Activists vs Opportunists - Which Are You?
Greta Thunberg is the most punk rock person on the planet. She wants to save your life and if you get hurt feelings in the process then that's a small price to pay. She burns with a righteous anger. A refusal to accept the world as it is and the mindsets that keep it that way. "But", say her critics, "why does she have to be so hostile and divisive?" Why can't she be more like noted hippy and sandal-wearer Jesus H Christ?
Lets check in on him shall we?
Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I have come to ‘set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law’; And a man's foes shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it. (Matthew 10: 34 - 39)
It turns out that Jesus was also punk as ****.
Greta and Jesus are activists. Complaining about them being divisive is missing the point. Activists are *supposed* to divide people. They tear down sclerotic and paralysed institutions by sheer force of will. They can be immensely destructive but they are so necessary for our survival as a species. But by themselves they are not enough.
I am not an activist. I am an opportunist. People like me come in behind the cyclone of the activist and reassemble the world in new ways. As I said about a former boss of mine: "She breaks people and I put them back together again" (I don't think I said this to her face. I'm not that stupid). Without opportunists, all you have is wreckage.
Activists and opportunists operate in different ways. Activists are charismatic. Charismatic people persuade you that they are worth following to the ends of the earth. Opportunists operate on charm. Charming people persuade you that you are worth following to the ends of the earth. In our society we tend to valorize the heroic and therefore charisma is more prized than charm. That simply makes things easier for the charming people.
It is possible for someone to both an activist and an opportunist but such a combination in person in the one context is rare. Often you will find an activist and an opportunist acting in tandem. They don't always get on. The activist sees the opportunist as comprised and weak. Why do they give up so easily? The opportunist sees the activist as unreasonable, naive and alienating to the constituencies that must be mobilized for lasting change to stick. I do think that successful activists and opportunists need to have a bit of other in themselves. And one person can act as an activist in one context and an opportunist in another. So the boundaries are not rigid.
Opportunists are often happier than activists. The activist is rarely satisfied. There is still so much to done. The world is still broken and imperfect. On the other hand, opportunists see the glass as half full.
There are many dangers to both roles. The dangers for the activist include an inability to stop and the growth of an ego so massive and a vision so extreme that it drives everyone around them away. For the opportunist, it is falling into the easy manipulation of others and becoming simply an apparatchik in a new bureaucracy.
Are you an activist or an opportunist? And if not, do you want to be?