🚀 go-pugleaf

[From Bill Powers (990507.1203 MDT)]

Tim Carey (990507.2145)--

>I would probably analyze it the same way as you. I don't think that the use
>of force is an essential prerequisite for coercion to occur. I just think it
>involves making someone do something against their will. If the little boy
>didn't want his father watching over his shoulder and wanted to do things on
>his own, then I would probably think of this as a coercive interaction.

I just realized what our problem is. The little boy, most of the time,
wants to drink his milk without spilling it, eat his food with a fork and
not his fingers, not drop food on the table or in his lap, and to eat
everything put in front of him. So his wants are aligned with his father's.
But why is that? It's because he doesn't dare want anything else! If he
ever did want anything else,he would DO something else, and as soon as he
did something else, his father would jump in with overwhelming physical
force. And by this time, he knows that would happen.

If you are forced to will something, your will is effectively nullified.
Your own higher systems can't adjust what you want at lower levels in the
way you need to adjust them. You have to satisfy someone else by willing
only what is acceptable to the other person.

None of this would amount to coercion, of course, if the parties were
equal. But they are not equal. One of them is so much stronger than the
other (as well as willing to use that strength) that in any conflict the
stronger one inevitably wins. And that is what turns a mere conflict, a
mere desire to control the behavior of someone else, into coercion.

Best,

Bill P.