authoritah

obligatory

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXvqYYJSv3I

don't care about me

I don't love authority but tend to also be annoyed by reflexive anti-authoritarianism plus I'm temperamentally a quietist so I'm the problem basically.

I tend to be fairly deferential to authority in practice (I'd really like to speak to a therapist about this someday), but I feel a grinding hate that so many of them don't know what they're talking about. I feel like that could overlap with "not honest" as well. I don't care if they care about me though.

I don't know if it's the same, but I am a scrupulous rule follower, especially the basic "keeping civilization from falling apart" type of rules.

Never trust the priorities of power = I picked "not honest."

^ political thinker

i just want authority to relate to me as an individual

get coffee with me, ask about my hopes and dreams

ha my feeling is that if authority is even aware of my existence, let alone interested in me in any way, then that's a very bad thing.

Voted "I love authority" cos a good policy when confronted w authority is a show of submission. They eat that shit up. It's why they are the authority in the first place.

thank god mordy lost his star or this thread would have a real difft dynamic

today i feel really in touch w/ the fact that authority is distant + capricious

authority wdn't work if it gave a fuck about its subordinates

thinking about it, lots of parenting moments taught me this lesson

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i got beef

This thread makes the common-as-dirt mistake of conflating power and psoition with authority.

The only true source of authority is ability, not position, credentials or the possession of power. Properly grounded authority commands respect naturally.

It is a predictable problem in any complex hierarchical society that there are far more positions requiring ability than there are capable people to fill them. So, the hierarchy compensates by vesting power in the position a person occupies, regardless of their ability to fill the position, i.e. substituting authoritarianism for natural authority and dutiful obedience for voluntary cooperation based in love and respect.

It works, mainly because the benefits of leveraging specialization and organization more than overcome the friction created by muddle and ineptitude. But, it doesn't make it any easier to work for a boss you hate.

today i feel really in touch w/ the fact that authority is distant + capricious

what was going on i don't remember

i don't know if i agree with that. shouldn't this be:

The only true source of authority ^SHOULD BE^ ability, not position, credentials or the possession of power

but as you said, in real life, people who have no clue what they're doing still hold power. I guess I am conflating power with authority, as you say, but what else can you call it? Say I'm on trial in front of a panel of two judges. One of those judges listens carefully to what I'm saying and respectfully considers my argument in light of all of the context they can gather. The other ignores what I'm saying and reads the WSJ while I'm making my argument. One of these judges clearly deserves respect and demonstrates aptitude for the job, while the other does not. But they are both in positions of authority. They are the judge and I am the defendant. I can say one has ability and the other doesn't, but they both have authority over me. Let's say that in this particular trial only one of the two judges needs to condemn me in order for me to go to prison. If the inept, stupid, careless judge says I'm guilty, what can I do? Can I say "you don't have the authority?" Yes, they do. They have the authority to make a terrible judgment because they're in a position of authority.

i realize i'm saying "they have authority because they have authority", so yeah, i'm not gonna defeat anyone in a logic battle here. but they have authority because they have position, credentials, and power, right? i guess this is just a semantics thing, but irl you can't walk up to a racist cop and say "you don't have authority" because yeah, he does

and on the other side, i can't walk into the observation area of a senate proceeding and watch a terrible bill get passed and say to myself "i'm the one with authority here, because they are incompetent"

i think authority is just legitimate power (as opposed to illegitimate power that exists outside the channels of credentialization) primarily vis-a-vis the 'legitimate' State - and specifically how it is invested in the particular actors within that established government