The other day I came across a story on the internet that shocked me with its unexpected ending. The story is about how a person called an ambulance for another person on the street late in the evening. Needless to say, it was impossible to get through on the phone, then the “help” took forever to arrive, then the doctors and paramedics vented on the victim and their rescuer the emotions that had accumulated during the day… In general, the plot is familiar and even typical, but since it was told by a witness and someone who cared—it gets to you. What shocked me, however, was the ending: the narrator decides to “go into power,” because there is no more strength to bear it…
Over many years around politics, I have seen many people “go into power.” None of them returned. Rather, they turned into bosses—subjects who learned to answer the simplest questions with “well, you know, this is a question of an ecumenical nature.” But we are not about that now. We are about how wonderfully the system works. Even more so—System. For the production and preservation of bosses.
Let’s imagine that our story is not about something as dramatic as an “ambulance,” where emotions might interfere with understanding reality. Let’s transfer the entire plot to, let’s say, the baking industry. Someone finds themselves in a city where, let’s say, no one produces Viennese rolls. At all. This person, accustomed to the refined pleasures of a Viennese roll, experiences terrible discomfort. Therefore, they write an angry post on their blog, in which they loudly and openly announce their unconventional decision to run for deputy. Viennese rolls shall exist!
To us, such behavior would seem strange. We know that if there are no Viennese rolls somewhere, it’s a good reason to start producing them yourself and earn money from those who care about them. Or tell those who can do it about it. However, for residents of the Soviet Union, there would be nothing surprising in this story. Except for some details about elections and similar democratic nonsense. Residents of the Soviet Union knew that the decision about the production of Viennese rolls, like everything else, is made by the boss.
Ukraine and other countries differ from the Soviet Union in two things. First, it is the volume of what is produced by the boss’s decision and under their control. Becoming a deputy for Viennese rolls looks funny to us. Doing the same for the production of ambulance services looks heroic. However, in reality, the boss is not needed for the production of Viennese rolls, nor for the production of ambulance services. They are not needed at all in the process of interaction between the producer and the consumer. Of anything whatsoever.
And it is at this point that the second difference lies. In the Soviet Union, the boss decided everything and for everyone, and didn’t ask anyone about anything. An ordinary person could not influence their boss. That’s why the Soviet Union ended. The system turned out to be non-functional.
Another system turned out to be functional. Rather—the System. In it, no one needs to brainwash anyone at party meetings; on the contrary, conscious citizens themselves, voluntarily, with their own money, and on the run, regularly ensure that the boss doesn’t disappear anywhere, and preferably—multiplied and prospered. Someone smoking in the entrance? — everyone to the elections! The cops beat someone up? — everyone to the elections! The faucet is leaking? — everyone to the elections! Bosses can be chosen. One can become a boss oneself.
Bosses can change. But the boss class will always remain. Although, for neither Viennese rolls nor ambulance services is it needed at all.