Political “Disruptions”
Such a bad habit has been spreading, a dirty little word…(Cosy Dens)
The strange word – disruption – emerged a few years ago. American Professor Clayton Christensen first used it to describe the distortion of set trains of thought and policies in business and technologies.
Today, disruption is a vogue word, since it defines the state of affairs after the arrival of the internet. Revolution in the distribution of information has changed ownership relations and behavioural patterns in the media, banks, research and development centres, and show business. A vastly democratic approach to any source of information without an institutionalized control has created a veritable UTOPIA, a state where “old-fashioned” rules ceased to apply. Disruption is a force that destroys received standards, procedures of thought only to replace them with a plebeian succession of surprising, innovative schemes without a hierarchy and guarantees. Sometimes it is good, other times it is just too bad, but the trend is, alas, irreversible. I can still remember when banks were the world’s most powerful entities. But then, in the late 1990s, they were sidetracked by telecommunication distributors and operators. Today, the petrified old juggernauts have been replaced by small ships, like in the Battle of Salamis. They have come to be called disruptors.
The costly, incompetent banking system, which take long and charge a lot, including fees and exchange-rate transactions, was pushed out by the Estonian startup, TransferWise. A small application has turned into multibillion-dollar business, based in London. They charge a fraction of what Česká spořitelna savings bank would and whisk off your money to an account twice faster than a big bank. The Hilton family’s hotel chains are crumbling, since plebeians and the middle class all over the world are using the Airbnb mobile application. TV stations have been upset by Netflix – the global provider of entertainment contents online – for peanuts, of course. Taxi can operators have been undermined by UBER. Quality journalism has been supplanted by dimwitted, unreferenced info mixes, concocted by semiliterate authors, spreading conspiracy theories hatched by Russian propaganda: it costs the Russians an arm and leg, but try not to buy into it and face the loss of millions passive brains with the right to vote… while freely shared photo albums and smartphones have wrecked the value and worth of master photographers. Skype, Messenger and Facetime services connect you half-free across the globe and operators will either adjust to it or have it.
Google Maps has navigated millions of Africans across the hardships of their continent right to the edge of North Africa, where they are waiting for death or a journey to Europe. Russian propaganda on small underrated servers and the impact of Russian lies on Brexit proponents have pushed the great power that is Britain to the brinkmanship of political death. Twitter started and promoted the Arab Spring only to serve subsequently as the main recruitment ground for Islamic State. How very disruptive. Erdogan fooled the world via FaceTime when he pretended to be without liaison and allies. Even renowned political think-tanks bought Twitter reports that he had allegedly applied for asylum in Germany.
Disruptions are the engine of change that banks or the conventional telecom operators are trying to introduce to their old, inflexible systems in the hope – vain, I believe – for surviving the start of the millennium. Disruptions herald the advent of an era when mobility, security and instant adaptability to anything are worthier than money. Traditional, conservative organisms will perish in this environment like mosquitoes sprayed with a repellent. It is too bad that as they go, so will their values – respect for life, memory of the elders, love of land, respect for the others, quality of the work done, trust and, take it or leave it, indeed also conservative approach to God. I don’t mean any quick dose of New Age, holotropic breathwork, or nationalist imitations of Modern Orthodoxy. I mean the good old calm Spirit, which restores hope in those who will not adapt.
The disruptive world breeds nervous people. Fear breeds aggression and escape to the old patterns, ingrained in the genetic memory of humankind: (Allahu Akbar! Nothing but the Nation! Czech Lands for Czechs! Patriots Get Together… or Let’s Stick Together – the song remains the same, doesn’t it?). The disruptive world tells us that NOTHING WILL BE FOR SURE AFTER THIS SEASON. However, human beings need certainties. In olden times, certainties were shaped and strengthened by religious rituals. But a new fridge or app from the Appstore will hardly instill certainties. Modern man is alone in his fear.