Opinion: History lessons

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Take a wide stance. We want to expand our base. Whatever the cliché, the ambitious among us all, each and every one, are prone to expansion. If properly managed, we proselytize good and encouraging news. We share the knowledge that we have accumulated, hoping to prevent harm and advance the cause of those who come behind us. If not so well directed, some can slant into megalomania. So certain are we in our own rightness that we oppress and cajole all others into submission.

So, good, let’s grow market share. Let’s expand the boundaries of our domain. Let’s annex, absorb, correct, enlighten and fix. We are better than most. We can multi-task. Unlike normal mortals, we can give 110 percent. We can bend the rules of time and space to squeeze 30 hours into a 24-hour day. We can hold five No. 1 priorities!

Well, maybe we can. But still, even as we attend less to existing clients, donors or family members to pursue new shiny ones, we hope that all the plates continue to spin. As we focus on some, others are being invariably and intentionally underserved and ignored. Growth is tricky business. Change, whatever that may mean, is equally fraught with peril. As long as “I” benefit, then we can figure out the carnage later. We win!

Sales teams, government entities and cola manufacturers go to war fighting over our hearts and minds. Would Poland be a better country if seized by the USSR – or Nazi Germany – or the EU? Some would argue so. Epoch, era or Reich, does it just depend upon one’s perspective or gain? If, as Churchill often claimed, history is written by the victors, is it rewritten by later warriors and thugs or by some pseudo-scientific reassessment by those eager to make their own names long remembered?


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