The look on their face, eh?
They seem so surprised.
In our “hunting and gathering” days, this scene would have been much more interesting.
In those seemingly long ago days, when our ancestors lived in relatively small groups and flourished within native habitats….our ancestors personally knew their “leaders”. This was true because the leaders lived among them on a daily basis. Leaders were part of the pack.
These leaders ascended to a top level of responsibility among the group, usually through some combination of hard work, intelligence, creativity, bravery and wisdom.
We were very picky about “leadership” in those days.
By and large, these leaders consistently acted on behalf of the overall group’s survival, and approached their critical leadership role as a sacred and honorable duty. They also knew they would be under constant observation by the pack, as there were not many distractions for the pack in those days.
However, in the rare instance that a leader began hoarding food, or other critical resources, or acting in other dishonest ways that were not in the best interests of the entire group’s well being – they were simply confronted by the pack.
In a time of day-to day-survival, this type of betrayal was considered attempted murder. The consequences for blatant dishonesty by a leader were usually swift, severe and unforgiving, and often included dismemberment/and or death at the hands of the pack.
Needless to say, it’s easy to understand how accountability by the leaders was the norm. This norm lasted for eons of human evolution.
Then, since the relatively recent dawn of agriculture, a distancing between the leaders and the pack began to escalate to now: a time when the majority of humanity on Earth now lives crammed into grossly artificial habitats known as “cities” and “suburbs”, governed by so called “leaders”.
In fact, never before in the entire history of the human species, have so few been able to control so many. Welcome to 2011.
Today, we only “think” we know our leaders.
In the Information Age, we see their faces on TV, hear their voices, and read about them on the Internet. So on a subconscious level, our brain tells us we “know” our leaders.
And since 99.9 % of our evolutionary existence occurred in a “hunting and gathering” mode, our brain, even among the most cynical of us, subconsciously still tells us to “trust” these leaders……provided these they tell us what we want to hear, and seem on “our side”.
So to this day, our brains remain wired at a primal level to know and trust our leaders.
The reality today, of course, is that we don’t “know” our highest leaders from Adam.
And never will.
The reality today is that vast majority of us will never see these leaders in person, much less sit with them, work with them, eat with them, or talk with them. In fact, often time the people we think are our leaders, are nothing but puppets controlled by more powerful leaders.
In effect, our leaders today, especially our highest ones, could literally be holograms, and we would never know the difference.
Don’t think most our current leaders don’t realize all of this.
And exploit it to their advantage.
They know we are busy and easily distracted.
And disconnected from Nature. And divided from each other.
They actually prefer all of this, take it for granted, and often consciously promote it.
Getting “voted out of office”, which is rare, or being terminated but given a “golden parachute”, is not adequate “accountability” if we are talking about the well being and/or very survival of the pack – the “pack” now being the entire human race.
The leaders will be so suprised.