The 50th Law (with 50 Cent)

particular at those moments when you can feel people’s disrespect, or

---

your authority on the wane. But keep in mind that there are always bad
apples within any group, people who will grumble and not be won over
by you no matter what you do. They live to be passive-aggressive and
undermine anyone in a leadership position. Don’t bother with
empathy; nothing will work on them. The art is to recognize them as
quickly as possible and either fire or marginalize them. Having a group
that is tight and committed will also make it much easier to control
such malevolent types.
Third and most important, you must not fall for the
counterproductive prejudices of the times we live in, in which the very
concept of authority is often misunderstood and despised. Today we
confuse authority with leaders in general, and since so many of them in
the world seem more interested in preserving their power and
enriching themselves, naturally we have doubts about the very concept
itself. We also live in fiercely democratic times. “Why should we ever
have to follow a person of authority, and assume such an inferior
role?” we might ask ourselves. “People in power should simply get the
job done; authority is a relic of kings and queens. We have progressed
far beyond that.”
This disdain for authority and leadership has filtered its way
throughout our culture. We no longer recognize authority in the arts.
Everyone is a legitimate critic, and standards should be personal—
nobody’s taste or judgment should be seen as superior. In the past,
parenting was considered the model of authority, but parents no
longer want to see themselves as authority figures whose role is to
inculcate children with particular values and culture. Instead, parents
like to see themselves more as equals, with a bit more knowledge and
experience, whose role is really to validate their children’s feelings and
make sure they are continually entertained and occupied. They are
more like older friends. This same leveling dynamic applies to teachers
and students, where learning must be fun.
In this atmosphere, leaders begin to believe that they are more like
caretakers, there to stand back and enable the group to make the right
decisions, doing everything by consensus. Or they entertain the idea
that what matters more than anything else is crunching numbers,
absorbing the mass of information available today. Data and
algorithms will determine the direction to take and are the real
authority.

---

All of these ideas and values have unintended consequences.
Without authority in the arts, there is nothing to rebel against, no prior
movement to overturn, no deep thinking to assimilate and later even
reject. There is only an amorphous world of trends that flicker away
with increasing speed. Without parents as authority figures, we cannot
go through the critical stage of rebellion in adolescence, in which we
reject their ideas and discover our own identity. We grow up lost,
constantly searching outside ourselves for that identity. Without
teachers and masters whom we acknowledge as superior and worthy of
respect, we cannot learn from their experience and wisdom, perhaps
even seeking later on to surpass them with new and better ideas.
Without leaders who dedicate much mental energy to foreseeing
trends and guiding us to long-term solutions, we are lost. And as this
situation becomes the norm, because we humans have always needed
some form of authority as a guide, we tend to fall for certain fake forms
of authority that proliferate in times of chaos and uncertainty.
This could be the strongman, who gives the illusion of leadership
and direction but has no real vision of where to go, just ideas and
actions that serve his ego and enhance his sense of control. This could
be the panderer, the leader who cleverly mimics what the public wants
to hear, creating the illusion of being sensitive to the group and giving
it what it wants. This could be the chummy leader, who affects the style
and mannerisms of everyone else, offering what seems to be the
ultimate in fairness, fun, and consensus. This could also be the
authority of the group, which becomes that much more powerful in the
age of social media: what other people are saying and doing must be
true and respected, by dint of sheer numbers. But all of these false
forms only lead to more turmoil, chaos, and bad decisions.
As students of human nature, we must recognize the myriad
dangers of our prejudice against authority figures. To acknowledge
people of authority in the world is not an admission of our own
inferiority but rather an acceptance of human nature and the need for
such figures. People of authority should not be seen as self-serving or
tyrannical—in fact, those are the qualities that diminish their
authority. They are not relics of the past but people who fulfill a
necessary function and whose style adapts with the times. Authority
can be an eminently democratic phenomenon. We must realize that
much of what is behind progressive ideas of consensus, the minimal
leader, and the parent as friend, is actually a great fear of

---

responsibility, of the tough choices that must be made, of standing out
and taking the heat. We must move in the opposite direction,
embracing the risks and dangers that come with leadership and
authority.
In the world today, we humans have become more self-absorbed,
more tribal and tenacious in holding on to our narrow agendas; we
have become consumed by the barrage of information inundating us;
we are even more fickle when it comes to leaders. And so the need for
true figures of authority—with an elevated perspective, a high
attunement to the group, and a feel for what unifies it—has never been
greater. And because of that, we are tasked with establishing our
authority and assuming such a necessary role.