The world in which we live…seems very…disjointed…we talk about events, and make policies and form ideas based on what happened 15 minutes ago without looking…back further, without trying to discern, why we are standing in this soup of problems and conflicting ideologies.
The truth is, this is just another chapter of a very predictable story, time and time again, humanity as writ upon the pages of history our story, not in the gold ink of prosperity and peace, but in the blood of our fellow humans countless tales of revenge and bloodshed…
When. Will. It. End? It is so easy in these days of fear and supposed hatred, to say, it is a simple matter of “us” against “them.” It is so easy to look towards the middle east and Africa and call it backwards and not worth caring about, their views flawed and paltry. What is hard, is the idea of tolerance.
What is hard, is to look at so called Islamic militants and regimes on the African continent, and see only ourselves. Century, after century, after century we, as a race as a species, have covered this world in a dark cloud of anger, and hate and selfishness, which has had a profound impact on not only the way we relate to each other on the individual level, but also on the planet itself.
The ideologies that are in conflict in today's day and age are not those of Islamic and Christian, or Middle Eastern and Western, but rather or a deeper more ingrained ideal of revenge and that of the hard path, the way of peace. If we are wronged, our natural response is to want a wrong to be done back to that person. How can this be our initial reaction? How can this be what we desire?
We as a nation were wronged. When our President spoke of the bravery of this nation in facing this new evil, this new threat, I scorned it. I looked at it and asked myself, if that was truly the depths of bravery. What would truly be bravery would be to look at those who attacked us and say to them, we do not want to fight you. We no longer wish the blood of humans to fertilize the soil of this earth, and out of that soil we do not wish the tree of hatred to continue to flower…we should have shouted at the top of our lungs, this will be a new age, a new dawn in the age of mankind, where death and mayhem is no longer an option in the minds of free people, for are we truly free? These… “freedoms” we claim to hold so dear; speech, religion, press, what do they matter if our souls are still gripped by the heinous ideals of the past, where killing and hatred were a way of life? What have we truly gained over our long dead ancestors? Have we not made the effective elimination of human life more efficient and swift and widespread then could have ever been imagined? Aside from the obvious weapons of mass destruction, has not even “basic” weaponry become more powerful, and its rate of destruction swifter then ever thought possible? We believe the times of barbarianism have passed, that the examples of extreme hate and wanton destruction have long past. But can not a sniper look down the barrel of a gun, and in a split second, end the life of another human being….in an instant, perhaps he was thinking of his small children, or his wife at home…perhaps reflecting on the nature of God, or the beauty of a tree…with one simple motion, we can end it all for him…
This cycle must be broken, and we stand upon the brink! We may either fall, cascading deeper into the chasm of doom and misery that has been the dwelling place of our species…or pull back…take a long look at ourselves…and instead of choosing the same death and hatred, we can follow the path of the few great lights that have shown out through the darkness…ghandi, jesus, martin luther king, we can say no to retaliation, we can say yes to words! To talking! To working out our differences! These are not childish fantasies, they are but the whisps and shadows of hope, and we need to is act, and they will become as real as this room…we can embrace everything that we can be…every aspect of humanity can be experienced and brought into glorious understanding, where peace can truly sound throughout the world…this is the future I choose…choose it with me…
