Enough of Enemies; Enough of Loot and Plunder!

The fact is that one of the instinctive roles of male humans is to defend the territory. Because the territory has food on it. Defending the territory and its food is a matter of life and death.

But, since the Industrial Revolution food is something humans buy with money. Therefore, access to or control of food-bearing territory is not a matter of life and death.

If we apply Nazi Carl Schmitt's dictum that the political is the distinction between friend and enemy, we can see that it used to make complete sense. Friend is someone that shares the food-bearing territory and fights to defend it; enemy is someone threatening to take away our food-bearing territory.

So when, e.g., Frederick the Great of Brandenburg invaded Silesia in 1740 it was not about defending Brandenburg's food-growing territory but it was about increasing the area of food-growing territory over which Fred could rule and tax. It worked out well for Our Fred, and he was a decent flute player that liked to play music of an evening. Of course, it could be that he sent the wrong message to the future rulers of Germany.

Then came the Industrial Revolution.

Then came Stalin. He starved the peasants of the Ukraine so he could buy industrial equipment from the West. Way to go, Joe.

Then came Adolf Hitler. He believed that Germany needed Lebensraum to grow food for its people. In the East. But Germany was an industrial nation that could buy its food as long as it wasn't in a world war.

Not a good idea, Adolf.

Now, of course, ever since World War II, our global elite has decided that nations and national leaders are literally Hitler, and it is their sacred duty to stop Literally Hitlers anywhere they rear their mustachioed heads.

But, our global leaders are still acting like male humans defending their territory. All across the world leaders during the late COVID emergency have been acting like male humans defending territory, issuing orders to the troops -- er, ordinary citizens -- to keep in line, to wear their uniform masks, get their vaccinations. Or else go to the brig. Just like the GIs in World War II.

And after the War on COVID our leaders are proposing to bravely lead us to Build Back Better with a whole raft of programs to dish benefits out to the people. And mobilize for the Next World War, the Green New Deal that will decarbonize the world before it's too late.

Needless to say, those that get on board with the new World War Green will be handsomely rewarded. Others will pay for their armed insurrection.

The thing that keeps bothering me is that, whether we are talking about hunter-gatherer bands in the Amazon rain forest or the cult followers of the World Economic Forum, Klaus Schwab, proprietor, we are talking about the same thing.

First there is the enemy to be defeated before it's too late. And then there are the glorious perks to all the faithful friends and followers.

In other words, whenever politics is involved it is always about the enemy, and then always about rewarding the followers. Just like in the Amazon rain forest. Just like with feudal lords and their retainers. Just like the Soviet leaders and their nomenklatura. Just like western leaders and their loyal deep state.

But, you only need to mobilize against the enemy when your life depends on the continued possession of food-growing territory. If you are growing food to sell, if you are making stuff to sell, if you are doing anything in the modern economy, you don't need to defend your food-growing territory. What is more, it doesn't make any sense to invade a country and plunder its resources and sell its inhabitants into slavery. They will benefit you much more doing what they are already doing and selling it to you. That's because 80 percent of wealth in the modern economy is "intangible capital" which is a fancy way of saying the knowledge and skills of humans.

Do you understand what I am saying? I am saying that the modern state with its compulsions, its endless partisan squabbling, its gigantic loot and plunder operation -- that in the developed world means something from one third to one half of gross domestic product -- is an echo from the past, the past of primitive humans that lived and died on food-growing territory that they defended with their lives. That's why I call it the Great Reaction.

Loot and plunder? The last major loot and plunder operation that I know of was the looting and plundering of eastern Germany by the Soviet Union after World War II. How did that work out, Joe Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev, Mikhail Gorbachev?

See my point? If you are in the enemy plus loot and plunder game you ain't doing yourself a favor. Although of course, you do get to drive your enemies before you and hear the lamentation of their women. If that's how you get your jollies.

The next Big Thing for humans is to get beyond the primitive culture of enemies and loot and plunder for the friends.

But I don't know how we get there.