Are we too many on the planet, beyond the optimum and, thus, unmanageable? Or, perhaps, our politicians are too incompetent or, mere puppets in the hands of faceless elites, who have insatiable hunger for power and wealth!
Climate Change is wreaking havoc on our planet, but our elected leaders can’t see it. Owing to the present Middle East military conflict, the Suez Canal is debilitated, severely impacting the world trade. The Panama Canal is also impacted by the drying of Gatun Lake, due to drought and deforestation of the Amazon. Japan and the UK are in recession since the end of 2023 and more countries could follow them?
Do we need a ‘mother’ of all wars to solve an insolvable mess created by irresponsible politicians – past and present – and their crony capitalists?
The world seems to have lost its moral compass, sophistication and regressed; it has exposed its true colours. A tribalistic world order operates under a deceptive veil of statesmanship and diplomatic sophistication. Powerful political bullies oppress, humiliate, and denigrate their weaker opponents to provoke them.
When the persecuted victims react publicly, they are smashed with a sledgehammer under the pretext of the oppressor’s ‘right to defend’. That reminds us of a school-time story, The Wolf and the Lamb, which ends with the moral, ‘might is right’.
We must think critically and ask questions, as Socrates taught us, and not believe everything thrown on us. Ensure Socrates’ sacrifice does not go in vain. No matter what, human dignity must be upheld at all costs.
Humans are increasingly feeling frustrated, disillusioned, and protesting, in both authoritarian and paper democracies. Elections are brazenly rigged and stolen from voters? Sham democracies commit most heinous crimes against humanity, whom they are sworn to protect and serve.
Gaza questions our individual and collective conscience. Can anyone be ever held accountable for up to 30-thousand civilian deaths in that godforsaken land? Disappointingly, a sustained UN effort for a permanent ceasefire and the recent ICJ ruling to stop the onslaught have borne no immediate fruits.
After Rafah is annihilated and Gaza evacuated, can we claim to be ‘civilised’? What would be our credibility? How soon will our textbooks remove words that have been rendered redundant, such as ‘ethics, morality, humanity, civility, humility, responsibility, accountability, honesty, integrity, empathy and compassion’?
Something ominous is brewing. Will the Middle East conflict spread? Ask any megalomaniac politician, who creates and nurtures social divisions and wars. In the emerging world order, nations are seen as ‘you are either with us or against us.’ Battle lines are drawn, there may be no escape for those who choose to sit on the fence and wait to avail material benefits from all sides.
Is our world possessed by a great demon, or have we lost the ability to think, either due to a religious-political opium being constantly fed to us or because of Coronavirus? Perhaps, our education is also not good enough to hone our thinking faculty. Imagine one morning we woke up and found our arsenal of nuclear and chemical weapons, guns, spears and swords all gone, will we continue fighting? Other than religion, oil and water, what will we fight about? Other than stones and sticks, what will we use to kill our kind? Bare hands? Who are we?
If our civilisation survives, subject to a nuclear global war or a colossal natural event, we will continue to be exploited by conniving, power-hungry individuals in the name of religion.
Tyrant regimes come and go. They enter like Trojans and spread surreptitiously like cancer, and incessantly consume the country and render it hollow from the within. History tells their benefactors and beneficiaries pay heavily for their misdeeds long after they are gone.
It is time to pause and introspect, as a slippery road lies ahead, potentially spiralling downward. We have been fed religious political opium for long and lured into a make-believe world and primed to fight Don Quixote’s windmills.
We must detoxify and purge ourselves of xenophobia and religious intolerances; keep our eyes and ears open, and brain nurtured with verifiable facts; and tread every step of the way with caution. The ground is wobbly and the weather rough. Our actions (and inactions) will define us, and our convictions and scruples will be tested to core. This year will redefine us.
These are unprecedented times, we must remain steadfast and hopeful, and brace ourselves. This will also pass.
Abominable glorification of the powerful elite can’t conceal the fact that the Subcontinent is severely plagued by a deeply rooted class, religious, caste and ethnic civil warfare and hanging on the precipice of self-destruction. Don’t blame the British for that. Verily, despite enjoying semblances of democracy in the first six decades after the British exit, the Subcontinent has returned to its strife-torn past. Of course, the British can’t be blamed for such regression.
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