It is not surprising that the lambs should bear a grudge against the great birds of prey, but that is no reason for blaming the great birds of prey for taking the little lambs. And when the lambs say among themselves, "These birds of prey are evil, and he who least resembles a bird of prey, who is rather its opposite, a lamb,—should he not be good?" then there is nothing to carp with in this ideal's establishment, though the birds of prey may regard it a little mockingly, and maybe say to themselves, "We bear no grudge against them, these good lambs, we even love them: nothing is tastier than a tender lamb. - Nietzsche
Trying to bring some order to my considerations of power and the traumas of powerlessness I begin by considering the experience of a 15 year old girl, attacked and traumatized by older stronger boys who laugh off her terror. It certainly could be any number of 15 year old girls; sadly, this is not a rare tragedy.
Such an experience is a shock to her system, to her nascent belief that she has agency, that she can determine the direction of her life. The opposite of what we want to encourage in all young people starting out in life. We want them to feel empowered; that their lives matter, that their feelings matter.
And then, to add further insult to terrible injury, her abusers continue to lead privileged, empowered lives. The injustice of this equation of power and powerlessness adds to the trauma. Not only did the experience damage her sense of agency and identity but the fact that she continues to bear the damage done to her while her abusers go on apparently feeling no consequences whatsoever for the damage they inflicted.
She comes to think this must mean, therefore, that she is worthless, that she doesn’t matter in the least, since not only did she suffer an attack against her person, but that attack went unpunished. Not only unpunished but unmentioned. She feels worthless, disempowered and filled with shame. Her life is poised on the edge of unravelling.
Perhaps, she is one of the lucky ones that somehow finds a way through her suffering. Finds a way to move from victim to survivor. Finds a way to begin to feel empowered, like she should have been from the beginning. It has been a long, difficult struggle but she can be proud that she has overcome her childhood trauma. The scars are still there, but her life has become meaningful and worth living.
She can’t get there by denying what happened to her. By repressing the memories or denying the truth of what happened to her. The truth of her experience is necessary and expressing it to someone who cares is vitally important to make that transition from victim to survivor. Luckily she has found people who care enough to listen and support her in regaining a sense of empowerment. Not all girls who have experienced such things find this kind of support and their lives do, sadly, unravel.
So now, years later, her abuser becomes a Big Shot, a VIP. Someone, say, being brought to the attention of the President of the United States and given the rare honor of consideration for the Supreme Court.
She is now in a crisis. How can she be true to her experience of what this abuser did to her and remain silent when he is being singled out for such a high honor. Maybe, she has gained enough sense of herself, enough empowerment, that she can gather up the courage to speak out about those things done to her so many years ago and call attention to the dark underside of that man of high esteem.
So she tells truth to power.
And this is when her experience becomes part of a much larger and longer story. It is a story of disempowerment and empowerment, of truth and lies and a larger, crucial philosophical question about the relationship between truth and power.
Philosophers have grappled with this relationship for thousands of years. Even back in Ancient Greece, with Homer: “woe to the conquered.” Those in power conquer and impose their will upon the conquered. The strong privileged boys impose their will upon the weaker, vulnerable girl and she bears the consequences. Might makes right.
I feel a deep sense of injustice about this state of affairs that has just played itself out on our national stage. Truth doesn’t matter, what matters is power. Might makes right. It is clear and obvious in this tragic, national farce; rebrutalizing the trauma of a young girl - now become a woman of accomplishment and dignity.
But her experience can’t be true, because it impugns the honor of a Big Shot on the national stage. He must be right, simply because he has more power than her. His lies don’t matter.
But now, instead of discussion and argument, brute force rises up to the rescue of discomfited error, and crushes truth and right into the dust. 'Might makes right,' and hoary folly totters on in her mad career escorted by armies and navies. - Adin Ballou
In their “righteous” anger at her courage our leaders revealed this equation clearly:
Boy, you all want power. God, I hope you never get it. - Lindsey Graham
That’s what they want, power and control. We are not going to give it to them. - Trump
It is a battle for power and nothing else matters, especially the truth. The victim - now become survivor - and the truth of her experience is collateral damage. She is once again told she is worthless. The truth of her experience, and truth itself, in general, becomes meaningless in the face of the manipulations of the powerful. Lies told by a powerful man are waved away and the truth told by an abused woman is attacked and disparaged.
The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command. His heart sank as he thought of the enormous power arrayed against him, the ease with which any Party intellectual would overthrow him in debate, the subtle arguments which he would not be able to understand, much less answer. And yet he was in the right! They were wrong and he was right.
The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power… Power is not a means; it is an end… not power over things, but over men [and women]… In our world there will be no emotions except fear, rage, triumph, and self-abasement…There will be no loyalty, except loyalty toward the Party. There will be no love, except the love of Big Brother…Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless. If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face forever. - 1984
And I imagine a boot stamping on my face, stamping on the faces of all of us who look, in disbelief, at how bald-faced lies were disregarded in an unfettered struggle for power. Disbelief at how the truth was shown to be the least of the considerations of those in power. And this was shown quite openly and brazenly on the national stage.
totalitarian movements conjure up a lying world of consistency which is more adequate to the needs of the human mind than reality itself; in which, through sheer imagination, uprooted masses can feel at home and are spared the never-ending shocks which real life and real experiences deal to human beings and their expectations. The force possessed by totalitarian
propaganda… lies in its ability to shut the masses off from the real world… - Hannah Arendt (The Origins of Totalitarianism)
The aide said that guys like me were 'in what we call the reality-based community,' which he defined as people who 'believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.' [...] 'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors...and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do’. - Ron Suskind (2004)