Because revolution in our culture has always represented an attack on hierarchy, it has always meant upheaval--literally a heaving up from below. But upheaval has no role to play in moving beyond civilzation. If the plane is in trouble, you don't shoot the pilot, you grab a parachute and jump. To overthrow the hierarchy is pointless; we just want to leave it behind.
As everyone knows (especially revolutionaries), hierarchy maintains formidable defenses against attack from the lower orders. It has none, however, against abandonment. This is in part because it can imagine revolution, but it can't imagine abandonment. But even if it could imagine abandonment, it couldn't defend against it, because abandonment isn't an attack, it's just a discontinuance of support. (p 95)
This only makes perfect sense to me. I used to think alot about the pilgrims, and how they set sail to find a place to start their life on their terms. I've had that on my mind a lot lately, too, and have been wondering if that's even possible today. Is there anywhere to go? (Of course, there are places. There are plenty cultures that aren't like our civilization, and it's somewhat imaginable that one could join something pre-existing; it's probably not necessary to start something NEW. But is there such a thing in a setting where one would want it? Is there some other culture to join into that's in as beautiful a place as, for example, Seattle?)
But that passage resonated in me, deeper than these recent thoughts, and it was a few minutes before I realized I'd read the best-ever description of Why I Don't Vote. I even knew that was why I don't, but I had previously been so unable to find the words, that I didn't immediately recognize them when they were presented to me. I don't support the current order of things, and not voting, to me, is as vital and significant a thing as being a conscientious objector during wartime.
My MySpace status: "Court Anonymous thinks that working for the man is part of the problem, and therefore could never be part of the solution." I've been doing things, and thinking things, and feeling things since I typed that, but haven't updated my status. Whenever I think to, I realize whatever else I might say is not as true as that statement.
Another insight I've had while reading this book today is on the subject of hierarchy. Leading up to that passage, Quinn talks a lot about how our civilization couldn't exist without a hierarchy. The ideas that sprouted from there also resonated in me. I got irritated several weeks ago, when I felt like people around me weren't the radical revolutionaries I perceived them to be when we would hang out together. It has a lot to do with the fact that I want everybody to be the revolutionaries, and I don't want to do more than anybody else--not because I'm lazy, but because I want people to live it as much (or more) as I
My business ethic, as I have and am sure will continue to repeat many times, is: I want to be the best. And I want you to be the best. If I am better than you at something, I want to help you learn how to improve. If you are better than me at something, I would like to learn, with help from you, how to improve. Your success and mine are not mutually exclusive.
So to me, a hierarchy does not belong in my world-view. I do not belong in a leadership role (which will bring me to my next point in a bit), because a leadership role does not belong in my idea of life. But I do have an interest in people following the ideas that lead me into and through life.
So yeah, my next point was one of management. I've had many managers/supervisors/bosses over the years. I was discussing one of them recently (I won't say with whom, as this person still works for said boss; we'll call her Jill, and the boss Jane). Jill was
But the thing is, in her position, I would do (or hope to do) the same thing. I HAVE done that.
Katie asked me once why I refuse to accept another management position (after all, can't good come out of it? Didn't she and I meet when I was her manager?). My explanation is this: I want to do my job as best I can. As a manager, my boss would expect me to motivate (and hire motivated) employees to drive sales. I would be expected to make an effort to increase profits, and increase them again next year. But I have no natural motivation to do this myself. In my mind, profit is profit, and growth is unnecessary, and beating out the competition is pointless.
If, at my current job, I provide books to people, and I can maintain room and board, and my boss is able to maintain room and board, and her bosses are able to maintain room and board, and all the way to the top, everyone maintains room and board, then our business is a success. Period. Because it's my job to sell books, and that's something I beleive in.
It's not my boss's job to sell books. It's my boss's job to motivate me to turn a greater profit than ever before... which is NOT something I believe in. I believe in my job; I do not believe in my boss's job. That's simple.
But there is an allure to my boss's job: more money. A chance to change things. But this is where my personal failure comes in: if I take the job of a manager, then I want to do the best job I can. And if I'm going to motivate my employees to turn a greater profit than ever before, then I am going to micromanage the hell out of the place. I disagree with Jill; I don't think that Jane is evil, because I would do her job just like she does, and I do not think that I am evil. (Jill's other complaints, that she is passive agressive, and forces subordinates to confront eachother so she doesn't have to do it personally would, sadly, apply to me as well.)
But stepping back from that microcosm, it really cames down to the hierarchy. I refuse to rise higher in the workplace, because I do not believe in having a hierarchy in the workplace at all.
The argument that comes to mind, for me, is "if you don't want a hierarchy in the workplace, Court, then how do you expect your workplace to become/remain successful?" That brings to mind this other passage from Beyond Civilization:
No special control is needed to make people into pyramid builders--if they see themselves as having no choice but to build pyramids. They'll build whatever they're told to build, whether it's pyramids, parking garages, or computer programs.
Karl Marx recognized, that workers without a choice are workers in chains. But his idea of breaking chains was for us to depose the pharoas and then build the pyramids for ourselves, as if building pyramids is something we just can't stop doing, we love it so much. (p 52)
But I would also recommend, to whomever might ask that question, reading this book. For all his talk about revolution and abandoning the current paradigm, every point in this book is actually a support for the argument that there is a better way to live--and he describes that way.
2 comments:
Hmm. If a plane is in trouble, ideally you reaccess the situation before you jump. Maintaining the status quo is probably not the way to go, shooting the pilot is probably not the way to go, but I don't think abandoning ship (and presumably the crew on it) is necessarily the way to go either.
I think that's what bothers me about your comment on management. A large part of the role of the leader/manager is to re-envision the situation. Another large part of the role of leader is to protect and guide the people under him. The responsibility to the ideals of his boss (if such a responsibility exists) is tertiary, assuming one takes ownership of the project. If I found myself in the position of the manager of a bookstore, my instinct would absolutely be to do the best job I can. But I would do that by making sure that the people under me and my customers were having a great time while at my store, by making the atmosphere more interesting, by having reading corners, by bringing interesting people together and having speakers, by re-envisioning the place. I can see how profits could be a goal, but that would be the goal of someone who cared about it (first), and second, if things were going well and people were having a good time, profits would be good anyway. When things work, they work, and no fake incentives are necessary.
It's similar sort of with competition. As a hugely competitive person, the thrill is not in crushing and conquering, it's in pushing against someone and having your push be met. If this can happen all the way to the top - fantastic! Being at the top on your own is great, thrilling, exhilarating on your own, but putting everything that you have in, and knowing that it is good, and having someone else do the same (or a number of someones) and everyone succeeding at the end is one of the most amazing things ever.
Ted (the instructor) at the latest blues lesson talked about weight in dance - the difference between putting your weight into the other person (which establishes the connection) and putting your weight down on the other person (which hinders and wears them out). This I think is the difference between the love of competition and the love of destruction.
Hierarchy (a functional hierarchy, not a status hierarchy) in any project I think can be important because people are not naturally organized and are differently talented and if something needs to get done, there needs to be some sort of organization. If you're doing some thing that you want to finish jointly, you need at least a visionary to keep everyone on the same page, at least some people who other people can go to and ask what needs to get done, at least some people who can show other people how to do the things that need to get done, at least the people who actually do the thing. But it is hard to maintain a healthy hierarchy.
Anyway, I've been waiting on this comment because I didn't want it to be a definitional argument, but I think enough of it is conceptual.
The problem with BN specifically, though, is that they leave almost no room for creativity. With an independent bookstore, yes, but BN is streamlined to the extreme. They seem to hope if you visit one store, it's exactly like every other store. That's good in the "every store provides great service" way, but stifling in the "that chair belongs two inches to the right" way.
Also, by saying there should be no hierarchy, it is not meant that there is no organization. There are definitely different jobs to be done, and certainly there are people more suited for particular jobs. Basically by no hierarchy, I meant nobody is superior/subordinate to anyone else. It's entirely lateral, but there are still pieces which fit together.
And as for the parachute example: yes, it is about reassessing the situation. I still like the jumping aspect of it, because it deflates the idea that it should be reassessed completely before acting.
I've been paraphrased there by saying, "I'm not playing their game." There's the schoolyard perspective of "I don't like your game [because I'm losing] and so I ain't gonna play," but I see it more as some people are playing game A and others game B, so why is it presupposed we should all play by the same rules? I'm talking about giving up the rules for A so we can play B.
In the plane crash scenario (that is, the plane IS GOING to crash), reassessing before jumping is good, you can save more lives, but you're still going to want to jump pretty soon.
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