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- Herausgeber: tredition
- Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
- Sprache: Englisch
Human beings have the inherent ability to live their lives in a self-determined and species-appropriate way, meaning oriented towards the conservation of the environment and the resources. This ability has however been deliberately suppressed for thousands of years by the elites that are in power, previously an alliance between throne and altar and currently by corporations and politicians. In order to increase and ensure their own power they have always understood how to make people dependent and to inculcate them "to serve with joy and obedience". Thus authoritarian social structures emerged and consequently people are treated like pets: slavery, serfdom and wage-dependency today. This development is currently reaching its limits. The global crisis has made it patently clear: those who would like to retain earth's resources for their children do not have the power to do so because they have relinquished this power to the elites. And the elites, who do have the power, are not interested. The aspects of these authoritarian structures (Church, corporations) and the ramifications thereof on the consciousness of the dependents are examined critically. Strategies to achieve a required change of awareness, changing from heteronomy to self-determination, are shown here. A renunciation of dependencies - even consumption! - enables more self-determination and freedom.
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Seitenzahl: 201
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
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A future for everyone or profits for a few
THE GLOBAL CRISIS AS A KEY TO A SYSTEM CHANGE
I dedicate this book to the courageous psychological researcher Stanley Milgram and to everyone else that, out of concern for the future of mankind, is prepared to question familiar concepts, to break away from beloved perceptions and to venture onto new paths.
Ero Langlotz
CONTENTS
Chapter 1 Self-Regulation and Global Crisis
1.1 Prelude Nature Idyll
1.2. Self-Regulation in Nature
1.3 Aspects of Global Self-Destruction …
1.4 GLOBALIZATION
Chapter 2: Global Crisis – Why is Self-Regulation Failing?
2.1. Europe and the Global Crisis
2.2 Politicians are helpless –since they are influenced by lobbyists
2.3 Is there a Common Reason for the Global Lethargy and Self-Destruction?
2.4 Obedience
Chapter 3 Agentic or Autonomous Mode?
3.1 Milgram: Obedience to Authority
3.2 The Experiment
3.3 Results
3.4 Milgram’s Interpretations of the Results
3.5 Reactions of Colleagues
3.6 THE CAUSES OF OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY Aspects of Civilization
3.7 OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY AS A CONSEQUENCE OF TRAUMA?
Chapter 4 “PRIMITIVE SOCIETY”
4.1. THE FIRST PEOPLE AND SELF-REGULATION
4.2 SELF and Self-regulation
4.3 “Vision Quest” as a Ritual of Self-Discovery
4.4 Aspects of “Primitive Societies”
Chapter 5: CIVILIZATION AND SELF-DOMESTICATION
5.1 ADVANCED CIVILIZATIONS
5.2 Self-Domestication and Authoritarian Social Structure
5.3 Self-Domestication and SELF-Alienation
5.4 Monotheistic Religions
5.5 War, Submission and Exploitation
5.6 Aspects of Civilization
5.7 Mystical Traditions
5.8 Enlightenment and Revolutions…
Chapter 6: SELF, TRAUMA AND SELF-ALIENATION
6.1 AUTONOMY AND SELF-CONNECTION
6.2 “Intrinsic Motivation”
6.3 The SELF and its Development
6.4 TRAUMA
6.5 Trauma Consequences
6.6 Symbiosis Pattern as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
6.7“Self-Integrating Trauma Constellation”
6.8 The Trauma Solution “Algorithm”
6.9 Case Study “Insecurity in the face of Authority”
6.10 Case Study “Professionally unsuccessful”
Chapter 7: THE CHURCH AND OBEDIENCE TO AUTHORITY
7.1 THE CHURCH
7.2 Connection between Religion and Power
7.3 WARNING TO READERS
7.4 THE DOUBLE MESSAGE OF THE CHURCH
Chapter 8 FROM THE MESSAGE OF JESUS TO THE DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH
8.1 The Theology of the Cross – A Survival Strategy?
8.2 What Happened to the Message of Jesus?
8.3 An “Almighty” God who Sacrifices his only Son to Atone for the Sins of Mankind
8.4 The Reinterpretation of a Shameful Death Penalty into a Salvation Bringing Sacrificial Death
8.5 Education to a Corpse-Like Obedience
8.6 Use, be Used … and Evaluate
8.7 Immaculate Conception and Virgin Birth
8.8 Debasement of Women
8.9 The Church Claims to be the Only Way to Become Blissful
8.10 Excursion “Sources of Early Childhood Religiousness”
Chapter 9 Ways and Means of Indoctrination
9.1 Traumatization “Methods”
9.2 Ceremonies
9.3 Paintings and Sculptures
9.4 The Conditioning Effect of the Sacraments
9.5 Church Hymns
9.6 ABUSE OF THE IMAGE OF AN “ALMIGHTY GOD”
9.7 The Almighty God – a Construct to Stabilize Secular Power
9.8 Summary
9.9 Christians for Future
Chapter 10 Power Complexes and the Democratic Movement
10.1 The Enlightenment
10.2 Democracy
10.3 The Fallacy of Enlightenment
10.4 Obedience to War and Authority
10.5 How could such a Catastrophic Event Occur in a Country as Cultivated as Germany?
Chapter 11 The Global Crisis
11.1 The Military-Industrial Complex
11.2 The Development of the Capitalist Economic System
11.3 “Growth Model” a Cancerous Tumor
11.4 Is Democracy Failing ?
11.5 The Capitalist Economic System is Destroying the SELF-Regulatory Mechanism
11.6 Aspects of Collective SELF-Alienation
11.7 The Domesticated Person …
11.8 … as an Engine of Growth
11.9 The Crisis – An Involuntary global Milgram Experiment?
11.10 The Capitalist Economic System is Failing
11.11 Evolution
11.12 A Second Enlightenment
11.13 System Change?
Chapter 12 Guide to Self-Empowerment
12.1 Alternative Visions
12.2 Your SELF
12.3 Recognize What is Blocking Your SELF!
12.5 Discover Your Own Potential!
12.6 THE SELF-RESPECT RITUAL
12.7 PRAYER TO THE EARTH
12.8 Release yourself from your blockades
12.9 Digression: “Do it Yourself” Instructions
12.10 Relief through “Do it yourself”
12.11 Requirements for a “Species-Appropriate” Society
12.12 The Crisis of the Economic System
12.13 “Warriors of the Earth”
12.14 Democracy is dead? Long live democracy!
12.15 Fridays4Future: Worldwide Protest against Climate Change
12.16 Extinction Rebellion
Acknowledgements
APPENDIX
Autonomy Questionnaire
AUTONOMY DIAGRAM
Chapter 1 Self-Regulation and Global Crisis
“Look up at the stars and not down at your feet…
Wonder about what makes the universe exist…
It matters that you don’t just give up.
Be curious.
And however difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at.”
Stephen Hawking 2018
PREFACE
There is a widespread idea that we all have an own innate sense of autonomy, an essential being, our “Self”. If we are connected to this inner authority, we are able to perceive ourselves, our needs and our inclusion into a greater whole, irrespective of other people’s expectations, convictions and needs. This enables us to lead a self-determined life in accordance with a greater whole. And it enables SELF-regulation and SELF-determination.
Every day trauma therapy shows that this connection to our inner selves can be lost due to individual traumatic experiences of loss or violence with the consequence that our SELF-regulation and SELF-determination abilities are impaired.
Here the standpoint is advocated and substantiated that there is a collective traumatization over and above that, which is due to a civilization that purposefully shatters the self-connection and thus the SELF-consciousness and the self-determination of individuals. This collective SELF-alienation is the cause of the current global crisis. Consequently, individual SELF-integration becomes necessary and it is quite possible to achieve selfconnection by means of collective self-empowerment.
1.1 Prelude Nature Idyll
I’ve just returned from my early morning jog in Munich’s English Garden. The morning sun is shining, birds are singing. Wild garlic is blossoming; the white blossoms look like unfolding New Years’ Eve fireworks. The scent of garlic … Morning mist is still hanging over the meadow and with every step I took I could perceive ever more clearly a flock of sheep, the bleating of lambs and a strong odor of sheep’s feces…
Does that sound familiar to you? A morning in a forest, a starlit night, a path between the dunes and the storm-beaten sea… We are deeply touched by the beauty and grandeur of nature, which already existed long before mankind. We sense a resonance inside of ourselves as if there were a part inside of us that already existed thousands of years ago. A deep understanding that I am also a part of nature, I belong to it. A feeling of awe of something bigger, which also conceived me, which I am a part of, which I am connected to. Of its grandeur, system and majesty that I may share. I feel as if I have been bestowed upon and I’m grateful and would like to contribute my part.
This part inside of us is our SELF.
The contrast between such experiences of nature and the daily escalating man-made global catastrophes could not be greater. This inevitably provokes questions – and hypotheses. Aren’t human beings part of nature? Where does this alarmingly aggressive and self-destructive potential come from? Is it inborn, anchored in our genes? Is it destiny – or have we spawned it ourselves, and can we thus control and influence it ourselves as well?
1.2. Self-Regulation in Nature
The principle of self-regulation is found in nature. It regulates the co-existence within a species.
Hierarchies are best known in social animals, birds as well as mammals. The alpha animal – in the case of horses it’s the leading mare and for elephants the matriarch – is not only the animal with the greatest physical strength in the herd but it is the one that is most capable of looking after the herd. This hierarchy has the effect, for example in the case of jackdaws, that higher-ranking jackdaws assert their dominance over others that are close to them in the hierarchy chain but not over those of a far lower status.
In the event of a conflict between two jackdaws (e.g. no. 6 and no. 8), the hierarchy has a collective self-regulating effect: the jackdaw that is higher in the hierarchy (no. 4) will rather support no. 8 than no. 6.
Thus a “Ranking among equals” regulates the coexistence of a group.
Self-regulation is however also found between different species. Foxes and mice are a well-known example: if there is an increase in the number of mice, more foxes are born, which will diminish the mice population and vice versa so that both populations oscillate around a median.
And there is even self-regulation between plants and animals!
Plants are not as defenseless as one might think. If too many sheep, for example, overgraze a clover meadow, the clover produces chemical substances that prevent the sheep from reproducing and so it has the effect of a birth control pill!
Or if, for example, Kudus are artificially fenced off in an enclosure that is too small and consequently overgraze their “favorite trees”, then these trees quickly develop poisonous bitter substances that can lead to the death of the kudus. And, these trees even release chemical signals that alert the surrounding as yet unaffected trees of their kind, so that they can likewise develop bitter substances – preventatively, so to speak!
This Self-regulation – so it seems – determines the coexistence of different species and groups and thus ensures the survival of all.
Is mankind also included in nature’s system of self-regulation? Did nature forget to equip human beings with self-regulation? Or did homo sapiens itself block this self-regulation “organ”? And if so, for what purpose?
1.3 Aspects of Global Self-Destruction …
EUROPE
Banks make their employees sell toxic securities and thereby harm their clients and even risk causing a banking crash.
Engineers of almost all auto manufacturers install deceptive software into their diesel engines and thereby harm the climate, their customers – and eventually even their own corporations.
Time after time we see that large industrial corporations and financial institutions only feel committed to one goal, namely to increase their profits regardless of the cost to “others”. Consequently they put pressure on their staff to improve their performance while salaries stagnate. They fire long-serving and/or experienced employees that then become unemployed. In the process they deprive more and more families of their participation in society, preventing them and their families of any chance of having a materially secure future. “The actual effects of persistent unemployment constitutes an act of violence that robs millions of people of their dignity, and this despite the fact that the industrialized nations are prospering as never before1.”
Industrial corporations and financial institutions find ways and means – and compliant politicians who enable them – to increase their already high profits even more by paying less and less taxes. Of all people, Luxembourg’s Minister of Finance, Jean-Claude Juncker, who legalized these practices in his country, was elected President of the EU Commission. Isn’t it obvious whose interests he represents? The same goes for all who support and tolerate him.
In this sense it is fitting that the whistleblower who made this tax evasion public knowledge was taken to court for a “betrayal of secrets”.
On the one hand this has led to years of tax evasion of countless billions. On the other hand public authorities lack resources to maintain the infrastructure that all of us depend on – including the staff of these corporations. Here just one example of the loss of infrastructure: one quarter of all public swimming pools in Germany are in need of renovation and have been closed. Thus, a quarter of all pupils don’t get swimming lessons in school.
This is the corporations’ principle of success: privatize profits – and impose the costs for infrastructure as well as the losses on the communities.
AFRICA, ASIA
Europe and the USA evangelized, colonized and shamelessly exploited other continents for centuries. Initially entire peoples were alienated from their roots and then they were made economically dependent. Their natural resources and their art treasures were stolen, destroyed or plundered and their people were enslaved. In this way these peoples were forced to provide Europe and the USA with cultural and economic “development aid”. Which enabled them – and especially the large corporations – to achieve an incredible economic upturn. The moral responsibility for humanity and planet earth was disregarded.
1.4 GLOBALIZATION
“Globalization” perpetuates these colonial politics using different means. Land was taken from regional economic structures – including agriculture – by an allegedly “free market” via free-trade zones. Figuratively speaking, the regional trout ponds were opened up for global pikes. Large corporations profited from it while the people who used to live from the regional economy got left behind in Europe as well as overseas.
Even though globalization was championed enthusiastically, the consequences were humiliating and criminal. An example: Due to a “free trade agreement” Colombia was obliged to buy products from the then US company Monsanto: grain seeds, that due to genetic manipulation had been made less resistant to the herbicide Glyphosate – which was likewise sold by Monsanto. In contrast to the traditional seeds of the Colombian Campesinos, it was impossible to harvest any seeds from the hybridized varieties of Monsanto. The farmers had to buy new seed from Monsanto. They became economically dependent on Monsanto – as experienced by many Indian farmers before, who were ruined and driven to suicide by the same practices. When Colombian farmers used their own seeds the government deployed soldiers with tanks on the fields to destroy them.
The same principle of exploitation and suppression continued during the oil wars led by the USA and Great Britain. To this end democratic governments – among others Prime Minister Mossadeq in Persia – were destabilized and overthrown because they had refused to comply with the oil deal. Whereas authoritarian regimes – even fundamentalists like the Saudis – were supported with weapons and funds because they were prepared to agree to the deal. It is well known that Saudi Arabia is characterized by Wahhabi fundamentalism and that it also supplies weapons to the “Islamic State”. Whoever sells weapons to Saudi Arabia also profits from the terror of IS.2
INFLUX OF REFUGEES
The peoples of Africa and Asia have for centuries been deprived of their livelihoods by exploitation and wars. This has been exacerbated by man-made climate change causing droughts and famines as well as by the increasing violence of radicalized fundamentalists. It is not surprising that these people hope for a better life in “rich” Europe.
CANCEROUS TUMOR
It is becoming increasingly clear that the large financial institutions and industrial corporations are exclusively interested in their own growth. They do not take into account the effects on people, nature or climate. And there is no authority that could stop them. Politicians as well as the public let themselves be harnessed for the interests of the powerful. This is analogous to a cancerous tumor: as soon as the body’s immune system isn’t able to keep cancer cells in check any longer, they start to grow unrelentingly without any “respect” for organs. In this way the whole organism dies – and with it the cancer. But cancer doesn’t care! Applying these principles to the global crisis, the question arises as to whether it is possible to initiate a collective immunedefense-system against this destructive growth in order to achieve Self-regulation again?
1 Oskar Negt, “Arbeit und die menschliche Würde” Göttingen, Germany 2001, ISBN 3-88243-786-3
2 Lüders, Michael: “Wer den Wind sät. Was westliche Politik im Orient anrichtet.” München, Germany: C.H. Beck 2015
Chapter 2: Global Crisis – Why is Self-Regulation Failing?
“We have to make democracy comply with the markets!”
Angela Merkel
German Chancellor
2.1. Europe and the Global Crisis
Even the European population is gradually being impoverished. The German government claims that Germany is well off because its economy is going well. But even in Germany the inequitable distribution of wealth is steadily on the rise. The southern European countries, Greece, the Iberian Peninsula, but even Italy and France are affected first. We have to pay for these countries to supposedly be “saved”, yet they are basically being driven ever further into a fatal dependency. Financial institutions provide loans at excessive interest rates to the respective countries and profit from them directly. The ostensible “financiers” are in reality unscrupulous “money takers”. The rich of these southern countries are pulling out. The pensions of the population are being axed and their medical care is being taken away. The state-property of the Greek people, the harbors etc., are being sold to China.
The German population is experiencing its own economic impoverishment as well as the helplessness and hypocrisy of their politicians. Whenever these politicians defend the Hartz IV laws (a social welfare benefit scheme for unemployed), more and more affected people are becoming helplessly furious and desperate.
But instead of following their own critical perceptions and standing up to the perpetrators, they are letting themselves be seduced by right-wing populist “Pied Pipers”. Instead of addressing their legitimate outrage against those who are actually responsible, namely the large corporations and the political parties that act in the corporations’ interests, they let themselves be manipulated and direct their outrage against the refugees and Islam, which serve as convenient scapegoats. This in turn reinforces Islamic terror, a dreadful vicious circle.
But in fact both the refugees as well as the impoverishing population are victims of the same “culprits”: the industrial corporations and financial institutions. If the victims were aware of these facts, they could take joint action against those who actually caused the crisis: large corporations and their bought politicians…
For them it is thus extremely advantageous that the two groups are fighting each other – instead of joining forces. Doesn’t this correspond to the proven tactic of the powerful: “Divide – et impera!”: divide the people into opposing groups – and rule over them!
2.2 Politicians are helpless – since they are influenced by lobbyists The stakeholders, the politicians, the representatives of the economy and to a large extent even the sciences, with a few exceptions, don’t seem to be able to understand this accelerating process of self-destruction. And if they do understand it, they are not able to stop it. On the contrary they seem to be part of this destructive system. This means that the politicians cannot fulfill their task of representing the interests of the population in respect of the industrial corporations and financial institutions. Consequently our society loses its necessary self-regulation.
It was the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, herself who openly spoke of the goal of making democracy conform to the markets. It’s as if she was committed to the well being of the economy. Whereas her oath of office reads as follows: “Iswear that I will dedicate my efforts to the welfare of the German people, increase its benefits, protect them from harm, uphold and defend the Constitution and the Laws of the Federation, conscientiously carry out my duties, and do justice to all. (So help me God.)”
She has broken this oath several times (without claiming that others would have done it any better) as these examples show:
During the financial crisis Mrs. Merkel sought guidance from Mr. Ackermann, of all people, who as we now know, was instrumentally involved in transforming Deutsche Bank into a global investment bank. Initially it made huge profits with speculative investments and by selling “toxic” securities. As a result many customers suffered huge losses while the bankers were giving themselves generous bonuses.
In Luxembourg Mrs. Merkel did not advocate tightening the exhaust emission regulations for passenger cars – despite her lip service to environmental protection. A short article was published in the newspapers that her party, the CDU, had received donations from automobile manufacturers a few weeks later.
All this was indeed published the newspapers – but not as a headline on the front page. One wonders why not?
Because the German economy is flourishing. Germany is the “export world champion”. The price to be paid: the distribution of wealth is becoming increasingly unjust. Families and their children who receive Hartz IV unemployment benefits are left behind, forever. And even the middle-class is noticing that they are losing ground. Savings are melting away; old-age poverty is rearing its menacing head.
Fortunately more and more people are publicly protesting against this development and are looking for alternative strategies.
For these people, I’m writing this book! And for all who are prepared to wake up because:
The majority remains silent. Resignation and lethargy are spreading. Why?
2.3 Is there a Common Reason for the Global Lethargy and Self-Destruction?
Environmental pollution, climate change, famines, influx of refugees, wars and terrorism, the global self-destruction has many different aspects. An ever-growing number of people are wondering desperately: What are the reasons for this? And especially: Can this development still be stopped?
It is important to recognize, that these catastrophes are not fate they are man-made. And it seems to me that they all have the same cause – despite all their differences.
There are very few groups that benefit from these catastrophes – or at least believe they benefit from them: the industrial corporations and the financial institutions. They have the money. They have the power. Their sole interest is to maintain and increase this power, whatever the costs. They create instruments to pursue their power interests such as lobbying and think tanks. They influence political parties, governments and voters via the media and lobbyists. And they know perfectly well how to hide their real interests
• by claiming that the problems are so complicated that only experts can understand them and
• by specifying morally impeccable goals: eliminating unjust regimes, facilitating democratic forces, combating hunger etc.
By means of these strategies they succeed in attracting people as employees. Fathers who use their intelligence and imagination to make their companies more successful. Mothers who believe that this is how to make it possible for their children to achieve better futures.
When employees realize the actual interests of these corporations, when they become aware of the consequences of their actions – for earth and its inhabitants and for themselves – they get into a state of inner turmoil. Some people tend to ignore this. Or they question their own authority, their own perception and their own values. They start acting in accordance with an external authority and behave according to what is expected of them. They let themselves be used and allow themselves to be exploited for the interests of others. External determination instead of self-regulation!
2.4 Obedience
Whenever people follow the instructions and expectations of authorities in this way, they react obediently. At that point they do not use their inner authority, their own “organ of selfregulation”, their conscience or their self. If this inner authority nevertheless pipes up, they might feel uncomfortable and mentally torn apart. But only few would “back out”. When these few publicize the harmful effects of these organizations they are classified as “whistleblowers”. Instead of receiving public recognition they are persecuted by their employers and sued in court. The public remains silent. Only a minority celebrates them as heroes. But in the end, they are left alone, abandoned by everyone.
It seems that we the public orientate ourselves more to the authorities “up there”, that we feel helpless towards them and accept whatever they do. True to the widespread motto, “rank always wins”.
On the subject of obedience there is a well-known psychological experiment …
Chapter 3 Agentic or Autonomous Mode?
I carried out a series of experiments to find out to what extent people will obey orders from authority figures regardless of consequences. Rigid authority stood against the strongest moral principles of the participants, not to hurt other people. And even though the test persons were able to hear the victims’ cries, in the majority of cases authority won.
Stanley Milgram
3.1 Milgram: Obedience to Authority3
The American psychologist Stanley Milgram (1933 - 1984) conducted extensive experiments under this title, which I will present here in more detail, since it contributes something essential to our topic.
