My last culture post was about Greater Fear Theory. This post extends this idea to nations.
I think we are often concerned with the world around us. Changing ourselves can be scary, so we look at changing our situation so it can avoid setting off our negative triggers, and can set off our positive triggers.
But there are times when changing society can be beneficial. Especially when it is done for the needs of others. (See next post on What Thailand Needs, coming up in 2 weeks)
There's no doubt that sometimes the collective values we hold can cause suffering to others, or even ourselves. Having lived in Thailand for 3 years now, I can attest that the western drive to always be somebody "special" and better than others has led to an erosion of community. It's more unusual for people to be lonely here and much easier to find people to support them and help them. Many people are also happier with a comfortable "average" life leading to less stress and all the problems that go along with it. I think modern countries should do better than dismissing countries like Thailand as "less developed" and try to learn from what is good here.
But in Thailand there are major problems, and part of it comes from an unwillingness to confront the uncomfortable things in life (the Sabai Sabai life). There are 1000s of illegal abortions, domestic abuse cases, drink driving deaths and emotionally based shootings in this country every year. And that's partly to do with the fact that many Thais don't want to be a buzzkill.
No matter what country you are from however, there are problems to face. And sometimes they get avoided because the populace fall into a comfortable complacency. And here greater fear theory works on a national level.
This can be initiated by people, or as "unintentional events".
Often when it is initiated by people (normally politicians), the results are bad. Nazi Germany was founded on the fear of inferior races like Jewish people and tried to eliminate them. World war 2 imperial Japan was founded on the fear of inferior Asian cultures that needed to be cleansed and educated in Japanese ways. In both these cases, the average German or Japanese wouldn't have committed the atrocities they did. But they were afraid.
The USA went to war in WWII and this ended the great depression. It's a tactic that has been used by American presidents ever since. Unfortunately they are starting only now to realize that a war is only stimulates the economy if that economy is based on manufacturing.
People know these events and so rightly are very concerned the use of fear in politics. But can fear be used for good?
In my last post, the death of my mother through cancer was a shock that pushed me into a life where I am now much happier and more joyful than ever. It was not an "intentional" event. Let's look at unintentional outcomes in some nations.
Germany has rebuilt itself on the concept of co-operation rather than dominance. WWII was horrible for German citizens as well as other Europeans. This memory has created a collective fear about centralized political control and propaganda. They now have one of the freest medias in the world and are deeply focused on getting EU members to co-operate.
Japan has recovered from the devastation to become one of the world's leading trading nations. Together with Germany, they are the worlds top advocates for nuclear demilitarization and global peace initiatives.
They do this because the results of war have been real and immediate to them. In the US, the battle ground has always been somewhere far away, and so this hasn't prompted a change in behavior there. We can see the result of the twin towers attack, which while tragic, it was a tiny number of casualties on their soil compared to what happened in Europe or in Asia (the Japanese are believed to have massacred over 20 million people in North Eastern China during WWII).
These have all been events that were never intended. But the reality of them and the immediacy of their results told the population that change needs to happen, and it needs to happen now.
I don't advocate that any of us seek to create some horrible event to initiate change. We have a remarkable gift for imagination that allows us a preview of events without having to "buy the ticket". But it does help understand why some nations don't appear to want to change. They're comfortable.
Many of the nations that have undergone great changes have had some horrible historical events. I believe this is what has kicked people out of their complacency and on a move towards a better future.
Some countries never get out of this change and suffer from repeated atrocities, like ethnic conflicts in some African countries. Which shows that fear is enough to initiate change, but benevolence is needed to use it for good.
