To the Powerful

What is it I want to say?

My concern over your place of power is not limited to the risk of abuse from above. Don’t kid yourself that you are a ‘good’ authority; that the alternative to your rule would be worse. Do not tell us that you treat your slaves, your workers, your tenants, with dignity and fairness. Don’t sully your thinking with this revisionism of ‘benevolence’. Are you so easily fooled?! The very place of power you occupy offends the idea of equality; how could dignity and fairness be possible in such a hierarchy?

Even if you exhibit great responsibility and selflessness, and choose to serve those you have authority over, even then you are operating in a system of injustice in which no one is free. Decisions made every day – every day decisions – endorse and propagate inequality, and force the hand of those with less wealth, less influence, and less voice. Do not steal from them using your riches.

And, Powerful, do you not see that you have found yourself in a place of deprivation? You debase your own mind as you take it upon yourself to make decisions that impact others. You have grown convinced of your right to rule, comfortable on your throne. You are convinced that your actions are just, or, at their very worst, harmless. Whether you live in luxury or feign poverty, live simply, and give generously to charity, you remain convinced your riches will multiply themselves with no harm to anyone. But both the powerful and the powerless begin to accept their lot; all understand inequality as a way of life.

Remove yourself – no – free yourself from your places of power. Dismantle the hold you have over others. We are, all of us, of an immense and too great a value.

Read at ikon's "The Place of Power"