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Politics, Power and Sex

May 14, 2024 Editorial

Kaieteur News – Politics, we should know, is all about power. Mr. Forbes Burnham once said that anyone in politics who said he did not want power was either a fool or a rascal. And Mr. Burnham knew a thing or two about power. The question, he asserted was, “What did the person want to do with the power?”

No matter how some might want to hide that fact, politics can only enter the picture when there is a differential in the power relations among individuals and power. Those entering the arena of politics invariably enthuse that their interest is to assure a more equitable distribution of power. But from the experience of not only Guyana, but across the world (not only in the present but since the beginning of recorded history) it appears that something invariably sidetracks those who engage in the pursuit of power.

The “something” is summarized in the well-known aphorism: “Power corrupts; and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” It does not matter whether the power is held in the hands of a king or a democrat – or in all the permutations and combinations between those relations – more often than not, once power is acquired it is soon abused and corruption sets in.

But all of this should not be too surprising. After all, what kind of person usually enters politics to strive for the crown? It’s an individual with an incredible drive and a willingness to take risks. Often times the person is driven to escape from his own circumstances and insecurities that he projects onto “the people”.

Once power is achieved it is not a far leap for the new incumbent to believe that he/she is not bound by the usual rules – those are for the run-of-the-mill folks. The irony that another differential in the power relations is recreated that will set off its own inevitable reaction is invariably lost on the erstwhile “man of the people”. So the wheel of corruption turns again.

As we survey the tableau of history we cannot fail to be struck by how often the corruption occasioned by the confluence of politics and power involves sex; how often this plays out.

The tales that are titillating our bemused public have been told even before politics took an organized form. The alpha male gorilla leader services the entire band of females; as probably did the alpha cave man ancestor of ours that wielded the biggest club.

Which king, whose story has come down to us, did not literally rule the roost, as did the prototypical roosters? Did not King Solomon have a thousand concubines, not to mention one consort?

Even though the present crop of leaders that gravitate into political activism can hardly be classified as the archetypical alpha males, once they achieve the authority of office, they appear driven to assume seigneurial rights over all females (and if the stories are to be believed) over nubile males as well.

The point that we are making is that the present difficulties we are experiencing with the well-publicized concatenation of political and sexual peccadilloes in our society is not peculiar to us. The new openness in the international media has made us aware of such abuses in even the most entrenched and successful countries in the world.

The scandals of Presidents John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton of the US are too well known to bear repeating. Politics, power and sex are part of the human condition – driven by primeval urges that Sigmund Freud dubbed the “id”.

What we have to do, as has been attempted elsewhere, is not to sweep the abuses of power under the carpet. They have to be exposed and values entrenched that can help us to strive always to rise above our animalistic instincts and fulfill the potential of our humanity. We might have wiped out the harems but have our institutions destroyed the old searching for sexual power by politicians?

It is the task of the media to expose the abusers and the duty of the people to create the new values.

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