Monkey Politics As Usual

These days, you seldom find something worth reading in the Atlantic. During the last decade, it has gone from being a top-notch magazine to a simplistic liberal rag. However, the bell can occasionally still ring clear. Like in this article, putting Putin, Biden, and other political geronts refusal to retire in a wider historical (Biblical) context. I will leave it to you to judge the parts and parcels of this analysis and its qualities. However, let me add a few words about an even more ultimate explanation for the fact that many old farts refuse to step down.

In human societies, the interplay between virtues and vices is a perennial theme, shaping the rise and fall of leaders and the power structures they create. Human nature embodies this power struggle and echoes primal instincts ingrained in both our individual and collective psyche. Thus, "good" and "bad" urges and behaviors are genetic traits ingrained through hundreds of millions of years of evolution and so immune to cultural change.

In other words, just because a human society becomes more civilized, our urges remain the same. Indeed, we can create cultures aspiring to suppress bad urges, but they will remain dormant under the cultural veneer. And it never takes much for them to break back. In fact, many seemingly cultural codes and accepted behaviors are just dressed-up genetic urges.

Moreover, among chimpanzees and other social animals, individuals compete for power. The winner then dominates until they falter in strength or agility as challengers arise, fueled by ambition and opportunity. From ancient times, the allure of power has been undeniable, rooted in the deepest recesses of human behavior. So, echoing this primal cycle of succession and overthrow, human politics is still basically just monkey business.

Even more specifically, among our inherent traits is a tendency to seek and maintain authority. And since it was long embodied by the most physically imposing figures, power politics is a male-chauvinist thing. The archetype of the alpha male, dominating through his strength (or cunning deed), is part of the views of leadership across all continents and cultures with only a few exceptions (such as the Amazons, who, as females known for their strength, archery, and riding skills, tellingly were depicted as preposterous in Greek mythology).

Hence, male-line primogeniture monarchy is the human race's natural state of political affairs, and state- and empire-building is just a reflection of the inclination of dominant males' drive to build ever bigger and more centralized power structures. Yet, even monarchs are not immune to another genetic feeling—fear! And the strongest fear of all is that of losing power and, with it, their security and political and genetic legacy.

As a result, human history is filled with tales of pretenders: ambitious individuals daring to challenge established authority. This dynamic persists in today's dictatorships and democracies in the guises of coup d'états and elections as opponents, driven by ambition and/or grievances, try to rice and displace incumbents (and so do men in power's gut reactions to fight opponents with all means possible, including trying to lock them up in front of a Presidential Election).

Thus, the fear of losing power is not merely personal for leaders but extends to progeny (did anyone say Jill and Hunter Biden?), as it means threats alsoto lineage, legacies, and the institutions that uphold power. Not stepping down in time is thus timeless behavior, and the Biden entourage's refusal to let The Big Guy - even after obviously being far gone into the sad marshlands of dementia - step down with dignity is as typical as it can be.