During the long march from creature to culture, always at play and usually dominating the play is the rivalrous impulse. We are born with it, bred to it, conditioned by it and rewarded for it. We are also saddled with it, subject to it, undone by it and, as illustrated by Adam, Eve, Cain and Abel, punished for it.
True, rough though life would be, had we no flexibility with our subjective capacity, the immediate relentless rivalrous impulse would be instrumental in keeping some of us alive. It drives lions and tigers to extend and defend their territory and to compete for scarce resources. We, of course, have extra brainpower, making it possible for us to transcend the immediate, to insert a pause between the stimulus and the response. We can anticipate our needs, make plans to acquire necessities, comforts and luxuries and set aside resources for the proverbial rainy day.
This transcendent know-how or can-do changed human possibility. Life is no longer limited to happenstance, to the way that it is; life can be about the way it ought to be. Unlike the jungle’s programmed creatures, humans now have the means for going beyond the condition and circumstance in which they find themselves. They can transcend the pulsing immediate and move into a wonderland born of intention, imagination and genius.
Does our access to this gift of transcendence mean that we’ve shed the rivalrous impulse as so much excess evolutionary baggage? No. The rivalrous impulse is alive and well, enjoying its heyday actually, under the aegis of a Scoreboard culture that has appropriated and now exploits it. We are at the effect of its beat, an internal and external beat so dominant that even conscience is at its mercy. Modern as we are, we could still say that the rivalrous impulse drives our lives and antagonism rules the day.
Fiercely and conspicuously or more under wraps and quietly, we’re competitors all. And too often, neither entirely fit nor good enough sports when we engage. Moreover, we now live in a world where widespread sophisticated exploitation of the rivalrous impulse drives contentious and adversarial (if not corrupt) competition for every inch of material or conceptual territory. We can’t escape it; it seems to make the world go ‘round. But very much about it makes for a lesser human being.
Think about it. Think about how so much of what we don’t like about others is driven by this impulse. Their antagonism. Their aggressiveness. Their pettiness and selfishness. Their drive to move up in the pecking order, their no-holds-barred scramble for rank and status, their corrupt reasoning and adulteration of value. We don’t like their envy, jealousy, conceit or that they’re mean-spirited, disagreeable, intimidating, argumentative and spiteful. Touchy, litigious and biased, they lie, cheat, thieve and loot our corporate, political and cultural institutions. They say and do very cruel things. And they sulk, shout or threaten when they don’t get their way and show their contempt for those they’ve passed on the ladder to success.
And for the most part, they do all this and at the same time manage an image of civility, culture and respectability. And, of course, possessing a moral compass is a part of this image! Who admits to being in the throes of immorality, to being party to dirty tricks, to getting what they want through intimidation? Who admits to cruelty, selfishness, indifference, envy or conceit? Who dares to take the public stage and assert that affinity, decency and moral obligation can be set aside because all is fair in love and war and business and politics? Is it really true that bloodthirstiness, brass knuckles and sucker punches are okay on the fields where rivalry is at play?
So, is the intemperate rivalrous impulse, appropriated by Scoreboard instrumentally useful despite its faults? The answer is mainly no. From one perspective it seems to prod us to develop practical prowess, which yields prosperity, which serves the greater good. But, is this the way life ought to be? Is life a contest? A harsh game with ruthless rules? Is there nothing short of the exploitation of the rivalrous impulse that might motivate us to develop our competence, our talent, our know-how, our leadership?
Yes, there is something else. We are not entirely without moral resource when it comes to modulating the rivalrous impulse; indeed, autonomy demands that we do so. What is morality if not accepting the demands of autonomy? Isn’t it autonomy that we care about in the first place? In fact, we care deeply about meeting its demands. We care about meeting the demand that we exit the ego protection program because it hides from us the authentic character-building demands of autonomy. We care about meeting the demand that we transcend, rise above or get over unexamined visceral immediacy in favor of practices that we might recognize as rational, decent, noble, meaningful or civilized. And we care deeply about meeting the demand to balance the runaway punitive, spiteful rivalrous impulse with our own carefully designed model of stability built of self-control, self-determination, creative intelligence, moral resource and practical competence.
Mostly, of course, we don’t fight for rank and status with deadly weapon, tooth or claw. We fight with acquisition—stuff, standing, fitness, relationship, connection. Besides mates and food, we acquire education, recreational pursuits, languages, opinions, beliefs, etc. Some of our acquisition is biologically driven, e.g., food as sustenance. Some of our acquisition, as we well know, is driven by Scoreboard, which cagily exploits our rivalrous capacity, condition and circumstance. And some of our acquisition may reflect thoughtfully acquired taste and an ability to appreciate human workmanship.
The question is: Are we acquiring the right stuff? Do we underestimate the value of the moral character of autonomy? Do we underestimate what we need to acquire in order to be successful with our lives and successful at being persons of substance? Don’t we want to be sure that we acquire both the critical skills to continue to prosper in the marketplace, as well as the skills of personhood to thrive as a human being and to contribute to the human prospect? These latter include the kind of stuff that would help us through challenge, fear, discouragement and loss; the kind of stuff that is displayed by generosity, gratitude, humility, compassion and tolerance; and the kind of stuff that shows up as resilience, flexibility, timeliness and resourcefulness.