Liberty Yell: We Live Here Now

As we engage in our many ridiculous arguments about abortion, gun control and any of the other cultural differences out of which “We the People” manufacture our various opinions, we should at least realize that we are fiddling while Rome burns. We have been fiddling for many years now, an orchestra of overwrought violinists. Fiddling while our country and planet slip from our grasp for no other reason than we are too lazy, self-satisfied and ready to accept the idea that we are powerless to do anything but saw the air with our deafening exclamations.

Our differences should be nothing compared to what we agree on, but it’s easier to yell at each other and to believe we are accomplishing something than it is to challenge the basic flaws in our thinking.   

“Dirty conservative bastard!”
“Filthy commie creep!”
“Christian!””
“Jew!”
“Moslem!”
“Blah blah blah!”

We are so busy making the most of our differences that we fail to realize how easily we are doing the dirty work of those who are grateful to us for this single-minded pursuit of our own self destruction.

And we will in our ignorance slaughter each other and most of the rest of this living world so that a handful of people can earn their elegant lifestyles thanks to our crudeness. They will bleed us and the rest of the world dry, maybe thinking that, given the current state of technology, they will escape to the moon or beyond, leaving behind the steaming roach hills and chemically altered swamps which will survive whatever final insults we can instigate before disappearing face first into the dying earth.

“Capitalism!”
“Socialism!”
“Monarchy!”

Bullshit. Every dumb ass distinction is nothing but somewhere to hide while everything but the wealth of our rulers disintegrates into the vacuum, until even that wealth is gone. Rulers who are as deluded as we are, in their own selfish fashion.   

For there may be those who believe that they and a few of their kind will return to Eden; they will get there in whatever crazy, genocidal manner they can. May the mighty rivers of their Newest World wash away all the blood, though there is no victory in that kind of defeat.

Ah, yes. May this never come to pass. May the triumph of new cars with better gas mileage, new computers with faster speeds and better content, more clothes, more trinkets for everyone, may these things shape this earth and the billions who inhabit it for centuries to come. May we continue to direct ourselves toward the production of “higher living standards.” May we be propelled into a New Age of Better Stuff for Everyone. May the deaths of millions in otherwise pointless wars be so that every survivor can have his or her own lawn to water in front of the proverbial garage hatching geniuses by the dozens. Future billionaires, future lottery ticket winners, future rejuvenated masses of consumers living for an average 100 years!

You know it, and I know it, and anyone who wants to think about it knows that we have sold our heritage for the equivalent of some beads and small shiny mirrors. If we want real democracy, then the majority is going to have to earn it, first by thinking things through to their proper conclusions. All the rest is a tempest in a teapot coming to blow down all the world.   

This is our earth. Ours. W-e t-h-e o-n-e-s w-h-o l-i-v-e h-e-r-e N-O-W. We the ones who live here now. NOW. If you want to pass your work on to future generations, you may be handing off your responsibilities to ghosts.

Never fear. None of this will ever come to pass. Or that’s how it will seem, until it’s too late for anything else to happen. Or we can shock ourselves by becoming much more human. More loving, more brave, more prepared to live in peace.

It is a fight to the death, and the dying is already well under way. Fortunately, we are still alive and can choose between life and death. Choose the reality with which we live.