Trapped in a Selfish Society

            Adam Curtis’ documentary entitled The Trap describes human beings as “selfish, isolated, and suspicious creatures who constantly monitor and strategized against each other.” Game theory is used in this documentary as a way to illustrate human’s social behavior and interaction patterns. According to Roger McCain's Game Theory: a Nontechnical Introduction to the Analysis of Strategy, game theory is defined as “a distinct and interdisciplinary approach to the study of human behavior. The disciplines most involved in game theory are mathematics, economics, and the other social and behavioral sciences.” One factor of human behavior that is brilliantly illustrated in this film is reciprocal altruism; the idea that people put conditions on love that their significant other can never meet.

            Curtis says that “everything humans did and thought had been programmed into us by our genes.” Humans are like computer programs or robots that are installed with a genetic code, directed towards survival. This isn’t necessarily only true for humans, but for all other living organisms. Everything from violence to altruism can be described (as Curtis does quite nicely) as “rational strategies played by the genes in the game of survival.” When looking at this from a biological viewpoint, it makes only the utmost sense, considering the fact that all animals are placed on earth with one goal, and one goal only: to procreate and spread their seed in order to carry on their lineage.

            There was a social experiment in the Amazon with a group of villagers who are one of the most violent groups of people in the world. It was proved through this experiment that the “individuals who took risks for each other in the fight were always more closely genetically related then those they fought”. Again, this demonstrates human conscious and unconscious attempts to protect their own genes to guarantee their strength for survival, and the likelihood that their seeds will be spread.

            Furthermore, there is a British idiom called Cupboard love which is defined in the Webster’s Online Dictionary as “A show of affection motivated by selfishness.” An example of this would be a child who fakes affections directed towards a cook, in order to get a free meal. Another more psychological name for this is Reciprocal Altruism. There are few other mammals that exhibit this behavioral trait, and interestingly humans and vampire bats are some of the few who do.

            Dr. Morton Schwartzman held an experiment (which is described in The Trap) where twenty couples in Britain are given a complex series of questionnaires which they are told to answer truthfully. It “analyzed how each saw each other moment by moment in their daily lives, and they were continually [asked] what they secretly thought the other really intended.” This experiment was coded and processed by computers. The results were interesting to say the least. Just as people acted in the cold war, the couples used their actions “as strategies to control and manipulate each other.”

Moreover, this experiment suggested that “what would normally [seem] to be acts of kindness and love were, in reality, weapons used selfishly to exert power and control.” That love was nothing more than an attempt to dominate and control. A couple would say the words “I love you” but at the end of that sweet sounding phrase, there would be a condition or an “if . . .” that would follow. This condition would be next to impossible to meet.

The family unit may possibly be nothing more than a machine of control. There is always an obvious pecking order. There has to be someone at the head of the household who is in charge of making rules and supporting the family. This person is usually represented as the man “who wears the pants.” The woman comes next, followed by the children. An interesting concept in families is that of sibling rivalry. Sibling rivalry is usually stemmed from jealousy in childhood and moves on into adulthood to create a different species of rivalry altogether. At first it might be jealously because one of the children is the parents preferred or “favorite.” The parent will pick a favorite unconsciously because that child has the stronger genes and it the one destined for biological success in life. Laurie Pawlik-kienlen says in an article entitled The Roots of Adult Sibling Rivalry that “The roots of adult sibling rivalry could be evolutionary and primal.” This would be explained by survival of the fittest, which is the ‘program’ imbedded in all living organisms related to competition for predominance.

In conclusion, it is very prevalent and obvious that humans are suspicious, untrustworthy, selfish individuals who will do what they feel is beneficial to themselves (without worrying about the consequences of others) in order to get ahead.  Researchers began noting the ways of human behavior around the time of the cold war, and it turned out that the behaviors shown during that time were, in fact, not brought on by the cold war, but actually human’s natural behaviors. Because humans are suspicious creatures, they will not fully trust another. They put conditions on love, which their significant other could try to reach their whole lives, but fail miserably. But at the same time this is a weapon for protection, since every animal's (including humans) goal on earth is to survive.