Understanding Psychotic Chasers

Prologue

IN A SEA OF HUMANITY around the world, individuality is merely a dictionary word in many places. Let’s start with some numbers first, before we delve into the mindsets.

Income inequality has been identified as the top societal risk for 3 years in a row since 2012, by World Economic Forum’s Global Risk Report.¹   Population mismanagement, lack or collapse of governance, and conflict for resources among the states, and large scale involuntary migrations further are expected to continue worsening the resulting conflicts for resources and economic opportunity.

More than 1.2 billion individuals would be added to the world population by 2030, as per United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs findings² (as of 2015). An equal number of young people will transition into those seeking employment. More than 2 billion children will reach school age, with the need to access excellent quality education to survive and thrive. More than 3 Million³, people would join the list of unemployed globally by 2017.  More than a billion³ people are expected to remain in vulnerable forms of employment globally, where working conditions could be dismal with improper or poorly defined contractual arrangements and worker’s situation further exacerbated with little or no access to worker rights and appropriate legal framework and environment, thus denying worker his or her fundamental rights. At least 1 out of every 4³ working individuals in developing countries have to live with moderate or extreme forms of poverty and around 3 Million more per year are expected³ to join this unfortunate group. More than 7 Million jobs are expected⁸ to be lost between 2015-2020. As time progresses, Logentivity and aging populations may be seen as dampeners to global growth and sidelined in favor of the young. Newly emerging economies have begun to compete with those that saw their own emergence over last couple of decades.  One in every 122 humans has become either a refugee, internally displaced, or seeking asylum, as a result of war or persecution.²³

An inward looking, self-serving, perhaps myopic shift in political ,social and economic ideologies that feed from and into the movements of the masses and elite alike, and the conflicting, confusing messaging surrounding such movements that perhaps looks to either conveniently simplify issues faced by populations, when they are not or await until the complexity and likely impact of such issues becomes suitable to further self-serving interests, are causing potentially degenerative mutations in social and sentimental fabric.

The decisions about and ramifications concerning such issues at local, regional, national and potentially global scales such as safety and security, climate change, poverty elimination, scarcity of vital resources, access to education and employment, inequalities with respect to quality of overall life are causing negative shifts in mentalities, sentiments, and value systems of those who have suffered from, and also in those, who have benefited from such shifts.  

Conventional dominations and stereotypes based on gender, sexual orientation, race, nationality, and many others could be challenged and toppled or already being toppled in many parts of the world.

However, as the governing ideologies and socio-political movements become self-serving, transient and unpredictable, similarly, the objects of opposition and adulation, will become very subjective and self-serving and will tend to mutate as per the corresponding mutations in value systems and belief systems of the populations, where the basic guiding principles of ethics, morality, empathy, philanthropy, trustworthiness, may suffer from decline.

With such unpredictable, and constantly mutating mentality and mindsets, the behaviors of opportunistic segments who are desperate to gain and sustain political, social and monetary advantages over those who they perceive as competition, would tend to be guided by the incentives to conceal ( like someone would do when playing cards) their present form of mentality mutations through behavioral facades that are designed to psychologically guide the  unsophisticated or common or crude or foolish  as perceived by them into oblivion and perhaps ruin.

Behavioral Facades

As an aspiring individual brimming with optimism towards life with your own rosy and sunny aspirations, it would probably be beneficial to avoid certain pitfalls through building an understanding of some of the dangerous, anti-social behavior patterns that you may be subjected to without even realizing that they are so, unless you build the needed discernment.

I wish to state that the objective of this book to present real life experiences that author is personally aware about. Such experiences may or may not happen to you in person or to others, because the social conscientious and behaviors undergo transformations and mutations from time to time.

The author simply wishes to build an awareness that such behaviors are possible, that they are not imaginary, that they need to be countered as they threaten survival and dignity of aspiring ones who are not deemed suitable because of malignant, pre-conceived biases or prejudices based on several other forms of convenient arrangements that are designed to promote select few and suffocate the rest, while hiding these real motives from the suffocated through creation of hallucinatory behavioral facades.

At the same time, this book is not meant to offend any section or class of society based on race, gender, class/caste, income levels, nationality, sexual orientation, religion or any other existing or newly forming segment. The examples provided were chosen simply because the corresponding concrete data or referenceable sources were available. Use of data from populations of a particular nation, or class of society is used for illustration purposes only and does not indicate that the issues or indications are restricted only to that country or state, or demographic, or race or gender and other categories as applicable.

I hope you enjoy reading this book.

Abhijit Telang

Understanding the societal formation of barriers and exclusivity

AS A TALENTED INDIVIDUAL who is aspiring for a good education, career, recognition and respect, wealth and in general success in life, you may not even realize how many forces that were created to sustain the status quo that currently exist and thrive without you. Noticed the without you? 

On the pretext, the status quo claims to surround itself with barriers that can be crossed only with high degree of skill sets. In reality, the skills barrier is one of the most fair one to face and cross. Because, skills can be crossed through education and hard work. The barrier claims that it can be crossed by any individual who either possesses or has acquired the needed education, skill sets and experience. (Which in turn, are surrounded by similar set of barriers with respect to prior education and skills, with a cascading effect, all the way down to the first step in your aspirational ladder).

The real barriers are societal, and depend on the prevalent structure of society, its various classes, communities, alliances, customs and beliefs. Irrespective of what those structures are and what sort of groups, alliances, customs and beliefs exist, aspirant needs to understand that s/he will face an enormous amount of resistance to his/her inclusion.

Millions of gullible would like to believe that they are free to pursue and realize their dreams. That war, slavery, and struggles for emancipation from apartheid based on race, caste, faith, community, nationality, immigration status, state, mother tongue, language proficiency including strict conformity with respect to popular accent, and age were fought and won by their ancestors and forefathers.

In reality, every forthcoming generation has to learn to defend, hold fort and win emancipation from the new breed of oppressors who may or may not necessarily belong to the same economic, or political or societal class or race or caste or linguistic heritage, or gender or faith or any other defining identities, and hence the people or classes they intend to oppress or plunder from also may or may not be the same.

This is because the thought process that enabled the prior generations to emerge temporarily victorious in their struggle for emancipation, also changes the thought process of the erstwhile oppressors. The changes can be constructive to some extent where some correction in behavior, and some form of equality, fairness, transparency may be brought upon through socio-political-economic and legislative leadership and commitment to bring such changes, so as not to lose trust of people who fought these brave battles and also to offer a ray of hope to their subsequent generations.

However, the equilibrium that is sought to bring equality and fairness is