One of the things which makes human beings stand out as exceptional creatures is their ability to deny their own nature for the common good. Look at people who abstain from sex; they tend to believe that sex is something special which needs to be guarded, so they repress their own desires to (in their eyes) benefit society.
I have often argued this above point to praise what humans are capable of. Whilst promoting the power of humanity, I have often stated that a human’s ability to deny their own natures for the good of others makes them remarkable. However, there is a more cynical and arguably more realistic way of reflecting on this issue.
There are many humans, particularly those in positions of power, who are aware of the damage that satisfying their desire for wealth has on society. Knowing that they are playing an active role in perpetuating inequality, they remain content to earn a living via ways which are socially irresponsible.
It would not be wise to argue that the recent crisis in the banking sector was caused by stupidity. Few bankers could really, having consulted even their own meagre consciences, denied that their job is socially useless. By and large, “fat cats” have been aware that they were making an extravagant living by running the masses’ future prospects into the ground. It didn’t matter to them, because they were satisfying their own disgustingly exorbitant appetites for material possessions.
Likewise, there are hordes of intelligent journalists who write articles for odious publications like The Sun, The Daily Express and The Daily Mail who are fully aware that the opinions they print, carefully constructed to persuade the gullible, are completely ludicrous and designed merely to cash in on petty prejudices. They know that they are making it increasingly impossible to build a fairer and more compassionate society, but choose instead to taste the rewards of quick remuneration and respect from people that they have denied a proper education.
Both bankers and journalists of this kind are aware of how their indulgence damages society, but see no reason why it is their responsibility to do anything about it. Knowing fully well that humans possess the ability to be selfless, and that selflessness would remove swathes of people from situations of gross injustice, they continue to reap the rewards of a corrupt system whilst strengthening the system itself. Put simply, they choose to be selfish over being selfless, in complete awareness that it harms more people that it benefits.
This causes an ever-growing obstacle to progress, and is highly depressing.
To summarise, it is a wonderful thing about humanity that some people repress their own selfish desires to look after the interests of others, but a more depressing thing that people who know the advantages which could be gained from this, use their cunning to instead profit from and perpetuate a stupidly unjust model for society.
This links to an ongoing debate I have with a friend, who fears that imposing a hefty rate of taxation on high-earners would cause a ‘brain drain’. I wonder if this is only true if you equate braininess with desire to profit materially from your braininess. I wonder if a great chunk of the greedy (yet influential) would leave for a less taxing nation, leaving a remainder of altruistic and intelligent people who previously had little influence but have a greater desire to improve everybody’s lives as opposed to their own.
We have to find a way to build a society where it is in one’s own interests to do what is in the population’s interests as a whole, in the short term and the long term. A society in which it is entirely pointless to simply look out for one’s self. This is why governments need to be strong and deny the ruling class (and let’s not pretend that there isn’t one), of the undue influence which they use to maintain their grasp on resources, power, and essentially, happiness.
High taxation would benefit the masses. It would scare many wealthy people off, but we’d be better off without them. For a while, it is quite possible we’d be materially worse off by doing this, but in the long run, it would build a brilliant foundation for a society where it is simply ridiculous to tolerate the levels of greed which are essentially encouraged and worshipped in our current society.
