All of us try to set up systems: whether small or big. We all try to set up a system in our family by deciding on the wake-up time and sleeping time, division of roles and responsibilities, some schedule for ordering the groceries, some rules to spend the money, and so on. We try to form systems in the organizations. Governments across countries also try to put in place different systems by making laws and rules and enabling ecosystems to use the technology.
There is no doubt that almost all the systems have multiple use cases. They make our lives easy and save a lot of time and energy which can be invested in exploring many interesting things. Systems also help provide equality of opportunities to different people. Systems also bring transparency and help haves not fight for their rights. However, when systems are misused by the wealthy and powerful for their advantage, they become the worst tools of exploitation too. In the past, systems have proved to be the worst tools of exploitation.
The military is the defense system of any country. However, in many countries, the military has been used by dictators as one of the worst tools of exploitation. Many enlightened people try to put in place big systems in the form of religion, comprising detailed guidance to live life, so that people may live a meaningful life. However, with time these systems get distorted and misused by a few to maintain their supremacy and they use these systems to exploit others. In fact, at times these systems get distorted to the extent that they produce even terrorists. Thus, as systems get distorted they start being used to kill and exploit the very same people for the welfare of whom the systems were initially set up.
What is the reason that the systems people have tried to put in place so many different systems in the world starting from religion, to capitalism, socialism, communism, families, states, and so on and each one of them has failed? Probably, the reason is the consciousness of the people who form part of the systems. I cross Yamuna Bridge daily and see that the entire bridge has been covered with a quite high net to stop people from dumping garbage into the water of Yamuna. Yet, some people have cut the news and formed a small window in the net. Now, the rest of the net is just a waste. In the winter season, we try to close all the doors and windows to protect ourselves from the cold weather outside. However, one small passage somewhere in the windows is sufficient to give us chills. The systems are as safe and effective as the weakest link. We are living in a world where people have become too fixated on material objects and their desires and have no shame in harming others and damaging the systems to fulfill their desires.
There are traffic cameras almost on each of the roads and there are more accidents now. There are so many antivirus installed on computers and yet there are so many virus attacks. There are so many two-factor and sometimes three-factor security in online transactions with the password, OTP, and profile passwords and yet there are online frauds. There are so many checks and balances in the examination systems and yet so many examination systems are being cheated. It appears as if the more foolproof we try to make these systems the more vulnerable these systems become. On a lighter note, it appears that the difficulties in breaking the systems excite the system-breakers to take up the challenge and they get a higher dose of dopamine.
I feel that unless we work on the consciousness of each and every individual, whatever systems we design, are not going to work efficiently. We can not force the kids to study unless they develop an inner desire to study. The moment something is forced on an individual, there is a natural resistance and when a majority of the people on whom some system is imposed have a resistance to the system, the system fails to work.
The fundamental reason for the resistance towards the systems is that the society of the day has moved away from the true core. Newspapers, social media, television, OTT, and cinema are full of advertisement that promotes comforts and luxury. The selling point of the soaps is beauty and not hygiene, food items are sold for taste and not health, flats are sold in the name of luxury and beauty and not for safe living, the selling point of cars is their design, beauty, and interior. The whole of the world is obsessed with comforts and pleasures. In such a world, when we try to impose certain systems on people, they naturally rebel against these systems. I feel that we need to change the narrative of the society. The purpose of human life is not to live in comforts and pleasures, rather it is to grow and explore. We can grow to the second level only when we set up systems for the first level otherwise we will keep struggling with the first level itself. The entire humanity will have to understand this sooner or later. We need to educate the kids about the purpose of life at the beginning so that he has growth as a human being as the core purpose of their life and is able to align the rest of their goals around the same. Unless that happens, whatever systems we put in place will always remain fragile and vulnerable and there will always be hackers to hack them.
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