“Winning” and “Losing”, the Feud by Contagion of Human Misery, 7
Same if the oppression apparently traces back to anything else than an individual, at which point the answer to the question, “who?” may well be: the individual hammering one with an idea, a thing, a condition, is nothing but oneself. And now it’s oneself who as a result of going through the aforementioned shift for good, has taken up the role of one’s own oppressor. Sure, it’s crazy, but how many among us? How many among us are chronically commanding themselves to shut up and shrink and pull back and lie low and be defeated and consecrate to inadequacy and inferiority and surrender and fail and lose and all such niceties anyhow and no matter what? And how much the fallout on all of us?
Saw a road sign once: the sketch of a smiling driver, steering wheel in one hand, the other hand stretched out to signal, «Please, after you.» Struck me as simple and profound. Giving way at the wheel may well be direct emanation of one's awareness there are others in the world, too, having the same rights as one has. A sane human being gives way out of ethics: cooperation, common sense and kindness; a "losing" personality gives it as a legal obligation, and a "winning" one expects it and takes it for granted and takes it as divine right, thanking not even conceived. One thing is the ethical and human drive to help to the point of giving, and giving way, more than one takes. Quite another thing is the subhuman and inhuman drive to be a victim, and even more so that to be an oppressor.
Arrogance is strengthened by guilty conscience, because the individual basically knows; allowing for a glimmer of hope and redemption always and anyhow is a fundamental make or break point of civilisations, but arrogance has to be stopped, not excused, whether the arrogant redeems him or herself or not. Turning others into potential trouble sources and shaping victims into oppressors in his or her likeness is maybe the ultimate insult of the suppressive and the ultimate stupidity of the victims. Certainly the suppressive’s one way feud against all of us is perpetuated endlessly by these pawns alone. Unless and until you and I say “That’s it!”
In my humble opinion, the entire scope of human misery boils down to this common denominator: “winning” personality and “losing” personality overriding self.
