Humans behaving badly again

Human intelligence is a wonderful thing. It can think about strong emotions and sort out what's causing irrational urges. It can formulate better questions and then discover better explanations, models and theories for what happens in life. It can redefine troublesome problems by making a more insightful diagnosis from several different points of view. It can get creative and come up with new ideas, approaches and solutions. It can explore other people's outlooks and give them the feeling of being understood. It can resolve differences, de-escalate conflicts and combine agendas into mutually agreeable commitments.

Our minds are designed to override this wonderful human intelligence whenever we're in significant danger. We are very well equipped to handle situations that threaten our physical survival or psychological well being. We react without thinking to provocations, warning signs and threats. We make snap decisions about the extent of the dangers suddenly jeopardizing our security. We obey our strong urges that overwhelm our less urgent conscious reasoning. We act out our impulses that have been proven to deal with the particular dangers we're facing. We become more dangerous to others to get them to back off or give up their threatening posture.

Upon occasion, we will act like we're in some kind of danger when others think we are perfectly safe. We start acting badly even though we know better and wish we would not overreact that way. We override our human intelligence when the situation calls for us to rely on it to give others the benefit of the doubt, more understanding or a better listen. We make it obvious to others that we are carrying some emotional baggage. We don't know what gets into us or makes us act up that way. The source of the strong urges remains unconscious and unthinkable.

When we start acting dangerously, others become certain that they have been put in danger by how we are over-reacting. They override their human intelligence and start behaving badly too. A cycle of violence or abuse takes shape. There's no end to the self-perpetuating violence, abuse, exploitation and crime -- while our human intelligence is getting overruled. This pattern brings about wars, dictatorships, drug cartels, crime waves, failed states and economic ruin. Welcome to the daily news.

We've got the solution in us. All we need is our human intelligence that gets automatically overridden when we're in danger. We need to tell a different story about what is happening when humans are behaving badly again. We need a story that mentions our baggage interfering with our human intelligence in particular situations. We need to tell it like it is.