Pride, 6:15
Her orders had been simple. Create a strategy to subjugate the indigenous population. Years ago, this planet had been identified as resource rich. Filled with impressive amounts of minerals and metals.
Her people had begun an immigration program to populate the planet.
The indigenous population, slow to reproduce, wily, creative with strong communal ties, was proving difficult to subjugate. All attempts to capture and control them, had, for the most part, ended in failure. The concept of using the indigenous to mine resources for export off planet was not working.
It was unusual for her to awaken in the middle of the night. But there it was, the idea, whole and complete, like a blueprint.
Her team had been called in to study these people, to find an effective yet discrete approach for subjugation.
Many years of study had shown two powerful biologic needs in the humans.
Challenge and accomplishment and sexual drive.
These two pieces of information formed the seeds of her idea. Because her people had similar physical characteristics to the humans, assimilation into the general indigenous population had always been easy.
A group of leaders would be formed to implement a new belief system. The basis of the new system would be derived from existing human beliefs that celebrated the natural and abundant world around them.
With a couple of subtle yet powerful differences.
There would be one, all-powerful god.
A god unwilling to share power with any other.
This god would respond with swift and deadly force against any possible usurper.
One brilliant twist was, not only would the new god demand credit for all human accomplishment, this god would make it a sin for any human to feel pride.
The pride of accomplishment would not only be denied, but also vilified.
In addition, this new singular god would create distinctions around sex and sensuality.
Good sex and bad sex.
She had observed, up to this point, sex and sensuality was one of the most basic and truest forms of human self-expression. Within creativity, passion, love and even despair, the bond formed between humans, based on touch, sensual or sexual, appeared essential. Touch, as essential to human life as food and water. The human soul is nourished by touch in a way for which there is no replacement.
Her years of experimenting on them, had clearly demonstrated that one of the most devastating experiences for a human was touch deprivation.
The new god, this new religion would allow sexuality only between male and female, only with the approval of church sanctioned unions.
All other kinds of sex or sensuality would be considered bad and wrong. A sin.
This powerful crushing of the human soul would weaken the human spirit leading to a more profound dependence on the church. The church, in return, would provide answers to unanswerable questions and ersatz love. Love that looked right but that would be devoid of the essential ingredients that cultivates and nourishes the human soul.
These insights coupled with the magic of illusion, confusing ritual and regal yet bewildering costumes would draw the humans into a soul-crushing trap. Loyalty and allegiance to the church would erode and replace traditional communal bonds.
Much later, in the history of humanity, two terms would be coined.
Stockholm syndrome, or capture-bonding, is a psychological phenomenon in which hostages express empathy and sympathy and have positive feelings toward their captors, sometimes to the point of defending and identifying with the captors. (Wikipedia)
and
Helsinki syndrome
Helsinki syndrome is actually a case of groupthink and unintentional blindness to the negative in order to achieve some perceived benefit.
Strife over acceptable beliefs would then feed this incongruity effectively obscuring what is truly needed; Domination of the demands of the church would provide rich soil for a flourishing garden of ongoing conflict.
The humans would mine and extract the rich resources of the planet, for their oppressors. Unknowing, fueled with the vengeance of religious fervor.
Over time, she would contribute bits of technology to one side or another with the intent of maintaining strategic imbalance within cultures. These technological advances would increase the need for strategic minerals and metals.
She was proud of her plan. Simple and effective, she had no doubt; the council would accept it later in the day.
Implementation could begin immediately.