“You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.” ~Mohandas Gandhi
With all this silly-ness going on these days you wouldn’t be amiss to think the world is just a horrible place. People are fighting wars of words in Washington and wars of bombs in Baghdad – one faction blasting away at the other until it doesn’t produce a winner, only more people dug in deeper with their own presuppositions about the other side.
I honestly find it humorous to think that anyone thinks anything that is happening right now is any more unique than the sun rising tomorrow in the east and setting in the west. All of life, all of time, all of civilization as we know it… its all cyclical.
For eons, man has cycled up and down in every way. The world gets rich, the world gets poor. The world gets more moral, the world gets less moral. Have we forgotten the 20th century? The turn of the century (1900) brought the old post-industrial age with all its Victorian pomp and circumstance – so much so that someone passed the prohibition of alcohol in the US. What!? Then, the moral decadence brought on by speakeasy’s and the “Roaring Twenties.” Everybody was rich and everybody was having so much fun… until the 1930’s! Here’s our downturn and everybody hits a level of poverty never before seen in the Americas. Well, here comes World War II and the huge industry boom and post-war Americana driving the modern era forward when everybody had a car, a tv, and life was good. Then came the 1960’s and we hit a huge slump of morality when love was free and drugs were plentiful. Everybody wanted to be a hippy! Then, the 70’s came along… down goes the economy and oil prices skyrocketed to $1.75 and people thought the world was gonna end. The ’80’s came along and morality leveled out before the Internet took off big and everybody got rich again!
And here we are… the first decade of the 2000’s has past and – in the grand scheme of things – has anything really changed? We got attacked in 2001… kinda like we did in 1941. Oh, and we’re at war… as if that’s anything new (the US was involved in 7 major conflicts in the 20th century). Everybody’s had to keep a close eye on their money… but still not half as bad as the 1930’s. Many people claim ethics and morality has completely gone out the window… not unlike they did in the 20’s… and 60’s. But surely something has to be said about technology booming, right!? …kinda like it did with the radio… and television… and computer… and…
So is ANYthing truly new?
“New” is always relative. Something is only truly “new” in the mind of those who have a short-term memory.
I don’t mean to sound cynical. I just wanted to put a little idea in your head.
Be thorough to think, slow to judge, long in patience. Stay tuned,
-Noah D.
PS: The above image was created by light painting… using a 1 million candlepower flashlight and painting the house with light during a multi-minute exposure.
