Russia, NATO, sphere of influence, and primate legacy

 

People around the world watch with increasing dread the daily deterioration of scene in Ukraine. This is the region that instigated two world wars -to call it world war would be an exaggeration since it gives centrality to Western narration and control over world history, it though significantly impacted the world. It was war of forces whose colonial influence spread across the world. Much of the world was in an exploitative frame of brutal colonizers and local feudal barbarians. ‘World war’ had cataclysmic impact on common people in Europe, while the later war incinerated thousands of common people in Japan and continued for decades with horrible effects of radiation. Most common people around the world were not impacted, probably not even aware. That is not the case now. We live in an era of world as intimate space, connected and immediate. If this festering war in the fragile region spreads, it could possibly be genuinely a world war with fracture spreading to Iran and USA, further complexity in the region could see it spiral into deep fissures that dangerous forces have kept alive through semantics of history. It will have a debilitating impact on survival of most of life on earth. It will possibly make earth uninhabitable for most species. 

To understand what motivates these ‘leaders’ we need to understand ‘sphere of influence’, and why some have this constant urge to expand their “sphere of influence” wherein the world has much better things to offer as also serious existential threat to focus on. These are not complex people so don’t be intimidated. They have fancy weapons -thanks to science misused into technology, and they talk in sweeping statements that has devastating impact on us as it percolates, millions of people have died for no reason and million will die for no reason. These are powerful people placed into powerful positions by flawed systems, and society that is systematically reduced as herd and are incapacitated by various systems of control to respond. These powerful people, projected by system to extend its control, are not complex people. You don’t really have to think much to approximate these people. These are crude crass the worst of common denominator that flawed system churns out. They try to use jargons of sophistication to confuse as also exhibit high bearing entitlements as deciders. They however work at most basic level that make us laugh in disbelieve if not for millions of lives at stake. Observe the street dog, and wonder why does it keep going around urinating on the poles at the periphery. You get a fair idea on ‘sphere of influence’. To understand these people or the systems that controls you don’t need much intelligence, a little observation is enough. Such is the level of ridiculousness we are in. It is heartbreaking. On the one side we have so much spectacular opportunities presented to explore and progress and on the other side humans like street dogs vying to extend the reach of their piss marking. Three hundred thousand years of homo sapiens evolution is at this crossroad of utter banality.

Street dog observation is compelling and relevant but too simplistic. So, let’s listen to the experts in this field. Harvard psychologist McClelland developed a measure called nPow (need for power). It’s correlated with desire to control other people and achieve recognition through control. To understand these deviant people Social Domination Orientation (SDO) measures individual propensity to want to dominate others -and affinity for hierarchy that put some people above others. Study on chimps helps us understand this mindset better. Chimpanzees are very much into power. Researchers found it was difficult to deal with chimps as they try to dominate or intimidate you, they are testing to see where they stand relative to you. And if they perceive some weakness, they will push you and try to dominate. It is same with some humans, and systems that control them, they have not evolved egalitarian impulses that characterize much of human life on earth. Even infants show humans have innate instinct to cooperate and share. Nature survives on mutualism and symbiotic relations. The intention is not to elaborate on these. These observations seem counterintuitive and shows how much systems of control have isolated us from the reality while they deteriorate collective will to place narcist psychopathic leaders to represent humanity.

Evolution led to changes in shoulder girdle (hominid Homo erectus appropriated into sapiens) and advantaged lethal use of ranged weapons, this transformed social structure, it became more of brain and skills than brawn and size. It flattened hierarchies, from primate despotism to hunter gatherer cooperation (studies clearly show egalitarian nature of hunter gatherer societies, remnants of which can be observed to some extent in indigenous societies and tribes; knowledge and wisdom were to persuade and not wield authority), the primate instinct to dominate was superseded by strong desire not to be ruled by someone else giving way to consensus driven deliberations. That surely doesn’t mean that these primitive flat societies were utopian; homicide was common. With proliferation of ranged weapon and later neolithic agricultural revolution and easy access to food meant large numbers of people/fighters which led to hierarchy for effectiveness, and this corrupted into power as control onto other spheres of society, triggering social shift hence emergence of chiefdoms and era of inequality. Surplus food and control of fertile land institutionalised inequality. Power begets conflict and violence. More people were murdered under chiefs and despots than in egalitarian bands. Hierarchy created new systems to cooperate and coordinate in large scale society. This led to corruptible systems and equally corruptible people who seek power within the system. It is therefore natural that the worst would emerge from the lot. Simultaneously a mismatch of thousands of years of hunter gatherer attributes that is stuck in primitive mind start to assert. Legacy of primates is much exciting to primitives than complexities of evolved mind. Hence the constant urge to increase ‘sphere of influence’. These were nurtured by the neoliberal value system that arose from necessary systems of goods exchange and benign market place into capitalism and tuned to pernicious neoliberal greed and control that pervades all human interaction making it transactive thus redefining ‘sphere of influence’. Religion meanwhile systematically worked as a control to increase its ‘sphere of influence’ through hierarchy, exploitation and fantastical view of world (thus negating individual connection to contemporary reality and valued personal experience and understanding) into spiritual -in the process degrading the same. Similar is the case of feudal institutions and value systems that seeks to control and negate liberty and freedom to weaken democratic institutions. Every system of control seeks to emulate and assert attributes that made the homo sapiens succeed for thousands of years as hunter gatherers. Every attempt by human to negate these systems of control asserts millions of years of hunter gatherers love for freedom and egalitarian valuation of self -not over other. Human history saw violence, domination, exploitation and misery and went through feudalism, colonialism and all forms of control through ignorance, threat and greed. It is only in the last few decades that democratic institutions are established, egalitarian humanistic ideals percolated and rule of law gave a sense of security and opportunity to thrive, to much of population across the world. Simultaneously, spectacular development in critical thinking and knowledge created awareness while technology quantified these into everyday deal.

Much of the world is piggybacking on the effort of few, democratic values and critical thinking has not seeped into most of populace. Complacency and comfort assert simplistic outlook of the world while hunger and fear seek easy solutions, incapacitated to evaluate complexities and inability to sense the nuance they look for assurance. Herein thousands of years of primal urges find expressions and are channelized through opportunist systems of control looking for profit and influence. Hence, we have image of ‘strong’ leaders constructed for herd to connect their primal urge with all the attributes of primate legacy intact. To understand these people, we have to go back to millions of years or else study apes and what motivates wild life. So you get fair idea on how legacy of primates become central to assertion of regrettable Homo sapiens and define aesthetics of their transaction with herd. Strip of all the modern technology and this could be band of hominids on four legs negotiating dangerous world under chest thumping leader evaluating the safety of cave for the night. This hominid band (not humans who evolved shoulders to use weapons as they were nonhierarchical nor fighting medieval army as they needed serious skills to survive) projecting to contemporary is theatrics of cave dwelling apes. These primates have dangerous weapons that can annihilate the world many times over, or the least unleash forces that could seriously jeopardize lives and living systems.