It stinks from the head....

Leadership is always to blame

Humans are social animals, tribal by nature. We require social interactions, physical touch, and a safe harbor among our own in order to thrive.

It’s hard enough to satisfy those needs in today’s modern society, but since March 2020, the majority of us have been on our own - living in a dystopian world where we feel more isolated than ever before. This applies especially to children and the elderly.

Our prolonged isolation in bubbles where we were constantly bombarded with pandemic-porn pushed some those of us already struggling with anxiety, depression, and other mental health issues over the edge. Some of us, like the Uvalde, Texas school shooter, found community and purpose in a rabbit hole of online hate.

Granted, gun violence has been a significant problem in American culture for decades, and our gun laws are ridiculous, but the recent acceleration of violence is due to new influences. I’m old enough to remember the 1966 University of Texas Tower shooting. Although shootings had happened before, they were rare and considered an aberration in earlier decades. We could never have predicted then how bad it would be now. Or perhaps we could have, but didn’t want to.

Regardless, we would be remiss not to note that, as reported in the NY Times, the FBI has documented that mass shootings have almost doubled in the last year.

• Do we really have any doubt why?

WHY:

The Italian aphorism, “Fish stinks from the head” is more politely articulated by systems expert W. Edwards Deming who famously said that “Management is always the problem.”

As social creatures, we tend to follow our paternalistic leadership. We absorb the cultural lessons taught us. We find it easier to go along with our tribal diktats than to think critically on our own. How we ultimately decide what is the right thing to do based on the messaging from above isn’t necessarily what was intended by our leaders.

• Or maybe it is.

When Dark Triad personalities, all of whom have significant narcissistic tendencies, assume positions of power, control is the thing they most want. Control of others is a drug for them. They can never get enough and don’t really care what happens to anyone else, because narcissists feel entitled to all the power, prestige and profit they can amass. Many of them are like arsonists who enjoy watching the havoc they wreak, and have an illusion of themselves as the fire-fighter saver. They love the adrenaline rush of this drama game.

These dark leaders have learned that they can incite armies of flying monkeys to virtue signal and bully the “other” on social media and in real life.

It stinks from the head - and it doesn’t matter if that head is a Republican or Democrat if he is a narcissist. People respond to emotional messaging with emotional outbursts, whether it entails storming the Capitol building, ejecting someone from a theater for failure to wear a face mask properly, or shooting up a classroom of children.

MODERN CULTURE:

In my opinion, our most pressing issue is our modern culture has become highly narcissistic and too focused on cults of personality, which lead to too much compliancy which encourages troops of "flying monkey" enablers who defend their leaders/experts. Virtue signaling is a level-1 manifestation of that knee-jerk behavior that provides a small hit of emotional satisfaction to the bully.   

Heck, we reward those over-confident dominant types with more and more power and praise, and then revel in bullying the "other" who the leaders identify. It's tribal, it's agnotology among the "elite" .... it is the establishment of new caste systems and corporate colonialism.

Consider the GOP and DNC choice of hate-speech. Whether they label groups as "undesirables," call them "anti-science conservatives," or disparage the “leftist liberal elites” and “socialists” it's a set up for us v. them based on the war analogy. It diminishes and dismisses the "other." And if a leader curses the the unvaccinated “other” upon whom he has declared “war” from a bully pulpit with a "winter of illness and death” or predicts a devastating disaster in Florida (or Sweden), neither of which materialize, he can ignore that reality did not match his predictions because he has the power that allows him to hold sway over the tribe with Svengali-like control. Rasputin did it and contributed to the fall of the Russian empire. Tony Fauci has a different style, but uses the same type of power. Ditto for Bill Gates. 

People who achieve success often abandon humility and believe they are better than others. They believe that they earned what they got through their superiority when, in every instance, there are always elements of luck and supporting players. But enough is never enough for these personalities. Narcissists and others in the Dark Triad¹ always have to be right, to prove something. They feel entitled to control everyone else. They have no empathy or compassion for those ruined in the havoc that ensues. Narcissistic leaders lie, confabulate, and intimidate the rest of us into compliance.

It’s not that hard to do. Most of us have been trained to be obedient and give up our personal agency. We have let any critical thinking skills we had atrophy because it is easier to be a consumer who trusts the boob tube and paternalistic oracles. It is easier to protect our positions and paychecks with silence.

Whether the narcissists are in in our family or in our government, they will always be a problem, and they will always contaminate us with their stink…. at least until we take back our personal agency.

I’ll give the power structure a pass on the two week lockdown in Spring 2020 when most of us didn’t know what was going on², but every restrictive mitigation measure since then has been a calculated power grab facilitated by psychological abuse based on a manufactured trauma bond orchestrated by sophisticated marketing experts. If we don’t wake up and claim our human rights, personal liberties, and individual biological integrity, we will be sucked into a black hole that has the power to destroy society, governments, and humanity.

…. and the power structures won’t care. They will scapegoat whomever is handy or claim they did everything right, that it was just reality didn’t conform to their expectations - just like abusive spouses shift blame by castigating their partners for perceived failures.

FINAL THOUGHTS:

Biological integrity and medical consent might feel inadequate, but… humans make mistakes, always. So maintaining our individual human rights in every venue is our last and best defense against a dystopian future under narcissistic leadership. The “Ministries of Truth” set up by governments, technological-scientific corporations and even seemingly altruistic global organizations are a deceptive power grab that emphasizes compliance with profitable and paternalistic diktats. And that stinks.

Maggie Russo is the author of “Dance with the Devil: Love in the Age of Covid”

1. The Dark Triad is a grouping of three malevolent personality types who are callous, controlling, and lacking in empathy and compassion. Narcissistic characteristics are foundational, but the three in the triad are labeled narcissists, psychopaths or machiavellians depending on their dominant style. Due to innate ruthlessness, Dark Triad personalities can achieve considerable personal success, which is achieved at a high cost to those in their sphere of influence.

2. Some did know what was going on. Hundreds of Yale faculty with scientific and public health expertise protested the Covid pandemic response in March 2020. They predicted that it would lead to more population health suffering and death and include supply chain issues affecting commodities, such as computer chips and baby formula: When 800 Mainstream US Scientists Warned Against Lockdowns by Edward Stringham, Brownstone Institute. May 24, 2022.

Sadly, warnings from similarly expert authorities on risk assessment about the negative impact of the Covid vaccines on the population, especially on young people, are being ignored in Spring 2022: On the use of the Pfizer and the Moderna COVID-19 mRNA vaccines in children and adolescents. Michael Palmer, MD Sucharit Bhakdi, MD, and Wolfgang Wodarg, MD. Doctors4CovidEthics.org  April 29, 2022.