No "I" In "Team"
The team is everything. If one of the players in a soccer-team, or any other sports team places him- or herself above the team, goes for the personal glory of scoring a goal, instead of passing the ball to the team-player that is in a clearly better position to score, they invite the anger of all other players in the team, as well as the fans.
Image by Jeff Djevdet - source: Flickr
And rightly so. There is no "I" in "team"; when we win, we win as a team and when we lose, we lose as a team. It's that simple. Life's that simple. At least in my mind. We humans stand on top of the planetary food-ladder, not because we're the fiercest, fastest, strongest, creature on earth. Not even directly because we're the smartest of them all; we didn't start out that smart. The reason why we're on top is because we're the best at cooperating, because we understand that there's no "I" in "team" and that only together we're able to move proverbial mountains.
"Survival of the fittest" doesn't mean that the strongest individuals of a certain species survive, it's not "eat or be eaten" like so many seem to believe is the case. It means that genes make sure individuals evolve, physically and / or behaviorally, in such a way that ensures survival of the species as a whole; in our case that meant, and still means, banding together to form tribes. For tens of thousands of years we operated in teams, strictly egalitarian teams actually; there were no discernible hierarchies, not even in modern hunter-gatherer societies. We worked together to slay one huge mammal and fed everyone in the tribe, so the tribe survived to guide the next generation into adulthood.
Are we still tribes? Well, yes in many ways; you need go no further than a popular sports match to see tribal forces in action. The player who for selfish glory refuses to pass the ball and misses, will suffer the tribes' scorn. On larger, national scale we see how we rally behind common causes, especially when threatened from abroad on an existential level, be it through military, terrorist or economical means (they all amount to the use of force).
This factual situation hasn't changed, and where in some situations we can not grow one tribe larger that approximately 500 individuals, we've proven that in other situations the tribes grow into much larger organisational entities, nations. But essentially we still operate as tribes; the rise of "own nation first" isolationist right-wingers all over the west might be an indication for the veracity of that hypothesis. The nation state seems to be, for whatever psychological, economical or political reasons, the largest size our tribes can grow to right now.
source: PxHere
The team, as well as the tribe, as well as our society, is of course a collection of individuals and, staying with the soccer-team for a moment, not everyone can be the star forward player; in order to serve the team, in order for the team to win, many other players in defense and the midfield, play in service of the star forward attacker. The teams strategy will revolve around getting that player in a good position to score, and getting the ball to him or her as often as possible. But that's not to further the glory of the forward player, it's for giving the whole team the best chance to win. And the real star forward player will on occasion, when another player has a better chance to score, pass the ball to that other player so he or she can make the score for the team. For the team. The star player gets all the glory and interviews but even that is result of a team-effort and should be felt as such.
Being human is a team-sport, always has been, there should be no "I" in the game of humanity, not where the survival of that particular tribe is concerned. Team-sport sounds so much nicer than socialism, doesn't it? I think so. Like in a team, some planning, a strategy is needed for all individuals to deploy their particular talents in their respective roles for the team to be successful. No soccer-team succeeds by letting their eleven players all individually strive for a score. Nor by completely restraining individual players to their designated role; even in emergencies, like when one player is injured or sent off the field with a red card, players need to be able to temporarily switch roles, and the real star attacker passes the ball to someone else if that creates a better scoring-chance. We need to be individuals, so we are free to spread our wings and strive to become the star player, but we need to be a team as well.
This is just me thinking out loud, after listening to the video I'll link below. It's an interview with Douglas Rushkoff, who I wrote about not so long ago in Billionaires Fearing "The Event". He has written a book called "Team Human" with a very long subtitle: "Our technologies, markets, and cultural institutions -once forces for human connection and expression- now isolate and repress us. It's time to remake society together, not as individual players but as the team we actually are." 'Nuff said where the source of my inspiration for this post is concerned. But please, do watch the interview, as he has more interesting things to say:
Douglas Rushkoff: Survival of the Richest & "TEAM HUMAN"
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