Child Slaves, Crack Cocaine and the meaning of 'LCD Syndrome'.

If you were an employer wishing to reduce your labour costs to the absolute bare minimum, to the extent that maybe all you had to pay your workers was food and water to stay alive and give them a place to sleep, then which sector of society could you exploit? Would you maybe employ women workers? After all, in some parts of the World, they are frail in numbers and have few rights! Maybe you could employ teenagers or old people, again both groups are weak without a real voice to speak out for them!

What about children? Of course, why didn't we think of it before? Children are the absolute weakest sector of society and completely, totally exploitable. Fantastic, bring in the kids! They'll clean your toilets and never complain, they'll pick your crops and never raise an eyebrow, they'll sew your textiles and never ask for clothes for themselves and they'll even do all sorts of other things that your sick mind can concoct and never shed a tear, at least not until they grow up and realize what you did to them. Children - The perfect solution to exploitable labour right?

This type of exploitation is what I call LCD Syndrome or 'Least Common Denominator Syndrome'. What this means is that in some parts of the World (and that includes 'civilized' developed countries), humanity has reached such low levels of depravation, that even if it tried, it couldn't stoop any lower. Essentially, it has reached the 'least common denominator' stage of exploitation. It's the same as the mathematical term - LCD, whereby LCD is defined as the smallest number that is a common denominator of a given set of fractions.

Currently, there are at least 8.4 million child slaves in the world, many of them held as forced labour. (12-Jun-2013 - Aljazeera) When we consider this staggering statistic, it's really not so hard to see that the people who engage in activities which make this statistic true, are indeed propagating the effects of 'LCD syndrome', whereby even the remotest sense of ethics, basic human decency or compassion have completely escaped their emotionally dead souls in favour of greed, sheer cruelty or simply an open and easy opportunity to exploit others.

Now, let's look at what other forms of LCD Syndrome exist in our world today. We can see LCD syndrome raise it's vile and ugly head in almost every facet of society:

• Human Trafficking - 21 Million Victims Worldwide. Amazingly, many within highly developed countries including the US.

• Crack Cocaine, crystal meth and other instantly addictive drugs. Why are these part of the LCD syndrome group? Well, if we think about it, if a drug is so instantly addictive that just one or two uses instantly imprisons the user into a rapid downward spiral of addiction, eventually leading to a complete decimation of their lives and possibly death, could it get any worse? Hence, Crack Cocaine and other instantly addictive drugs definitely fall into the LCD syndrome group.

The World's most dangerous drug Part 1:

Part 2:

 

• Invoiced killings - In Pakistan, there are thousands of reported incidents where, an invoice or 'Parchi' is given by a gang member to a member of the public. It could be anyone, not necessarily a wealthy person. The value of the invoice can vary. The recipient is given instructions on when and how to pay. If payment is not made, the person is killed. There is no question or negotiation involved, just a straightforward killing, often in public. Definitely LCD syndrome operating here. The perpetrators are not serial murderers, rapists or people who are mentally sick or abused. These are rational people, able to make choices and well thought-out decisions who simply decide that if the law allows it, or where the law overlooks it, they can more or less go to the level of LCD in whichever activity they decide to engage in. And it is precisely because they are rational and capable of deciding for themselves what is right or wrong, yet willingly opt to stoop to the lowest levels of depravity, that makes such events and acts such a very sad indictment of our modern world.
• Exploitation of the natural world to virtual extinction, including industrial exploitation of animals to the most painful extent possible. All these are cases for LCD syndrome worldwide.
• People living in the sewers of Colombia and Brazil to escape being killed on the streets by private security companies hired to provide 'social cleansing' services.

• And the list goes on...........and on................and on......................

It seems to me that despite the greatness of the human spirit and the richness of our endeavours, our race equally possesses a dark side which drives us to commit the most atrocious acts towards ourselves, towards others and towards the natural world.

Juxtaposed against our huge advances in science, medicine, engineering, the arts, politics, ethics and almost every sphere of achievement that Mankind has touched in a positive way - we see an emerging picture of a world in disarray where the worst side of human nature is equally visible in a contrast as sharp as day and night.

Why is there this 'duality' in the nature of man? What happens when LCD behaviour becomes the norm in the societies of the future? What happens when todays children and tomorrows adults become de-sensitized to the atrocities? What then?

Comments Are Welcome:    

Don't Do It! - Stop WASTE Now!

It's a simple thing to understand - Burn down Rainforests and destroy the land, Burn lots of Fossil Fuel, Fill up the land with Waste products and think nothing of throwing anything away on a whim and buying a replacement without a thought - What do you get? Overproduction and overindulgance - What does this produce? Lots of heat and heat retaining gases in the atmosphere - What does this result in? Warming of the atmosphere, what happens then? more water evaporation from the seas, land and rivers - And what does all this evaporation and extra heat do overall? it melts ice and makes more rain - and lots of it. This means more water in the seas, oceans, rivers and land, which means more surface area for water to evaporate and this leads to more rain resulting in more rain and more ice melting. So it's a complete cycle of catastrophe.

Nature always tries to reach a balance, that balance can be good for us or it can be bad for us. It does not matter to Nature how that balance is achieved or whether it benefits us or not. Trouble is that we are always throwing Nature out of balance and ultimately a point could come when, Nature in trying to restore her balance, ultimately destroys us. So you need to think before you waste and think hard before you indulge yourself. Just because you may have the money to do it, does not mean you have the right to waste. The cost of wasting a product is Much, Much higher than the cost of purchasing it.

The debate about whether Global Warming is man made or not isn't really a debate, it's a complete dead end. Why? Becuase, nobody can deny that Man's presence on Earth must have at least some effect(s). But it's clearly visible that this effect is a very large one when we see the Earth slowly being destroyed bit by bit by our actions. For example, when we see millions of sea dwelling animals dying on our TV screens as a direct result of an oil spill, we just know without a doubt that the oil spill caused the catastrophe right? Nobody debates whether or not the cause was related to the oil spill because we bloody well know that the oil spill caused it! So what's the difference when we pollute the air or the ground with our waste? Just becuase we cannot see the effect, doesn't mean that the effect does not exist. Of course the effect exists and it's a terrible one, with a terrible price at that!

Here is a link showing the change in water evaporation rates and the effects on climate change.

This is the Top of Mount Kilamanjaro in Kenya - Some say, the snow will only be visible for another 10 years, then it's gone.........

Quotations by Madhur Seth

The following are some quotations that I have come up with from time to time to describe different emotions I have felt during life's events. They are just random thoughts in no specific order or storyline but they mean a lot to me and hopefully to you....Enjoy :-)

Paint the canvas of Your Life with the colours of your mind.


        Madhur Seth: 04.04.2014 


• Live Your Life in such  a way that if there is a God, then that God would be proud of You.

        Madhur Seth: 04.04.2014  

• Whatever You do in life, hold on very tightly to a few things about yourself no matter what happens. For example, if you love to write, or to ski, or to dance, or to pray, or to weight train, or to act or to swim or to meditate or to play tennis or to windsurf or to paint, or to.......or to.....................Whatever it is, never let go of it. For in times of trouble or strife, it is these things that you can and should turn to, to bring peace and solace to your heart, when nothing or nobody else can. Turn also not to narcotics or alcohol at those times, for they destroy you, turn instead to the things that you held on to because it brought happiness to your inner self once and will do so again.

        Madhur Seth: 19.01.2014 

• We are but mere bubbles rising to the surface of the ocean of logic that is nature. A thought, a possibility, a reflection of what can be and must be possible if creation itself is infinite.

         Madhur Seth: 18.11.2013 

• God is a guy with a plan.

         Madhur Seth: 18.11.2013

• You can't make a flower bloom by pounding it on it's head.

         Madhur Seth: 11.11.2011

• If you rely only on destiny to be the vehicle in which you travel to get to where you want to go, then you might just not get there.

Madhur Seth: 05.09.2013

• A belief that your destiny is pre-written, rather than working towards maximizing the chances of reaching your desired outcomes by creating the path and the events that leads to those outcomes, is a very risky game to play and a futile way to live.

Madhur Seth: 05.09.2013

• It seems to me that it is the artists of this World that have the most profound and beautiful vision of how society and civilization should work. Yet politicians are the ones who actually shape society and civilization to their will. Artists are not politicians. To be a politician you need to be a very different animal. You need to be versed in the art of diplomacy, deception and subterfusion, skills which alas, artists do not posses. Yet what a wonderful World it would be, if just for one day................

I was inspired to write the above after I saw an interview with Sir John Tavener. A gifted man with the most wonderful and touching ideas on life, God and society. If such a man were in the position of leading others, then such a leader is one whom I would surely follow. 

Madhur Seth 05.08.2013

• Everything in life comes to a conclusion, during the interim, it's all just speculation and speculation is merely an illusion.

Madhur Seth 05.08.2013

• People miss you more when they see how much happier you are without them.

Madhur Seth 12.07.2013

• Nature always seeks balance. This is logical and observable. If all that we experience is simply a manifestation of Nature finding her balance, then surely God is balance, God is logic and God is Nature, all of which are essentially the same thing.

Madhur Seth 01.01.2010

• If you think you are the most this or that, you run a big risk of stagnation because you will fool yourself into believing you've already arrived before you've even begun!

Madhur Seth 08.10.2012

• Charm has to be applied smoothly over time, with mystique, in layers. That's why they call it 'charm'. Being charming, is like being a mysterious thing or place that needs to be discovered, not an open book that reveals everything at once leaving nothing to discover.

 Madhur Seth 12.06.2013

• One can either use the water to put out the fire or use the fire to boil the water, one simply cannot do both simultaneously.

Madhur Seth 12.06.2013

• Shotgun friendships, much like shotgun weddings, are a pain in the ass because, somehow, at some point, someone always get's shot in the ass. Therefore, why would you KNOWINGLY want to inflict that pain upon yourself? A pain in the ass is bloody annoying in the long run too.

Madhur Seth 12.06.2013

• If you put yourself on a high pedestal, then jumping down off it can be risky, because, nobody can reach up so high to help you down. Madhur Seth 09.06.2013

If you see good in someone - Tell Them

Part of emotional intelligence is to understand how an emotion might impact another person. But before you can do this, you have to understand how that same emotion impacts you. This, one could say, is the fundamental basis of emotional intelligence, because an understanding of how emotions work to create real events, real reactions and instigate real change in people, can only be done through a deep internal and introspective understanding of the emotion as it exists within yourself first.

So you can only relate to an emotion and it's impact outside of you, if you first understand it's impact on you.

So let's say you see someone behaving in an unusual way. The first thing you would do from an EI perspective would be to examine what might be different in that persons life. What might have changed that is making them behave, say in an angry, sad, pensive or even overly happy way (it doesn't always have to be a negative change in behaviour :-)

Next, you see clues in their environment which tells you what might have changed in their life to make them behave in an unusual way. For example, they may have recently changed job or moved home, or maybe they're having a relationship problem or maybe they're just extra happy because they've gone into a new and exciting relationship (remember it does not always have to be negative).

Now, your own emotional self is the best 'test environment' to test how change impacts a person's behaviour, because if you consider the changes that you see in the other persons life and then place yourself at the centre of those changes as if they were happening to you, then you can 'test' what YOUR emotional response to those changes would be. It's very similar to putting yourself in another's shoes, except that here you are putting yourself in another's 'emotional shoes'. Once you understand YOUR emotional response, you will be in a better position to understand the other persons 'range' of possible emotional responses, which leads to a better understanding of how to better deal with that person or maybe even improve that person.

From here it's a simple set of logical steps to instigate change in that person, by telling them that you understand what they are experiencing. If that person is experiencing something negative in their lives, then just the fact that someone else took the time to understand their situation without prompting, firstly demonstrates to them how emotionally intelligent you really are and secondly and probably more importantly, makes their burden infinitely easier to bear (knowing that they are not alone with their problem). Of course, it does not always have to be negative, so if the other person is in an overly happy state of mind and behaving as such, by understanding the emotional aspects of that happy state, puts you in a good position to reinforce their positive behaviour and to better share their happiness with them.

So this is all pretty standard stuff, but what happens if it is applied for example in a work situation? Let's say you are a manager and you need to get the best out of your people. What better way than to instigate change and reinforce positive traits and behaviours in your people by reinforcing those traits right from the emotional centres where they are formed?

This takes me onto the point that if you see good in someone, it is absolutely your duty to tell them, even of you can't stand that person, in fact, especially, if you can't stand that person! If you see good, then say it. It makes people valued and it also makes people value you as they see you as an insightful person and a person who can see beyond prejudice or personal opinions, a person who sees a higher vision and cause. Above all, it appeals to their sense of self-worth and they see you as the person who made them feel emotionally better, the person who instigated a change for the better in them right from within themselves. Remember, even a prisoner, a thief, or someone whom society classifies as 'bad' has something good about them. It's just a matter of finding it and being sincere in telling them what good YOU have seen. So if such people have good in them, then surely there is some good in just about everyone?

Returning to the discussion on EI, what about if you are fighting for a good cause? By understanding the deep emotional aspects of what motivates people to believe and work for a good cause, empowers you to move and activate people into actually getting things done rather than just talking about them. A good cause could be anything from an idea or vision that you have to create a new business, for example, or to organise and complete a challenging task, or a belief in some kind of change in society or maybe a desire to change the way people think about something. A deep understanding of how emotions work and how they motivate people is what led great leaders in history to do great things. Thus, without a doubt, people such as Martin Luther King, Mahatma Ghandi, Albert Einstein, The Dalai Lama and even those with an ulterior motive such as Adolf Hitler, all clearly possessed great intelligence, but the ability to instigate great changes in society (good and bad) came from their deeper rooted emotional intelligence and knowing how to use it.

Fundamentally, each and every one of us has a basic need. The need is to be fulfilled as a person, it is what makes us complete, what makes us feel that we are worth something to others and to the world at large. How, within ourselves do we achieve such fulfilment? The answer is that we constantly take emotional feedback from others and our responses to the world, our behaviour, our outlook and our perception of who we are and the value that we hold are all based on this feedback. It is exactly this constant flow of emotional feedback which meets our basic need to be fulfilled, because fulfilment ultimately comes from being acknowledged by others for who we are, being understood and having a feeling that we belong and that we are wanted. In my opinion, it is these fundamentally deep needs and the fulfilment of these that forms the entire basis of emotional intelligence. Even a bad person, a person who hurts others, is either not having these needs fulfilled and therefore becomes 'bad' in response to the deficiency in fulfilment of their basic emotional needs or it could be that the person has had too much of the 'wrong' type of emotional feedback which leads them to do things, as they feel fully justified in what they are doing, as a direct result of the emotional feedback they may have received. In either case, the subconscious emotional centre is driving their conscious actions, whether good or bad.  

Now, when we see a strong person who is able to handle life's battles with ease and succeed, we wonder how they became strong. People from underprivileged backgrounds or those who grew up in extremely difficult circumstances, who still seem to succeed in their lives despite their circumstances, may well have been shaped by their environment, becoming hardened to the harshness of the world and thus succeed because they simply overcompensate their shortcomings by pushing harder and working harder. Nevertheless, environment alone cannot completely give all the feedback a person needs to know if they are right or wrong about something and whether or not they are making the right decisions about different events in their lives, yet ultimately, if they are successful, then surely they must have made a net number of the right decisions over time in order to become successful. And this is where emotional intelligence comes in because those decisions, which were the right decisions, will have come from an inner sense of confidence, self worth and surety that they are indeed the right decisions. That confidence and surety, in turn, will have come from the emotional feedback that they will have received from others and therein lies the 'Eureka' moment, when that person absolutely knows they are doing the right thing. In this way, I can absolutely guarantee, that if you were to ask any successful person, the reasons for their success, ultimately it will boil down to the influences from others which fed their emotional centres, which then led them to make the right decisions, which ultimately led to their success. Thus, in order to deeply understand the human world around us, we need to be perceptive and open to giving and receiving this constant flow of emotional feedback and to be able to recognise when it can be of value to us.   

A final point: Ever heard the phrase 'If it isn't broke, don't try to fix it'? Well, for me, the meaning behind this (apart from the obvious) is also 'don't keep looking at life and people you encounter to find only their negative aspects. Instead, look at things to find the positive aspects'. In this way, don't find wrong where there is no wrong and thus don't try to fix wrongs that don't exist. its futile. If you only see negative things, you will always be trying to fix them. If you see the positive, you will learn to appreciate life and others and thus find ways to tell them what you see as positive in them, reinforcing such behaviours and thus instigating the change in your world and in society that YOU ultimately desire!

Be Extraordinary, Because It's Bloody Boring Being Ordinary!

In this post, I refer to 'success'. However how does one define success? - well, this is the subject of  a different blog, keep reading :-)