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Supervision is really not a recommendation: this is what happens when power corrupts

What about Facebook, an Intel advertisement and the shredding of anonymous complaints of sexual harassment?

Dana Pan Luzon saw again last week how the force corrupts.

And the real concern from the stories?

No person or business can be expected to self-control when it has too much influence in its hands

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• Intel

• Facebook

• Sexual harassment

Dana Pan Luzon

Friday, October 15, 2021, 10:25 Updated: Sunday, October 17, 2021, 08:23

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Public discourse has recently revolved around the concept of power in its destructive sense.

Power, the same mechanism that can be very important and necessary to manage, becomes destructive when it is more concentrated.

Like any stimulus, power also has a certain point from which it already becomes dangerous.

The new headlines in recent months provide a very clear picture of where the wind is blowing.

There is a healthy awakening and desire for boundaries, but also difficulty in applying that desire.

We wake up and do not want to see people and economic entities, whose power makes them feel that they can act without responsibility and without paying the price of the social damage they do.

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It's not him, it's human nature (Photo: Reuters)

Last week it was reported in the news that Israel is launching an initiative against Facebook. The Ministry of Communications is drafting a move in which a team of experts will examine whether Facebook will be legally responsible for the posts that will be published in it. The hope is that Israel will take an important step, aimed at curbing the power of those who use it unchecked. It is no coincidence that Facebook has also recently been attacked by those who have worked for it.

On another and non-business issue, Minister Elazar Stern denied his remarks about shredding anonymous complaints of sexual harassment. This is how it works, with the power in your hand you can shred the weak. When reality is so unbalanced and unsupervised, there are those who are pushed into a corner and only anonymously can send one last piece of power.

Shredding the last piece of power is an escape from responsibility and a great way to stay in your comfortable position. Skip a few weeks back - the discourse on sexual harassment and abuse of power remains in the headlines, faces and names only change, whether it be modeling agents, actors, sports stars, singers and businessmen. And yes, so do prime ministers.

Not consumerism - worship

Just as political dichotomies have only become more radical in recent years, so has the gap between the strong and the weak.

Facebook is just one economic marketing example.

The power of some companies has become so great that even if they have competitors they are not really threatening.

We may also be to blame, as long as we continue to cooperate and sometimes even actually worship the economic giants and products.

"Worship", a word that reflects religion and not consumerism - and this is not an exaggeration.

Want proof?

Take a look at the Intel commercial, which came out just a few days ago with a message that leaves nothing in the dark and puts the painful reality on the table for the company itself as well.

Intel calls Apple users "consumers under a spell."

In an advertisement conducted as a social experiment, Intel introduces subjects to products and tells them "Did you not know they existed? You are captives of one brand, you are under magic, really addicted."

To see and not to believe.

Is Intel in such distress that it has chosen its marketing strategy to show that it is simply unable to stand up to the strong competitor?

In the ad, by the way, Apple consumers enter one by one into Intel's witchcraft remover (hopefully) room and simply declare that they are Apple's captive consumers.

One says she's a girl living in Apple's world, another says she's 100 percent loyal to Apple.

The word ‘apple’ is repeated dozens of times like a mantra.

Worship, we have already said.

Dana Pan Luzon (Photo: Nir Keidar)

Want to buy Apple and not Intel? No problem, but the question arises what happens to us? How much power do we give these companies? Adoration of technology products puts people in line for hours every year to be the first to purchase the new enhanced version. And in companies, of course, look with pleasure.

The psychological study that defines the phenomenon of corrupting power is called the "power paradox". Thatcher Keltner, a research psychologist at the University of California, compared a person in a position of power to a person who had suffered brain damage. He showed how people with a lot of authority and power behave like patients with damage in the area of ​​the brain that is responsible for empathy and decision making. The force makes them start acting stupid, they flirt incessantly in an inappropriate way and actually become impulsive.

One of the most interesting studies in the field shows in a simple way the effect of power on us. Researcher Adam Glinsky took participants and made some of them think of an event where they were in a position of power and felt strong. Other participants were told to think of an event where they felt weak.

He then asked everyone to draw a sign on their forehead.

The researcher found that the participants who were given a sense of power tended to draw the letter as such that could not be understood by the others, they simply drew it in a way that was convenient to them without thinking about what the researcher or any other person looking at them would call it.

In contrast, those who thought in research about a story that made them feel powerless, were more concerned with writing the letter while taking into account the reading ability, not only of themselves but also of others.

The conclusion from the study was clear - people who feel they have too much power are unable to take into account the perspective of others, they are certainly less considerate.

This study, along with dozens of other studies on the influence of power, combined with reality, should convey a clear message - it is time to understand that these are not personality traits of one person or another.

Power itself has an effect.

Therefore, dialogue, setting boundaries and supervision are not a recommendation.

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