Sometimes I wonder if my take on the world of today is filtered through the lens of my age and the number of losses that I have endured. At the age of seventy seven I have to admit that in spite of the many ups and downs mine has been a good life, but of late the daily news is more often than not disturbing. I find myself longing for calm and peace rather than stories about wars, shootings, chaotic upheavals of the economy and other bad news. After the Covid pandemic I had hoped that the world would settle down into a long appreciation of surviving with all of us humans quietly focusing on the most important aspects of life. I did not expect the ensuing chaos that feeds the daily headlines and creates continued uncertainty across the globe. This is not how I imagined my last years on this earth to be, but I suppose the pattern is in keeping with the flow of history.
Somehow we humans have a very difficult time getting along with one another. While it seems easy enough to me if we just work together and allow people to be themselves, that is quite a pipe dream when set against reality. The truth is that we have a finite amount of resources and opportunities that fuel the problems that we keep having with each other. The story of our beginnings as told in the Bible tells us that the first man and woman lived in the kind of paradise that most of us would truly enjoy but even back then they were tempted to take more than they had been given. Their original sin follows the rest of us for all time.
Even if this is only a metaphorical story created to warn us about the flaws of our human emotions it is still a powerful explanation of our tendencies to never be satisfied with equality for all. The same jealousies that pushed Cain to kill Abel are present in the wars that we humans have inflicted on one another throughout history. While our natures have the capacity to be kind and loving we always seem to have someone or some groups among us who lie and cheat and steal and want to dominate rather than just living in peace. Mankind’s inhumanity to each other creates problems after problems over and over again.
Sometimes those problems manifest themselves in very personal ways. Humans sometimes hurt those closest to them in emotional and physical ways. In an almost cyclical repetition wars seem to spring up over and over again when we grow wearing of trying to understand each other or when greed for resources overpowers our will to compromise with groups and nations that see the world very differently than the way we do.
I am admittedly the kind of person who prefers detente. I am more than willing to share and listen to ideas and philosophies that are very different from my own. I have been fortunate to live in the United States of America, a nation rich in both material and human resources. I view our country as a delightful salad of many colors and beliefs. My way of thinking is mostly to live and let live, but of course there are times when evil has to be curbed but doing so should not impose limits on how the majority of good people choose to be from day to day.
We boast that we have freedom to speak our minds and to protest things that we believe are unfair but then we engage in culture wars that demean those whose thoughts about how to live are different from our own. This is especially egregious when the limitations on our basic liberties are legislated by those who govern us. There are very good reasons why the founders of our nation created the Bill of Rights. We should all want to protect our liberties even when we have disagreements. When I participate in a “No Kings” protest I am not being unpatriotic. In fact, I am celebrating my right to express my concerns. Nor am I being hateful when I critique the president and his overreach in unilaterally creating tariffs or declaring war. I am using my rights as a citizen when I point out the problems with ICE. I am not being anti religion when I worry that Christian Nationalism is moving into classrooms and being used as a cover for threatening people whose beliefs do not jibe with theirs.
I have many friends and relatives whom I dearly love and would fight or even die for whose political stances are the polar opposite of mine. I want to be able to explain to them why I have developed my own feelings about how our government should work rather than being accused of being unpatriotic and even sometimes being tossed aside. I am sickened by the group speak of those whose politics worry me. When I hear the same sentences being echoed over and over again I worry that too many are being propagandized rather than treated with honesty and a willingness to have adult conversations about what we need in this world to grow and prosper rather than eternally feuding.
I am weary of the fighting that is tearing the world apart and specifically turning individuals against each other and yet here we are. Just as Joseph Goebbels used his propaganda to turn ordinary Germans into believers of the fascist Nazi movement. I see much of the all present media using emotional tactics to influence our thinking rather than showing us facts that help us to identify and accurately assess problems. When people tell me that immigrants are raping and killing as though it is a given that large numbers of them are criminals I want to hear real statistics which they can never provide. They have been bombarded with generalizations that play on their fears and emotions. When I hear outrage over trans women hurting young girls in sports or bathrooms I realize that a tiny percent of the population is being used to stir up unnecessary trouble. Fear and want are fuels of propaganda.
The truth is that the vast majority of immigrants are hard working family members. The criminals are outliers, exceptions who can be arrested without creating chaos for those of good will. The truth is that few people have ever encountered a trans individual and the numbers of them who participate in sports is so small that they represent less than one percent of the athletes. It would be so much better if we were to attempt to understand that these souls are mostly kind and well intentioned rather than than pariahs who must be wiped out of our society.
I know that we humans have the capacity to get along if we are willing to stop the quibbling and to select leaders who demonstrate a willingness to work together rather than to drive us apart. There will be blips in the process because in the grand scheme of things there will always be broken souls driven by hatred, greed and a lust for power. We would do well to avoid any group that survives by turning us against each other. We should shun them not our fellow citizens.
Somehow all of the examples of history that should have taught us to beware of any movement that takes aim at certain groups have yet to keep us from being manipulated by power seekers. When will we learn?
All It Takes Is A Little Love 