable. Americans went along with going to war with Iraq then because they thought Iraq had attacked them and had nukes and could attack them again. A complete propaganda tissue of lies. But if you believe it all, well, of course Iraq needed to be attacked.

What looked to the rest of the world as crazy was entirely logical. It was, however, still insane. If I see a tentacled monster from the fourth dimension attack me and I respond by grabbing a knife and slashing apart my next door neighbour who’s waving at me, well, I had a logical, coherent reason for what I did, but I still murdered him, and I’m still insane.

This is the first type of insanity in the US and it runs deep. I often feel like I spend more time correcting outright lies, outright propaganda, than anything else. Just this week I had to explain to a left-wing blogger (who should know better) that single payer health insurance is cheaper and gives better results than private insurance system. Now in the US, this is somehow still in doubt, but that’s insane–this isn’t in question. Every other western nation that has single payer insurance spends about 1/3 less than the US and has as good health metrics or better either in most or all categories. This isn’t something that’s up in the air, this isn’t something that is unsettled. This is a bloody FACT.

Americans think they are the most technologically advanced society in the world, yet the US does not have the fastest broadband, the fastest trains, the best cellphones, the most advanced consumer electronics (go to Japan and you’ll see what I mean) or the most advanced green energy technology.

In the primary season, Ron Paul was repeatedly cut out of media coverage and John Edwards was hardly covered. The majority of Americans thought that Edwards was running as the most right-wing of the Democratic candidates. Huckabee was constantly called a populist when his signature tax program would gut the middle class and slap the poor onto a fiscal rack.

And, when all is said and done, politicians are still running on slashing taxes and having that make up for itself, while the US runs a balance of payments higher than any other country post World War II has ever done without going into an economic crash.

That’s one type of insanity–thinking the world is something that it isn’t.

The second type is worse, in a sense. When Diamond wrote his book on why societies collapse he came to the conclusion that it occurred when elites weren’t experiencing the same things as the majority of the society–when they were isolated from the problems and challenges the society was facing.

For 30 years, ordinary Americans haven’t had a raise. And despite all the lies, Americans are beginning to get that.

But, for the people in charge, the last thirty years have been absolutely wonderful. Seriously, things haven’t been this good since the 1890’s and the 1920’s. Everyone they know–their families, their mistresses and toyboys, their friends–is doing well. Wall Street paid even larger bonuses for 2007, the year they ran the ship into the shore, than they did in 2006 when their bonuses equalled the raises of 80 million Americans. Multiple CEOs walked away from companies they had bankrupted with golden parachutes in excess of 50 million. And if you can find a senator who isn’t a millionaire, (except maybe Bernie Sanders) you let me know.

Life has been great. The fact that America is physically unhealthy, falling behind technologically, hemorrhaging good jobs, and that ordinary Americans are in debt up to their eyebrows, haven’t seen a raise in 30 years, and live in mortal fear of getting ill–because even if they have insurance, it doesn’t cover the necessary care–means nothing to the decision-making part of America because it hasn’t experienced it. America’s elites are doing fine, thanks. All they can taste or remember is the caviar and champagne they swill to celebrate how wonderful they are and how much they deserve all the money federal policy has given them.

This is the second insanity of the US: The decision making apparatus in the US is disconnected from the results of their decisions. They make sure they get paid, that they’re wealthy, and let the rest of society go to hell. In the end, of course, most of them will find that the money isn’t theirs, and that what they’ve stolen is worth very little if the US has a real financial crisis.

The third insanity is simpler: It’s the wealth effect. At the end of World War II, the US had about half the world’s economy. Admittedly that’s because Europe had been bombed into oblivion, but even when Europe rebuilt. the US was still far, far ahead. The US was insanely rich and powerful. See, when you’re rich you can do stupid and unproductive things for a long time. There are plenty of examples of this but the two most obvious ones are the US military and the War on Drugs.

The War on Drugs hasn’t reduced the number of junkies or drugs on the street in any noticeable way. It has increased the US’s prison population to the highest per capita level in the world, however. It has cost hundreds of billions of dollars. It has gutted civil liberties (the War on Terror is just the War on Drugs on crack, after all). And after 30 years, does anyone seriously say, “Wait, this doesn’t work, it costs billions of dollars and it makes us a society of prisons?” Of course not, if anything people compete to be “tough on crime.” What’s the definition of insanity, again? Doing the same thing, over and over again, and expecting different results?

Then there’s the US military. It costs, oh, about as much as everyone else in the world’s military combined. It seems to be at best in a stalemate and probably losing two wars against a bunch of rabble whose total budgets probably wouldn’t equal a tenth of one percent of a US appropriations bill. And it is justified as “defending” America even though there is no nation in the entire world which could invade the US if the US had one tenth the military.

But the US could (not can, they are now unaffordable, but could) afford to have a big shiny military and lots of prisons, so it does. Lots of people get rich off of both of them, lots of rural whites get to lock up urban blacks and lots of communities that wouldn’t exist otherwise get to survive courtesy of the unneeded military bases and prisons which should never have been built.

Insane–believing things that aren’t true.

Insane–decision makers are cut off from the consequences of their decisions and in fact are getting reverse feedback, as things get worse for most Americans and as America gets weaker and poorer, they are the richest they’ve ever been.

Insane–so rich that no one will stop doing things that clearly don’t work and are harmful, because people are making money off the insanity.

All of this is what makes predicting the US so surreal. It’s not just about knowing what the facts are and then thinking “Okay, how would people respond to that?” You have to know what the facts are, what the population thinks the facts are, what the elites think the facts are, who’s making money off of it, and then ask yourself if these facts are having any real effect on the elites and if that effect is enough to outweigh the money they’re making off of failure (how many of them have children serving in Iraq? Right, not urgent to fix).

And then you have to go back to the facts and ask yourself, “What effect will these have even if they’re being ignored?” Facts are ugly things, they tend not to go away.

All of which makes the US damn near impenetrable, often enough even to Americans.

But here’s what I do know–you can get away with being nuts as long as enough people are benefiting from you being insane. When the credit cards are all maxed out, when the relatives have stolen even the furniture, suddenly all the enablers go away, and the kneebreakers or the men in white pay you a visit. At that point, you can live in the real world, or you can go to the asylum.

I wonder which way the US will go?

(Originally Posted at FDL January 20, 2008)

(Second repost, last one was May 5, 2009. This is, IMO, one of the more important posts I ever wrote.)

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The results of the work I do, like this article, are free, but food isn’t, so if you value my work, please DONATE or SUBSCRIBE.