RAGE LEADS TO BLINDNESS, DEAFNESS, LOGICAL DYSFUNCTION, AND TRAGEDY
WHERE RAGE, REVENGE, AND RETRIBUTION ABOUND, GREAT TRAGEDIES SOON FOLLOW
Sorry for my absence
I hope most of you noticed that I did not publish in April. Despite our best-laid plans, life happens. I spent much of April dealing with a family death, and a serious medical issue with one of my children. I have also been working feverishly on another ethical intelligence project. We have partnered with a worldwide corporate training organization, and we are creating a three-year training course for corporate ethics and cultural transformation grounded in ethical intelligence principles. It is an exciting project, and I will relay more information as we get closer to launch.
What others have said
Anger is a killing thing: it kills the man who angers, for each rage leaves him less than he had been before - it takes something from him. — Louis L'Amour
People who fly into a rage always make a bad landing. — Will Rogers
I don't lose my temper. I used to, but I realised I would probably die of a brain hemorrhage. So I've governed myself not to mind about things. I have no road rage or anything like that. Because it's life-shortening. And also, there's no need for it; it uses up energy. — Joanna Lumley
No beast is more savage than man when possessed with power answerable to his rage. — Plutarch
Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured. — Mark Twain
Abused patience turns to fury. — Thomas Fuller
The rage of the oppressed is never the same as the rage of the privileged. — Bell Hooks
He who angers you conquers you. — Elizabeth Kenny
How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it. — Marcus Aurelius
Whatever is born in anger ends in shame. — Benjamin Franklin
I do not believe in the God of theology who rewards good and punishes evil. My God created laws that take care of that. His universe is not ruled by wishful thinking but by immutable laws. — Albert Einstein
Rage is the opposite of thought, whoever has put you in this frame of mind has more control over you right now, than you have over yourself. If he is your opponent and you will face him today, you will be defeated. — Sister Souljah
Rage is mental imbecility. — Hosea Ballou1
About
In this issue, we further consider the Emotion tier of the Ethical Intelligence Model by examining the RAGE currently coursing through our societal arteries and veins.
We haven’t spoken about the Emotion tier for quite a while. Given the apparent public insanity we see in society today, now is a good time to revisit emotion and its critical role in ethical intelligence and everyday life.
Here are some “insane” incidents from just the last several days.
In North Carolina, a man shoots his next-door neighbor’s daughter because her basketball rolled into his front yard. When her parents run out of their house in response, the man shoots them. Then, he walks up and down the street shooting his weapon until running out of ammo.
Near Austin, Texas, four car-pooling young women, returning from cheer practice, arrive at a grocery store parking. One of the young women mistakenly started entering a car that resembled hers. Although she apologized to the man sitting in the car, he shot her and her companions anyway.
An assisted living attendant nearly beats a wheelchair-bound elderly resident to death because the attendant didn’t like the resident’s “white privilege.”
In California, an off-duty armed “security guard” shoots and kills a Home Depot employee when the employee tried to stop the “security guard” from shoplifting an iPhone charger.
In upstate New York, three young women, looking for a friend’s house, pulled into the wrong driveway, and the homeowner shoots into the car, killing one of the women.
Using a weak and discredited case two predecessors refused to pursue, a Manhattan District Attorney indicted a former president of the United States, destroying 240 years of judicial precedents.
Fox News fires its most-watched host, whose ratings are through the roof, consistently the highest in cable news ratings. Fox immediately loses $1 billion in market value and plunges in cable ratings.
What do all of these incidents have in common? The answer is RAGE!!
You can explain every one of these seemingly insane stories with RAGE.
You don’t believe it? Let’s consider the possibility.
Rage
Rage is violent and uncontrolled anger or a fit of violent wrath. In earlier times, rage was equated with insanity. Rage is also an anger that, even with time, never subsides. It slowly consumes its host from within like hidden cancer or concealed fire. The host lives in an angry state striking out at any perceived offense even against complete strangers.
Subterranean rage is sneaky. It slowly blurs the mind’s perception of reality. The host’s mind is overcome by an increasingly skewed sense of reality, perceiving everything in a way that reinforces and amplifies the original spark that ignited the rage. The host’s sense of hearing undergoes the same wicked transformation. Everything the host’s mind hears is subtly twisted to support the emerging skewed sense of reality. Then…
Overpowering rage hijacks the host’s rational logic. When the mind lies, logic is a powerless brake on the coming emotional dam burst. Our primitive limbic system takes over. Once the dam (rational logic) breaks, pent-up rage roars forth, like a flash flood in the desert, drowning its host and igniting orgies of violence like what happened in Rwanda in 1994. Images like this shocked the sensibilities of anyone who saw them.
Collective overpowering rage created the aftermath depicted in the Rwandan image. During 100 murderous days in 1994, using rifles and machetes, Hutu tribesmen killed more than a half-million fellow humans who happened to be members of the Tutsi tribe. The victims included men, women, and children. Some have said this slaughter was just a “normal” outcome of the three-year-old Rwandan Civil War.
I am sorry, but there is nothing “normal” about hacking helpless women and children to death with a machete. This type of demonic behavior is the inevitable outcome of collective overpowering rage that was allowed to simmer and fester for years. When the neurological dam finally gave way, we ended up with half a million people dead in a country of only 6.8 million people, roughly 7% of the population in 1994.
Rage begets revenge. Revenge is a predictable outcome of rage, and the degree of revenge is almost never commensurate with the alleged offense or transgression. This is the fodder of family feuds. Where tit for tat retaliation can go on for decades, often spanning multiple generations. In these instances, we often hear the refrain, “You hurt one of ours. We’ll hurt two of yours.” Wars between rival gangs are another instance of rage-borne revenge.
Historically, society has been benignly tolerant of this behavior because it only affects members of specific small groups. Where nations are involved, as in Rwanda, society takes notice but has muted reaction because it was only amongst those “crazy” tribal people, and it “only” accounted for 7% of the population. What happens in a country of 330 million people? I will let you do the math.
Throughout the world, and especially in the United States, I see and feel dangling hot and exposed electrical wires of rage laid bare by the storms of injustice continually ravaging the social order. The world has always had two systems of justice, one for the powerful and another for everyone else. Until the last decade or so, the United States had been able to rise above this destructive construct. For the most part, the law was equally applied to everyone.
The United States was founded as a nation of laws, not men. Regardless of your status, the law was applied equally. The phrase, “Do the crime, serve the time” was an actuality. Yes. I realize that throughout our 250-plus-year history, there were instances of racial and ethnic discrimination, but we collectively addressed those issues, efforts that thoughtful people continue today.
After the 2008 worldwide financial system collapses, we began noticing a change. Unlike prior years when powerful people, like Ivan Boesky and Michael Milken, went to prison, almost no one was prosecuted for the financial crimes preceding 2007-2008. Except for the prosecution of some “small fish,” the “whales” behind the collapse remain free.
The injustice continues. Now we are beginning to see political prosecutions. Using a country’s justice system to punish political opponents has heretofore been a phenomenon in Third World countries. Unfortunately, the practice has emerged in the United States and is growing ever more prominent. Even if you believe the current practice of going after political opponents with who you disagree is a good thing, be careful with the genie escaping the bottle.
Abused patience turns to fury. As Thomas Fuller reminded us, eventually patience runs out. My challenge to all of us is to nurture our emotional maturity. Don’t let underlying simmering rage seize you. Stay the course as we collectively work out these societal challenges. We tried civil war once, and the result was tragic. Nearly a million fellow citizens perished, and that was with primitive weapons. Today, such a conflict is unthinkable.
BE A PEACEMAKER!
Next time, we will continue the journey.
Remember, you cannot lie and be ethically intelligent.
Until then, Shalom!
Reference
Unless otherwise noted, quotations are taken from A-Z Quotes, Goodreads, and Brainy Quotes.
May 2, 2023, Volume 3, Issue 7