Power and Perspectives
January 15, 2007
0 CommentsNot good news for our current political climate. A recent study appearing in the December 2006 issue of Psychological Science reports that people with power are often unable to take other people’s perspective.
Study Gives Us A New Perspective On The Powerful
To study the link between power and perspective taking, Galinsky and colleagues used a unique method in which the participants were told to draw the letter E on their forehead. If the subject wrote the E in a self-oriented direction, backwards to others, this indicated a lack of perspective taking. On the other hand, when the E was written legible to others, this indicated that the person had thought about how others might perceive the letter.
How can you use this information? Perhaps a perceived reduction in someone’s power can help someone take yours or another’s perspective. A simple language pattern should do the trick.
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Loading ...Has Justice Been Served?
December 29, 2006
0 CommentsI feel sad and, well, unsatisfied with the death of Saddam Hussein. We went to war with Al Qaeda in response to 9/11. Yet Bin Laden still lives. Then we went to war with Iraq and declared mission accomplished over two years ago. We have now lost more Americans in that war than those who died in the 9/11 attacks. Today Saddam Hussein was executed. Has justice been served?
I know Saddam did some bad shit and I know many Iraqis feel justice has been served. But we, the US, went to war with Iraq based on misleading intelligence connecting him to terrorism and Al Qaeda. I just can’t make the connection in my mind to our capture of Saddam and his execution. Of course that’s not his trials were about, but it’s one reason why I feel unsatisfied.
I’m an American and I can’t truly understand the plight of the Iraqi people. And not many Americans can. Which is why I feel extremely uncomfortable with our presence in Iraq. There are far too many Americans ready to give their opinions about Iraq and the Middle East without having any understanding of these cultures. Imagine someone coming into your home and telling you how to live your life and raise your family. And imagine that person coercing you to value what they do, shopping malls, manicured lawns, and intelligent design. Then you just might be able to put yourself in the shoes of an Iraqi. It’s a type of cultural gentrification.
Peace might be too much to ask for; Compassion is not.
(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...John Edwards Is Running For The White House… 2.0 Style
December 28, 2006
0 CommentsJohn Edwards launched a bid for the White House in New Orleans today. Seth Godin is calling him “The YouTube President” because he also announced his candidacy on YouTube. Scoble is blogging his campaign.
This is going to be fun to watch!
(No Ratings Yet) Loading ...The Power of Nightmares Part 3
December 8, 2006
2 CommentsThe Shadows In The Cave
The precautionary principle: Not having the evidence that something might not become a problem is not a reason for not taking action as if it were a problem. It is a powerful triple-negative. Action without evidence is justified.
We had to make a shift in the way we thought about things. So being reactive, waiting for a crime to be committed, or waiting for the evidence of a commission of a crime didn’t seem to us to be an appropriate way to protect the american people.”
- Attorney General John Ashcroft
The paradigm of prevention: Instead of holding people accountable for what you can prove they have done in the past, you lock them based on what you think or speculate they might do in the future. And how can a person who’s locked up based on what you think they might do in the future disprove your speculation?
The idea of a hidden, well-organized web of terror is a fantasy. And by embracing the precautionary principle, the politicians imagine the most horrifying outcomes from an organization that doesn’t even exist. And they count on no one questioning them because the very basis of the precautionary principle is to imagine the worse without supporting evidence. So the politicians with the darkest imaginations become the most influential. The fear of a phantom enemy is all they have left to maintain their power.
(1 votes, average: 5 out of 5) Loading ...The Power of Nightmares Part 2
December 4, 2006
0 CommentsThe Phantom Victory
At one time, Moscow was seen as the “evil enemy.” Back in the 1980s, the neoconservatives and the Islamic extremists were allies. Washington gave money and weapons to the Islamic Mujahideen. Most notable among these “freedom fighters” was Osama Bin Laden.
When the fighting was over, and the Soviet troops pulled out of Afghanistan, both neoconservatives and the radical Islamists found that their victory failed to transform the world the way they had hoped. So they both took on new enemies. Islamists used violence and terror to amass followers against the infidels while the neocons invented a new enemy, Bill Clinton.
Look us today. The neocons defeated their politcal enemy, liberalism, and found themselves fighting the idealistic monster they created in the mountains of Afghanistan. They would have us believe that under their leadership we’ll be safe. But they are actively creating this phantasy. And it’s a heck of a thriller. We are mesmerized by terrorist stories and entertained by “target America” plots. The necons know too well that the monster thrives by instilling fear in the citizens of the world. What a tragedy.
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