Control of Society: Is This Ultimately Destructive?

Control of society by bureaucracy, is this killing endeavour?

Why are risks attractive to most yet opposed by bureaucrats?

We are now officially encouraged to avoid risks, even emergency services are told they must make a risk assessment before taking emergency and urgent action. Bureaucracy in action. Health and Safety has become an excuse to controlling so much of what we do. Local administrations claim they can not do something because of “health and safety”, yet if this is questioned or examined, it will be found that in many cases this is an excuse to not undertake some work. Activities that have been carried out a hundred times without serious harm to anyone, are now routinely banned by local authorities who do not want to spend money supporting an event that is popular with local people. They claim that they can not get insurance, or that they must not put themselves in a position of responsibility for an event they do not control; and this last bit is the centre of the thinking. Control, bureaucracies the whole world over, hate not being in control. They hate this because it may demand they think new thoughts, deal with new situations and this pushes them outside the core of all bureaucratic idealism, which is all things must follow a precedent. They can pass responsibility on to previous administrations if they follow precedents. A new situation demanding original or in any way creative thought, is absolute hell to time serving officials.

The real reason people take risks, especially physical ones, is the thrill you get. The feeling of being outside the dull boring normality of life. Riding a powerful motorcycle at speed, driving a high powered car fast through corners, the feeling of actually being in control of your own destiny, the alertness of consciousness the feeling of being actually awake to every nuance of the situation; that is why people take personal physical, risks.

Motor racing, mountain climbing, skydiving, bungee jumping are all activities where risk is known and great efforts are made to lessen the consequences of a mistake but every participant knows that injury and death can be the consequence if anything goes wrong. They know this but accept that chance in exchange for the excitement, the thrill, that adrenaline rush of knowing your own skill or capacity to resist panic, are what keeps you from harm.

In ancient times, much of everyday activity contained high degrees of risk, hunting with a spear or bow and arrow could end up with you being dead and your prey getting away. In medieval times, warfare involving face-to-face battles were common, even more risky was drinking water in a town without sanitation. The capriciousness of the elite rulers meant everyone who had a religion or an opinion was at risk.

The world wars taught us that there was no safety in being a non combatant, bombs and missiles meant everyone was a target. While the cold war kept us all mindful of these risk; the generation now coming in to positions of power and responsibility, have not lived with this experience of being constantly at risk of destruction.

The modern world is so dull and even argument is restricted, conformity and compliance are not just regarded as good but as essential to ordered life. The brilliant but wayward eccentric, the maverick but sublimely gifted actor, are now buried under mountains of rules and expectations of mediocrity. They can be cursed and punished for “inappropriate behaviour”, years after a drunken spree, there need be no evidence or trial. Their risk taking has to be suppressed, they must conform.

Risk taking has now become an act of rebellion, of defiance against our overcrowded and over regulated society. The petty criminals who use small motorised bikes to robe and steal, know that they do not actually risk great punishment if caught. They can have a thrill of risk taking while knowing that in reality, they will come to very little harm whatever happens. May be if they thought an intended victim carried a gun and would use it in self defence, these petty thieves would consider the risk too great and find some other way of relieving their boredom. If they actually believed they would be caught and serve ten years in jail, they would think again.

These criminals are a product of the way society is controlled and managed now, they are taught from childhood that nothing is their fault, that they have no responsibility for anything. They are also led to believe that society will take care of them, and that they are protected from harm. They are led to believe that if they are injured in the course of their criminal activities, they can find a “no win no fee” lawyer who will sue the authorities or the intended victim, for them.

Computer games also suggest this idea that you may kill and destroy others but even if you fail to escape, the worst thing is game over. The sense that you can risk hurting others without risk of hurt to yourself is engendered powerfully.

This is the crazy world the anti risk bureaucrats have constructed. Any sane logic would have impressed on everyone that, if you are engaged in criminal activity, then you are out side of the law and so outside of all rights and protections of that law. If this was the norm, as it should be, then we would see a change in the risk taking by juvenile criminals.

This is why a risk adverse future is dangerous, it encourages irresponsible and bad behaviour, by suggesting that there is no down side, no punishment that will follow their wrongful activity. It is also stifling creativity, progress, new thinking and the expansion of human ability.