Well, I got to hear this story while confined in a truck for 32 hours with a modern day hero who has tales that perhaps will never even be written in the history books.
It can be applied in my opinion both across the military and even in the civilian world.
There were two sayings I hated in the Army and still can't stand them today. If we look at the Army as a microcosm of society, then the things that were at times bothersome or prevelant there are truly magnified out here.
1. "Its not my job". Usually applied in any situation where the individual is just lazy. Typically, not something that is asked for specifics jobs, such as electrical wiring or mechanical engineering where you need to know your shit. Normally, it goes like this. Me - "hey, lets get this trash and dump it, its over flowing". 9 out of 10 folks in the office surveyed - "Dude, thats not my job".
2. "Thats the way its always been around here" - Oh man, this one drove me crazy in the Army and continues to do so here in corporate America. Uhh, hello, lets be thankful we could at least get past this thinking for a moment and get rid of muskets and hatchets, eh? Amazingingly these semi automatic weapons are much more efficient than the damn muzzle loader. You don't always HAVE to walk through the swamp, its okay to go around it. I never got to wear knee pads or elbow pads while jumping on concrete airfields, WHY? Because "this is the way we've always done it" ( the literal was either "this is what Rangers do" or "Rangers don't do that".) Out here, again based on laziness in my opinion, to do something different requires effort on someone elses part and most are just content to do what they have been doing while keeping an eye on the clock waiting for 1700 hrs when the whistle blows. Or it requires a train of thought that is different than what people are accustomed to. We are creatures of comfort and extra work or abstract thinking have a tendency to make us uncomfortable.
My understanding is the Command Sergeant Major who distributed this was quite the warrior. I don't know if he wrote it, but it damn sure makes sense to me.
For your reading pleasure:
Start with a cage containing five apes. In the cage, hang a banana on a string and put stairs under it. Before long, an ape goes to the stairs towards the banana, but as soon as he touches the stairs, spray all of the apes with cold water.
After a while, another ape makes an attempt with the same result – all the
apes are sprayed with cold water. Turn off the cold water. If, later, another ape tries to climb the stairs, the other apes will try to prevent it even though no water sprays them.
Now, remove one ape from the cage and replace it with a new one. The new ape sees the banana and wants to climb the stairs. To his horror, all of the other apes attack him. After another attempt and attack, he knows that if he tries to climb the stairs, he will be assaulted.
Next, remove another of the original five apes and replace it with a new one. The newcomer goes to the stairs and is attacked. The previous newcomer takes part in the punishment with enthusiasm.
Again, replace a third original ape with a new one. The new one makes it to the stairs and is attacked as well. Two of the four apes that beat him have no idea why they were not permitted to climb the stairs, or why they are participating in the beating of the newest ape.
After replacing the fourth and fifth original apes, all of the apes, which have been sprayed with cold water, have been replaced. Never the less, no ape ever again approaches the stairs.
Why not?
“Because that’s the way it’s always been around here.”
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