[MUD-Dev] authority and human nature

[Koster]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Matthew Mihaly [mailto:diablo at best.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 1999 3:54 PM
> To: mud-dev at kanga.nu
> Subject: [MUD-Dev] authority and human nature
> 
> 
> On Tue, 23 Nov 1999, Koster, Raph wrote:
> 
> > It's human nature to distrust authority. It's extra-obvious 
> to distrust
> > authority that has godlike powers over your life. If said 
> authority is in a
> > uniform and has no fixed name and is (worst of all) just an 
> email address
> > out there in the beyond, the worst will be assumed about them.
> 
> Sorry to get off the point, but this isn't true. It is not 
> human nature to
> distrust authority. Quite the opposite actually, historically 
> speaking.
> Inherent distrust of authority is a very modern western view. In most
> cultures, including the west for most of history, trusting 
> authority was
> the norm.
> --matt

Er, allow me to clarify my hastily crafted sentence. :) Yes, humans also
implicitly trust authority and submit to it. What's really at issue is the
amount of resentment over it... this is as apparent in history and in
literature of other cultures and of the distant past as it is today.
Certainly the effect of uniforms and anonymity among authority figures on
the general populace is very much a factor in world history in all cultures
going back a very long way...

-Raph



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