Cav's Place

I missed the proper opportunity to post something about the political mess we’ve been in recently, but I think it’s all for the best. The constant contradictions between me and Remus Cernea, other Greens and many of their supporters when it comes to their approach and desires regarding what should happen to our government and president helped me extrapolate the concept, so now I can take some of the ideas I meant to use in that post and use them in a much more general way, because they can apply to a lot of other situations just as well.

I’m starting from the fact that everyone has the right to criticize, as you can assume that when a person chooses to do something that will also affect others, or at least be shown in public, they should do it well, but you can’t demand change if you don’t really know what you want to change to. You can demand change if you think you could do things better yourself, if you don’t have the actual skills to put everything in practice but nevertheless have thought of a good plan that could be implemented by those who do, or if you simply endorse someone else’s plan, but you can’t demand to remove someone from a position of authority without knowing just what should happen the second after they’re removed! That’d generate chaos and most likely turn a system that’s working very poorly, if that is indeed the case, into one that’s not working at all!
Yet that’s just what usually happens, whether we’re talking about politicians, sports team coaches, company managers or anything in between. Whenever things don’t go quite right, people will rise up and demand the resignation or removal of those in charge, apparently thinking that all problems will magically solve themselves if that happens, or at least that some other person who has all the right answers is already all set up to take charge once the way will be clear. Yet of course problems aren’t solved like that, though they are usually right in believing that someone is all set up to fill the power vacuum something like this creates, but such a person is highly unlikely to have anything other than their own best interest in mind and is therefore also highly unlikely to do much to solve the problems that made the public demand the removal of the previous authority figures in the first place.

Overthrowing an authority figure only to have their position filled by someone who’ll be just as bad or even worse is a very stupid move, but the masses are always stupid, even when they’re made up of otherwise smart individuals. And many use that for their own benefit, by incensing the public against those whose positions they desire for themselves, or simply against those they dislike. I don’t think anyone’s a stranger to the concept of players playing poorly to get their coach fired, knowing he’ll get blamed for the performance as he’s considered to be in charge, and it’s even more obvious in politics, where the opposition constantly points out the flaws of the government and does everything to block all its plans, be they good or bad, in order to later be able to say that the government hasn’t done anything, only to be in the exact same position and create the exact same problems once they get their wish and are put in charge.
And this is the catch: Those you want to overthrow may well deserve it, in fact they almost certainly do if we’re talking about politicians, but those who’ll take their place are unlikely to be noticeably better if things are allowed to run their “natural” course. If you want to get out of this vicious circle, you need to fully plan the aftermath of the rebellion before starting it! Any other course of action only serves the interests of those who’re getting ready to fill the power vacuum, leaving everyone else in a similar situation as before, only more worn out and disappointed…

There was an opinion piece I read in a newspaper recently, which said something like: “The difference between an idealist and a reformer is that the latter focuses mainly on the ways in which his plans could go wrong, and especially on the ways in which others could use them to cause harm, and comes up with countermeasures well before setting them in motion.” In practice, this would pretty much equate idealists with thinkers and reformers with doers, which seems quite true to me and also explains why idealists should stick to coming up with ideas and leave actually turning them into reality to true reformers. A reformer trying to do an idealist’s job is unlikely to see all the progress that could be achieved and all the good that could be done, while an idealist trying to do a reformer’s job is unlikely to see all the ways in which others could turn the whole rebellion around and use it solely for their own gain. Both of these situations mean that the rebellion will bring far fewer benefits, so there is a place for each and those places should be respected.
Of course, the vast majority of those who end up involved in such movements are neither idealists nor reformers, but just a mindless mass that gets pushed around by whoever happens to be in the best position to do so at the time. But unfortunately opinion leaders, who should fill the gap between the idealists and reformers and the masses, putting the latter under control, often get carried away in such situations as well, greatly speeding up this process that turns a good part of the energy that could be spent in a constructive manner, preparing and planning for the future, into anger, hate and other kinds of destructiveness aimed at the present.

This shortsighted approach only ensures that even our successes will turn out to be failures, yet we keep getting carried away by this kind of attitude each and every time. You’d think we’d have learned something in several thousand years of civilization, in one form or another, but apparently not… Yet there may be a chance for just enough of us to do so now, if we’d only stop to think for one moment longer. Or so thinks this here idealist…