We tend to think of our times as unique as relate to threats, lack of reason as applied to domestic and international affairs, crazed opinions, end times, etc. That is only because we lack the perspective of history. “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”– George Santayana in his The Life of Reason. Look only to the strifes of Asia as depicted in The Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan, The March of Folly by Barbara Tuchman, and The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon. There are numerous other examples. My favorite is The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today, Mark Twain. As to personalities (i.e., sociopaths) we can look to Caligula, the corrupt Popes of the 1100’s, Napoleon, Stalin, Mussolini, Hitler and his minions, and others we don’t recognize from our Western perspective: King Zhou of Shang, Qin Shi Huang, and King Yeonsangun of Joseon.
My point is that historically there have been repeated tyrannical epochs that rival our current circumstances. Civilizations and despots arise and fall of their own hubris and folly, leaving untold suffering of masses in their wakes.
I would like to spend some time on “corruption.” At first glance, it may not be clear that corruption is antigonal to power, selfishness and compassion. Imagine a triangle with compassion in the center surrounded on three sides by power, corruption and selfishness. Wow, what a geometric tension! Pythagoras would be enthralled. It is so odd that certain groups have perseverated about the “Deep State” and now we are immersed in a deeper state of corruption involving cryptocurrency, political favors (Jets, etc.), Russian banking support, Saudian deals with family sons, pardons for financial and drug criminals , Epstein entanglements and obfuscations, etc. So, what have these to do with compassion? It’s not a stone’s throw. The motivation to enrich one’s self at the expense of all others is the antithesis of compassion. All is impermanent. All passes. Why seek to maximize one’s personal desires at the expense of all others when one is going to die? Duh. We have a department head of Defense who is motivated by testosterone and anger; has he ever read the Art of War? Why are the ‘art of wrestling” and boxing the touch stones of masculinity today Why is it that compassion is not a masculine ideal? Ask Black Elk. We have corrupted the ideal of the compassionate male, at the same time of the compassionate female. How do we escape the corrupt political landscape? Look to yourself. This is not someone else’s problem.
I think it is harder to be compassionate than to be a tough guy. It is easy to oppress the less fortunate, to imprison someone who has no power, to abuse one’s sense of importance at the expense of another. Oppression is a gift of power and an affront to humanity. If your only reason to exist is to subjugate, enthrall and demean others, then you will find history as your enemy and domination as your downfall.
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