posters
Before graduating from college, I had a very good chance to enter a certain health bureau in a certain province. The course of events will be left to be detailed later when writing "The Collection of Wind and River". Later, the reason why I did not enter was because when I waited for a director to come to the interview, several of us sat and waited for nearly two hours, but the director did not come. I said to Yu and Chen, you two wait, I'm going to visit the West Lake.
A few years later, when I told my big brother what had happened, he showed unusual anger. The eldest brother did not finish junior high school, and then worked everywhere all year round, that is, a migrant worker. That day he scolded me very angrily: "It's stupid, it's stupid." He said, if you come back in a police uniform, don't say that we are in the summer palace village, even the loess (township) ground, we must be afraid of three points.
It will take many years for me to appreciate what my eldest brother said.
There is a family in our village, two brothers, both of whom went to serve as soldiers, an armed policeman and a firefighter. Now the two brothers, the eldest is a policeman in the county, and the second is a firefighter in a development zone. Both returned to the village, both in uniform. Their father, a former cattle dealer, now digs a pond and raises pigs, ducks and fish. The pond, dug from the original farmland, is on the edge of a piece of land in my house. Every time I went back to the field, my mother always told me indignantly: He took his two sons as officials and dug up our family's land.
Another family, the son, is now attending the police academy in the province and returning to the village in uniform during winter and summer vacations. The second uncle often said to me, why didn't you go to the police academy in the first place! The tone was full of envy and reproach.
The above examples are all experienced and heard by my own ears. I say this because after watching the movie "Captain Fake," the first thing that comes to my mind is the uniform. I don't think much about other far-reaching and big questions about human nature, war, etc.
The importance of uniforms may not only be so strong in rural areas. In what I saw, some of the highly educated people around me, when they saw people in uniform, also felt that they were officials and they were citizens. This kind of psychology must be deeply rooted, and there is no difference between urban and rural areas and the level of education.
Similar reports are common in the news. Some people pretend to be public officials to go to the localities, and the local people, whether they are officials or businessmen, let alone ordinary people, are deceived. The movie "Captain Fake" is about this kind of news.
Still
Many people sneer at the deceived and despise why they are so stupid. But this is all "sanity" and "backbone" after the fact, and it cannot withstand the test at all.
Behind the uniform (including the official seal, etc.) is power and identity. Identity is critical. Putting on a uniform doesn't mean he has much power. This power is implicit, and behind it is a powerful identity cue (there are many such media, and uniforms are only one). A small clerk who has just graduated and started working, or, as in the movie, a deserter, has a strong class background. When it appears as an individual, it is no different from ordinary people, nothing; but if it appears as a representative of a class, it has the great power conferred upon it (although it is implicit, but it is well known for its mysteries).
Section members of organs and units go to grass-roots units, and those cadres at the section level and deputy section level of grass-roots units need to pay him three points. I have encountered this kind of thing in a state-owned enterprise. At that time, I had just graduated, and every time I went to the grass-roots units to deliver documents, or made a phone call to convey a notice, the leaders of those grass-roots units were kind to me and said nice things. Similar experiences, presumably most people have heard or encountered.
The reason is easy to understand, that is, as the saying goes, "the official level crushes people to death." At this time, I was not an ordinary clerk, but a clerk of a certain organ and unit. This is identity implication, which has implicit powers.
The reason why this power can work is not limited to the war years, as set in the movie. It is just that in extraordinary times such as the war years, it will be more typical, and it will be more able to stimulate the hidden and internal parts of people and society.
That is to say, no matter when and where, the uniform can play a role, which is the result of the joint action of both parties. That is, if someone does it, someone will believe it. And, it may be the people who believe in it.
Some people do it, and this part of the people is a minority after all. When a profession appears, such as policemen, doctors, teachers, etc., this is not out of initiative, the responsibility is not a single person; but in extraordinary times or extraordinary people, such as war, desperate, ill-intentioned, etc., most people will not do this.
Those who believe, one is the majority, regardless of time and place, there is no distinction such as occupation. It is a social ethos; second, it is a long-standing and deep-rooted ethos.
The deserter in the movie, who can start deceiving a person with a uniform from small to large, and later bewilders the entire complete unit structure (a cell camp), is not only the poor communication of information in extraordinary times, but more importantly: everyone acknowledges and believes that the uniform represents great power behind it.
As I said earlier, the audience may think that those who have been deceived are really stupid, or some viewers may wonder and anger those who have been deceived and persecuted, why not attack them in groups? Such an idea is not only "rational" and "bone" after the fact, but also a childish disease.
Because, first, behind the uniform is power, you are not facing a Zhang San Li Si, but the hidden power behind him. Because of a momentary impulse, you beat Zhang Sanyi and was very happy, and afterwards you were faced with the huge class represented by Zhang San.
Second, the energy of power is enormous. There may be a misconception here: power is long-term. wrong! Ephemeral power, even more destructive. When a long-term oppressed person gains power for even a minute a day, it is enough to commit destructive acts. The deserter may not be bad in nature. At first, he may just want to borrow a uniform to cover his body from the cold, and then he finds that after wearing the uniform, he can gain the respect and obedience of others, and then power comes into play. He could do whatever he wanted: to deceive, to beat, to even to slaughter.
In the movie, the fake captain is finally arrested and his false identity is revealed. This is the legend that justice will eventually triumph over evil. The good of this movie is "justice" and "evil", and there is still room for discussion. This is another topic that will not be discussed in this article.