To improve our situation, we must understand it. To understand it, we must moralize. Yet moralizing, like any activity, requires energy. In a stressful, toxic, and overstimulating environment, our energy is scarce. Thus to improve our situation, we should conserve energy whenever possible.
Most moralizing today wastes time and energy. Instead of deepening our understanding of things, we—the sick and working poor—judge and punish one another. This is a serious problem.
To help solve it, we should clarify our concept of power.
Power is the ability to command and assist. The President tells soldiers to kill; a CEO fires employees. Both fund projects, be they bombs or buildings.
Commands and assistance are also threats and promises. If a soldier disobeys, they are imprisoned (i.e. tortured), but if instead that soldier obeys, they are fed, housed, and praised.
Belief makes power real. If a worker stops caring about hierarchy, she won't follow orders; if a boss stops, he won't give them.
We have a good definition: power, a function of belief, is the ability to use force and assets to make others obey.
This definition lets us see and name who has power: heads of state, generals, bankers, board members, bosses, parents, cops, landlords, judges, doctors, and bureaucracy's gatekeepers. Yet these groups differ greatly. When compared to a billionaire or President, a parent's power is negligible. So power is also defined by scale.
Well over 99% of people on Earth have essentially no power. Please reread that sentence. Then read it again.
To improve our lives, we—the sick and working poor—must use our energy wisely. We must reject the call to fight amongst ourselves. We must name and understand power so that we may circumvent, thwart, and outgrow it.
