“Look how the caravan of civilization
has been ambushed.
Fools are everywhere in charge.
Do not practice solitude like Jesus.
Be in the assembly, and take charge of it.”
~ Rumi
“Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives.
I think we’re being run by maniacs for maniacal ends
and I think I’m liable to be put away as insane for expressing that.
That’s what’s insane about it.”
~ John Lennon 6/6/68
“The more that money rules the World,
the more that money ruins the World.”
~ Ron Rattner – Sutra Sayings
Have you ever wondered why there is so much suffering in our world; why we are facing extraordinary ecological, financial, international and interpersonal crises so serious that they cause misery for millions and threaten all life on our precious planet?
Is is possible that these crises have been precipitated by sociopathic world “leaders” – obscenely privileged corporate, political and religious plutocrats – who without remorse amorally acquire and misuse power, and excessive material wealth far beyond their conceivable needs; people so crazy that they are unjustly and brutally harming countless people and creatures, and myopically scuttling Spaceship Earth, destroying the life support systems which sustain us?
As more and more studies emerge demonstrating the corrosive effect of psychopathy on governments and corporations, researchers have begun to explore how our society has been afflictively molded in the psychopaths’ image.
One of these psychopathy researchers, Canadian author Stefan Verstappen, believes that we live in societies shaped and ruled by psychopaths – people in positions of great corporate and political power who without conscience, empathy or remorse, act to promote their delusionally perceived self interests, amorally and often violently.
Verstappen says that psychopaths often attain positions of power because, unlike the vast majority of people, they don’t play by the rules and have no qualms about cheating, lying or doing anything to anyone that gets them what they want.
Here are two You Tube videos of Stefan Verstappen explaining his findings about psychopaths, which are recommended for your consideration.
(15 minutes)
(38 minutes)
Ron’s comments:
After much reflection, I have come to believe that – as Verstappen contends – psychopaths do indeed rule the world. As an octogenarian, I am mainly a twentieth century person soon scheduled to say “bye-bye” to this twenty first century. Because the twentieth century was blighted by over 300 million democides – government instigated or perpetrated killings of mostly non-combatant civilians – far more than in any previous century, I have long wondered about psychopaths in power.
In my student days I learned of maniacs like Hitler in Nazi Germany, Mao in Communist China, Stalin in the U.S.S.R., Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia and numerous others who were then bestially causing untold murders and misery.
Naively, I then believed that my country the USA, and its Western allies, represented only virtues of good and democratic decency, and that after the demise of World War II era psychopaths, the world would be restored to a utopian age of peace and prosperity. But I was wrong.
Officially instigated and perpetrated amoral wars and killings – many patently or covertly attributable to the US empire and its allies – have continued. And, with governmental sanctions and support, international corporate plutocrats are insidiously and unsustainably pillaging and poisoning our precious planet’s ecology, and hurting human health, with countless chemically, genetically and radiologically polluting products – even including foods, drinks and pharmaceuticals.
After the traumatically shocking 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the soon ensuing deranged Viet Nam war devastation, I became aware of the prescience of President Dwight Eisenhower’s 1961 valedictory caution against dominance of the “military-industrial complex” with “potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power”.
Despite Eisenhower’s warning, isn’t it now apparent that ruling power has indeed been misappropriated by the military-industrial complex which, in complicity with political and corporate sociopaths, is ruling and ruining the world?
As Hitler in Nazi Germany molded an insane society to support his pathological pretensions and plans, since 9/11/2000 sociopathic Western leaders have contrived and fomented alleged “terrorist” enemies as a pretense to create an insane society which has fearfully condoned or acquiesced in outrageously immoral wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and deranged plans for attacking Iran and other Moslem countries, with radically expanded US military budgets and executive powers, and obscenely enriched entrenched vested interests, all accompanied by serious curtailments of US constitutional protections and civil liberties.
But how can humanity solve this planetary life and death problem of societal insanity and irrational fear fomented by psychopathic authorities? For many years I have been looking to His Holiness the Dalai Lama of Tibet, one of the world’s wisest incarnate sages, to offer guidance on how we can evolve beyond the critical problems stemming from governance by sociopaths and psychopaths.
Addressing our ecological crisis His Holiness has said: “Ultimately, the decision to save the environment must come from the human heart. The key point is a call for a genuine sense of universal responsibility that is based on love, compassion and clear awareness.”
But, how can heartfelt appeals to psychopaths lacking empathy be successful?
At present, most psychologists and psychiatrists are devoting research efforts and treatments to individual mental pathologies. Perhaps we need first to address societal pathologies attributable to stress caused by psychopathic and sociopathic authorities complicit with the military-industrial complex. How can people avoid individual psychological problems while they are insanely and unnecessarily subjected to constant societal stresses concerning their health, life necessities and human rights?
Recently inaugurated at the Dalai Lama’s suggestion is a “Center For Investigating Healthy Minds”, at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, my undergraduate alma mater. Similarly, wouldn’t it be helpful to establish scientific centers for the study of sane societies?
Weren’t there indigenous societies whose peoples lived sane and happy lives by prioritizing sustainable harmony with Nature over it’s unsustainable exploitation, cooperation over competition, respect for prophets over lust for profits, democracy over authoritarianism? Isn’t it crucial that we learn from their experience?
President Eisenhower in 1961 deemed essential “an alert and knowledgeable citizenry” to prevent “the disastrous rise of misplaced power”. These comments are respectfully offered in furtherance of that goal. May they help inspire “a genuine sense of universal responsibility that is based on love, compassion and clear awareness” which will promote our heartfelt, sane and nonviolent transcendence of current planetary insanity.
