Girard in Silicon Valley
According to Aristotle, tragedy functioned so as to reduce common peoples’ anger toward successful people. The lesson in all tragedy is that even the greatest people have tragic flaws. Everybody falls. It was thus cathartic for ordinary people to see terrible things happen to extraordinary people, if only on stage. Tragedies were political tools that transformed envy and anger into pity. Commoners would retreat contentedly to their small houses instead of plotting against the upper class.
.. The dual founder thing is worth mentioning. Co-founders seem to get in a lot less trouble than more unbalanced single founders. Think Hewlett and Packard, Moore and Noyce, and Page and Brin. There are all sorts of theoretical benefits to having multiple founders such as more brainstorming power, collaboration, etc. But the really decisive difference between one founder and more is that with multiple founders, it’s much harder to isolate a scapegoat. Is it Larry Page? Or is it Sergey Brin? It is very hard for a mob-like board to unite against multiple people—and remember, the scapegoat must be singular. The more singular and isolated the founder, the more dangerous the scapegoating phenomenon.
.. It probably wasn’t just building great products or being a good insider that saved Steve Jobs. His being terminally ill part was probably a very important variable. There is much less power in scapegoating someone who’s power—indeed, whose life—is waning anyways.