|
|
| [MASTER INDEX] [DATE INDEX] [THREAD INDEX] [SUBJECT INDEX] [AUTHOR INDEX] |
| [Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] |
Jan 20, 2001 11:44 AM
by Blip Bland
Abstract:
Our economic reward system is not a democratic system because the rewards
aren't divided up equally; and the concept of democracy is about equal
participation.
In order to have a reward system you have to have a reward.
-Therefore some group has to be stuck with the
thankless task of generating that reward. For that group, life isn't very rewarding,
as not only do they have to produce what they need, but also what those above them
demand as their reward. Now, in order to get this group to accept their place;
a backdrop of starvation is instituted so that they will accept the menial reward they receive for generating the reward system's reward; since the only alternative is the backdrop of
starvation. This is how the reward system is enabled to
operate. However, the backdrop of starvation that is needed for enabling
the reward system, has negative undesireable consequences
of its own.
Do you recall, in BF Skinners operant conditioning
experiments where a rat was being trained and its
behavior modified? The researcher would use food
pellets or droppersfull of water to reward the rat for
modifying its behavior (after initially training the
rat to get the reward with an associated stimulus).
But in order for the food pellet or water to become a
reward, the researcher would deny the rat these things
the night, or a couple of nights before, so that the
rat was really thirsty or hungry by the time the
researcher worked with it.
This denial of a positive thing, is defined to be a
punishment -and not associated with any behavior the
rat did. This punishment was not attempting to modify
any behavior of the rat: its purpose was instead, to
turn the water or food pellet in the hand of the
researcher, into a reward in the rat's mind.
In our society today, I feel we have relied
excessively heavily on this operant conditioning
psychology to modify human behavior . So, in our
society, even being allowed to participate in / be a
part of the group, is denied to newcomers just as a
matter of policy, in order to make them hungry for
this: so it can be used as a reward to modify
behavior. The good jobs and positions of society can
be doled out as rewards to those who modify their
behavior favorably towards those who dole out these
things, (as directed by those who dominate the larger
society).
Since teenagers are newcomers, as they didn't even
exist before 19 years ago, they must be starved and
made hungry for their places in the greater society;
for this operant conditioning to work. It is this
starvation and living in a vacuum concerning being
able to participate in and be part of the group and
the greater society, that sets the stage for these
caveman type groups and gangs to try to fill that
vacuum, as best as they are able (and they don't do it
very well.
This (see abstract) is why we have so
much poverty in the U. S.. It is because it supports
the reward system that is the operating system used
here in the U. S. to organize us in getting together
in groups and producing. Yet the power of getting
together in a group for economic activity can be
organized in ways much better than this reward system
way. These better ways don't depend on a backdrop of
poverty and starvation to make people hungry enough
for the reward in the hand of the system so that they
will conform to economic servitude. So, if better
ways exist, why hasn't the U. S. implemented them?
Well, once a system is in place it develops an
inertia; and then it isn't easily replaced. Certain
people develop a stake in seeing it continue. As long
as it continues to function, there isn't enough
motivation to replace it. Only if it were disrupted
and shut down, would we then replace it with a better
system. One might think violent disruption would be
the way to go. But actually, non violent methods are
more effective. One might think our political system
could be the vehicle for change. But that hasn't
happened. The political avenue for change is an
indirect route. We are trying to change the economic
system, not the political system. We don't elect the
CEO's of major corporations; and that is the system we
are trying to change. We need a more direct approach
than trying to change the economic system through the
political system. What has happened to the political
attempt, is that the economic system rulers have made
getting elected very expensive, and there is much
money involved in political lobbying; so that the
economic system has basically bought off the political
system. What I refer to as a solution, is the
reverend Martin Luther King's successful use of the
boycott of the public transit system -where that
famous African American lady refused to go to the back
of the bus and was arrested for it; to start the civil
rights movement and make inroads for civil rights.
Since he was assassinated, I take it he was an
effective threat.
Let's start a revolution:
We need to spread democracy to the workplace. As it
stands now, workers don't elect their bosses, but
serve under dictatorship. It is time for workers of a
company to elect those who have authority over them,
especially their direct superiors. Anyone within the
company could run. And if we consumers enforced this
all over the world, this would be a level playing
field, where corporations couldn't leave America for
cheap labor in third world countries so much.
To encourage corporate America to accept this, I
propose a boycott. Vote with your dollars. We shall
single out one corporation at a time, -preferably the
larger multinational ones (retail is small potatoes);
figure out where their products ultimately go, and
then boycott that. In the case of where one company
produces a cog and another company produces a wheel,
and another company produces another piece of a single
finished product; we shall thus target all these
companies simultaneously by boycotting that single
product. Our ultimatum will be: adopt democracy in
your workplace, or you will not survive.
So lets get started. Add to this message.
What I am saying, is that it is in their (corporate)
interest (concerning their present way of operating),
to not improve this area, and would also benefit them
to cause vacuums in opportunity in this area (who
knows if they(on a case by case basis) have actually
done so however). Society has done great things in
other areas; but this area remains unimproved: I
claim because it is not in corporate interest to do
so. (that there is a corporate opposition to this).
What I also suggest, is that for this situation to be
changed from the present corporate operating system,
would benefit the overall picture of humans and
mankind.
I feel the present way 'the (corporate) system'
operates by, is like a sickness, a virus, whereby the
overall picture of mankind is weakened, and the best
results from working together in a group are prevented
from being realized.
I think it's time corporate systems stand up and take
responsibility or be held accountable for the
backdrops of starvation that exist. You might not
think this is their fault, but actually, I think it is
more their fault than they would like you to believe,
as it is a part of their operating system. It is time
these corporate entities and their republican friends
in government who enact the policies enforcing
backdrops of starvation; to be held accountable for at
least some of the effects of that starvation. These
backdrops of starvation have an effect and an impact
to make our society a stagnant and non growing one.
They are what make our system less than the best.
The group is naturally more powerful than the
individual; and I feel the highest place for more
powerful entities, is to help out lesser positions.
But presently, and throughout most of human history,
more powerful groups have instead, in a deviation from
the best, have instead used their greater power, not
to help the individual, but to instead take advantage
of the individual's weaknesses and needs and their
lack of being self sufficient. -Just as part of how
they operate, (to help in their system of operation).
Given today's technology and our working together in
groups, we can produce a certain amount of economic
goodness. We could divide that up evenly among each
individual; Or we could divide it up some other way.
In order to supply a reward system; requires that we
divide it up other than equally, however.
Our system is based on rewards. To have a reward
system, you have to have a reward. So a major cost to
a reward system, is that some group has to sacrifice
to produce the reward.
Life may be OK for those who earn the big and medium
rewards, but for those who are selected to receive
less than an even share of economic goods and who also
are burdened with the harsher tasks of genrating the
economic goods/reward; do not find this reward system
they are in very acceptable. In order to get them to
comply in spite of this; a backdrop of starvation is
created so the little reward they are given, is
accepted by them. So it would seem this system is
working well eh?
Well, because of the fraction that has to live on
less; this system is a stagnant system. This means it
doesn't grow well. Other systems that treat their
members more equally, are better growing and threaten
to outgrow these stagnant systems. This puts pressure
on the reward systems to come up with more growth.
And who do they pressure? The same people who they
always put the burden on. So that the people at the
bottom receive even less actual reward.
Most people when faced with the backdrop of
starvation, choose instead, the limited reward offered
them by the reward system. But what of those who
reject that and choose starvation instead? We'll talk
about that shortly, but for now, when the reward
becomes too small, and is nearly the same as the
starvation option; (as the reward system competes
against other systems); then a larger number of people
are forced into the starvation option. The thing
about the starvation option is that life doesn't last
forever in it. Eventually, that life dies. Then
whatever remaining life is of the person, is free of
the reward system.
What is our life? What is it that denotes that we as
humans are alive? Well, we get up in the morning and
do stuff that we choose to do. But
when we do what a reward giver wants (for our survival
reward), we must
set aside doing what we want, and do what the reward
giver wants. Then, what we do isn't from us and our
life but is from the reward giver and their
consciousness. Thus doing what the reward giver
wants, represents a death of our life, at least a
death of the part of our life represented by our
higher consciousness. And what is our life anyway?
A) The otherwise inanimate chemicals that compose our
bodies; or B) the expression of our consciousness?
(Choose B.) So, conforming to the control of the
reward giver under this reward system, represents some
death of our life consciousness. If we suffer too
much of this 'death', by having our whole life filled
only with what the reward giver wants, we come to
realize that dead people do not need rewards, and why
are we killing ourselves for something we no longer
need? We then disobey or deviate from the reward
giver in order to be alive in our higher consciousness
in some form, even if it is at the wrong end of the
reward system.
Speaking of reward systems, the roman empire comes to
mind. From what I understand, theirs was a culture
based on more complex rules over economic activity,
compared to other surrounding simpler cultures based
on religion and control by religious officials.
Apparently, the roman system was able to extract more
resources on demand from its population using its
systsem, (kind of like the free enterprise system of
its day) and was thereby able to conquer the simpler
surrounding cultures; and enslave them. But once
everybody had been conquered, and become romans;
(after several generations), the burden of (economic)
slavery had to be internalized. The Christians had a
problem with these economic control systems: 1 John
3,17: "But whoso hath this world's good, and seeth
his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of
compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in
him?"
Of course, the roman elite would cause the rest of the
population to hunger and starve, so that they could
dole out what little reward they had (little, because
there were no more conquered people to extract reward
from), and this was their system of maintaining
control. (We conquer people economically. Without the
third world supplying that cheap labor, we wouldn't
have such a reward system either. Mustn't let a
little communist uprising spoil our supply of things
in central america. And do you remember the good ol
days when the middle east oil was ours for the taking?
Boy we sure miss that.) Without humans being needy
and dependent, a system of rewards with a backdrop of
starvation, is ineffective at control. But in order
to have need and be starving, one must be alive -there
must be life there. Unfortunately, living in
starvation long enough, causes the life there to die.
This is the dying to the flesh the Christians espouse.
After living in starvation for enough generations,
the Christians died to the finer things, and with what
life they had remaining, they were able to live more
or less self sufficiently with what little they had.
-Wild men in the wilderness (recall John the Baptist).
As such, instead of going to work; (Jesus didn't have
a job in his ministry, after his carpentry work), they
would roam about the countryside preaching; and
eventually the roman control system broke down, after
the Christians suffered much persecution. Where once
the superior roman system conquered the simpler
religious cultures surrounding them; this roman
economic culture was replaced with a religious
culture.
Yes, this reward system you're so proud of has nasty
ends to it. So go ahead and keep embibing on the
coerced labor of they on the lower rung. Never mind
me and my boycot trying to get corporate entities to
change.
Keep poking around in the starvation option more and
more, and see where it gets us. Those who don't heed
history are bound to repeat it. Perhaps you can
provoke a second comming. But most likely all you'll
get is riots.
I have been asked to describe my own personal
path on the "work" front. I find this difficult
because whenever I work, I do what a superior wants in
exchange for money; therefore what I do
at work is not much from my own self but is from the
supervisor's. I therefore find it difficult to
claim what I do at work as my own and part of my self,
or aspath.
Work is a reward system. -Whenever I work, I do what
a superior wants in exchange for money:
money which I need to purchase my essentials, which I
need to stay alive.
What is it that denotes that we as humans are alive?
Well, we get up in the morning and do stuff
that we choose to do. But when we do what a reward
giver wants (for our survival reward), we
must set aside doing what we want, and do what the
reward giver wants. Then, what we do isn't
from us and our life but is from the reward giver and
their consciousness. Thus doing what the
reward giver wants, represents a death of our life, at
least a death of the part of our life
represented by our higher consciousness. (If you don't
use it you loose it.) And what is our life
anyway? A) The otherwise inanimate chemicals that
compose our bodies; or B) the expression
of our consciousness? (Choose B.) So, conforming to
the control of the reward giver under this
reward system, represents some death of our life
consciousness. If we suffer too much of this
'death', by having our whole life filled only with
what the reward giver wants, we come to realize
that dead people do not need rewards, and why are we
killing ourselves for something we no
longer need?
Another aspect of the reward system is the far
reaching associations the system makes with
just about anything the reward giver wants one to do
in exchange for the reward. When we do
what the reward giver says in order to gain the reward
of our survival (food, shelter, clothing);
then this becomes one source of producing the survival
reward that we all need. And this allows
the actions which actually supply this reward to be
hidden away from us (as there is another
source). The actions we do to produce our survival
reward in the reward way, have very little to
do with the actual concrete actions that supply the
actual survival reward we consume. It is said
that in the U. S., only 1% of our labor force is used
to grow our food; so that on average, 99% of
the work we do is something other than actually
supplying the food we eat.
Another way, other than the reward way, of
producing our survival reward, is to get together
in a group and actually do the concrete actions which
supply the survival reward we consume.
The story of giving a man a fish vs. giving him a
fishing pole is so often used in speaking in
capitalistic economic situations. It applies here as
well. The way of producing ones survival
reward by doing what a reward giver tells one to do in
a job, is like giving a man a fish, because
the person here never gets any closer to the actions
which actually supply ones survival reward.
The other way of producing ones survival reward -which
is to do the actual actions which
directly, supply ones survival reward, is the fishing
pole in this story. But in order that many
people may remain under the control of, and dependent
on, a privileged few; this way is made
unavailable to most of us.
In any case, the doing of school 'work' or work work
is the
doing of what others want, and prevents one form doing
things as out of oneself. This prevents
one from developing a sense of who one is, a sense of
self, because one is too busy being what
other people have decided for one to be in that time
spot. Thus, since there is no emerging
identity, one cannot use it as an initial source for
ideas about careers, in what Super calls
crystallization.
I was interested in thinking about how an individual
could produce their essentials
directly as opposed to obtaining them from the reward
system. Unfortunately, I didn't come up
with much, although I did establish this as a value in
my mind. I also cemented in my mind an
idea of how things should be. I realized that in
society, there is a certain amount of work to be
done, just for us and society to survive, and that
some of that work is unpleasant or undesirable.
I cemented an idea in my mind that we all should bear
the necessary hardships of society evenly,
and that we shouldn't shove them off onto others, but
do our fair share.
Here in the U. S. is a system heavily based on setting
some above others in a hierarchical fashion.
The wealthiest 10% of families own 90% of corporate
stocks and business assets and 95% of
bonds. The bottom 20% of workers make only 3.6% of
the income made, as of 1997. I was
uncomfortable being part of such an hierarchical
system.
. As for all my education specifically in the
subjects I studied, and aside from my development of
my self concept; all that was for the benefit
of employers, to make me more useful to employers.
The information is nearly useless to an
individual
-something an employer has, but the individual does
not. So I thought I was doing something to
further my path on the work front with my education.
In one of my interviews, I recall a fatal
mistake at least in terms of the work front. The
question was 'if you had a million dollars, what
would you do with it?' In line with my developing
self concept; at that time I could not think that
anything was more important than helping others, and
if that if anyone had a serious objection to
that, I didn't want to be part of that organization.
I answered, give it to the poor. I was not trying
to be flippant, but was expressing that caring for
others was an important value of mine.
Although I was naive to it a the time; now I see that
having a backdrop of poor people is part of
the motivational system reward system that operates in
corporate America today, and that my
saying to give money to the poor was a direct slap in
the face of that system. I can't remember
his exact words, but he said that I was qualified for
the job, but something to the effect: you can't
do anything if you aren't given the chance.
I would say then that my emerging self concept spoiled
my efforts in education to progress on the
work front.
Now, the thing about using rewards to raise
children, is that children do what their parents
want in order to get a reward. But the things their
parents do to generate that reward, are often
not the same as what the kids do to receive the
reward. If the parent is a good parent, they will
train and teach their children well so that someday
they also will be able to do the same things to
get the reward that the parent does to get the reward.
But at the time they are able to do this, they
will no longer be under the parent's control and will
be independent. Some parents may not want
this and so may never lead their children in the means
of obtaining the reward as they do. Here,
the child does things to obtain the reward from the
parent, but must discover on their own,
outside of this, how to do the things to obtain the
reward like the parent does.
In any case, a parent must first be able to generate a
reward in order to use it in parenting. If the
parent does poorly at this and has little reward to
give: they can still have parental control over
their children using a reward system if they withhold
love and warmth from their children and
dole this out sporadically as the reward. This is the
basis of the authoritarian parenting style. But
if these parents are themselves having difficulty
generating economic reward; they certainly have
no clue as to how to lead their children to that even
if they wanted to; so that the child under such
a parent, in addition to doing what the parent wants
in order to receive their limited reward, must
additionally, outside of that, figure out how to
produce the economic reward of the greater
society.
In our society today, even a person's place in
the greater society; their very ability to be
allowed to participate in; even to serve and WORK for
and with the group; is made to be a
privilege and a reward itself. But the dispensing of
this reward is not done in the usual way.
There are no agreements guaranteeing the good job if
certain conditions are met; which allows
the good job reward givers to disappoint a certain
portion of those who have filled the conditions.
With these people, not only have they forfeited their
life consciousness to fulfill the conditions:
they also don't obtain the reward.
In a system that uses the economic subservience of
some to enrich the lives of others, not all can
have the good job. A certain percentage has to be
relegated to the subservient positions.
Otherwise the good life wouldn't be so sweet and
rewarding, if everybody had to do their share.
Even if everybody did well in school and did what they
were supposed to; not everybody could
get the good job reward. They would have to just find
some other way to divide up people into
who are the servers and who are the served.
In today's system, the school acts in the role of
parent. The student gives up the life of their
consciousness to do what the teachers want, and thus
earn the reward of the grade: similar to a
child doing what their parent wants in order to obtain
their parent's reward. But when the student
goes to the corporation in attempting to gain the
reward of the good job, they are acting as the
parent in doing what it takes to generate/produce the
reward. So that essentially for the same
reward (the grade is essentially symbolic of the
reward for a good job); the student acts in close
succession, in the role of the child, and then in the
role of the parent. Perhaps this is supposed to
impress upon the student psychologically, their rite
of passage into adulthood; allowing them to
integrate into one, their role as a child, and their
new role as adult.
I got several responses to my book, which I responded to. I didn't know where to put them so I put them here:
You ask me about my stand concerning Christianity. You ask me to reveal myself concerning my relationship with Jesus Christ. Well let me ask you: have you unmistakeablly seen God or Jesus lately?
I don't know, maybe somewhere in the back of my mind, and also just beyond the corner of my eye they were there; but I didn't get a clear look at them. And I don't remember them comming up and shaking my hand, or if it was them, I didn't know it. Now just because I haven't unmistakeably seen God or Jesus, doesn't prove they don't exist. But if they do exist, let us take a lesson from their actions/example. It is clear that God has stepped back from our world and let us have our way with it. It is clear that God is not stepping in here to visibly in power run things here. Therefore we can deduce that it is God's intention that we excersize our free will (in all that we do). Why then does religion try to contermand God's directive here by trying to run and control our lives? From this contradiction we can then realize that religion is not from God but is from man. Men/women are always running about trying to control and dictate each other's lives as part of the excersize of their free will.
It is at this time that I announce my belief in God and Jesus Christ, because I resent having my life dictated and controlled by others, not only by religion but also by all the other secular organizations/institutions that attempt to do so.
I encourage one and all to join and be converted, in freedom from oppression, and in joy.
And now I wish to pass along some words of encouragement I had written to one of the faithful:
Hi. Yes, I get the general jist of what you're saying. One minor point I learned in my psych class that I didn't know before, is about the ego. According to Freud, it it the id which represents our basal human fleshly desires related to the body, which demand imediate satisfaction. Then there is the ego, which we develop a little later in childhood, which represent our delaying gratification of these bodily desires when the moment is not opportune, when gratification would be out of place and cause trouble with/for others. And this represents the rudimentary departure from the bodily desires as absolute director of our affairs, (which we experience as infants). Of course, the ego still represents those bodily desires and individuallity; just in a modified form, in that it just recognizes that it is beneficial to delay or modify bodily desires, but is still centered in and around gratification of bodily desires. So, this is then just a minor point I point out.
Note: in this article, I use the term 'ego' to take the meaning of 'id'.
The fact of bodily desires is something that none of us escapes and that we all must deal with in our own way. The idea of tests where we go toward soul, or towards ego, I guess, is inevitable. We all are tested in these ways, I feel. The thing I would add, is to know why staying in ego is something to be avoided. If one can know this and understand this, then that represents a motivating force whereby one can strive towards soul. And for me, it is the understanding that things of bodily desires or ego, result in stagnation of life -lack of growth. -the reason this is so, according to my understanding, is because these things contain a component of destruction or destructiveness of life. -always, whether we choose towards soul, or towards ego; the destruction remains; it is just done to different entities. If you choose soul in a test, the bodily desire does destruction to your body. If you choose ego, destruction is done to life other than your body. The idea is to attempt to escape and be free of any destructions; at least to try. In my current thinking, I have to recognise that one must do some 'ego' in order to survive; but that once the edge is taken off, not to continue full throttle in ego, but to move away from ego and towards soul. -To realize/recognise that what I do in ego is not a permanent thing that should be let continue and let go on automatic pilot for its own merits: because it lacks in merit. Once I keep this in mind, I can curtail what I do in ego, and have some soul life.
However. I have the idea in the back of my head, that religion has overempasized the point about sin and ego. What I mean is that one gets the impression that God condemns one, and is displeased with one, and is watching one's every move to see if they measure up or not. No. I think that is a false conception of God. People who desire to exert control over others act like this; but that stuff is far from God -one who is higher than any being in any controlling system. And that the intense scrutiny and weightiness and blame one thinks one might receive for failures in tests, perhaps one even thinks such feelings are helpful because they motivate one to do better in a reward/punishment sense; are actually a part of the problem.
In the direction of what I feel is the solution, is to realize ones own state, as being that of needing changing/ of not being ideal or finished; and to do what one can to remedy their state; and to allow God to do what He will to remedy that state. Other than that, the only punishment for failures, is having to live with the undesireable and stagnant effects that ego actions produce: -which is also the motivator to get away from ego as much as one can. The idea of a second system, which rates behavior and then metes out additional punishment or rewards; I think is part of the problem. -Because systems of punishments and rewards prevent one from expressing what is in them and then dealing with and overcomming the evil they do: they suppresses what is within one, to be replaced with what is outside of one -a separate entity from one. The very idea that one suppresses what is in themselves, and in place of that, uses what outside entities choose; places one in a box that is limited and not growing. One stagnates in such a setup. Now if one were all evil/destructive, that wouldn't be bad at all. But usually, one is not all bad/destructive, but has a good degree of good in them. That goodness and life, never gets a chance to get out and be freed from its current state of being tied to destructiveness, in the current state one is born in as being alive and a human life. A system which does not free the trapped goodness of a person, is a system which is less than the best. And this system we know for sure does not free ones trapped goodness during the time we live. My suggestion is not to suppress oneself in order to replace what one is with an outside programming, but instead, to work with what one is, to try to free oneself from their current state which is what they were born alive with; and also to accept God's help in this.
On the other hand, one must not become complacent in themselves, because the state of oneself, is one of needing help from an outside source, such as God. One needs to be looking towards asking God for help, and submitting to God, but only to a God who can help us; and that is a benevolent God only.
However. I think what is missing, is an attempt by us to see things, not from our perspective, but from God's perspective. If we could try to imagine what we look like from God's perspective; we would see that God is operating from a position of being free from the evil that traps/besets us; and that He would see us as like an animal caught in a trap, a snare. God has no need for us to do tricks for him or repeatedly prove our allegiance to Him by enduring test after trial after tribulation. -how do you tell the difference between the snare that you are in, vs, a part of the snare you are in that God is using to test you? If God tests you all through your life, then he has not set you free of the snare you are in throughout your whole life.
His thrust would not be to try to train us and get us to follow sets of rules or comands; but to set us free from our snare: to change what we are on the inside so that we would do naturally what was good*. God would not have an external programming in opposition to an internal programming, as that would not work according to 'a house divided against itself will not stand'. *(All that would be required on our part would be a willingness on our part to accept His help.)
Now, being helped by God out of our snare would make a big difference to us. And one could consider this a second system that delivers additional rewards/punishments. But no, this is actually God delivering us, because we do nothing additional to free ourselves, because we are already doing all we can and that hasn't been enough; and it takes God's help to get it done. If however, God has not been created yet, then we must create God in the long slow hard road, which is the same as us freeing ourselves from our snares in our own stregnth. We all try at this, but overall, only a few of us will suceed (be saved). But once a few of us have suceeded, then they can come back and help the rest of us, so that it will not continue on and on that only a few will suceed.
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Auctions - Buy the things you want at great prices.
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Auctions - Buy the things you want at great prices.