Saturday, May 1, 2010

Rulers and Leaders I: How Rulers Rule

To Rule is to exercise control over other people through two methods:
1. Coercive force
2. Facilitation of dependency on the Ruler

Facilitation of dependency simply means guiding into being a situation where the Ruler is one of the few, if not the only, source of a nescessary resource. Necessary resources are things like food, shelter, energy, defense against crime, and a relatively stable social environment. Not to mention the one thing that ties all of these elements together: money.

Historically the Rule has been Coercion as the primary means, and Dependency as the secondary means. As a civilization, the West has evolved to the point where the Rule is by facilitation of dependency as the primary means, and coercive force as the secondary means. This IS a step forward, and is perhaps at the root of what we celebrate as the greatness of the modern world. It is the progress won in the 20th century and due credit is owed those who made this advancement. However, this is no longer the 20th century and western civilization, especially America is demanding further progress.

In our current situation in America, there are three levels of dependency.

  • The first level is financial dependency; relying on Rulers to pay the way of the Dependents. This is all types of tax-funded welfare, from food to housing, to health care.
  • The second level is subsistence dependency- the Rulers that those who pay their own way rely on to sell them food, energy, health care and social stability. This second level of Dependent has a job and buys their own food, energy, and health-care from a very limited number of suppliers who themselves are simply appendages of a larger centrally organized system of manufacture and distribution. The social-stability that results is one that is based in corporate marketing and results in a social hierarchy scaled by material consumption: the more a Dependent consumes of marketing-determined high-cost items, the higher the Dependent is considered to be on the social ladder.
  • The third level is lethal-force dependency- The Dependents rely on the Rulers to provide for the defense-by-force of their lives and property and rights.
The current struggle today is to not allow these Dependencies to become coerced Dependencies. An example of a forced dependency is limiting food production and distribution to massive centralized systems, so that the consumer can buy their food from ONLY these systems. This type of forced-dependency is enacted through the facade of "Modernization of food safety practices" regulations which essentially cause the only sources of food to be those same massive production and distribution systems. Making it illegal to grow, produce, process or distribute any food without first purchasing a series of permits, licenses and control-mechanisms that total in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, and which only the largest food production and distribution systems can afford to pay.

This is a work in progress and will be continued soon.

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