When Helplessness Becomes Rooted in Nations
Dr. Michel E. Abs
Secretary General of the Middle East Council of Churches
This is neither a social psychology nor a political science article. This is an article on the fate of populations and their future.
This article is inspired by the biography of the Lord, from His scourging of the temple merchants , His revolution against hypocrisy and corruption , as well as from His realization on the cross of the ignorance of the people- "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."
The worst thing that can happen to a people is falling prey to hypocrisy, corruption, and ignorance, which are three characteristics that are inseparable in the history of nations. The worst thing that afflicts a people in this context is a slow sliding that reaches the limits of helplessness.
When a people descend into such a state of decadence, we can say that they are afflicted with acquired helplessness, or in other words that they will not be able to rise up for many decades. We can say that they have fallen into severe slavery, either to outside powers or to their own ruling class, which is more often than not enslaved by outside pressures.
A people acquire helplessness after they fail in successive attempts to get out of a predicament, a problem or a group of problems interlocking in such a structural way that any breakthrough becomes unattainable to them. When problems abound and combine, they are transformed into a trap that becomes difficult to break out of. Descartes says that when the soul cannot win, it falls into weariness.
Worst of all is when the trap maker - or the side that benefits from it - is the one who had been entrusted by the people with their fate and future, or the so-called "ruling elites". In such a state the inside ally with the outside in sucking out the blood of the people and leaving them prey to various kinds of disasters out of which it is not possible for them to free themselves without exorbitant human, moral and material sacrifices.
Here the ethics of the ruling class play the main role.
History informs us of cases when people were in deplorable conditions, as an aftermath of their exit from war, occupation, natural or man-made disasters, at which time their honorable elites come and heal the bleeding wounds of the nation and take it towards prosperity and affluence. There are many examples of such cases in world history.
On the other hand, nations may be “luckily graced” with an “elite group”, that has no sense of responsibility, no honor, and no meaning of shame. Such ruling class wreak havoc in the life of their nation, rob them of their bounties, increase their state of frustration and exploit their weaknesses – thus further entrenching such states in them – and thereby instigating the “Acquired Helplessness Syndrome.” This nation becomes disorganized, torn, impoverished, and unable to rise up against its reality and against those who caused it. It becomes a nation with a fate of extinction.
The distraction of people with insignificant crumbs by depriving them of a minimal standard for a decent life is the most effective means to control them and prevent them from removing the ruling junta sitting on their chest, that junta that benefits from this frustrating - surrendering reality. Not only "divide and conquer", but also "impoverish and conquer"!
When helplessness and surrender become rooted in nations, and the state of affairs in this situation is prolonged in time, for three decades or more, as historians say, getting out of the trap becomes more difficult and more costly.
What gets worse is when the ruling groups plead with the dimension of ethnic or religious identity and rely on resorting to ethnic or religious considerations in order to unnerve its own group and intimidate it from other groups so as to control it. When the hate speech permeates the line of methodologies with the ruler’s purpose of enslaving the ruled, the system of hegemony is completed. Thus the matter is settled for the ruling class for an indetermined time that does not end except with the intrusion of a free and luminous trend of thought capable of breaking the ice of slavery and guiding the nation to the vast realm of freedom, a freedom the doors of which are only knocked on with imbrued hands.
It was written by Gibran Khalil Gibran: “They tell me if you see a sleeping slave, do not wake him, perhaps he dreams of his freedom, and I tell them if I see a sleeping slave, I wake him and speak to him about freedom."
When the will of individuals weakens, their aspirations fall down to their lowest levels, and the people lose their dignity, they enter the tunnel of the struggle for survival and settle for anything that helps them to continue at the minimal level of subsistence and lose sight of values, ideals and a decent life.
Hence, we rebelled against the order in effect and began to work on rehabilitating the social capital and the value system in an orientation towards restoring human dignity, in all its dimensions and all its expressions.