Takers and Followers

Broadly speaking, I think, people can be put into three categories:  Takers, Followers, and everybody else.

Followers are people who, through lack of imagination, inculcation through school, church or parenting, do what they are told.  Period.  Psychologists refer to this as having an Authoritarian Personality.  I'm pretty sure this is a majority of the population: nearly all political conservatives and moderates (except for a small group I'll describe later) and even a large number of otherwise fairly progressive people are followers. Even if they know better, they believe that morality comes from a given authority, usually someone who purports to speak for a deity.  They believe that only through obedience can there be social order.   I'm pretty sure most of them started out with a mind of their own, but it was driven out of them over time.

The second group are the Takers.  These are people who will will take advantage of whatever situation they see or can construct for themselves, never mind the consequences to other people.  Most of these are simply thieves, but a lot of them understand how to manipulate Followers to do their bidding.  Mitt Romney is a defining example.  The welfare parasites that Romney alluded to in the "47%" comment are takers, although they are only a tiny fraction of those who collect government benefits and pay low or no income taxes.  These are people who wouldn't take a job if one was available, but have found some scam to live on.  They are at most 1% of the people who collect some sort of welfare.   Welfare frauds cost a negligible amount of money, but they do a lot of harm because they give credence to monsters like Romney, Pete Peterson, the Kochs, and Fox News. Most evangelist preachers are takers, and I'm pretty sure all televangelists are, although a few seem to have good intentions to go along with their rapacity.  Bernie Madoff is a taker, and so is Jamie Dimon.

The final group is the rest of us.  Utilitarianism demonstrated that the vast majority of Judeo-Christian, Buddhist or any other,  morality can be derived from very basic principles, mainly the golden rule.  We don't need to follow anybody, we just need to recognize that not hurting each other is important.  Many of us aren't utilitarians, but you don't need to be.  School is good at teaching this stuff, and it could be better.  Religion could be too...but it has been co-opted by Takers.

We all fall into the temptation to be followers.  If the leader has good intentions, this can be harmless.  But we must always be aware that the Takers are out there.