This conversation started like so many others, with a premise that today I would define as naive. I presented Gabriele with my initial vision, the one that circulates more easily: the institutional system as a machine of domination. A structure designed by a tiny elite to control, exploit and manage a mass considered dangerous if left free. It was a clear, binary narrative, full of accusatory certainties. 0.01% against 99.99%. A story that, I must admit, has its own emotional power and widespread diffusion.
Gabriele did not accept the picture. Not immediately. He began to ask questions, to question the very sustainability of that model. If it were really like that, he asked me, how could the world have held up for millennia? His objection was not dictated by naivete, but by a ruthless realism. And from there began the dismantling.
The first conceptual turning point was clear. Gabriele overturned the perspective: the system is not the problem. The system is neutral. It's a tool. It exists because a large majority of people want to be regulated, guided, relieved from the burden of autonomous choices. The other part, significantly smaller, does not need that guidance and, indeed, desires self-determination. The institutional system, in its essence, is simply the structure that organizes this compatibility of needs.
It's not a set trap, but a requested refuge.
This rephrasing changed everything. We no longer talked about victims and executioners, but about autonomous and dependent individuals. The hierarchy was no longer seen as a pyramid of oppression, but as a ladder of responsibility. The higher you climb, the more you stop being regulated and become a regulator yourself. The system, Gabriele explained to me, is equal for all. What changes is the will and the ability to know it, to understand its mechanisms. Whoever knows it, masters it. Whoever ignores it, is mastered by it.
The real crucial point, the heart of the whole discussion, emerged when we touched on the theme of demagoguery. Gabriele showed me clearly that the deepest damage is not done by the system itself, but by those who tell people the fairy tale that the system is the enemy. This narrative, which is pleasing because it absolves one from taking responsibility, leads people to hate what they should instead learn to love.
"The system is man's best friend," he told me. "It exists to allow you to grow, develop, and prosper. If you know it, you can use it as a powerful ally. If you ignore it, it is inevitable that you will suffer its effects."
The problem, therefore, is not the wickedness of the system. The problem is that no one teaches how it really works.
And here lies the most bitter paradox: people who don't know the system tend to listen to those who have every interest in keeping them ignorant. They are popular voices, credible ones, offering a convenient conspiratorial explanation, fueling anger and impotence.
On the other hand, those who truly know the system, because they have studied it or lived it from within, and want to explain it, are systematically ignored. Why? Because they are "nobody". Because they say uncomfortable things, things that go against the dominant narrative. Because they invite the effort of understanding, not the comfort of complaining. Knowledge exists, but it is not sought. The competent voice exists, but it is drowned out by the noise of those who profit from it.
At the end of this exchange, my initial position was in ruins. Not because Gabriele had "won" a debate, but because he had brought the discussion to a plane of factual lucidity superior to mine. I had started the chat seeing a monster to fight. I ended it seeing a mirror.
The institutional system faithfully reflects human nature. If man is passive, the system crushes him. If man is lucid and enterprising, the system empowers him. There is no structural deception, only a tragic and widespread renunciation of knowledge.
The way out is not in rebellion against a phantom, but in the only revolution that counts: learning how the world works, to stop suffering it and start guiding one's own life.