Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: The Thieves, the People of the Pit and the Opportunistic Onlookers…

There once was a group of people who had been pushed into a deep pit. For years and years they tried to climb their way out of this pit, but as one, two or more would get to the top, the thieves who pushed them into the pit in the first place stood waiting to push them back to the bottom.

One day enough of them decided to climb up all at once. They reasoned that “if we all climb up as one, we will outnumber the thieves, and we can thus over power them, even while some of us will surely be knocked back down.”

Having seen the cycle of these people climbing up, one, two or more at a time, only to be knocked back down, many onlookers saw the skirmish on the day that they all ascended from the pit. “What is the point of coming to their aid or even cheering them on” they said. “They will only be knocked back down like every day before. And besides,” the onlookers speculated, “what if the people who are in that pit are there for a good reason? What if they were pushed down there to protect us all? What if they are worse than the thieves who pushed them down? Perhaps we should be supporting the thieves!”

Finally, and to the great surprise of the onlookers, the plan succeeded and the people climbed out of the pit all at once. A long battle ensued, and the theives did push some individuals back down, again and again, but it was never nearly enough; since they had climbed up all at once. This is when the real battle began…

Some of the onlookers who had supported the thieves, fearing that the people of the pit would be worse than them, being opportunistic, started to cheer on the people who climbed up. Word spread, via some who had climbed up, that people pushed into other holes, by other thieves, could do the same. As other groups ascended to fight of the thieves who would push them down, these thieves grew more defensive and began throwing daggars at the people in the pits, hoping that this would cause the people at the bottom to argue that they should all stay in their place.

At this time, the opportunistic onlookers said “It is an inevitability that the same thing will happen at this pit that occurred at the other one. These people will get free and when all is said and done, they will have subdued the thieves who we hate as well, because these thieves prevents us from doing business in these areas successfully. We should come to the aid of the people climbing up, so that we can gain their favor, and so that they will replace these thieves, who we must bribe in order to do business here.”

So the opportunistic onlookers began shooting at the thieves but they could not tell which people were the thieves and which were the people who had just climbed out of the pit. The opportunistic onlookers only knew about themselves, how to identify people who looked like themselves, and communicate with people who talked like themselves. So in the course of their shooting, they killed many people who had climbed up out of the pit. They did, however, kill many of the thieves and more and more people managaged to climb from the pit, but the plan of the opportunistic onlookers, to garner their favor, did not work as planned. Still, they did not tell these opportunistic onlookers to go away, because as it turned out they were able to get free by means of these attacks.

In the end, many of those who arose from the pit ended up hating the opportunistic onlookers. Those who had called the people of the pit “worse than the thieves” were quick to say “We told you so!” rather than begging their forgiveness for the casualties they inflicted on the people they said they were trying to save.

This was their “self-fulfilling prophecy.”