David McElroy

When I was a child, I was mesmerized by seeing my name on McElroy Motor Co. in downtown Birmingham. It was just a used car dealership, but it made me feel successful.

The company had moved from this location by the time I remember visiting, but I still remember wandering around the lot while my father visited his Uncle Emory — my grandfather’s brother — who owned the place. I remember standing in front of the main sign and seeing my name in huge letters and thinking that I would do far greater things one day — and that I would one day have my name on even bigger signs.

I don’t know exactly what I expected. I was probably 4 or 5 years old when I used to visit, but I know I was obsessed with the idea of success — the idea that I was going to achieve great things. There was something about this tiny bit of family success that made me feel as though anything was possible.

When I look back on that child, I can see why some people might have thought I was arrogant. I was unfailingly polite and charming to adults, but I always quietly believed I was the smartest person in every room. I never doubted that others would one day recognize my greatness — and I believed they would want to follow me.

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If I had lived in a less civilized era, I would have become a killer and conqueror.

In a more savage society, men took what they wanted in ways that seem vicious and cruel by our standards. If a man wanted more material goods, he would lead his tribe to raid the territory of rivals and take whatever he could get away with. If a man wanted a woman, he would take her by force. If he wanted a woman who belonged to another man, he would kill the man and take her.

It was a world in which the strong competed with the strong for resources and mating rights. Those who weren’t strong accepted whatever was left after the winners took what they wanted.

This is antithetical to all of our modern values. We know not to kill. We know not to steal. We know not to take women against their will.

I’m a modern, civilized man — with modern values and a modern ethical code. I have made a conscious decision to try to love others and do what I consider to be right. Even so, I wrestle with the savagery in my DNA. There is a part of me — a part which frequently tries to bubble to the surface — which wants nothing more than to be that savage warrior king of the past. More than anything, this part of me wants to win — to kill and plunder and take exactly what I want.

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