Evading The Antigen

Over the last 20 years or so, I have spoken all over the United States and many parts of the world about the idea that there may be a single and relatively easy way to correct very evasive flaw in market capitalism.

Fixing this flaw could correct many of the biases and divisions that plague relationships and communities in an otherwise functional social organization system.  The work of the Ingenesist project, of course, is precisely to correct the flaw.

From past experience, I always get one of three reactions to our work:

1. Some people get it immediately, and engage deeply.
2. Some people don’t get it and ignore completely,
3. Some people attack it, sometimes dangerously.

I learn a great deal from each type of response.  In fact, the vast majority of ideas in the Ingenesist Project come from hundreds of brilliant people who have participated in one of these three ways.  The first two types are self-explanatory. This post is about the third type – I call them “the antigens”. As the term implies, when an Antigen perceive a threat to the existing body they react strongly to neutralize it.

The Flaw in Capitalism is well protected

The antigen is not just a person who disagrees with a fact or feature of our work.  They hold a deep visceral objection that is personal, emotional, physical and always disproportionate to the level, scope, or even the topic of conversation.

Much to our astonishment, the antigen is always someone who would be expected to embrace our work and ideas.

The problem, I have come to realize, stems from the suggestion that the Zertify knowledge inventory strategy seeks to increase the efficiency of matching the supply and demand of knowledge assets in a community. The antigen has a vested interest in this same goal and does not believe that there could or should be a better broker than themselves.

If it’s not Broker, don’t fix it

Several examples of antigens that we have encountered:

One was the economic development agency for a less developed country.  Our proposition was to present their engineers as world class quality.  They saw this as an emigration threat more than an off-shoring draw, and shut the program down.

One was a celebrity author and lecturer that champions the cause of the common man against the oppression of corporate tyranny.  This individual makes his living selling books, lectures, and endorsements. His scathing misinterpretation of our work hurt us badly.

Another recent  antigen was a person who runs an “accelerator” for start-up companies whose passion is to identify promising start-ups and match entrepreneurs to funding in the spirit of high tech titans of the past.  He saw us as a threat to his “God’s Eye” approach to the garden of money.

On the surface, it would seem that these people or entities would embrace a comprehensive knowledge inventory and machine enabled means of matching supply and demand for knowledge assets.  Instead, they saw us as a threat to their vested interests.

It’s not about right and wrong

The point of this article is not to make the antigen wrong about their response –  it is quite natural and we have all done it.  The Flaw in Market Capitalism is the antigen behavior/reaction itself – not the person demonstrating it.  Our challenge for the future will be to amplify mavens and community organizers to become better at connecting people in collaboration with each other while also identifying and redirecting the antigen response before it is activated.  Because once it emerges, it cannot be put back in the bottle.  

The corollary:

Those who would embrace this work likewise have little or no vested interest in “controlling” others and would therefore appear to be the least likely to accept our work.  So by definition, those who accept the ideas that we present are those who would perform well in such an environment.  This further demonstrates the counterintuitive nature of The Ingenesist Project.