Power and responsibility: they need to go hand in hand

 

     "With great power comes great responsibility". I suspect there aren't a lot of people (globally) who have not seen, or heard, that phrase. It did not originate with Spider-Man, of course, but the character has certainly made it much more widely known.

     So many plots in books, especially spy or science fiction genre books, seem to have the antagonist wanting to "take over the world". This makes sense to me only from a fragmented perspective. If you divide the power from the responsibility -- power without responsibility -- then I can see it as a goal of the evil villain. The world, and all its people and contents, as personal playthings to do whatever they want to do. The thought sends shivers up my spine. And there have been such people in history although they have never had the global power that they might have sought.

     But power WITH responsibility? It is not surprising to me that, upon looking at the photographs of most US Presidents before and after their time in office, there is a lot more grey hair, a lot more wrinkles, a lot more mileage.

     Power paired with responsibility varies a lot of course -- in depth and breadth. If I am in charge of taking care of a paraplegic then the great reliance grants power and, in turn, enormous responsibility. If I am in charge of the wellbeing of a thousand children at a school, I have less power per individual as they each continue to have a degree of power in themselves but the aggregate power and responsibility is considerable.

     That responsibility enforces its own requirements. When my business partner and I started our company, we sometimes had cash flow problems. As corporate leaders, when that happened, our paychecks disappeared so that we could continue to pay bills and send out paychecks to our people. I was lucky that, at the time, I was single and without others to depend upon me. Ramen noodles are easier to spread out over a month with one person than when there are others, used to a more nutritionally rounded meal, who depend upon you.

     But, it is a balancing act. We never reached the point where dire divisions of cash flow were required but we did have to look at the future and, at one point, had to layoff some of our very knowledgeable, experienced, staff. Otherwise, the projected future cash flow would have forced much more stringent needs upon us. If our savings had hit such a low that my business partner and I could no longer have survived without income, it would have been necessary to reduce everyone's paycheck such that we could have participated in that reduced income.

     The point is that we were responsible to, and for, all of the people within the company and choices always had to have their needs in mind at all times. Luckily, we never went public or we would also have had the needs of the stockholders in mind also.

     I spoke of breadth and depth. Superman (in one version within the DC mulitverse) had the power to destroy a planet. NOT destroying planets was one aspect of responsibility but there was no way to leverage that power to be able to take care of eight billion individuals. He had one aspect of depth of power but did not have the breadth of power for the needs of all of the living creatures.

     With great power should come great responsibility. When it doesn't, it is a severe problem. Power comes in many forms and many degrees but it should align with appropriate responsibilities.

The Fragility of Life

     Growing up, I was not in the very bottom of the the U.S.'s income classes but, as discussed in my blog on Democratic class structures, we were in the lower income region. This basically meant that we survived but we never quite knew how we were going to survive. Each day was a recognition that my father might not have a job after the end of that day, my mother might be heading out again to find yet another service job, and that it might even mean moving once again. But, in comparison to many, I was still lucky and blissfully ignorant of how bad it might be -- I always had food, shelter, clothing and, although I was aware of those who did not have such, since I had always had them, I still mostly felt that I would continue to have them.

     This stays with me, on a daily basis, as part of my individual psyche. Each day when I go to work, I recognize that I might not have a job when I come back. When I spend money I am concerned as to whether I am saving enough -- do I REALLY need that item -- or should it go into savings? But, if I put it into investments or savings, is it really safe? Should I, instead, live fully with my income as it is and just live with the reality that it might go away at any moment?

     Life is insecure. Life is fragile.

     My children haven't faced that environment and it is both good and bad. They don't have the fears and they do have a feeling of security. On the other hand, it is hard for them to really understand how others can be so concerned about their ability to live into the future. Empathy is also more difficult when you have always had store-made shoes in which to walk.

     Life is fragile. It can be fragile because you are aware that a job is something that not everyone has and which you might not have after the end of the day. Some groups face something even more directly tangible -- you might be dead because someone feeling anger, fear, or hatred decides to kill you as you walk along the street.

     Recognizing that life may end at a moment's notice affects the way people live. You live each day as best as you can -- or you give up (either option is possible with, in addition, complex mixing of both). You embrace family while, at the same time, you cherish them each day because either you, or they, may be lost before tomorrow. Or you reject family -- afraid of the pain that will occur if you lose them. You may live life loudly -- shouting instead of speaking -- out of joy of life. Or you may retreat into your own world drawing up the blanket to hope that the angels of death and misery will pass you by. Everything may be met with a laugh, perhaps your best shield against the pain and fear. Or there may be a blank face to the world trying to never give offense, never be noticed.

     In regions of the world where war and poverty are more prevalent on a daily basis, life is seen as ghostly. You don't name your children until they are one or two years old because the chances are good they won't live that long. Material objects become meaningless (or everything) because a bomb may take them away as you are sleeping. Knowledge becomes more important because, most of the time, that cannot easily be taken. At the same time, the ability to survive may be paramount and leave no time or energy for seeking out knowledge that is not able to be immediately put to use.

     Daily awareness, conscious or subconscious, of life's fragility molds the way many of us live our lives on a day to day basis. We may fight for greater opportunities and equality of treatment. Or we may take the other end of the teeter-totter and hold tight to what we have and denying others out of fear of loss of our own -- the fear of scarcity. We may look around and decide to blame others for our situation. Or we may look around and recognize what we do have and embrace that.

     As difficult as being aware of life's fragility may make life -- lack of awareness, in my opinion, is much worse. No fear for the future because it exists as a tantamount right and anything done to stay on top of the mountain is as natural as water running downstream. Everyone else deserves to be in an inferior, lesser, position, because the divine right of ownership and leadership belongs to oneself. If you have the power to do what will benefit you then you use it for such. More is never enough because you are entitled to it all.

     I don't have any decent arguments that indicate that reincarnation is a reality -- but it is something in which I WANT to believe. Each of us is placed in life with certain obstacles (even being rich can be an obstacle depending on the definition of the goal) and we struggle forward. Wouldn't it be nice to have further chances with newer, possibly less difficult, obstacles as we give it another try?