I was recently chatting with a friend and realized that despite my joy during the last elections and commitment to democracy, I could be persuaded by an enthusiastic population to be a benevolent dictator. The world could do worse--actually, it has done much worse. I mean most people hate dictators because we equate them with evil and lack of accountability. But I'm a relatively nice person on many, many levels. Sure I have temper issues, but I limit myself to yelling and an occasional use of profanity. On the upside, I believe in feeding people. If I make crazy declarations like, "Let them eat cake" (which Marie Antoinette never did by the way), it will be because I have baked lots and lots of cake. Also, I would never make such declarations until everyone has had lunch or dinner. Unless it is their birthday, in which case they can eat cake whenever they want.
I'd also put a lot of emphasis on universal literacy and health care. I'm pretty sure if there weren't such ridiculously high levels of illiteracy and ignorance in the world, we wouldn't be dealing with half the things that are going on around the world. I know ignorance is in the eye of the beholder, and literacy cannot erase it, but it can be reduced and isolated. I'll take that as a positive first step. All that knowledge can be channeled to doing a few positive things--curing diseases, building things and what not. Plus, once everyone is literate, they can read about all of my amazing contributions to the world.
I think that's a good start to a new society. I realize that I would technically be a dictator, I'd emphasize the benevolent part. I'm not sure how I'd go about achieving such things--I'm assuming there will be a petition or a revolution involved. Just please, keep it civilized. This should be a happy event.
No comments:
Post a Comment