Marcel Proust author of the renowned “In Search For the Lost Time ” made a questionnaire. He believed that, by answering these questions, an individual reveals his / her true nature. Here are some of the questions from Proust Questionnaire.
1. What is your idea of perfect happiness? 2. What is your greatest fear? 3. What is the trait you most deplore in yourself? 4. What is the trait you most deplore in others? 5. Which living person do you most admire? 6. What is your greatest extravagance? 7. What is your current state of mind? 8. What do you consider the most overrated virtue? 9. On what occasion do you lie? 10. What do you most dislike about your appearance? 11. Which living person do you most despise? 12. What is the quality you most like in a man? 13. What is the quality you most like in a woman? 14. Which words or phrases do you most overuse? 15. What or who is the greatest love of your life? 16. When and where were you happiest? 17. Which talent would you most like to have? 18. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? 19. What do you consider your greatest achievement? 20. If you were to die and come back as a person or a thing, what would it be? 21. Where would you most like to live? 22. What is your most treasured possession? 23. What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery? 24. What is your favorite occupation? 25. What is your most marked characteristic? 26. What do you most value in your friends? 27. Who are your favorite writers? 28. Who is your hero of fiction? 29. Which historical figure do you most identify with? 30. Who are your heroes in real life? 31. What are your favorite names? 32. What is it that you most dislike? 33. What is your greatest regret? 34. How would you like to die? 35. What is your motto?
A similar questionnaire, answered by various celebrities, is regularly published on Vanity Fair magazine. There is also an interactive version of the questionnaire, which compares your answers to various personalities.
Society seeks order. If we investigate the rationale behind all the major war and terrors we have encountered, beyond its superficial petty causes, would lie the real reason that is a “craving for order”. Major terrors like world wars, genocides, and jihad are carried out in the name cleansing the society and to bring order in the social system. One group justifies that they use terror for making it a fair society, another group claims that they are declaring war on them to stabilize governance and make peace.
Political ideologies and religious doctrines are instruments to carry out such social experiments to make order in the society. One group thinks that changing the culture and social structure is necessary for making it a fair society. When such change is denied, war and terror are used to enforce it. All such major wars, riots, invasion and terror campaigns are carried out with an intention to bring more order in the social system. No one wants to break the world they live in. If we asked the need for such violence to Adolf Hitler or a suicide bomber, they would swear that they were striving and sacrificing themselves for the betterment of the world. They justify the atrocities they commit by believing (and making their followers believe) that their actions would make the world a better place to live.
Such craving for order came into existence from the time when our nomad wandering ancestors decided to settle in a place. By many generations, these small communities where everyone recognized and trusted everyone else became bigger. As population plummeted, communities turned into camps, camps became colonies and it further evolved into societies. In large societies, people stopped recognizing each other so they became less trusting. Societies disintegrated. Conflicts increased. People started polarising into separate inner groups to reduce their insecurity, which made it worse. Rules and rulers became a necessity. They believed that “God’s deeds” were responsible to their mysteries like earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, epidemic deaths etc. So the concept of God, induced fear in them which was used in reducing violence and improving morality. From that time our societies have further evolved into nationalities and cults evolved into organized religions.
Communism, Islam, Nationalism, Capitalism, Democracy etc.. are our attempts to bring order into a wild society. While some ideologies tried taming the society by putting them into chains, some other ideology considers to set them free after tranquillizing them with greed.
Communists solution for the disorder is “One Class and No Religion” principle. Communists argue that, if there is only one class the “Working Class (Proletariat)” there won’t be any discrimination. Psychologically, people do recognize themselves in different circles of identities like class, politics, job, wealth, religion etc. By suppressing the formation of such associations, inner conflicts within the society could be eliminated. Hence in communist nations such rights are revoked and religion is discouraged.Centralized polite bureau controlled government owns all state property. Government will take over the excess resources produced and allocate them when required. Private ownership has limitations. So that there would not be rich to exploit the poor. People would not hoard materials and unwanted resources for advancing in their social hierarchy, as there is no such social ladders to climb. Communist ideology enforces strict regulations by limiting the rights of the people.
Capitalism advocates for “Liberty“. Society is fuelled and run by money. Meritocratic society provides opportunity to make profit for everyone without much discrimination. As it is a consumer oriented society, materials are liberally produced (or acquired ) and marketed to the people. Resources are owned privately and are operated for profit. Corporate lobbyists have higher influence over political decisions. Economy as the basic building block, rich people are considered successful. What POWER is for communism, MONEY is for capitalism.
Theocracy ( eg: Islamic state with Shari’a law ) is based on “One Religion and No Class“. People who endorse theocracy argues that people would be more moral towards each other with religion as its central doctrine. Islamic States enforce Islamic rules using Sharia based on Quran and Sunnah. Sharia crimes include heresy, apostasy, atheism, refusal to pray, adultery and alcoholism. Punishments include amputation, stoning, flagellation & death sentence.
All the religions, which evolved from ancient cults to today’s popular religions had two main objectives.
Spiritual Enquiry (in some cultures Philosophical Enquiry).
Socio-political Control (Political dictate).
Even though all major religions have both these sides, different religions prioritizes it at different levels. Eastern religious traditions like Buddhism, Hinduism (School of Vedanta), Zen, Taoism, etc. gives more precedence towards the spiritual (philosophical) side. Questions on “Nature of Reality”, “Consciousness”, “Defining the Self” etc., is analysed through the teachings and sanctities of gurus (Buddha, Adi Shankara) and scriptures (Upanishads, Brahma Sutra etc.). Yoga and meditations are methods used in stabilizing the body and mind. Logic, science and reasoning are used for hypothesis. Social control using the politics of religion was also widely used from ancient times by the imperial cults.
Politicizing religion could be seen from ancient Egyptians, Aztec civilizations where the rulers proclaimed themselves as Gods or their representatives. This prevented rebellion of the slaves, militants and the oppressed, hence prevented society from anarchy. Predominantly, it was also used to justify social stratifications like “caste system”. Abrahamic religions like Islam and Christianity gives precedence to social control by doctrines and commandments, which deals with “How to live in a society” and “How not to live in the society”. Depending on the social zeitgeist and culture, such indoctrinations are made voluntary or coerced. We can clearly see this in Islamic nations where the sharia laws are used for governance. In an Islamic regime, because religion is the foundation of political control, criticizing it (Heresy) is punishable by the death sentence.
Through religion dictators got a “probable cause” for their invasion. People had their emotional attachments towards God and religion. Dictators exploited this relationship and their invasion became their commitment to the Gods will. Throughout our history, such Invasions, Crusades and Jihad are carried out for expanding religious social control. People from different locations, who identified themselves with some religion sympathized, funded and participated in this bloodshed. Modern day democracy has compatibility issues with the religion. On going clashes between the Taliban and Pakistan government is an example for this.
Nationalism which identified people based on their geographic location got strengthened with the advent of Democracy. Democracy is centred around “Right to equality”,“Right to freedom of speech and expression”,“Right to freedom of religion”, “Right to seek constitutional remedies” etc…. In a democracy, eligible citizens are the sovereign power, but political power is exercised indirectly through elected representatives. Any citizen can participate or cast votes in the election. The majority decides the ruler, minorities sometimes gets reservations or considerations.
People living within their national boundaries are considered as citizens. Outside those boundaries they are “foreigners”, and require permission to enter other nationalities. As most nationalities have at least one ongoing conflict with their neighbouring nations, people detest, envy, or fear their neighbours. Since there is a separate economy and military for each nation, people from their birth believe that they have such boundaries and segregation and address people from other nations as “they”. Living in the largest democracy, another problem I have felt is that the fundamental right, which allows “Right to associate and form groups”, might lead to inner segregation and people living in a democracy usually have (or could afford to have) multiple identities. Nationalism is invoked to de-fragment their loyalties and nationalism (which is good), might advance towards patriotism and later into chauvinism.
Throughout our history, thinkers, revolutionaries & terrorists have set off to bring order into the world. These Samaritans can be categorized from fundamentalists to intellectuals based on what they are holding, a gun or a pen. Violence like war and terrorism is the result of them getting blinded by their own inhibitions like their ideologies and loyalties.They are not being able to see the world with their biased judgements and ends up compromising their ethics for somehow reaching their goal.
We are continuously trying to patch up our imperfect world with our “..isms” and “..cracys“. These “..isms” are the main cause for schisms in the society. Before blindly trusting our leaders or ideologies, we must also remember that, we are all palpable emotional beings with incomplete knowledge, moderate intelligence and distorted world view. This humility will stop us from weighing our rights and wrongs over others. This will prevent us from being a bigot by fending off our stereotypical prejudices.
I am convinced that, if there is any “state of peace”, it is when we don’t have to compromise our freedom for our social order or vice versa. Everlasting violence for order will go on until we agree to sign the pact for peaceful anarchy. Like John Lennon “imagine”d, if there is anything close to utopia, it is a time when there is no flag to salute, no politics, no religions, no loyalties, no boundaries. Perhaps, by understanding that all living things have common natural ancestry, we would be able to tolerate each other. Only if we dethrone the bourgeois dictator living in our minds, who distorts our world-view by giving us snobbish opinions and judgements, we could respect each others differences. Only in a time when words are given precedence over weapons and when we try to convince others with rational discourses rather than subjugating them with force through terror and conquests, we shall have peace. When we break free from our own cages of conformities and loyalties, we will get freedom from our own identities, that would bring us Peace by eliminating the need for the Order.
War and terror could never bring either peace or order.
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“I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.”
― Mahatma Gandhi
Status Anxiety is a Non Fiction Book / Documentary written by Swiss-British writer & philosopher Alain de Botton. Like the title clearly states, the book and the subsequent documentary questions the worth of “Status” and the anxiety gifted by our continuous effort to improve our status. The book deals with all the aspects of the subject from the birth and evolution of status to the lifestyle and social structure we adopted due to its influence. The documentary differentiates the lives of the people who gives ample priority to the status, to the lives of Bohemians who value freedom rather than status.
Alain de Botton tells us with the change in our political ideologies, how our value based communities deformed into status based societies. Earlier, when there was a prescribed social stratum, people were not much status conscious as drastic change in status was not possible in that system. But with the advent of democracy and globalization, on the place of nobility and aristocracy which were the main status meters, Money and Power became icons of status. Everybody got the opportunity for improving their status infinitely. Societies got meritocratic ( …which is good ) but the drawback of a meritocratic society is that if the people applauded the successful people because they deserved success, the people also booed unsuccessful people and labelled them as “Losers”, and thought that they deserved that too. Life turned into a ccompetition as people constantly evaluated their status by comparing it with their friends, neighbours etc. Alain de Botton says the joy of living is lost because of the anxiety caused by STATUS.
It reminded me of the story that I once heard. When Burmese Prince visited India, Indian Prime Minister ( knowing that the GDP of Burma is much lower than India), asked the prince ” How much is the current GDP of Burma ? “, the prince smiled and replied “We don’t value GDP as much as we value GHP ( Gross Happiness Product )”.
I think one prioritizes STATUS as per they define the meaning of LIFE. When Life is seen as an endless tournament with others or conquest to acquire more materials, values like empathy & sympathy diminishes from the society. Conversely, if Life is seen as a brief moment in consciousness ( …utmost 80 Years ) to experience and learn from the world we inhabit, we get a value based system. I throughly enjoyed the Documentary and Book. 5 Stars.
Full Documentary of Status Anxiety (12 Parts ) below.
“Every adult life could be said to be defined by two great love stories. The first – the story of our quest for sexual love – is well known and well charted, its vagaries form the staple of music and literature, it is socially accepted and celebrated. The second – the story of our quest for love from the world – is a more secret and shameful tale. If mentioned, it tends to be in caustic, mocking terms, as something of interest chiefly to envious or deficient souls, or else the drive for status is interpreted in an economic sense alone. And yet this second love story is no less intense than the first, it is no less complicated, important or universal, and its setbacks are no less painful. There is heartbreak here too.” ― Alain de Botton, Status Anxiety
“Wealth is not an absolute. It is relative to desire. Every time we yearn for something we cannot afford, we grow poorer, whatever our resources. And every time we feel satisfied with what we have, we can be counted as rich, however little we may actually possess.” ― Alain de Botton, Status Anxiety
“People who hold important positions in society are commonly labelled “somebodies,” and their inverse “nobodies”-both of which are, of course, nonsensical descriptors, for we are all, by necessity, individuals with distinct identities and comparable claims on existence. Such words are nevertheless an apt vehicle for conveying the disparate treatment accorded to different groups. Those without status are all but invisible: they are treated brusquely by others, their complexities trampled upon and their singularities ignored.”
― Alain de Botton, Status Anxiety
Marcel Proust author of the renowned “In Search For the Lost Time ” made a questionnaire. He believed that, by answering these questions, an individual reveals his / her true nature. Here are some of the questions from Proust Questionnaire.
A similar questionnaire, answered by various celebrities, is regularly published on Vanity Fair magazine. There is also an interactive version of the questionnaire, which compares your answers to various personalities.
Government will take over the excess resources produced and allocate them when required. Private ownership has limitations. So that there would not be rich to exploit the poor. People would not hoard materials and unwanted resources for advancing in their social hierarchy, as there is no such social ladders to climb. Communist ideology enforces strict regulations by limiting the rights of the people.
The book deals with all the 
Desirable Transactions 