How do I measure up to Joseph Stalin?

I often object to the description of Stalin and his ilk as “geniuses”. To me they all seem like the ordinary people swept into a role. But there is one aspect where there is indeed a genius. When Iosif Dzhugashvili met a person he always defaulted to the expectation that this person is out to kill him. This looks like a reasonable evolutionary trait. And to be sure Stalin expected every human being on the face of the earth to kill him, so he hurried up to kill them first or used them to kill others who are higher on the list, till it was their own turn.

If I have to think about my life, the biggest mistake I made was to default to the expectation of goodness and smartness from every stranger. The result is to be expected. I am soaked to the bone in mortal disappointments and betrayals. People who I though had my back, stabbed me instead, people I looked up to for inspiration turned out to be fakes, charlatans and buffoons. I have underestimated the immense stupidity of the human race or specifically people who form my social milieu. I am surrounded by the compliant humanoids who live by the ideas they never examined and the killers pretending to friends. At best I can expect to transact with a well-meaning terminal morons. It’s not much of a genius to expect the worst from people, but if this is what you call a “genius”, than Stalin was indeed a wunderkind.

• Joseph Vincent Paterno Tackle
• Psoy Korolenko & Daniel Kahn – Yiddish Song to Stalin
• The Power of Expectation

Tagged as: emotions, psychology