The Lie

I’d immersed myself in the exploration of darkness years ago and seen it for what it was, a reflection of myself. A painful realization that I was, at one time, blind to. Seeing what I needed to see, I’d moved on and closed that chapter in my life. I was done. Paradoxically, over ten years later, I stumbled upon Sibel Edmonds, an FBI whistleblower, with a radical integrity that deeply inspired me. I had to laugh as I questioned why I was so compelled to devour her book, Classified Woman.  It has been years since I’ve touched anything of this nature. Her ability to stand up and speak the truth within the intelligence community, in which exists a cultural paradigm of intimidation and fear, was revolutionary and deeply inspiring. She exhibited an utter disregard for her personal security. The emotions I felt as I read her book were quite intimidating and revealing to me. Revealing in a way that forced me to see that most likely, I’d not have the courage to do what she did. Not something I’m proud to admit.

This left me pondering a few things. First, the idea of breaking free from your cultural paradigm is an extraordinary thing to do. Second, what does this idea say about breaking free from our egoic identity? Are there parallels?

I ended up digging through my bookshelves in search of a connecting thread. As usual, I was surprised by what I found. Scott Peck’s book, People of the Lie, jumped out at me. I’d read it in 2007. It’s near the end of the book that he explores an idea he calls “group evil”. An idea that may shed light on what Sibel experienced and why so many people participated in repressing her with their silence.

I was amazed at how directly and thoroughly this FBI whistleblower, Sibel Edmonds, was repressed by all branches of our government. It is beyond the scope of possibility that everyone in the FBI, judicial system, executive branch, and intelligence community are intertwined in a nefarious cabal. I was forced to recognize an alternative. Seemingly natural tribal assimilations repress deep individual value systems that allow, what Peck refers to, as group evil. This is a thread that seems to run deep within humanity and remains a formidable road block in personal truth, critical thinking, and integrity.

A source of group evil, according to Peck, is the compartmentalization and specializations in our culture. This allows us to avoid larger and more comprehensive responsibilities that seem to lie outside of our immediate control.  The average large corporate structure offers a basic example of how this works. Low level managment is asked to perform an unethical task. They’re able to admonish themselves of responsibility by surrendering their responsibility to mid level management. This behavior continues all the way to the top of the hierarchical structure. Mid levels defer to the VPs. The VPs use the executives, or CEO, as scapegoats and the CEO uses the board of directors. The board of directors then claims they are beholden to the demands of the investors. Nowhere is personal responsibility required. The entire chain of command somehow enjoys freedom of responsibility from the unethical practices of a soulless and seemingly benign entity. This is even more exaggerated in hierarchical government and military structures. Lower level individuals choosing to set aside their personal integrity with the goal of moving up the hierarchical structure, avoiding peer based reprisal, or blindly accepting that the people in charge know better than you. This is quite often a story we tell ourselves to bury our moral and intellectual laziness. Regardless of the reasoning, the group evil is maintained. Manicured into something the ego or micro culture can even be proud of. Which, quite simply, means large groups of people are much more able and likely to conspire or ignore unethical and/or immoral behavior through dismissing personal responsibility to an abstract “other”.

Our culture tosses around ideas like “conspiracy theory” with little thought. It’s an easy and dismissive term because the implications of a large cabal of evil-doers is beyond our scope of reason. Many people argue that if the “conspiracy” were actually true, there would be no way that a group of people this large could maintain a paramount level of secrecy/complacency. But the reality of human nature is absolutely the opposite. Not only will most people say nothing, but they will lash out at those who do to protect themselves and the organization that provides them security. Look at our pop culture whistleblowers and the way they are marginalized in society if you question this idea. It comes as no surprise that as a greater number of people maintain their silence, others are encouraged to maintain future silence. The cultural rogue is less and less likely to emerge.

The staggering amount of people that are privy to this information is shocking. Their ability to maintain the status quo, silence, and secrecy knowing the great harm that will fall on others really best describes the concept known as group evil.

This is also prevalent in less established cultural structures such as personal politics, religious persuasions and/or institutions, and racial and sexual identities. Hypocrisy is rampant. The ability to judge others of opposing persuasions and identities is easy for us to point out. What’s harder to see and acknowledge is our willingness to sweep under the rug inconsistencies and hypocrisies that undermine our ideological/egoic perspectives.  All for fear of losing a component of our identity that we have so carefully crafted.

This whole topic may seem off compared to what I usually spend my time writing about. At a subtle level, this idea of group evil ties directly into the concept of waking up/self awareness. This is directly related to the mechanism that maintains our collective delusion.

Those that strive for internal peace/enlightenment often misunderstand the path that is necessary. We know that ego is an obstacle but how we surmount it is often misunderstood. The idea of having to let go of ego/identity is beyond the scope of most. Absolving ourselves of all identity is unimaginable. We fool ourselves into believing we just need to rid ourselves of the aspects of our identity/egoic self that we see as negative. This isn’t the truth.

Ultimately, it’s our need to oblige and intertwine ourselves into mass culture which supports group evil. It’s the cultural expectation of an egoic ideation that maintain our adherence to our egoic ideation. A circular ideology that feeds itself. The cultural expectations are the ruling force. In fact, from an early age, identity is what we are taught to strive for. Ribbons and pieces of paper that separate us from others declaring us to be something special.  Those that gain the most cultural recognition are positioned as though they fly above us all. Their identities become almost super human and god-like as we shine brighter and brighter lights on them. The accolades showered upon these cultural icons maintain a seemingly unsurmountable barrier suggesting and maintaining our perceived inferiority. Even our spiritual leaders, like the Pope or the Dalai Lama, are projected to have something we don’t. This isn’t something they’ve declared; it’s a cultural identity that has been overly inflated. This truly causes more repression than anything. The subtle suggestion that you aren’t that. It is our self imposed egoic ideations that clouds our essence, an essence that’s within all of us. It’s when we commit to removing the false self that we can be reintroduced with our greater self. To step away from identity is not something that is overtly practiced, expected, or encouraged in our culture. We have very few known spiritual leaders and because of the nature of awakening, those who have awakened are often silent. Self awareness/awakening is the rebirth that humanity desires but doesn’t fully comprehend. It is the unbroken thread that connects us all. To see this and live this universal truth is the next evolutionary step. A state of consciousness where group evil has no room to breath and integrity has no barriers.