Fixing Things

When there's a problem to be fixed, we naturally approach it with caution. We don't want to make things worse, and we don't want our efforts to be for nothing. Hence, we take the required time to think things through before we act. Only when things are urgent do we apply a quick fix, and it's rarely meant to be final. It's meant to give us the required time to fix things properly.

Any trained engineer will tell us this. Furthermore, there's a saying among engineers that if it isn't broken, then don't fix it. Engineers understand and respect complexity. They keep their meddling down to a minimum.

All of this is intuitively understood by most people. However, there's a class of people who gladly mess around in things they have little to no understanding of. These people are typically incapable of taking care of even the simplest thing at home. Yet, they are never lacking in confidence when it comes to truly complex issues, like climate, medicine and national economy. In these matters, they think themselves competent to the point of mastery.

These are the politicians of the world. While they would be reluctant to change a light bulb at home, they have no trouble issuing decrees about sustainable energy, decease control and the economy at large. They hand out subsidies and they tax people with no worry about waste and inefficiencies that they create in the process.

There are no less than two green politicians in my family, and I often wonder how they know so well that the climate is a problem that needs fixing, and how they know so well what the solution must be. My guess is that they listen to sales pitches from various corporate entities, and that they pick and choose their solutions based on this. For some reason, they think that this will fix whatever real or imagined problems they come across, be it climate change, the plague, or the economy.

The more intelligent among politicians must realize that they have no idea what they are doing, and that their business isn't really about fixing things, but about money and control. The idea that they are fixing things and that they can control things are merely excuses for grift.

This is why honest people tend to leave politics almost as soon as they enter. Only those who find it acceptable, or even exciting, to trade in favours, remain in politics. Hence, we end up with a thoroughly corrupt and incompetent elite that does whatever it pleases, and rather enjoys messing things up, especially if there's a quick profit or a future reward to be had.

But none of this can cover for the fact that politicians are meddling with things that are much more complex than anyone can comprehend. They are like the Sorcerer's Apprentice. They see a quick and easy hack, and they go for it. But without any real understanding of what they're doing, things are bound to get out of hand. Only yesterday, I saw a double masked individual carrying a coat rack as protection against the virus. Mental illnesses are on the rise, including eco-anxiety. The economy is out of whack, with inequality skyrocketing, and it's all due to political meddling.

What happens when the true horrors of this meddling shows its ugly face, we don't know. But two things are certain. It will be messy, and politicians will do like the apprentice. They'll panic and then pretend they had nothing to do with it.

Politicians fixing things

By Ferdinand Barth - Goethe's Werke, Public Domain, Link