A Better World

You can't build a better world for people, people have to build a better world for themselves. Granny Weatherwax said that or something like it. Of all the inequities in the world, the Bible comes close in nailing down what I believe to be the root cause: selfishness. From selfishness comes greed and from greed comes the proverbial love of money. It's pretty easy to come up with situations where love of money isn't the cause of evil but selfishness is harder to factor out.

If I could pull out selfishness from the spectrum of human behavior, would I?

There's a reason that selfishness is such a base behavior: it's beneficial to the survival of the individual of the species therefore the selfish survive and procreate and pass on their selfish ways. Lately, humanity has turned evolution on its head somewhat. Where someone, say, with poor vision might have had difficulties surviving in the past, today it's a non-issue. Not only can we correct the problem, but we don't even really need to. Not every person has to be able to track down his own food anymore. So this previously "poor" genetic material that would not have been as likely to replicate can now "pollute" the pool and we could end up going backwards.

If you take away selfishness, at least at some point in the indeterminate past, we would not be where we are today. This position I refer to includes the good of where we are today along with the bad, technologically, culturally, intellectually, etc. The question is, do we still need this trait? Or more broadly, is it possible that we could someday do without it? As an aside, I offer that the oft expressed discontent of humanity has also been crucial to our progress.

Selfishness has gotten to a point in our society where a select few can govern and control the masses for their own benefit. The super rich got that way through the exploitation of the anyone lower in the food chain, which turns out to be everyone. Some people just feel the effects more severely. I can't fix this myself and neither can you. The question is, will we fix this?

There are various signs that point towards optimism even amongst all the problems we face as a species. The greatest hope I feel is the increasing interconnection between practically everyone on the planet. The level of communication is coming closer to truly putting power in the hands of the people. All the people. Free access. It has never really been feasible to do this, but maybe soon it will be. Those in power are legitimately worried. I see attempts to stop this access and most folk don't even see the war that's going on. They rely on the old media for their information and thus have more difficulty seeing with open eyes. But the times, they are a changin'.

In the end, a species is a self-correcting mechanism. While the selfishness is beneficial, the species can thrive. If not, it may disappear. We're taking some of this power into our own hands now, but the effects will be the same as if they had arisen naturally. We're speeding up the process of evolution. Not all species survive. In fact, most don't. You'd better start swimmin'.

The New Party

Considering my last post, I decided to play back this short conversation detailing my actual political stance. This will probably suffice for the lifetime allowance of political commentary on this blog. It begins:

Man in suit: Thank you coming out and voting today, son.
Me: I'm not voting.
Man in suit: You're not voting? Son, it's your social duty to vote for who you think is the best candidate.
Me: I don't think either are worthy of the job.
Man in suit: Well, that's the beauty of democracy, son, anyone can run. You could even write-in a name.
Me: Or I could write a letter to Santa asking for World Peace. That'd probably work too.
Man in suit: Well, you can't just ignore your responsibility.
Me: Look, if you lived in the height of Roman times, and went by the colosseum, and some man was standing outside asking you how you thought the gladiators should die, how would you vote?
Man in suit: I don't understand, son.
Me: Let's say he gave you the options of ingestion by lion and skewering by pointy sticks and told you it was your civic duty to choose, for the good of the people and their welfare, their entertainment, what would you tell him?
Man in suit: Well, son, voting *is* tricky business.
Me: You don't have to answer. That's the only way free from the travesty of public execution for mass media appeal. There are other means of change.
Man in suit: Uh, so, are you a democrat or a republican?
Me: Neither, I'm an apathet.
Man in suit: Come now, son, you have to have an opinion on important public issues. Which party do you favor?
Me: An opinion? Look, I think you're all idiots.
Man in suit: Well, that's hardly fair.
Me: Shut up, dad.

Nothing More Important

While I don't really want to get directly political here, I just have to mention this.

I was trying to sleep last night with the TV on when I heard this idiotic commercial for a congressjerk. He goes on about how dangerous terrorists are, how we should be afraid of them, how we _almost_ just got blown up by liquids (while holding a bottle of Gatorade no less), and as a punchline says this: "There's nothing more important than our security."

I rolled over and let out a storm of profanity and rage at this. I'm more concerned with freedom than security, and as usual we have someone taking advantage of a situation to promote an agenda, not to mention spread more fear than the actual terrorists. Well, I'm pissed. Oh, and to make matters worse, this guy's the democrat in the race. I guess that's what you get living in a red state.

Link to the A/V page for "He who will not be named"
Directlink

The Unfriendly Skies

John was running late for his plane and couldn't take any more delays, but there he was, taking off his shoes for airport security. "This is ridiculous," he spouted. "Someone tries to sneak a shoe-bomb, so now we have to check our shoes! What happens if someone hides a bomb inside a prosthetic hand? Do we all have to chop off our hands to prove they're not bombs?" The guard checking John continued his search quietly. "Now that I think of it, I oughta pay someone to rig up a bra-bomb just to get caught. You know, terrorists these days are capable of anything. After that, maybe we should start checking bras. I'm sorry ma'am, but we'll have to see your bra" he imitated. The guards were not amused, taking their responsibilities of protecting freedom seriously. "Be careful of my laptop bomb!" John thought about saying, but at least had enough sense to know when he had taken something far enough for his crowd.

John settled down, having vented, and continued on to make it on the plane without further incident. Upon reaching his seat, he unpacked his laptop and started getting ready for a little work on the flight. Before takeoff, another man, running late as well, took his seat next to John. It turned out to be an old business partner from his days just after college. It wasn't until they were in the air that John placed him, "Bill! I almost didn't recognize you!" John began as he turned to face Bill. As the two caught up briefly, John turned back to notice his laptop was missing. "Bill! My laptop's gone!" he said in a hushed tone, "It's been stolen."

Bill answered, "Well, we know the thief has to be on board, there's no way to escape!"

"Yeah, you're right," John thought for a moment. After thinking with no thoughts volunteering, John quickly jumped up and shouted, "All right! Nobody move!" his next words would have been "Someone on this plane has my laptop", but the air marshal on board didn't wait for it.

It turned out that there were worse things than being late for a plane.

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Fight the Power

I know, I know, great inspiration.