How Intellectual Dependency Affects A Nation
In an ideal society, the authority or elders will encourage people to follow their conscience even when it goes against them. If everyone in the society is governed by a common set of principles, it becomes established that loyalty towards the authority must not supersede ethics. But our definition of success is to rise to a position where everyone submits to our commands without asking any questions. We see compromise as a sign of weakness, be that as a parent, a teacher, or the authority of any kind. As we grow up, we become so used to becoming dominated by others, we cannot wait to be in a position to do that to others.
When life is embraced by common ideals and tradition led by idealistic individuals, man learns to sacrifice his motives for the sake of others. Breaking the shackles of society’s order will surely lead to the demoralization of men. Without social hierarchy, we may not grow our sense of good or bad. Society teaches us rights and wrongs but I believe moral laws can only guide us when we follow them out of our conscience, not as orders by our superiors. When we know the reasons why they were established, we can review our actions when they contradict our morality. Only when we learn to interpret the natural laws on our own, can we learn to apply them in our life. Then our morality can work as an inner constitution.
But if we do not possess a sound moral sense, and follow orders only because we are told they are good, we become intellectually dependent on paternalism and want them to do the thinking for us. As a result, when we come across situations where we need to make impartial judgments, we make judgments out of prejudices set by our superiors. If the orders instructed onto us by the pathernalism, and are not validated by ourselves, there will be higher chances of authoritarian selfish motives being clad within them. Although “chain of command” may be the appropriate culture in most organizations, there should be a “check and balance” system from down to top. A better culture would be to follow your superiors, but only when their actions do not defy the common principles.
As intellectually dependent, people do not possess the moral intellectuality to challenge others through argument and so they feel like using force to prove their point. They feel hostile to the people who share different ideologies. As we move farther from civilized discussions and toward brute force, we destroy the concept of meritocracy and loyalty becomes more important than capability. In this juncture of a nation, two distinctive features are prominent. One is the silence of the intellectuals, as their ideas are not valued anymore and the second is the death of art and literature. Because everyone becomes so afraid to strike a nerve, to offend the established ideas, that the artists and writers intentionally become mediocre.
If a political organization does not stand upon any specific ideals but focuses completely on hierarchical allegiance, and loyalty to the highest order is considered more sacred than following the moral code, then party members become intellectually dependent on their leaders. A political party is not supposed to be run like a company with a CEO. Political parties should work as a shelter for like-minded people who all share some common ideas (For example: the Republican Party in America stands on the ideas of limited government, God-given rights, and the founding principles) on how to govern a country. If we put too much faith in the authority, it is easy for them to manipulate us into doing their dirty work in the name of ideals.
Another symptom that comes with ignorance is pride. There are people who pride themselves as defenders of their beliefs. How? You can see them mostly on social media. They pick fights in the comment sections at the slightest provocations. But their arguments do not focus on why their ideas are good (as clearly most of them have no idea why), but as someone had told them they are good, now they feel a sense of pride to force others to believe in the same principles as theirs without explaining good reasons. This is why understanding your own principles are so important.
But perhaps worse than having no principles at all is having a biased morality. It is when people have a moral system but use it to satisfy their prejudiced views. For example, if an immoral action serve the selfish motives of such a person, he will justify it. He will twist the words of his principles to fit any narrative that is convenient to him. These kinds of people are the worst. Because when you don’t have a moral sense, you do not know right and wrong. But people with biased morality rationalize anything using their flawed idea of moral code. Unfortunately, in a society where people cannot think for themselves, the morally biased ones become the leaders.
When intellectual dependency reaches saturation, the society becomes completely authoritarian. At this stage, if the authority says two plus two equals five, the supporters will believe and preach it enthusiastically. The minority may know it to be wrong but would not dare protest it.
To encourage intellectual freedom, civilized debate is important. You cannot convince someone of some idea by holding a gun onto their head. When we say things like, you cannot say this or that, people may not speak of those out of fear, but we do not magically stop people from thinking about them. And as their ideas are banned, that means there is no one to tell them that their ideas are bad. Intellectuality starts with the right to disagree and when thst right taken away, ignorance takes over. Banning so-called bad ideals means barring the counter logic against them. We can only change peoples’ minds not by silencing them, but by proving that their ideas are stupid.
