- 04 Jul 2018 15:30
#14930024
Lately I've been writing a lot about the intersection between power and responsibility. I was watching a YouTube video and there was this guy who said that people don't want control, they want the illusion of control.
I feel a little bad going there but this is a politics forum, so this seems like the best analogy that comes to mind. There are a million other examples I could use besides "Trump derangement syndrome" but I'm going to use that here. A lot of the smarter, calmer liberals are telling people that the Maxine Waters strategy (bordering on AntiFA-like behavior) wherein people physically harass others is not an effective path towards regaining control, which I'm conflating with power here, although the concept of control is arguably broader than this. I would think the idea that these kinds of behaviors will not be effective should be obvious, yet it's clear that large numbers of people are rejecting that seemingly obvious thing.
So the YouTube video got me thinking about this phenomenon, naturally in relation to other things I've been thinking about. Maybe it's true and lots of people do unconsciously prefer the illusion of control to actual control. Instead of just writing what the video says though, I'd like to posit an explanation for this: people, perhaps unconsciously, recognize the existence of the relationship between power/control and responsibility. They don't want the responsibility but they do want the power, therefore the illusion of control and power is more attractive to them than possession of the actual thing is.
Do you agree/disagree and if you disagree but think that some people prefer the illusion to the reality, can you imagine any reasons why this would be?
I feel a little bad going there but this is a politics forum, so this seems like the best analogy that comes to mind. There are a million other examples I could use besides "Trump derangement syndrome" but I'm going to use that here. A lot of the smarter, calmer liberals are telling people that the Maxine Waters strategy (bordering on AntiFA-like behavior) wherein people physically harass others is not an effective path towards regaining control, which I'm conflating with power here, although the concept of control is arguably broader than this. I would think the idea that these kinds of behaviors will not be effective should be obvious, yet it's clear that large numbers of people are rejecting that seemingly obvious thing.
So the YouTube video got me thinking about this phenomenon, naturally in relation to other things I've been thinking about. Maybe it's true and lots of people do unconsciously prefer the illusion of control to actual control. Instead of just writing what the video says though, I'd like to posit an explanation for this: people, perhaps unconsciously, recognize the existence of the relationship between power/control and responsibility. They don't want the responsibility but they do want the power, therefore the illusion of control and power is more attractive to them than possession of the actual thing is.
Do you agree/disagree and if you disagree but think that some people prefer the illusion to the reality, can you imagine any reasons why this would be?
Last edited by Hong Wu on 04 Jul 2018 16:23, edited 1 time in total.
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