Thus spoke the Foreign Minister of France upon hearing of the signing of the trade agreement between the EU and America. "It is a dark day when an alliance of free peoples gathered to affirm their values and defend their interest, resolves to submit."
This occurs when international governmental relations are governed via blackmail, by threats inimical to survival of the idea of equality between nations. It rather becomes a status quo of domination and false merriment, of hugs with hands holding knives behind the other participant in that hug. It resolves in a cesspool of dishonesty, greed, and entitlement. It never has worked out in long time effect in positive manner, not for dominator nor for the dominated.
Its manifest unfairness, its aura of ominous predictions and consequences remain at all-time highs, nothing settled, nothing assured, nothing upon which to rely and rebuild. Nothing. All that results is rife with anger and unhappiness, of "being cheated", of succumbing to pressures unfair and unreasonable. This is a world of dissatisfaction so strong it can literally be palpated, sensed, touched, resented, and all are encouraged into free throwing contests, of airing dirty laundry to the eyes of the world, of situations of demands of sympathy and partisanship which effectively block off the road for any forward movement. The false bleating of wolves hiding beneath fake robes of fur already filthy with blood of their previous victims, fooled those willing to be fooled, and the carnage remains, maintains, and even grows, victims seemingly always at the ready.
How to combat these horrendous times? How and where do we find a champion, not perfect, for no person is such, to lead, to stand with courage and persistence, to know, to recognize the enemy and wage successful campaigns against one and all of them, no matter who they are or what words of threat and intimidation emerge from their twisted tongues and mouths. No matter how frightening they are, no matter the corruption of their souls. No matter the petrified state of their hearts.
Unfortunately, these leaders are few and far between. Even when found, are unwilling to be the head of such defense of humanity, or even to uncover others willing to stand with them. Todays' environments, politically, spiritually, any which way, are corrupted, cracking, fraying, at the seams. Tailors of talent and honor, of courage and persistence, of resistance to threats and with clear vision of true realities and necessities are scarce upon the face of our earth.
The leaders of today are so clearly not what we need; in fact, are the very opposite of such. They are the very antithesis of what we need. Even when a positive act or result is achieved, it is immediately countered, negated, with yet another betrayal, another passage replete with false words and values tainted, and of trust - not even on the closest radar. The very simple and natural act of picking up a paper or magazine, of tv broadcasts, are often avoided these days due to their quite partisan stands. Instead of neutrality, the facts, we are presented with skewed viewpoints and the demeaning of those who differ in thought and policy. Goals and aims are written in stone, impossible to mesh with others, to find points of righteous compromise. Harbingers of hope are scarce, growing scarcer day by day.
What hope is there remaining on the plate when the elite, the powerful, those able to withstand pressures better and longer than the average citizen are instead jumping on the ugly bandwagons of hate, of ugly compromises shorn of honor, of acquiescing to all the wrongs perpetrated on the populations of this challenged world of ours.
When one can state that the leader, in this case, the President of the USA, is not to be trusted, whose words of promise are false from the get-go, what models are we presenting to the future generations. They will, soon enough, step into our shoes, walk the same paths we have mistakenly trod. We will have failed to honor the proper precepts of the past and instead will emulate the decidedly opposite of such. We will perforce champion the wrongs of today, the moral vacuum, and thus, will betray the possibilities of the tomorrows, the future.
Instead of pointing fingers of shame and disdain at eminently negative and greedy behaviors, we praise those 'clever' enough to have done so with success. The discovery of crooked under the table agreements whose implementations led to success achieved by striding over the bodies of those unable to meet them in fair combat will be mourned not for their evil but for their failure to remain in place. Perverse antisocial behavior will be saluted with wink and nod, as children, as women, as men are forced into compromised situations. All fodder for the entertainment of those who break every rule of civility, of decency.
Even the very forces and methods of keeping people on the straight, the narrow, the proper, are turned on their heads, used as enablers of indecency and dishonor. Courts are used to strengthen the bizarre and contrary behaviors of ruling classes. Wealth is increasingly and unfairly distributed. Shared cooperation, shared positive views of mankind, of the humanity of all, of the right to respect and decency, are strained to the breaking point and beyond.
Does anyone notice? Does anyone care? If so, where the hell are they? Not out there in the streets fighting the right battles on the right side. Instead, the loudest, harshest voices are winning the battle, gaining the notice, the power, needed to grow the false promises of their negative repressive society. Opposition to these twisted values, so corrupt that the path to correction is obscured almost beyond revival, is discouraged via any which manner or path found, be it in bizarre rulings and immoral laws, broken and corrupted court systems, and cowed yesmen toadies of legislators willing to abjure their powers to right wrongs, to be the leaders so necessary, so glaring in their absence.
I look back many, many years, to those of my youth, to the idealism of the young who 'know' that we can improve, that we can make a better, more moral and caring society, able to take care of all. We can and did dream of such but fell down on the job as life progressed. We ventured to other roads of needs and deeds. Our songs veered from hopes for the future, to words of what could have. should have been - "those were the days". That and those deemed as necessities overpowered the dreams and thus, here we are. Same old, same old, even worse, perhaps.
We should have known better, done better, but we did not. Gains achieved with great difficulty were negated, fell back under attack and the hopeful generation of then became the rather conservative generation of the now, with too much of the false returned. Mean times in every which way possible, bitterness growing within all, refusal to see and recognize shared dreams and necessities. The next generations began to follow the same retreaded paths rather than blaze new ones. Attempts to do the right thing, to choose the proper pathways through life were often met with disappointment for they needed hard and intense, long-lived effort, with too tired, too selfish, too incapable and/or too unwilling to put in the time and effort dominating.
And here we are. Again. Yet again. Those who are hopeful, still, despite all that has gone on, particularly within the psst decade or so, dream of better times, of younger dreams, and pray that this next generation will see through the obscuring fog of wrong choices or those misdirected, and a better world will be visualized and realized.
Each generation must take on and shoulder the blame for their errors, their failures, the need to move past the wrongs of yesterday, keep the encouraging and build better todays, and certainly build for much improved tomorrows.
Perhaps at some time in the near future, the song will be not 'those were the days, but these are the days. A person can dream.
No comments:
Post a Comment