An Essay
Friends,
Romans, countrymen! All people, like Gaul, are divided into three
parts! These are the three personality types that dominate human beings.
Each personality type
is named after an animal totem that best exemplifies that type:
"'Sheeple', Canines, Felines." Please note that some individuals will
exhibit perhaps more than one of the types earlier in life, but one
specific type usually comes to eventually dominate, most often early on,
and especially as a person ages. However, extraordinary circumstances
might "awaken" a sleeping trait, so beware.
"Sheeple", "Canines" and "Felines"
The Sheeple are of course the majority, the sheep-people, bah-bahing
through life. They're followers, following each other one-by-one till
they form a group, always following their leaders (who are usually
Canines, rarely a Feline). Sheeple are by far the most numerous of the
three types. Perhaps they're mostly born that way, though I am certain
the modern state-imposed educational apparatus does its very best
to stamp out any potential Felines (Felines are just too dangerous; see
below). The modern educational system is definitely NOT going to turn
out Socrates, Aristotle, or Thomas Jefferson, not if it can prevent it.
(Richard Feynman, the famous American physicist, has a quote about that,
somewhere.)
Sheeple or Buffalo?
Essential
to being a Sheeple is that Sheeple don't question orders; they obey.
They'll obey people in authority, whether or not those people deserve
that authority over others. Any "argument from authority" is OK by them.
Or I mean, that's the usual way sheeple are – perhaps a
clever Feline can get them to question orders. Perhaps Canines can push
Sheeple far enough that they "break" and "stampede." Difficult, to be
sure, but not impossible. Sheeple are usually not going to cause
trouble, but then again, circumstances can arise – rarely – when the Sheeple turn into rampaging buffaloes. For a short time.
Now,
don't get me wrong: Sheeple have minds, souls, the innate dignity of
being human; they can be smart or dumb, "educated" in modern society's
understanding of "education", or not. They can be knowledgeable about
particular things, and competent in keeping a technological civilization
running whether as plumbers, technicians, or engineers. They can be good people, they can be bad people, they can be the worst of people, they can be the best of people – well, in absolute moral
terms. They can, of course, be the "best" people in a shallow wealthy
society sense, naturally enough; but if so, they inherited their wealth
and position rather than garnered it by being inventive entrepreneurs.
Sheeple just aren't (usually) risk-takers.
Wolf or Guard Dog?
The Canines are either shepherds or wolves. Fewer in number than Sheeple, they dominate – or try to – the other two groups. Canines
are always leaders of the Sheeple and are proud they're not Sheeple!
But then again, many Canines question their orders no more than the
Sheeple do; HOWEVER, unlike the Sheeple, the Canines have a
higher likelihood of rebeling against authority. Sometimes moral Canines
will do this in order to do what is right and needful because they're
good shepherds and moral leaders; alas, usually they rebel in order
merely to seize the power of authority for themselves.
Canines
have a certain edginess about themselves. They think they're dominant,
"top dogs" or "alphas" and "leaders of the pack." Or at least they seem
born with the urge to become policemen, soldiers, or those nasty kinds
of bureaucrats who love bossing other people about. You've all met the
type. (I had an uncle by marriage who was a nice guy except when he put
his Army uniform on. Then he became the worst kind of military
martinet.) Canines can be smart or dumb as well, they can be good or
bad, they serve as your friendly neighborhood cop or, also, the local
Stasi agent. (Again and again we've seen regular, everyday American
policemen – even elected sheriffs – abuse their authority during the Covid "lockdowns".)
Canines
can be exemplary clergymen "leading their flocks" or they can be
classic Pharisees. But again, though they take up their time bossing
people about, they do not often ask that pesky question: "Why?" (Unless
it is: "Why am I following this leader's orders? Why don't I jusr shoot
him and become leader myself?")
The Cats
The Felines do ask "Why" because they are the Cats, and, like their whiskered animal totem, they're curious. Few in number, they are inherently driven by
the notion that "the unexamined life is not worth living", as Socrates
("patron saint of Felines"), liked to say. Felines want to know the
"Why" of everything. And by definition they are more suspicious of
authority than either Sheeple or Canines. That's just who they are, who
they are born to be – if society doesn't beat it out of them! This
curiosity of theirs naturally makes them the utter pests of the Sheeple
and the Canines, especially the latter, for the Sheeple are usually
clueless about being curious although they find the Cats quite harmless
while the Canines are smart enough to know they're lacking something in
life. (It's partly why so many Canines are emotionally unbalanced, too,
naturally enough!) Also, to be sure, the Canines definitely DO NOT like
their shibboleths questioned. My personal experience over 60 years
confirms that Canines can become quite aggressive when you question the
current narrative (whatever that might be at a given time) whereas
Sheeple just smile and say, "Fancy that."
Canines will therefore react badly to pesky Felines, as they did with
Socrates himself, after all. They put him to death for, really, just
asking questions. (Doesn't this remind you of the current "race"
narratives being fostered or Covid situation? It is out of control in
politics, where curiosity about, say, the 2020 election can get you into
serious trouble with the authorities. Canines are very clearly trying
to "shut down" any Felines who question "the Party Line"; we see that in
a number of countries and states. It will get worse.)
Felines make up many – though not all, by any means –
of the world's philosophers: but I would think they make up most of the
artists, the inventors, the gamblers, entrepreneurs, and risk takers.
They also make up the quiet dreamer types noted for being an excellent
teacher in the classroom or "problem solver" in business. Once upon a
time, they made up the majority of journalists and scientists, but that is definitely no longer true.
The academic disciplines of science and journalism drive them out as
surely as any military or journalism traditionally drives them out, and
business will also drive them out, with vengeance.
Why?
In part because the Cats embarrass the "hacks" and "time servers" in
business, science or the military, or the propagandists in journalism;
and in part if they're ever actually listened to by Canines in
government, Felines can change the world.
Canines can't have that. It would disturb the "peace of mind" of the Sheeple, don't you know. (I'm being sarcastic.)
Examples:
The Military:
General
Patton and Napoleon Bonaparte are perfect examples of exemplary Cats
who engaged in the usually Canine Profession of the Military. They were
fantastic generals. Thus, of course, they were not popular with their
contemporary generals. They were
Felines in the military art and they embarrassed their Canine friends.
They were hated. (Napoleon dealt with that by making himself an emperor
but failed to establish a lasting regime. He was eventually exiled and
died not long after. A wide-spread belief is that Napoleon was murdered.
George Patton, however, was murdered even before he went into exile;
i.e. retired to the U.S.)
Such leaders are usually few, and they end up badly. This is true in the history of any military, for example, Ancient Rome. But just look at the Japanese military during WWII and consider Admiral Raizō Tanaka and General Tomoyuki Yamashita, the "Tiger of Malaysia". Brilliant military leaders indeed, these two garnered famous victories against impossible odds. (The Americans called Tanaka "Tenacious Tanaka".) However, these
two men were loathed by the leaders of Japan's military. And alas, the
Canine idiots had the power, and thus they sidelined both of these
extremely capable officers. Yamashita was brought back in a hopeless
situation toward the end of the war and ended up accused of war crimes
and executed in 1946. Admiral Tanaka peaceably retired post war and lived quietly in obscurity until 1969.
Finally,
two quick examples from U.S. history: U.S. Grant and William Tecumseh
Sherman were brilliant generals in the American Civil War,
but both men had actually been driven out of the Peacetime Army before
the war. (The extraordinary circumstances of the war allowed them back
in.)
The Canines in the Peacetime Army didn't want them because the two cats
were just too
clever. And also, I am sure, neither Grant nor Sherman liked being
bossed about by Canine "hacks",
and the two clever generals were probably utterly bored in the
Peacetime Army. (Similarly, had the French Revolution not happened,
Napoleon would have
never risen to be a colonel of artillery. Canines and Felines take
advantage of extraordinary circumstances.)
Examples
could be multiplied, but it is also true that we'll never know about
all those cats who were caged by canines before they were allowed to
gain any recognition for their "catness", or hammered down into the Sheeple.
In
Part Two of this essay, I'll consider the situation regarding the
discipline of science, because that is affecting all of us at the
moment, and will continue to do so, in ever more profound, and dire,
ways.
An Préachán
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