Weekly 5

Konnor Drewen

3/4/011

Does Power Corrupt? How or How Not? Why or Why Not? Do you think Alexander was corrupted? And who influenced whom the most: Did Persia become more Greek or did Alexander becoming more Persian?

            Yes, I do believe that power does corrupt. Power is an interesting thing to have. It can be corrupting especially if you are a person who has never had power before. If you, all of the sudden, come into a large position of power you don’t know what to do with it. You could use your power in a good way, or in the case of corruption you could use your power in a poor way. If you don’t have the experience to handle power than you will corrupt, only for the reason that once you got the power you only wanted more. Power corrupts because it is like an addictive drug; once you have it you only want more and more until you go into a downward spiral into oblivion.

            How power corrupts can be a number of things. Edward Abbey once said, “Power is always dangerous. Power attracts the worst and corrupts the best.” According to Edward Abbey, power can make the best of us begin to corrupt into the worst. Along with that the thought of power attracts the worst. You could make the argument that the person was corrupt when they came into power. Corruption could occur because of a want for more power or because if you don’t have power before then, then you would not know how to control it. Power does not always corrupt though. If you have an all-around good person then they might not give in to corruption.

            The other part of the question is the why power corrupts. Why, is a very hard question to answer. It could just depend on the type of person that has the power. David Brin once said, “It is said that power corrupts, but actually it's more true that power attracts the corruptible. The sane are usually attracted by other things than power.” The corruptible are the ones that are attracted to power so the way is because they are easily corrupted. But why power corrupts, that is a matter of opinion. I think that it is only for one reason… that it can. The corrupted only becomes that way because he/she can become that way.

            Do I think Alexander was corrupted? No, well at least not at the beginning of his journey. In the beginning I truly believe that he was fighting to avenge Persian wrongs. He was fighting to avenge the Greeks, but after Darius was killed he was fighting for power. He could have been fighting to make the Persians like him, or for the glory of battle. He could have also done it to avenge Darius because he thought that he died in a dishonorable way. His mind was just becoming more and more splintered.

            In the end I think that Persia was not much influenced by Alexander the Great. The countries that make up Persia all have the same picture him. A demon with horns is the most common, some going as far as to call him Alexander, The Cursed. But Alexander in the end was influenced by Persia in my opinion. He began to wear Persian garments first of all. He also began to recruit young boys from the villages to be in his army.  In conclusion, power is a drug that once getting addicted, it is hard to leave it behind.