all of human history and 90% of human psychology fits into one sentence

This morning, I remembered a moment in my 8th grade social studies class.   Mr. Crenshaw was telling us about problems in the middle east and was encouraging the class to suggest solutions.  Kurt, a loudmouthed, dunderheaded classmate offered a direct and simple solution: nuke em.  

And then my rather evil adult brain of this morning attempted to crawl into my tiny 8th grade body of long ago to explain it to kurt:  "Kurt, suppose I had the only gun in the whole world and I decided to save humanity from the likes of you by shooting you in the head.   The important thing is that all of your tribe, and nearly every tribe all over the world has the exact same mindset of what you suggest:  might makes right.  But this staunch belief has a tiny caveat.  90% of the people who think it, actually think "MY might makes right" and if anybody else brings might to the table, they are an oppressor and we should have democracy make things right instead.  What is further twisted about this idea of "democracy" is that each of these people thinks that the majority will think the same thoughts as them - and if they don't, then ... well ... might makes right."

"So, your friends and family will decide that I am an evil oppressor, and put together a 'might makes right' package to 'fix' this obvious problem.  One morning I wake up infested with arrows."

"A better solution might be to poison the water of your house so that your whole family becomes a different flavor of dim.  One day you will yell out 'FLEEP!' and your family will say 'why did you say that?' 'I think it sounds good!' and your whole family is soon saying 'FLEEP!  FLEEP! FLEEP!'  To make this a bit sweeter, it would be great if I could get your whole family to work for me for slave wages and thank me profusely for it."

"So, if we nuke 'them,' they will bring awful war to us, and that sounds like a really depressing bother.  Instead, what if we set up hundreds of television transmitters and sent them 'gilligan's island', 'the brady bunch' and 'happy days'?   Before, they would be getting together and scheduling times to kill people, but now they say 'I wish to help you with your deadly plan, but I can't tonight because laverne and shirley is on.'"

Television ... the opiate of the masses.  FLEEP!


The philosopher Jeff Foxworthy once said

Women don't want to hear a man's opinion...  They just want to hear their own opinion in a deeper voice.

I think the truth in this can be expanded to "most people NEED to hear their own opinion from all other people" and then add in "and are frustrated that they don't have the might to make it 'right.'"




This is the root of all of human history and 90% of human psychology.  



I started off saying "half a page" but I now realize I can squeeze it into a single sentence:




Most people NEED to hear their own opinion from all other people and are frustrated that they don't have the might to make it "right."




I promise to FLEEP for seasons 2 through 10 of firefly.


-----


I have a bit of evil frosting to put on my evil cake.  

I now embrace that 95% of the population thinks like Kurt.  So they protest and say angry things and debate and yell and start wars and shit and stuff.  1% will find ways to slip opiates to the masses and orchestrate things so that the masses will be thankful for their slavery.  They will even get the Kurt-like slaves to staunchly defend the masters.  This comedy has been going on for thousands of years.

Embracing that most people are very set in their position, taking their positions on directly is a very tough path that rarely bears fruit.  

But, people do like to try new flavors of candy, fancier cars and spiffy phones.   A magnificent gateway to an otherwise blockaded brain.

As luck would have it, permaculture is loaded to the gills with powerfully fascinating stuff.  So, when somebody is out shopping for a spiffy new thing and cruising youtube for clever ideas ...

Have you noticed all the youtube videos and podcasts I've put out?  The forums?  

So, rather than protesting ... rather than starting a war ... rather than poisoning ....   I think the most civilized approach (which appears evil to those that don't agree with my position) is to gently present a parade of knowledge tidbits ....  thousands .... until  ..... my opinions come out of the mouths of all other people.  

I call it "learning good things rather than being angry at bad guys."

Well said fearless leader.

Redhawk

lol!!! Love this!!  I'd like to share words from another great man, if I may:

"People will believe a lie if they want it to be true OR they are afraid that it is." -- Richard Rahl, Wizard's First Rule

Since I am talking about psychology, I would like to mention a rather fascinating thing.    

I have never been to see a psychologist.  My own arrogance I suppose.  But I have put out hundreds of podcasts.  And as it turns out I have met two practicing psychologists that have listened to all of my podcasts and they have reported that I am not only sane, but that I am fucking awesome.  



Today I got word from one of the two that this statement:

100% of human history and 90% of human psychology: Most people NEED to
hear their own opinion from all other people and are frustrated that
they don't have the might to make it "right."

generated the following response:

I absolutely agree with that statement.  I'd even add to it:  "...and are frustrated that they don't have the might to make it 'right', so instead they transform the problems unique to their brain into everybody else's problems.."

This is pretty much the root-cause analysis of social dysfunction.

Interesting, I think that most of my problems have stemmed from others trying to enforce their might on me.

I have never understood why people care what people they don't like or know think about them.

Over the last week or two, it seems that this has come up about a dozen times a day.

People NEED me to think the thoughts they tell me to think.  The need is so strong, that there is zero respect for my history, my efforts, my contributions, my philosophies ... none of it matters.  These people just need my utter obedience without any annoying discussion.

Further, it doesn't matter that we are talking about permaculture and that they are the student and i am the teacher.  Nor does it matter that I have a hundred times more experience in the field.  

And when I don't obey, they go through extreme frustration that they cannot use might to make it "right."   They get extremely angry and express their frustration to anyone else who will listen.  Their message is "paul will not listen" when the more accurate message would be "paul will not obey."

Great minds never succumb to conformity nor do they fall into compliance.

Some related threads:

paul wheaton is impossible to work with

paul needs to change

Wheaton's Law of Reflective Douchebaggery

be nice; don't be a dick; be a dick

being an asshole is relative and subjective

respect: a critical ingredient for community

Wheaton's Law of Subjective Crazy

paul wheaton wrote:Over the last week or two, it seems that this has come up about a dozen times a day--People NEED me to think the thoughts they tell me to think.

Out of curiosity, does it seem worse than during workshops in the past?

My wife was relating to me some passages from a famous book regarding the siege of Stalingrad, in which the generals kept calling back to Berlin with all sorts of real-time, on-the-ground, plain-as-day information as to why they should retreat, and the man in Berlin.....who insisted he knew better....told them to keep fighting.

Just wondering if a current cultural/societal sentiment "meme" that seems more about forcing others to see their way, even in the face of monumental experience and evidence, isn't infecting more minds than we realize.

For what it's worth, I've noticed a serious uptick in pushy behavior as well. I see it at work, while driving, almost everywhere...except in the wilderness where the only equivalents maybe were extra aggressive mosquitoes and raging streams full of snow melt. It's really tempting for me to disengage entirely but for the fact that I am supposed to demonstrate to my 2 teenagers how to act. One day at a time here...

John Weiland wrote:Out of curiosity, does it seem worse than during workshops in the past?

Yup.   We've had events here where people tell me how to do things, what to think, how to live my life ...  it is a powerfully human thing.   But there has just been a lot more of that at this pdc than any previous event.

Peter Oakland wrote:For what it's worth, I've noticed a serious uptick in pushy behavior as well. I see it at work, while driving, almost everywhere...

Ernie was telling me that he has received feedback from several teachers at other events about the exact same thing.

Once in a while I hear

you are not listening

and I feel like I have hours put into listening.  I just don't agree with what they are saying.   So I think they are saying "you are not listening" and thinking that this is a far more polite way to say

I need you to do what i am telling you to do.  Don't think about it, just do it.

So in this case of "you are not listening" it is an attempt to establish a master/slave relationship.

This sounds like your week Paul. 😀

I promise to FLEEP for seasons 2 through 10 of firefly.  

I'll FLEEP along with that.

But seriously,

Most people NEED to hear their own opinion from all other people and are frustrated that they don't have the might to make it "right."

They may not have the might to make it 'right', but they can always toss a spanner in the works to slow things down.  One can get seriously tired of cleaning up spanners.  

paul wheaton wrote:Over the last week or two, it seems that this has come up about a dozen times a day.

People NEED me to think the thoughts they tell me to think.  The need is so strong, that there is zero respect for my history, my efforts, my contributions, my philosophies ... none of it matters.  These people just need my utter obedience without any annoying discussion.

Further, it doesn't matter that we are talking about permaculture and that they are the student and i am the teacher.  Nor does it matter that I have a hundred times more experience in the field.  

And when I don't obey, they go through extreme frustration that they cannot use might to make it "right."   They get extremely angry and express their frustration to anyone else who will listen.  Their message is "paul will not listen" when the more accurate message would be "paul will not obey."

I have this sort of problem with almost all the people coming to MY place. They do not know the place and they do not want to do as I want until they are more than a beginner for a place they know nothing about... And if I explain, they accept because they understand. Fair enough, except that nobody can understand ALL about a place in a few days, and that no teacher / land tender can explain all in one day without having serious health issues after this!

So they get angry and i am the bad person who is impossible to work with...

Well, for social and schooling reasons,
- most people have been traumatized, and they want to learn but never be taught.
- They want to learn from their mistakes, but they do not pay their mistakes.
- They want to learn as for sure children do, but in 10 days instead of 10 years.
- They have a fixation on freedom, whereas nature offers a lot of obligations!

Along these lines, here is a video that jocelyn sent me:



So the healthy path is to be prepared that people will resist our wacky stuff.   And, at the same time, we will resist their wacky stuff.  

Further, I think this is a big part of my videos, podcasts, articles etc. ....    if I can convey a few hundred bits and bobs from my brain to theirs, then my stuff seems less wacky.

What with people who listen to you and then spinn your words into something skewed ? Or those who come to listen to you and then hog your time with questions about things you know they know...
In the UK they have this marvel of a word to discribe the mindset 'bloody mindedness'.

One problem, i see with groups as this one is that we speak amongst ourselves. There is some shift in mindsett but i'm not confident things are going fast enough.

paul wheaton wrote:
So the healthy path is to be prepared that people will resist our wacky stuff.   And, at the same time, we will resist their wacky stuff.  

....and yet have something on hand to eat in order to get them to sit down to a conversation.  From the Salvation Army to mind-changing movements of all stripes, show that you are willing to share some of that food with them that you profess to have a better way of producing.  

Then when they say "Thanks, that's nice of you..... a lot nicer than that @#$%$%^ HILLARY would ever do!!!".  This is your cue to gently probe the origins of that person's belief that Hillary C. would not be forthcoming with food and conversation.  You don't have to convince them otherwise in one sitting, just plant the seed that information comes from many sources.  If someone had already told your guest that "Avoid that Paul W at ALL COSTS!!....He's a crazy MoFo!....", you've just now served them pie (the real stuff) a comfortable place to sit, and amicable, non-combative conversation.  You've just steered the conversation...and their beliefs...that little bit in a healthier direction than it was traversing before the visit.

Food....warm butt on RMH bench....open yet probing conversation....in that order.  Won't turn everybody, but it's the baby steps involved....

I clicked on this thread mainly because of the Caddyshack thumbnail.  Then I read it, and found that it relates to a book I recently read, called, "What is Power?" by philosopher Byung-Chul Han.  It was too tough a read for me to get very far in it but here's my summary of the relevant bit:

The more voluntarily one does another's bidding, the more power that other has.  The more resistance one puts up to another, the less power that other has.  A complete loss of power feels akin to death.

The person who needs you to do or say their bidding is under some assumption or entitlement of power.  This explains why they want your total obedience, since any amount of resistance is proof that they don't have the power that they think they have.  They have this assumption until you do or say something that explicitly counters their assumption.  Then they perceive that their "power" is under threat, and they react just as if their life was under threat.  Where they got this assumption is anybody's guess.

.... great thread! - a perfect example of why Permies has become an indispensible personal go-to; heartfelt, humane, ethical, humorous logic (courtesy of Paul) - inciting others to follow suit for the potential (subjective) betterment of all.    

.... am remembering the first article read when first visiting Permies; a story of Someone making sourdough pancakes for a group - and the negative energy from one individual that spoiled the entire gathering...and am still using that scenario to monitor personal bring-to's and take-froms when interacting with others.... Thank You for making pancakes Paul - they have nourished this individual for years; still stumbling/striving to 'pay it foreward'...

Britton Sprouse wrote:
The more voluntarily one does another's bidding, the more power that other has.  The more resistance one puts up to another, the less power that other has.  A complete loss of power feels akin to death.

I like doing favours for people that I like. Sometimes these people feel compelled to compensate me somehow but I decline because I know that the dynamic will be changed into an employee/employer relationship. If I help my neighbour out of a feeling of generosity, she'll thank me with a smile. If my neighbour hires me to do the same thing, I'll feel compelled and she'll be concerned about getting her money's worth. I feel like I have the "power" when I volunteer and I feel uncomfortable with it, so I try to downplay or even obscure what I've done so the recipient doesn't feel obliged in any way.
When I worked for a paycheque, I used to start earlier than I was required to so that I could feel like I was actually volunteering part of my time. This was only known to me usually, but allowed me to feel less like the company "owned" me completely.
The process of typing this out has made me realize that I've got some hangups that don't work very well in society.