Rodrigo Duterte: Benevolent Dictator
September 30, 2021 4 minutes • 699 words
Table of contents
In Eastern philosophy, there is no such thing as an absolute good and bad. Instead, ‘good’ is anything that matches one’s True Nature, while ‘bad’ is anything that goes against it. This True Nature is called Tao by the Chinese and Dharma by the Indians.
Being in line or in-sync with one’s True Nature is called being ‘dharmic’, while being out of sync with it is called ‘adharmic’. Thus, the moral system derived from this prefers to classify things as dharmic or adharmic instead of good or bad.
Morality and happiness come from being dharmic, while immorality and misery come from being adharmic.
Comon examples of adharma are:
- working in a job, career, or company that you don’t like
- having a partner or spouse that doesn’t match your nature
- eating unhealthy food that eventually leads to disease
This dharmic-adharmic moral system prefers to prevent early adharma and mismatches from brewing into evil and conflict. This is follows the rule that ‘prevention is better than cure’ and is similar to a car’s preventive maintenance to ensure good performance and long life.
Matching the Social Cycles
According to Socrates, the True Nature of society is to have four cycles:
- Democracy (Socratic* Liberalism)
- Tyranny (Dictatorship or Socratic Neoconservatism)
- Aristocracy (Enlightenment or Theocracy or Socratic Conservatism)
- Oligarchy (Socratic Neoliberalism)
*This is to emphasize a new definition, separate from American Liberalism, but more in line with Classical Liberalism
Extra Info
In India, this was known as the four castes instead of cycles: Shudra, Ksattriya, Brahmin, Vaeshya In France, Montesquieu called these estates: Farmers, Church and Nobility, Merchants
“Russia is composed only of slaves employed in agriculture [first estate] and slaves called ecclesiastics or the gentlemen lords of those slaves [second estate]. There is then nobody left for the third estate of mechanics and merchants.” (Montesquieu)
After the French revolution, this became known as the Left Wing and Right Wing, with the peasants and merchants going to the Left and the nobility and the church going to the right. We match modern terminology with that of Socrates so that:
- Socratic Liberal = Democrat (Peasants, Farmers, Employees)
- Socratic Neocon = Tyrant (Imperialists, Dictators, Military)
- Socratic Conservative = Aristocrat (Religious, Philosophical, Theocracy)
- Socratic Neoliberal = (Oligarchy = Big Business, Speculators, Gamblers, Investors) This classification is more systematic than the left, far-left, centrist, right, far-right classification
The leaders should match the cycle that their society is in, so that their policies would match and create happiness. Civil war and recessions occur when the leaders are out of sync with their society.
According to our social cycles model *, the Philippines is currently in a tyranny cycle, to which a dictatorship is the best kind of leader.
*The rough equivalent of Cambridge Analytica to this is its psychographics and OCEAN model, just as Myers-Briggs has its E N T J classification. Our Bio Superphysics uses a 10-aspect model which we still have to name
This explains why Duterte won by landslide in 2016 since the country transitioned into a tyranny cycle in 2014. This also explains:
- why the Liberal Party was so popular in the past
- why the liberal Otso Diretso lost so miserably in the last election
- why it’s easy to predict that a pro-Duterte candidate will win in 2022*, unless the votes become split.
*Update May 2022: This actually came true with the landslide victory of BBM. This proves the solidity of our Social Superphysics
The Policies of a Benevolent Dictator
As mayor, Duterte was referred to as ‘Tatay Digong’ by his constituents. As president, he prefers to be called ‘mayor’ instead of ‘president’.
Unlike the other dictator called Marcos, Duterte did not impose martial law arbitrarily against the Communists, Muslims, the opposition, and the oligarchs. Instead, he:
- used his police and military against Islamists in Marawi and drug dealers around the country.
- entered talks with the Communists and gave disputed lands to the people of Mindanao
- used his allies in the lower house to close ABSCBN, but not nationalize Maynilad or Manila Water
- did not arbitarily dissolve senate when it (Gordon) accused him directly of corruption
While his political policies are dharmic, his economic policies are quite adharmic .
In another post, we will explain Dutertenomics
