"Great men are almost always bad men" is a phrase that goes through my head a LOT (along with an appropriately gender-neutral-ized version when applicable)
“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority: still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority.” -Lord Acton, 1887
It's said that "power corrupts," but actually it's more true that power attracts the corruptible. The sane are usually attracted by other things than power. When they do act, they think of it as service, which has limits. The tyrant, though, seeks mastery, for which he is insatiable, implacable.
that was david brin; also:
Power attracts the corruptible; suspect all who seek it. We should grant power over our affairs only to those who are reluctant to wield it, and only then under conditions that increase the reluctance.
-Frank Herbert
To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it.
To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.
- Douglas Adams
I think part of it is, what type of person would want to put themselves on the world’s stage and get in front of people to deliver a speech. There have been good people who have done it well but for the most part, I don’t think there’s enough people who would want to live that way.
there are those, like Galadriel who said, “I will diminish, and ģo into the west, and remain Galadriel.” - not everyone is corruptable, and those are the ones we should seek; the reluctant candidates
From what I've read (psychology studies etc) and observed it takes a lot of effort and support to not be corrupted when power is acquired. Pretty sure anyone can be susceptible, and with enough power, it's completely impossible to maintain perspective.
If I had power, my biggest concern would be letting my ADD just chuck carefully laid plans out the window because I am bored and feeling frustrated by something
Yes. 100%. People with good intentions have the potential to be more dangerous if their power is unchecked, as they’re more inclined to believe that whatever they do is morally right.
This goes down a similar mechanism that was explored in “Das Experiment”. There’s discussion whether the movie is or isn’t brutal enough to illustrate what happened in the experiment that actually was conducted and inspired it. It’s even worse when people believe some thing/person “allowed them to”.
Part of why I don't like it is that it sort of presupposes that people are either good or evil inherently. I think a lot of what people end up doing in the world is more circumstantial than that
I was reading an article about some celebrity and realising that the level of wealth and fame they were at meant they probably couldn't even recognise the impact of their words and deeds anymore. Maybe not even if they tried to.
There's some psych research that suggests that very thing.
I wonder about the causal relationship, though. Does power cause a person to lose their empathy, or does a person need to lose their empathy to obtain power?
Also, fwiw, I think Tolkien believed firmly that the USE of power was what corrupted people. Thus Gandalf warning Frodo not to use the ring, Manwe forbidding Gandalf from using his full power in Middle Earth, and countless other examples.
One of the things I love about Tolkien is how much Evil bored him. His focus remained always on the dangers of despair and the daily effort that doing good demands.
That's a fair point. I wasn't thinking of it as evil, more of a susceptibility as to an illness....but I've certainly not made up my mind on the issue.
There was a quote early in the show 'Vikings' I really like: "Power is only given to those who are prepared to lower themselves to pick it up." It centers behavior over innate nature.
I think it's a both/and situation. Certainly in my context (religious leadership) there are people who make bad decisions once they've been empowered; but there are absolutely others who seek out those positions from a place of personality disorder or moral dysfunction.
If you leave God out of it, there is undoubtedly an evolutionary tension between the survival of the species (altruism, ‘good’) and the survival of the individual (selfishness, ‘evil’). Theologically, we are all created by a perfect God but are ourselves imperfect/fallen.
In some people, the ego goes beyond the mere preservation of the self to the aggrandisement thereof (Trump, Johnson, Hitler, Idi Amin). Spiritually, this could be characterised as evil, demonic possession, etc.
(That’s enough philosophy/theology. Ed.)
While there are genuinely evil men who do evil acts, there are also ordinary men who also do evil acts. The debate over Arendt’s banality of evil characterization continues, yet the Nazi’s evil couldn’t have been carried out without co-opting neutrals to do their evil (Note: Eichmann was a monster)
It also ignores the effects of having (rather than only achieving) power. For example, the echo chamber/bubble effect of being surrounded only by other powerful people. Or hedonistic adaptation, so you still always feel like you need more. I'm sure there are more.
Agreed; it's reductive to say folks are inherently good/evil
However, the "P attracts C" theory still holds IMO, when viewed in terms of Opportunity Cost
e.g. If someone has extraordinary wealth/power/achievement, then they likely internally value those highly over other ideals like charity/ethics
I believe that everyone is inherently good. Many times - and it's easy to do, in my experience - I've easily been able to see how a terrible event (usually in their formative years) has turned a person to evil acts, and I've argued for their goodness (sometimes, to them, themselves).
They’re both good and evil, not one or the other. Just like the world we live in is both awful and wonderful. There’s beauty and darkness. They all live side-by-side.
To achieve big power you need ambition and a bit of a ruthless streak. Then, the most important thing is the ability to keep this ruthlessness firmly in check. When you see bad people, you almost inevitably see people who lack restraint.
I don't think people are inherently good or evil, but I do think by adulthood, that self vs. other morality schema is formed - should I work for the good of everyone or just for my own advantage? Are other people means to an end or as important as I am? Do I deserve more than others do? etc.
Yeah but that's kind of the whole conceit of the Dune saga with Paul. I think most people don't read far enough into it to get that but it basically is like "hey good people can be corrupted by amassing power, maybe don't let them do that". Unfortunately the latest films aren't really showing that.
