Will to Power

The submission of man is within the nature of man. The desire for power is nothing more then the response to our most animalistic selves. Power is the assertion of patriarchal superiority. Domination of others is the means by which the alpha male asserts his own unequivocal right to pass on his genes: A primitive instinct which still resides deep within the core of our beings, and which continues to motivate our actions into the twenty-first century. Some might observe the suggestion to be uncouth and idea appear unappealing at best yet scientific study has exposed; the social/political domination of individuals' mirrors the assertion of natural-physical superiority observed among animals, and genetically supposed inferior beings. If we wish to examine man's "will to power" we must recognize our most animalistic nature.

"There is no stronger test of a man's character than power and authority, exciting as they do every passion and discovering every latent vice (Plutarch, 46-120 A.D.)" The suggestion of vice as latent rather then developed interests me. Society has the tendency to suggest that power corrupts rather the exploring the idea that power enables the inborn the weakness of man and the indulgence in gluttony, laziness, and every other transgression of the flesh. The suggestion that power corrupts is the suggestion that the very fabric of our beings is fundamentally and irrefutably flawed. Corruption becomes the suggested result of our natural inclination to social-political animalistic supremacy. In 1951 R.H. Crossman stated: "It is not power itself, but legitimation of the lust for power that corrupts absolutely." Still others have suggested that; "The love [and pursuit] of power is generally an embodiment of fear (Bertrand Russell 1931)."

It is my belief that the will to power is born out of the necessity of the continuation of the species: A necessity, which has become perhaps less pressing in resent decades. Without abandoning our basic animalistic nature, mans has pursued the advancement of an ever increasingly complex and demanding social hierarchy. One in which our animalistic nature has become increasingly obsolete. Our social-political matrix has out grown our own intellectual and emotional abilities, and in so many years surpassed our own natural response. Survival in the world today is not dictated by Darwinian theory of natural selection but an increasingly complex social matrix yet we continue to act upon a prehistoric struggle against one another and nature. Power in today's society has replaced physical strength as a means to assure our own right to reproduction, and the continuation of some part of our selves. The truth is we are a nothing more then the inherently flawed product of natural selection, struggling to adapt to the artificial environment we have created for our selves. In the relatively short period of time man has inhabited this earth we collectively have convinced our selves of the organic nature of our self-imposed reality.