Humanity’s Achilles’ heel

Good and evil are characteristics that imbue almost every aspect of our nature. It’s why it’s the subject of so many narratives, including mythologies and religions, not to mention actual real-world histories. It effectively defines what we are, what we are capable of and what we are destined to be.
 
I’ve discussed evil in one of my earliest posts, and also its recurring motif in fiction. Humanity is unique, at least on this small world we call home, in that we can change it on a biblical scale, both intentionally and unintentionally – climate change being the most obvious and recent example. We are doing this in combination with creating the fastest growing extinction event in the planet’s history, for which most of us are blissfully ignorant.
 
This post is already going off on tangents, but it’s hard to stay on track when there are so many ramifications; because none of these issues are the Achilles’ heel to which the title refers.
 
We have the incurable disease of following leaders who will unleash the worst of humanity onto itself. I wrote a post back in 2015, a year before Trump was elected POTUS, that was very prescient given the events that have occurred since. There are two traits such leaders have that not only define them but paradoxically explain their success.
 
Firstly, they are narcissistic in the extreme, which means that their self-belief is unassailable, no matter what happens. The entire world can collapse around them and somehow they’re untouchable. Secondly, they always come to power in times of division, which they exploit and then escalate to even greater effect. Humans are most irrational in ingroup-outgroup situations, which could be anything from a family dispute to a nationwide political division. Narcissists thrive in this environment, creating a narrative that only resembles the reality inside their head, but which their followers accept unquestioningly.
 
I’ve talked about leadership in other posts, but only fleetingly, and it’s an inherent and necessary quality in almost all endeavours; be it on a sporting field, on an engineering project, in a theatre or in a ‘house’ of government. There is a Confucian saying (so neither Western nor modern): If you want to know the true worth of a person, observe the effects they have on other people’s lives. I’ve long contended that the best leaders are those who bring out the best in the people they lead, which is the opposite of narcissists, who bring out the worst.
 
I’ve argued elsewhere that we are at a crossroads, which will determine the future of humanity for decades, if not centuries ahead. No one can predict what this century will bring, in the same way that no one predicted all the changes that occurred in the last century. My only prediction is that the changes in this century will be even greater and more impactful than the last. And whether that will be for the better or the worse, I don’t believe anyone can say.
 
Do I have an answer? Of course not, but I will make some observations. Virtually my whole working life was spent on engineering projects, which have invariably involved an ingroup-outgroup dynamic. Many people believe that conflict is healthy because it creates competition and by some social-Darwinian effect, the best ideas succeed and are adopted. Well, I’ve seen the exact opposite, and I witness it in our political environment all the time.
 
In reality, what happens is that one side will look for, and find, something negative about every engineering solution to a problem that is proposed. This means that there is continuous stalemate and the project suffers in every way imaginable – morale is depleted, everything is drawn out and we have time and cost overruns, which feed the blame-game to new levels. At worst, the sides end up in legal dispute, where, I should point out, I’ve had considerable experience.
 
On the contrary, when sides work together and collaboratively, people compromise and respect the expertise of their counterparts. What happens is that problems and issues are resolved and the project is ultimately successful. A lot of this depends on the temperament and skills of the project leader. Leadership requires good people skills.
 
Someone once did a study in the United States in the last century (I no longer have the reference) where they looked for the traits of individuals who were eminently successful. And what they found was that it was not education or IQ that was the determining factor, though that helped. No, the single most important factor was the ability to form consensus.
 
If one looks at prolonged conflicts, like we’ve witnessed in Ireland or the Middle East, people involved in talks will tell you that the ‘hardliners’ will never find peace, only the moderates will. So, if there is a lesson to be learned, it’s not to follow leaders who sow and reap division, but those who are inclusive. That means giving up our ingroup-outgroup mentality, which appears impossible. But, until we do, the incurable disease will recur and we will self-destruct by simply following the cult that self-destructive narcissists are so masterfully capable of growing.