Forum Post: The World's Problem Summed Up In 6 Words : "Someone Has To Be The Janitor"

This is what the majority of us have been raised to believe.

Someone has to be on the bottom. Someone has to be the one who cleans up other people's messes. Someone has to make an abusively low wage justified by the fact they are one of the "slower" people in society.

Life is a race. Life is a competition. If you can't keep up : you will be left behind. Nothing personal, it's just business, it's just the way things are.

Life is a hierarchy. Humanity is a hierarchy. Hierarchy exists on all levels. Hierarchy of families. Hierarchy of companies. Hierarchy of countries. Someone will always have to be on the bottom, and nobody wants to be on the bottom. Nobody wants to be the one who is looked down upon. Everyone fears being on the bottom, but, in a hierarchy, someone always has to be. That is the nature of hierarchy.

Someone has to be the janitor. Someone has to be the CEO. Someone has to be rich. Someone has to be poor. That is the nature of humanity. The wealthy of the world would tell people to just compete more aggressively so they don't become the janitor, to scramble up the ladder as intensely as possible so they aren't the one left behind cleaning up garbage.

So. This is humanity, humanity as it has been since its beginning. Human beings running around, terrified of becoming the janitor. Entire nations struggling not to become the world's garbage dump, because humanity thinks of itself as a hierarchy, with someone always on the bottom.

This is the world's problem summed up in 6 words : "Someone has to be the janitor."

---- A Solution... ----

What's the Star Trek solution? Hierarchy is an essential organizational tool for a group to function; HOWEVER, in the Star Trek future, hierarchy which exists is hierarchy of experience. Basically, exactly the same as now with one difference : the people with more experience, the people at "the top", aren't compensated with great wealth, they are compensated with great responsibility and great respect. The people at "the top", don't strive for the top for personal wealth. Money. Valuables. "Stuff". Such things don't mean anything to people in the Star Trek future. People at the top are there to lead, are there to teach, are there to pass on their greater knowledge, to share their broader vision with a well-fed, well-clothed, well-educated, well-respected, equally valued human family.

Wall Street, The Wealthy, And Actually : Everybody, need a human nature paradigm shift. Competition. Hierarchy. In their proper place : to empower people to grow, not to determine the allocation of resources, not to create a world of rich men and poor men.