Fear is the Lock

At the back of certain kinds of success is the fear, not of failure, but of less success. In Atlantis, where the Priests of the White have held sway for fifty years and more, the loss of even one small district out of the Eighty is occasion for breast-beating (or chest-thumping, which is even more distasteful). Accordingly, as with all normal humans, the fear of a negative sensation has led the Priesthood to find better ways of reducing the likelihood of such.

As we learnt in the Halls of Training, in the Priesthood of Learning, there are four ways of supplying motive (I shall not say 'motivate' here):

• reward — supplying what is desired when the subject meets positive criteria
• punishment — supplying what is undesired when the subject meets negative criteria
• withholding reward — not supplying what is desired when the subject meets negative criteria
• withholding punishment — not supplying what is undesired when the subject meets positive criteria

It is always good to teach people such things so that they know how they might be manipulated. It is clear that the situation that I outlined at the beginning of this post is one based on fear of not having enough success, and being punished for it in terms of loss of ego, and perhaps sense of entitlement and/or privilege.

Till this day, amused outsider that I am, I have failed to see how increasing the size of authority blocs helps bring better representation and flexibility to those under authority. It is like saying that putting more generals in one room makes their armies work better, even though all the generals were chosen to think the same way. I've seen this in the Citadel of the Wyverns before, and those who have passed through its portals in the last few years will know what I mean.

I remember sitting at a meeting in which I said the f-word. Immediately, the Boss pounced on it. "What? Who is frightened? We are not frightened! What do you mean?!"

I was amazed at the response. I had meant that the general population might not be as sanguine about new directions as we were. And then it clicked: he was genuinely afraid and angry that I had apparently noticed it. Ho ho. Such is life.

It's all about fear. And you can smell the metallic, acidic tang of it in the air at certain times. Those times are beginning again. I shall need more Earl Grey tea.