Let’s look at two archetypal characters.
One is a philistine — thinks in terms of material gains and prevailing narratives. A hustler. Draped in (what others deem) precious metals, dressed in designer brands. He knows how to toe the line in what he calls “high-stakes” situations.
The other is a monk — lives simply, with near-zero expectations, attachments, fears, or desires. When these two meet, they’re NPCs to each other.
The philistine can’t extract (what he sees as) value from the monk, nor enter into any transactional dynamic. The monk, in turn, can neither seek nor bestow understanding — only cultivate a detached compassion toward animated clutters.
But this isn’t about a monk and a philistine.
It’s about beings outside each other’s frame of reference — and the failure to grasp that. This is how the West often misreads certain actors from the East — and then proceeds to build entire strategies on those misreadings.
Recently, I took a short trip to Iran, returning just two weeks before the latest Israeli aggression began — on May 30th.
Even after witnessing only a fragment of Iran’s layered and subtle culture, I returned more certain than ever: peasants and punks, shouting in all caps on social media, having somehow found themselves at the helm of state machines armed with lethal toys, have no business deciding who should own what — or how anyone should live.