Will
The Year 2008 Be Different?
By
Mirza A. Beg
21 December,
2007
Countercurrents.org
January
1, of the year 2008 of the Julian-Gregorian calendar will be just another
day in the steady flow of time. Some will celebrate because it is customary,
while others will rejoice in the ever present hope of renewal, but most
of the teaming poor and dispossessed of the world will not notice it.
The wars will go on as legalized murder. It will be yet another day
of misery and deprivation.
Most people,
across the globe, at least wish for peace on Earth and equity and justice
for all. They are kind and considerate as individuals. But as a group,
"us versus them", we conveniently forget that it requires
treating the distant "others" as we, the "us" would
like to be treated. It is easy to find tortuous reasons to justify selfish
interests, resulting in wars based on the worst of lies, the self serving
lies that we tell ourselves. They propel us to support the politicians
who lie most convincingly that killing neighbors or a people in far
off lands is necessary to preserve our way of life.
Religions
become the most convenient hand maiden of the propagandists, and we
willingly with enthusiasm profane what we purport to hold sacred.
Eventually
all wars do end, often with the exhaustion of all sides. In the past
two centuries, the quantum growth in modern technology has provided
unimaginable material conveniences. It has brought prosperity, but sadly
there is even a greater growth in weapons to feed the wars; weapons
that can be used without any danger to the user; impersonalized weapons.
In my name,
with my taxes, a neighborhood full of people with similar dreams as
mine, in a far off place, will be destroyed by a rocket delivered by
a remote controlled plane, while I am celebrating the New Year festivities
and talking of peace and goodwill. If confronted by the deception, the
trite explanation will be "collateral damage", or at best
an oft repeated hackneyed phrase "Oops, a mistake for which we
are extremely sorry."
Ours is an
age of information and instant communication. No technology can be secret
for very long. Every weapon invented by an established government to
oppress others in the name of crass nationalism will eventually leak
out or are sold to those fighting the oppression, who after gaining
power, in turn become oppressors.
The wars
can not be fought or sustained unless the populace is duped into believing
that the "ungodly other" or "beastly other" is trying
to destroy them. The propaganda is self-sustaining and it grows until
we are jolted after falling off the precipice.
Those who
see injustice and keep quiet, end up being silent supporters of oppression.
The "innocent" bystanders are no longer as innocent as they
want to believe, especially in a democracy. If we do not object to our
own government's misdeeds at home and abroad, we are guilty, because
in a democracy we are the government.
Many of us
were not taken in by the lies of warmongers. We foresaw and wrote about
the quagmire and destruction that the war would bring, but being right
before a majority realizes the folly is perceived as a greater political
folly. The strength of ethical principles and intellect is branded as
weakness of brawn by the glib power seekers who keep trying to deceive
the electorate by appealing to the baser instincts.
We need to
speak in louder and clearer voices to inject backbones in politicians
who want to be with the winning side. We also need to convince the popular
media that people do want to hear the other side as well. It is not
economically injurious. They do not need to imitate Fox news. Unless
we do it in greater numbers, the malfeasances of the Bush administration
in domestic policy and endless indiscriminate wars in the name of peace
will continue to create more terrorists and wider wars.
The warmongers
had their run. They have sown terrible death and destruction. They have
the power of the latest weapons, but they suffer a great disadvantage.
They have to be against others to be hegemonic. They thrive on hatred,
pitting "us" against "them".
The ideals
of peace and of consideration of others as human beings may appear to
be powerless, but they have one great advantage. They can unite across
the false divide created by forces of ignorance and war. They extend
a hand of friendship across the artificial divide. They can erase the
dishonest divide.
Let us make
the year 2008 a watershed, when the 21st century emerges from the deathly
clutches of the wars of the 20 th century to claim its much needed place
to unfold an era of peace in the flow of time.
Mirza
A. Beg can be contacted at [email protected]
and at http://mirzasmusings.blogspot.com/
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