Sometimes when I talk about loving people, and embracing humanity, I’m sure some of you picture a hippie, a beatnik who wants everyone to be equal, right up until the moment they discover just what that equality means, and then back off and say “ew! ew! ew!” as they realize that all of humanity really means *all* of humanity.
I’m not a kumbaya around the fire kind of guy. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I want peace between people. I want human beings to finally realize that we’re mortal, we’re fragile, and we need each other. It’s just I know that human nature isn’t so straightforward.
Singing songs and playing the guitar’s not going to get everybody to pay attention. Hoping and praying won’t bring peace. For some, even the elimination of hunger, sickness, poverty, wouldn’t be enough for them to come around. For every person there is at least one point of view, one opinion, and one fear. These things struggle inside every human mind. It is unavoidable, inescapable, and inevitable that such a situation exists inside the head of every person.
We are shaped by our experiences. We live by them.
The greatest saving grace humanity has is that we can adapt. We can empathize, reason, and learn from our mistakes. What happens when our empathy is diminished? When it is curtailed? Brainwashed out of us? Forbidden as being weak? We lose our ability to adapt. Instead of adapting to the environment around us, we begin to force the environment to our will. As a result, the environment begins to show the damage which comes from being pushed into situations for which it has not become accustomed, it adapts.
Nature lacks empathy. When a hurricane bears down on a tiny little fishing village, it doesn’t avoid the churches or the schools, it obliterates them just as surely as it does the homes and businesses of everyone else. Nature does not have empathy. It is a response to stimuli acted upon it by other forces.
An avalanche will not move out of the way when encountering a school bus of children on the mountain road below it. It will slam into that bus and drag it along with it as it slides down the mountain at a hundred and fifty kilometers per hour. It has no feeling, no awareness.
People do. We possess awareness. We possess feeling. We can alter the world around us to better fit our needs. So why don’t we alter the society around us in which we live? If we truly care about others like we say we do, then why are people starving to death in some nations, while others face an obesity crisis?
Allocation of resources.
Of course, it comes down to the haves and the have-nots, just as it always has. Those who have and are willing to share with the have-nots aren’t the problem. It’s the haves who refuse to share their more than ample resources with the have-nots, finding awful reasons to justify their cruelty. Is it because these haves are bad people? Not usually, no.
It is because, often enough, that these haves are told time and time again that it’s okay to hoard wealth, to gather as many resources as they can under their name, and to defend it from those who need it most because they, the have-nots, must earn their right to take as much as they can, though they’ll have to find a different watering hole, of course.
It doesn’t occur to these people that they can only do this by the generosity of others, that where others give freely, these people who believe they have a right to grab everything within their sight take as much as they can, as fast as they can, and it’s still never enough.
Some people with whom I raise this issue often tell me that humans won’t ever change, that we’ll always be like this, that calling for peace and brotherhood is a foolish venture. They say this even though if it were not for humanity pulling together at times throughout history, we’d likely all be dead, with the earth not missing us one bit.
It is only recently, however, that our foolish decisions have gained the capability to cause harm on a global scale. That is why we need to rethink the way we’re doing things, because we cannot sustain this way of life. Too many people suffer so that a handful can continue gluttoning their bellies and their bank vaults. That cannot continue, and singing kumbaya is going to do fuck all about it.
So no, I’m not trying to create a gluten free, organic, free range, cold-pressed, non-fat, skim milk version of humanity, because that will not happen any time soon. What I am trying to do is foster empathy in others, because that is the greatest tool for the advancement of humanity. Without empathy, every person is a stranger, every face a threat. Every nation becomes an enemy, and every life cheap and unworthy of consideration.
We teeter on the brink of this situation in some places already. In the United States, we’re becoming colder, more distant. Our empathy is being reserved solely for people we deem “worthy” of it, as if kindness must be doled out like a reward for obedience. It is abusive, and we are endorsing its use around the world.
So that is where I am starting. Play the guitar, sit around the fire, please. Getting together and enjoying one another’s company is a wonderful way to connect with others, but I need to start rebuilding our humanity in those who have found it far too inconvenient to care about, and that includes those in power.
Save me a non-fat mocha latte for when I return, though.