The Truth? I think there are real born leaders, but they either die young as adrenaline junkies or become insurgents, almost always using their leadership to overthrow the ruling status quo. A born leader's story will go like this:
From my earliest memories I knew that I was born, if not to lead, at least to do something special." This could be Rousseau's "Confessions" or some kid that lives in cyberworld.
Do such feelings of one's destiny mean the person is a born leader? Not necessarily. The male of our species has always had some obvious traits that lend themselves to the roles males have to play in their kinship groups. The sex drive is concentrated to the extent that the group is likely to need members or need to jettison members who are a drag.
Anyway, from jet pilots to bull riders, men who swagger and think they are the greatest can only be conquered by love; if their woman is unfaithful, or even if they suspect it, they lose concentration and auger in.
I don't want to take anything away from pilots and bull riders. They've got such big balls I don't know how they walk! But, in the last analysis, they are probably what Robert Pirsig called "ego climbers" in his book on mental breakdown, "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance."
McMurphy, the Christ figure in "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," had the same traits as arrogant men and megalomaniacs, but by sacrificing himself for his friends, he took it to another evolutionary level, the level that Jesus referred to when he said, "Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends."
For Mac, the twist was, he was not a "legitimate" hero. Not a priest, not a prince not a knight of the king, not even a soldier. He was more like a ward of the state. Only Ken Kesey would know what was inside his character's mind, but I'm betting Mac never gave a #@%! about religion OR leadership.
So it seems the leadership gene is in every male, relatively speaking. If a boy doesn't have fantasies where he is a hero cheered by thousands, something is missing in his DNA.
Not every male will become a Top Gun or a Donny Gay, but every male who wants to find his purpose will sort through a myriad of hero possibilities very early in his childhood. The behaviors spawned: toughness, competitiveness, aggressiveness, even arrogance if untempered by social constraints. All these traits may be needed for a leader in today's world. If so, it sounds like natural selection at work.
Philosophers since Plato have examined what you might call the Ideal Man. His idea of philosopher king has always had a positive spin to it. After all, wouldn't we rather have a wise man for king than a knuckle dragger? Yes, of course.
One problem, one that always dogs the classicists or anyone who looks back two millennia, is that their sources are set in amber and cannot participate in human dialog in a world without slavery, famine, and iron handed rulers.
Plato was undoubtedly right in believing that leaders should be the best of humanity. Philosopher Kings. Through the ages the ideas of the ancients formed a thread through the chaos of the Middle Ages and past the Renaissance and smack into the--you guessed it: Neo Classical Period.
God help us if history looks back on our time as the Neo Conservative Period. These people are a greater threat to America than Al Queda any day of the week. When the current Boob is done with his term, the Neocons, overt and covert should be sought out of every nook and cranny and tried for treason. They should be purged like a bad disease.
Born Leaders. Aren't we all?
For many who grow old, such dreams die hard. There can be a problem when reality sets in, at age, who knows, at fifty or sixty, when they realize that their destiny was spent on standby. That problem and how to get through it is another article. If they are lucky, memories of the Journey, the Race, the Struggle, the Hunt will comfort them long after they are done.
Fulbright in 1966-67; Visiting Lecturer in American Literature with Baghdad University/Texas University Exchange Program. Guest Lecturer for the American Authors Lecture Series for the United States Information Service in Iraq.
Co-authored with Carole Chaney "Baghdad Letters" in 2003, a collection of letters and journals written in 1966-67 in Iraq.
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