Friday, September 17, 2010

History repeating

In a sad revival of ancient prejudices, "France" and "Italy" started expelling Roma from "their" "territory". The idea of people living a rather nomadic life style in Europe seems to clash with a lot of ideas about government in general. However, the idea of forming a society with its own culture predated the historically modern idea of nations.

Being born in "Germany", I haven't encountered any 'gypsy' camp where I grew up. Not too surprising, as "Germany's" war against others under Hitler targeted Roma and Sinti even before they engaged into the genocide of Jewish people. Depending on the proximity of nation towards acting as a civilised nation, the horrific history of "Germany" under Hitler is reduced to the Jewish genocide. Homophobic countries ignore Hitler's war on homosexuals, others ignore the war on free-thinking artists, the war on handicapped people, the war on communists or the war on "gypies" (Zigeuner).

This simplistic view of the historically accepted times of "German" fascism might contribute to the "French" politicians showing dismay after some EU representative reminded the world publicly about the similarity the "French" governments activity and the Nazi strategy against this people. It became quite common for governments in the 21st century to rather engage in indirect killings than to this dirty job the same way "Germany" did it more than 70 years ago. Australia unilaterally breaches the UN conventions with its policies towards asylum seekers and their native population, France doesn't care to send Roma people into countries which intend to end the journey of this travelling people forever.

So, yes, while the Nazis had killing squads to deal with Sinti and Roma, the "French" don't kill them straight away. The just follow the narrow-minded strategy "Out of sight, out of mind", thereby perverting the ideas behind the United Nations declaration of human rights. However, comparing what "France" is doing to the Roma people right now has much more merits then "French" diplomats want to admit.

The Nazis created acceptance for their violent ways of treating other people as non-humans by targeting easy scapegoats. Without exposure to minority groups, the stories being told about them often originate from sources with an agenda. It requires a large amount of gullibility to believe what Hitler wrote about the Jews in Mein Kampf, to believe anything the "French" government accuses the entire people of Roma of, or to believe anything that "government sources" in the Western World say about "terrorists".

In a world without easy access to global travel and communication making people scared of "others" comes easy. In the 21st century individuals have access to an overwhelming diversity of opinions and facts, and no longer depend on "government" to tell them about right and wrong. Nationalism, the meme that extended empathy from immediate kinship to a larger community, has turned into a fatal disease of society already before this millennium, but developments like the "US" wars on non-befriended owners of valuable resources, or "Israel"'s war on the indigeneous people of the Middle East, or the allegations of some European governments that Roma cause a hike in crime rates demonstrate the popularity of the 'us versus them' meme that aim to prevent the emergence of global empathy.

Life doesn't need humans, yet humans need each other and biodiversity to survive. As humans, we cannot escape the laws of nature, but we can easily can create laws that pave the path of self-destruction. On an individual scale this means substance abuse, domestic violence, suicide and excessive risk tasking. Only larger scale, organisation like nation or multinational corporations can accumulate and use resources in a species endangering way. No invisible hand determines the fate of mankind, rather the combination of an ignorant populace and uncontrolled government.

Each living organism on this planet is an contemporary evolutionary winner, born into an environment that provides more than enough for survival. If there wasn't enough for everyone right here and now, those chosen by arbitrary governments not to deserve life wouldn't exist in first place. Anyone still repeating Adam Smith's mantra "There is not enough for everyone" lacks either intelligence or empathy, which disqualifies them from taking on responsibility for other people's life. However, history shows that no safeguards against stupid or evil leaders has been put in place, and that real existing "democracies" rather function similar to feudalistic societies.

As long as governments use "national security" as an excuse for institutionalised violence, humanity is light years away from justice, and wolfs remain the shepherds of the human race. As long as societies allow their leaders secrecy and special rules, humanity is doomed to repeat history until the extinction of humanity. I haven't lost my optimism yet, not everyone acta as harmful, inconsiderate, unempathic and unconscious as the parasites of society euphemistically called "politicians".

Saturday, September 11, 2010

A memorial of madness

The mass trauma induced by the events of September 11th 2001 still linger untransformed in the global human consciousness. 3000 people were killed on that day, more than this number died as a consequence of the irresponsible exposure to the toxic aftermath of the collapse of three WTC buildings, more than 4000 American soldiers died since then in Iraq and Afghanistan, and hundred thousands if not millions of civilians in Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen and Afghanistan have been killed.

The global development since that event seems familiar and new at the same time. Utter violence replaced diplomacy, creating a boom for the prison and war industry. A Global Financial Crisis was created to redistribute more tax payers money to subsidise human destruction. Many grass roots movements emerged around the 'truth of 911', and millions of hours of mass media coverage hammered the official narrative into the minds of peripherally interested people.

Although it seems impossible to merge the factoids assumed about this event into a consistent image, and the 'truth about 911' might remain hidden, we could learn a lot about the way we interactively create reality. Diversity of opinion, a hallmark of healthy democracies, contradicts 'Political correctness' for certain topics. 'Believers' of the wrong story can only be lunatics, nothing from their mouths worth a second thought.

Most, if not all, societies use ostracism as punishment for perceived unacceptable deviation from the myth that maintains a society. Besides the senseless destruction of lives in the war zones, many people in the warmongering democracies lost their jobs. What happened to Dr. David Kelly might appear in the files of the muscle of Organised Crime better known as Military Intelligence.

A staggering amount of resources have been destroyed to 'bring freedom and democracy' to some countries, while social systems and civil rights in the war faring countries deteriorated. A great deal of focus of governments in the western world lies on the paranoia about 'terror' to the expense of life supporting principles.

No matter who is responsible for the immediate victims of the events on 911, the US government brought havoc and death to the people of Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Yemen since 2001. If a nation reacts with a vendetta against their perceived illicit controllers of valuable resources, its behaviour can neither be called rational nor humane nor civilised.

The events on 911 brought suffering to many, yet the insane reaction to this dreadful event initiated a bloody cycle of violence with no end in sight. Violence breeds only more violence, and any reasonable acting agent can learn this truism from history. Yet the structure of government allows just for limited adaption of strategies, as it is based on the idea of the demonstration of strength against 'the others'.

The narratives of our global pop culture show the essence of this principles since Orson Wells' 'War of the world' radio show. No matter how bad the situation in the certain circumstances seem, once the aliens have taken over civil life ends. An experience shared nowadays in many regions of the world, be it Gaza, Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan. And a reminder to the citizens of warmongering nations of the 'greater good' in using life-sustaining resources to destroy human life, culture and sources of food and income.

So let's remember 911 as the day that unveiled that existing democracies base on the business model of the military industrial complex, and not on the 'voice of the people'. As long as our planet divides the responsibility for sharing its resources among more than 100 unaccountable 'leaders', violence seems inevitable.

War as solution for negotiation problems seems as modern as blood-letting as one all cure. More of the same leads to fatal consequences. In medicine, the folly of this well meant cure could not remain undetected, in politics paradigms shift very slow. I honour each human life, that's why I favour healing after suffering, not spreading more of the same.

Well intended death and suffering can no longer be hidden under the carpet of national security - history converts from the domain from creating useful narratives by a chosen few to accessing the subjective treasure trough of eye witnesses and opinionated observers on the internet. Monolithic myths of 'official' versions fragment into a kaleidoscope of perspectives to create idiosyncratic approaches to remedy the collective trauma induced by 911.

Violence can not heal, revenge only creates a vicious cycle. Nobody attacked the civilised world on 911, history has yet to see a civilised mankind on this planet. Which might just happen during our very lifetimes.







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