The Civilized Cave Man and Woman
Did our circumstances improve with the rise of civilization?
Flash back to the nascent days of cultivation of the land, domestication of animals. Now our lot is to be a serf or a peasant, in Babylonia or Sumeria, Egypt or Assyria, to serve a monarch or pharaoh, to be his property. Or if we’re freebooting raiders and plunderers of Asia or Africa, then we’re tribesmen still, imprisoned within the pitiless hierarchical demands of the clan and the pillaging band.
Or perhaps we have evolved more highly, to take up a sword and serve in the armed forces of some prince’s ambition. What are we now? We’re “subjects.” We’re disposable instruments of war.
If we work the land, we’re chattel. We’re the property of some princeling or potentate. Or if we have ascended beyond such mean station, we’re courtiers, dependent for our livelihood and prosperity on maintaining our station within the good graces of an all-powerful sovereign. Think we were free, even in the days of the Magna Carta and the Rights of Man? Michelangelo served the Pope, as Leonardo did the Medicis.
In other words, we’re still cave men and women.
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Bingo! What had bothered me all week from the last post was the prospect of being a boot licker. Steve, thanks for the posts that give our minds and hearts a workout.
May we all bring light, value, and love into the new year by knowing who we are inside and in the sharing of the gifts of that Self.
Wow, didn’t see that coming – ‘we’re still cave men and women’. Sadly true. Thanks for a new perspective.
True for even the business owner today, who one would think is free. He or she is a slave to the shareholders who were promised a certain return on investment and the bank who holds the commercial note and the owner’s pledge of personal assets to pay the sum owed.
Maybe the only facet of our lives where we are not “bootlickers” and are truly free is when we are at the keyboard or piano keys, creating our art… As Jackie noted when we are “sharing the gifts of Self.”
Good one, Brad.
Of course, we all still fear a dinosaur coming around the corner. Merry Christmas and a happy new year, friends!
No fears of Saber-tooth tigers here, though, and I can turn up the heat with the wall switch, but as civilization advanced, so did the laws governing behavior. Complex Copyright laws that are working out the AI bits.Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays.
Yes, we are the same as we’ve always been, only now with more advanced technology and deadlier weapons.
But it’s still a miracle to be alive, knowing that even though there have been billions of us, each has been unique.
Someone is in a mood!
In this servitude theme post, perhaps the family unit should be included. The husband is out there working for the livelihood of the wife and children. The mother works in the home for the benefit of husband and children. The children are under the authority of their parents.
Without the master and the slave, great feats of architecture, art, music,etc. wouldn’t exist.
Instead, man would be nothing but wild beasts prowling about with no direction or purpose.
Man would be as he was before he domesticated himself—in line with nature. His purpose is survival. His direction is to hunt and gather.
One could say the caveman’s destiny aligned better with the world back then. But then we wouldn’t get to view the works of Tolstoy or Tolkein or Michelangelo or .
As long as society exists, there is no freedom. As the Bible says, you get to pick your master. That’s about it. Although, I think Nelson Mandela’s quote is worth considering- “They can imprison the body, but not the soul.” The closest we ever come to freedom is to know our minds, hearts and souls. This self-determination can never be taken away regardless of circumstances.
Thanks so much for this insightful post. I think about this often, the way human beings organize themselves into hierarchies and the effect it has on us. I always enjoy reading your insights.
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I have discovered that complete freedom is not for the faint of heart. If this independence is actually achieved, then do I simply become inert? Not so much.
Seems the Creative prospect of not responding to any social structure whatsoever will still leave me to deal with the Muse. I like knowing that I have no place to hide, and that I will never be left alone.
Thanks Steve for the Holiday fun. I need to go shopping now… I have people to serve…
Joseph Campbell’s book Oriental Mythology lays the roots of the transition from clam member (and matriarchy) to lord/subject (and patriarchy) really well. It seems that the change happened when people started deciding that they owned a piece of land. How does one “own” a portion of nature and the Earth, and every living thing that’s on it?
Hey, this is a great piece of thinking expressed in words. I think I’m tracking: through stages of our human evolution, we become less free. Pleistocene people were beholden only to the members of their tribe. No accumulation of wealth. The survival of the individual was dependent on the health/strength/survival off all the other individuals in the known world. Call it a neighborhood or a tribe or a family. They were wholly autonomous: not dependent, not serfs, not subjects, not property, not disposable instruments of violence. Pleistocene or cave people were independent.
I’m hearing a call to remember that we are most free when we are unbeholden to those structures of emerging civilization. Our freedom resides within the recognition of our inner autonomy. As Jackie and Brad observe, when we are “creating” is when we are most independent of those toxic features of emerging civilization.
And I’m noting that I changed to “evolving civilization” to “emerging civilization,” in this case.
I think we ought to reserve the word “evolving” for those emergent features that embody the positive and pro-social improvements in the condition of the human organism. We’re all just cells in that organism, really. We flash into and then out of “existence” as part of the wider body of humanity, our Homo Sapiens Sapiens branch having lived for 200,000 or 300,000 years, depending on how you count. I’m a skin cell that lives 30 days. I’m gut lining that lives 5 days. My body endures while component cells are born and then die.
We’re each cells in that superorganism of humankind. As far as “evolution” and what may arise for us in the future, I have great hope and belief that this human organism will awaken to see itself as it is. Be able to see past duality and the need to create an “other.” Recognizing each other as cousins
Back to that Pleistocene cave woman or man… where everyone in the world is intimately connected to you.
Appreciate all a y’all in this space.
That’s fact most of us don’t like to acknowledged. We tends to relate the phrase cave men to uncivilized but it’s that from the other end and we are still under those kinds of subjections the likes of emperors and pharaohs came with during their days.
It’s an important thing to know that what might bother us today has been the way it is since the beginning of humanity.
And there is really no one at the top that we can shake our fist at as those at the top are ultimately accountable to someone else above them or cyclically back to everyone else.
In other words, carry on and enjoy every moment in our brief time here in this infinite vastness.
Thank you Steven, this is a great reminder of that.
“It may be the Devil / it may the Lord / but ya gotta serve somebody…”
Mr. Zimmerman
I’ve been thinking for some years now that we’re anchored in a medieval system. Not much has changed other than fashion, transport and communications. The models societies are built on are nedieval.
My dear Steve, my comment won’t be sent for unknown reason. I tried it 5-6 times, clicked the button, but it doesn’t. Let me know if there’s a word limit.
Merry Christmas, and a Happy new year. To war then, the cavemen’s war of art.