Sunday, February 22, 2009

Objectivity in a corrupt world

It’s a fallacy that being objective is rightful and subjective application should be dishonoured. I myself am a sheer propagandist of objectivism but there is a misnomer in place here. Being subjective actually works wonders and so does dictatorship. Why democracy is advocated is because it doesn’t encourage subjective opinions that are manipulative in nature to creep in. Hence I myself believe in democracy. But then the choice of the belief is not out of option but by choice.
It can’t be denied that people would want to manipulate a system to get the maximum possible off it. From a capitalist point of view this seems correct, putting to test the system itself. And so the system shall evolve to plug in all the holes to further move on to becoming objective and just. This is under the assumption that the system or at-least the user of the system is a universally good person. One must agree that there is something called universal justice. Else judicial systems would not have evolved only. And considering the best judicial system in Pakistan and the poor execution capacity, one can definitely and safely assume that both the subject and the object shall abide by universal laws of goodness. One shall now agree that the world is not made of good people only. That’s when we start thinking of objectivity. Let there be one ruling. Only objective and no subjective decisions shall be made. Say a majority of the people say that a particular person should be in power, a subjective thinker may might as well think that the majority is foolish and would consider a single voice that is logical. If all logic is in place, it goes to prove that a good dictator is way far better than advocating democracy. Democracy is meritocracy provided an alternate involves only good people. An alternate to democracy is dictatorship. So the point driven down here is that when we don’t have a good dictator, we shall go for democracy.
But now, by good people I mean very good people. People with good intentions, who would not want to steal the show and who are objective. But sadly, people with good intentions believe in equal opportunity. And so dictatorship cannot be under a good person.
Now I equate objectivism with democracy and subjectivism with dictatorship. Simply put, dictatorship formed under a good ruler is sane; else democracy makes a lot sense.
Now I am trying to apply this to informal situations. A small group of friends is lead by a ‘group thinker’. This is fine as long as the person’s intentions are good. It’s not so always. Worse still the members don’t even know it’s a group think. Subjective decisions made by a person who is illogical, let alone with bad intentions, leads the group to dogs. Worse still when two different roles played by the person are deliberately mixed.
That’s exactly why we make it democratic. Say, the simple task of choosing which place to hang-out. The group leader decides. If any member feels that his/her intentions are not fine then discontent creeps in. Then what’s the use of dictatorship or subjectivism. Objectivity works wonders. Subjectivism is only for ideal cases. Rules and frameworks are to be adhered to. But objectivism is costly. A single unintentional violation of a rule breaks your bones. You are asked to compensate for the violation in an unfair manner. That’s when subjectivism would look a lot better. But had you been subjective, such a situation would be hell. There again objectivity is the best way out.

2 comments:

Chandy said...

Good post siva after a long time, in your typical style;
Objectivism or Subjectivism - It all depends on the reality, where you will have to choose either to be objective or subjective weighing all the possible future implications.

Sivaprakasam said...

Ya true da. But looks like subjectivism is confined to an ideal world only or to emotional matters only.