Was it General McCarthy who said that the life was cheap in Asia? He had the cute desire to use the nuke again on us it seems! Well if not the followers of the “great” general, some of our political leaders do not place much store by life. They believe in the policy of immediate and bloody retaliation, but only when they are safely away from the zone in which it occurs of course. This is the common human trait and we can hardly find fault with it.
But what about the poor morons who gets it good and proper in the exchange, well they are just that, Morons with a capital M. This statement is made from a stance that life is valuable and has to be preserved as far as possible. There can be other points of views. The harikiri types for instance, they show a complete disregard towards their own life and other’s life as well. What prompts them I for one could never understand?
Ideals can have a destructive hold on people; people at times even accept death to submission in certain cases. Men have died for causes and great objectives. Bruno would rather burn at the stake than recant. But I am with Galileo in this business. There is no point in braving the stupid to change the system overnight. Other than the very few, all the other revolutions have happened all most benignly, over a period of time giving people enough breathing space.
But there are scrupulous fanatics who deal in mass murders to keep their spoils intact. Some of the modern day Indian political parties are like that. Not the party ruling at the moment of course. It has enough sense to keep in the back ground whenever a national calamity happens. The fanatics I spoke of, they are not religious, if they have any religion it is the religion of gain. Gains are of different kind. Even the death of a follower can be turned into a gain sometimes, or should I say most times. The left as well as the extreme right has their numbers of martyrs, this keeps the system going. Their anniversaries are made much off, celebrated with great feeling and pomp. These occasions are conspicuous by the absence of any relatives of the dead and gone martyr. Their cases are never thought of.
But what is so wonderful about this is that, the poor muffins are convinced that they are doing something worthwhile, while every one else can see that it is other wise. The right wing has fashioned its cadres in the manner of an army and the left wing also has its methods of training. Where do they get the candidates is the question. Once they get them it is very easy because there is subtle machinery at work to make it happen. It can be called peer pressure. Once into the fold there is little escape, like we hear in the case of the underworld.
Scapegoats are pushed forward to the front and they get sacrificed for the “benefit” of the party.
Slowly the organization is taking on the role of the religion. As some shrewd writer had remarked some time ago religion is being replaced by the party and all its rituals are being re enacted with only the very perfunctory difference. Perhaps it is inevitable in a sense, because we are intimately linked to the motifs we are familiar with. They would emerge in one way or the other during the course of social evolution.
Living in our land at these times is not easy my friend, it gives us the heart sores.
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