Free Write-Machiavelli
Posted by chriskurz on March 18, 2008
Chris Kurz
ENG 121
March 18th, 2008
Questions
1.) Does a leader need to be selfish in order for his/her country to be taken seriously and advance in worldwide society?
2.) Machiavelli says that friendships or deals that come through bribery cannot be trusted. What does that say about controlling interest groups and major donors to modern day campaigns?
Oh crap! I woke up in the middle of the night and remembered I forgot to do my free write. So now it is 5:30 a.m., and I am thinking about Machiavelli. He would have a much harder time trying to get things together in the dark to write at this time of day.
Anyway, what struck me as interesting in Machiavelli’s writing was the amount of thought that he put into his ideas. He obviously spent a great deal of time trying to wrap his mind around the concept of love and fear as related to how his society functioned. I wonder if he ever had aspirations of becoming a politician but could not go through with it because he felt the need to be loved too much. Sometimes I wonder if some of the pieces we read are written more about the author but disguised as an essay about their society or surroundings.
Most of Machiavelli’s ideas are very astute observations about what it must feel like be a politician. For all the heat that politicians take from the press, the public and others, think about what it must be like to try and sleep at night for them. Throughout the course of the day you are placed in the position of making decisions. Once those decisions have been made, then they are questioned. Next people form judgements about you based on the decisions. Nevermind that the people may not be fully informed about whatever issue is at hand, they will crucify the decision maker for not agreeing with their point of view. It is hard not to want to be feared rather than loved. It is much easier to piss everyone off than it is trying to please everybody.
