The ∞$VorV?∞ Scale

∞$VorV?∞ ... WTF?

Here are the questions that define this scale ...

Which side of my handy economic scale is our interdependent team living and working? Which side will we be living on and working on for the foreseeable future?

Are we creating a VICIOUS-CYCLE-DEPENDENT world of work? Or are we inducing VIRTUOUS CYCLES for every stakeholder in our economic game?

When MAGA killed the Republican Party in the United States of America, they made it clear. We can no longer describe the two political movements in the United States of America in the traditional 'left vs. right' framing. Conservative vs. Liberal doesn't work either.

This is a fascist society OR a flourishing society conversation.

Social scientist, historian, and author Riane Eisler is known for her best-selling book The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future. But her most recent book Nurturing Our Humanity: How Domination and Partnership Shape Our Brains, Lives, and Future (co-authored with anthropologist Douglas Fry) has had a huge influence on my art and the way I think about politics as well as our private sector.

Here is Dr. Eisler's version of an economic and political scale that better defines the ambitions of politicians and business leaders in the United States and everywhere else.

Partnership and Domination transcend conventional categories such as religious vs. secular, East vs. West, Right vs. Left, or Capitalist vs. Socialist. How closely a society orients to either end of the Partnership/Domination Scale affects all of our relations, from intimate to international.

The Politics of Partnership: Four Cornerstones, Dr. Riane Eisler

And this is why Right vs. Left framing for somebody like Trump does not work.

The domination configurations is found in repressive and violent societies – from secular cultures like Adolf Hitler’s rightist Germany, Joseph Stalin’s leftist USSR, and Kim Jong Un’s leftist North Korea to the Taliban, ISIS, and other fundamentalist religious cultures.

Despite their many differences, in all these societies, the ideal norm in both family and state is top-down authoritarian rule, a high degree of abuse and violence, and rigid male dominance.

The Partnership and Domination Societies published in the Encyclopedia of Violence, Peace & Conflict, Dr. Riane Eisler

Reminder, Trump is a superfan of all of these assholes.

One more important point from Dr. Eisler:

No human society is purely a domination system or a Partnership System; all are somewhere on the spectrum between these two possibilities.  Our task today is to move our institutions, policies, values, and practices further in the direction of Partnership.

Riane Eisler - Source

Which is the task and mission of this new media adventure.

Okay, so back to the stupid-looking symbol in the banner of this little corner of the interweb.

When I think of pyramid schemes, I think about outcomes. And every fascist playbook on the power/domination side of the Eisler continuum is a pyramid scheme.

So, for my economic scale, I am thinking about the outcomes that result from societies that live in a fascist state and those that don't.

I don't know about you, but I am not a fan of pyramid schemes.

Nobody who isn't living on the top floor of the pyramid wants to be caught in a pyramid scheme. This means that there is a fuckton of deception and manipulation that must occur for that scheme to work. And since the game is all about the extraction and hoarding of resources, 99.99% of society stuck in the scheme is hurt.

And too often, utterly destroyed.

So, authoritarians always create a malnourished servant class. I call this a VICIOUS-CYCLE-DEPENDENT society.

However, the other side of Eisler's Domination/Partnership Social Scale produces a far different world of work. Let's consider this dynamic on the extrinsic/intrinsic motivation scale. The domination edge of the scale is about greed. And this type of society produces greed in its ugliest form, which I'll refer to as a virus called Blind Rapacity.

Blind Rapacity—with power—always moves society backward. It results in monopolization and the rigging of essential markets.

But a few people on the top floor of the pyramid must be happy!

Right? Sometimes? Maybe?

Sure, there are the drugs, the parties, the jets, the yachts, all those beautiful #2's on pure golden thrones, etc. All of that Instagrammable bullshit produces smiles and a widespread belief that these rapacious assholes are happy.

But that story is almost always bullshit.

This is a vicious world without any true friends. Every relationship in this world is a transaction void of lasting partnerships. So these are all really lonely folks even though so many people follow their every word and every move.

It gets worse. This transactional world is a cutthroat, zero-sum world. So, beyond being stuck in a lonely existence, everybody at the gala and on the yacht is fucking scared that a knife from their "friend" is on its way to its destination. Their back.

Oh, and they are also fucking terrified that their mistress is going to barge in on the gala any minute with a tape.

Or they are fucking terrified that their trophy wife is now the trophy of a "friend."

Or they are fucking terrified that their own pyramid scheme might be exposed, the "friends" they have been pillaging will find out, and they will join their old "pal" Bernie Madoff in prison.

The worst part about all of their misery? They all think the next transaction and the next big "win" will eradicate all of their hidden misery. Instead, those transactions and "wins" worsen the world for every other living being trying to flourish on our otherwise miraculous pale blue spaceship.

And when these miserable assholes have power, this is really terrible for most of us puny humans.

When our world falls into the vicious vortex of the power and domination side of Eisler's continuum, everybody else but the top floor is forced to do the work demanded of those on the top floors.

Some do this work because they are desperate to move to the top floor, but most of us do it because we are just trying to survive on the floors we are stuck on.

There is very little meaning in those bottom floors of the pyramid and very little joy. It is consumed by drudgery and survival. And all these folks are just trying not to fall into Maslow's dungeon.

But this is not about Maslow's pyramid. In the pyramid designed by the pursuit of power, there is no joy or self-fulfillment on the top floor. In this scheme, Maslow's pyramid looks more like a couple of buildings in NYC that stood proudly ... until 9/11.

But on the other end of Eisler's continuum is the magical and regenerative fuel of human curiosity. When unlocked and unleashed, this fuel creates an intrinsically rewarding world of work. Sure, everybody in this society is happy to get their well-deserved paychecks, but that is not WHY work is done on this side of this scale. The WHY is in the curiosity that fuels local communities and society as a whole forward.

So, this is a VIRTUOUS-CYCLE-INDUCING world of work

Since this is not a zero-sum based transactional world, Partnership Societies move society forward.

Life is an infinite game, and in the zero-sum players game, we, the puny humans, might not get to play for much longer, but life will keep playing.

But since life is an infinite game, in a world run by partnerships and the regenerative fuel of curiosity, we, not-so-puny humans, will get to play the infinite game of life for a long fucking time.

So, I arrive at two simple questions.

V? Or V?

V? Is the economy designed to optimize the most rapacious of our teammates? OR!? V? Is the economy designed to optimize the health and well-being of our entire fucking team?

OR?! I guess there is one more choice. We can all live in and work in that vast and complex gray zone that far too much of the American economic game lives in today.

But it does not have to be this way going forward.

Here is my interpretation of Eisler's Power vs. Partnership dynamic.

I think about this symbol as a compass.

• A compass that can help guide our votes for who we send to town/city councils, school boards, state offices, our nation's Capitol, and the people's Oval Office.
• A compass that can also serve as a guide that helps shape every government policy.

This isn't just a tool for government. A flourishing government needs a flourishing private sector, and vice versa.

• This compass can guide those of us with entrepreneurial dreams.
• This compass can also illuminate the way forward for old businesses so they remain vibrant, modern, essential, and beneficial to their customers.
• This compass can even guide the essential work done by our non-profit enterprises (while keeping them from turning into tax avoidance scams for the rich).

Perhaps most importantly, this symbol can be used to examine the policies that our politicians have passed, the business models that our business leaders have introduced into our world, and the benefits or harms that result from them all.

This symbol can explore the effectiveness of our past actions and then turn back into a compass to help guide course corrections if needed.

So, I believe this can be a fucking powerful compass when not ignored or purposefully destroyed.

V? Or V? Two very different pathways. Two very different worlds created.

I plan on writing about these pathways every day for the foreseeable future. So hit that subscribe button if this conversation intrigues you. FYI, this is a paywall-free corner of the interweb, so there is a free subscription option.