The Society is a Fiction

The world and the society in which we live is a complete fiction. All its structure, its operation and its results are possible simply by the collective imaginary. The beliefs and perception we have of society is simply an exaggeration of what society really is.

You don't believe me? Well I will try to explain it in the shortest way, since it is a topic that gives enough to talk about, and from which I could get 4, 5, and even 6 post about it, although I will keep short and try to express it from the more summary but at the same time simple.

Before starting, just one more question, can you define what is the State? You know what, don't answer me, just think about it, think about the State, are you able to think about it? Close your eyes and think about it, can you describe what the State is? just try to think... "is the political and social organization..." Wait a minute, organization?, what is an organization? " well, the organization is a group of people". Exactly, then that's the State, a group of people, just that.

The magnificent and almighty State, feared by many and loved by others, is that, only a group of people, a small number of individuals. Did you ever think of the State in that way? Well that's the State, simply. When we say things like "the State should take care of..." or "the State should not get their hands on..." we only talk about that small group of people, a very small number of individuals, should or should not do something.

The State, no matter what country you are in, is such a small number of people, perhaps 200 or 300, although many of them only occupy one position and have no power, which reduces them to a number no larger than 100, who are in charge of managing the country. It is no such thing as a gigantic and grotesque entity or a body or corporation with the ability to monitor or control all individuals, none of that, only a handful of people.

The state has control over numerous institutions, over the economy, and over the armed forces, so is, they have control over men with guns. That is, a tiny group of people, no more than 100, is in control of an army of hundreds of thousands and even millions of people with guns. These individuals with guns have the physical strength not to be subjugated, but the fiction of authority makes them subordinate to a small number of people called the State. This means that in the United States, for example, a hundred people have absolute control over hundreds of thousands of soldiers simply because each of these men who make up the army believes fervently in authority so as not to question it.

The only thing that gives power to this group of people called the State to control and govern these millions of soldiers is that each of them believes that the State has that power, that is, the soldiers give authority to the State, a small group, to rule over them, although this is done in a way so subconsciously implicit that at no time can they notice it.

Social organizations and human societies live from constant fiction, from beliefs and magnifications, in some cases absurd, so that everything can work the way it does. During the Early Middle Ages it was common to see the Kings in person go to fight in the wars and battles that fought their kingdoms, the Kings were probably the male alphas that guided the group as if it were a herd, that's why that we can't find women reigning Europe until the Late Middle Ages and beginning the Early Modern Period. The countries that were adopting military strategies no longer needed a leader to fight, but one who thought, so the kings were moving away from the battlefield.

There came a time when the King was neither the strongest, nor the most intelligent, nor the most capable to govern, so the only meaning that had validity for his governance was that he was a divinity, the King was the descendant of an ancestrally divine bloodline. Although today even the most pro-monarchist people don't defend monarchies for these reasons, at that time it was vitally important that the collective imaginary think of the King as a divinity or something magical that would make him more capable and superior to the populace, because this gave a meaning to his government.

The communists and fascists did the same in the countries they governed, exalting the figure of the leader was of vital importance because this way people could stop interfering in politics and begin to trust that the leader, a man of exceptional qualities and superior ability, could take care of everything. That is why all socialisms have not been simply socialism, but as the quality of the leader and personalism is very important, we can see differences between Stalinism and Maoism, or these two and Trotskyism, or Leninism, or Marxism-Leninism, or simple Marxism, or any of the countless personalist variations existing in Latin America, Africa and Asia.

Fiction today is still quite present, the fact that we go to the polls every four years to cast votes, gives people the feeling that they really have power where the country's direction is heading, but the reality is that as history has shown us, no person who holds power has yielded it only because those less powerful have asked for it, the reality is that people who have seized power have never released it unless they are forced to do it.

As we have learned so far, the fiction in people's heads keeps the whole system functioning, if people doubt the process, if people believe that the King is not different from them, if people believe that the vote is useless when it comes to running the country, if people feel they are being cheated, then everything breaks down, and the system becomes defective.

When the people stopped believing in the divinity of Kings, liberal revolutions began to emerge in America and Europe. During the French Revolution the kings of Europe made adverse propaganda to these events to prevent the revolutionary euphoria from spreading over their countries and their head being the next to be in the guillotine. But... How do you think that propaganda was? Were they based on the pros or cons of having a monarchy? Did they explain why the King should stay in power? None of that, the advertisements appeal to emotions, and of course to the mysticism existing in the collective imagination, so the Kings were only tried to illustrating the French as savages, as animals, people who disrespected the deity and authority of the King, and they opposed the will of God, the French were no different than an animal to them, Napoleon was depicted as the son of the devil, and revolutions were seen as a setback, and the bloodthirsty course taken by the French Revolution strengthened this idea.

German propaganda: The Devil carrying his dear son Napoleon

Human societies need a constant pumping of fiction to keep functioning, this is as true today as it was 1,000, 2,000, and even 10,000 years ago, and will continue to be the same in the future. It is necessary. People may know that we live in a world of fiction, however, we will continue to feed the desire for fiction and mysticism that we carry within, it is by nature, think that even though almost everyone believes that politicians are corrupt, most of people have a favorite politician.

As I said before, this is a topic that gives a lot to talk about, because in reality not only the social organization lives from the strange beliefs of people, but practically all the components of life in society need this constant feeding of fantasies; from science, culture, religion, knowledge, intelligence, truth, reason, emotion, and many others.

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