Ignorance Is Bliss, Till It Isn't

I am not one for debates on facebook, this is something that I just needed to write out because of the sheer helplessness I feel when I read about the things people are going through, the things humans are capable of doing to each other. Because, they ARE humans, they aren't aliens. Calling them monsters or names, does not solve the problem. The problems lie within us. We have to face it and address it. 

I will not hashtag any specific attack, any specific country, because it is happening EVERYWHERE, EVERYDAY. 

Condemning attacks is all well and good, but Governments with all their money, technology and power need to take action. Psychopaths need to be dealt with. Hopefully the world gets some sense before we nuke each other out.

The fact that terror attacks are becoming as recurrent as movie releases in your newspaper should be alarming enough even for those living under a rock. There IS a problem of power-hungry sadists exploiting the stupidity of people, and There IS a problem of certain segments of people being exploited and brainwashed into doing these ghastly things. Diplomatic statements of "Terror has no religion", and everyone hearts everyone and unicorns are real will NOT help. Of course there are good people, but they aren't the problem, so every time a country, or religion, or political party is questioned, the answer is not the "good" people, the answer is the ones who are not good, the answer is to fix that. Not deny or justify it. Because people are dying, and it is closer home for each one of us now, much more than ever before.

People have become so oblivious to the real issues and so caught up in defending their personal prejudices or preferences that it is terrifying. The apathy regarding other people’s lives, or more so, deaths, is deeply unsettling and speaks volumes about the ignorance of the majority of us. The attacks in Bangladesh, Turkey, Pakistan, France, India… all that has been happening in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan.. Hell, everywhere except maybe Antarctica, should scare you. If it doesn’t, you are stupid. If you are debating wiping out a religion because they are perpetrators or because they are infidels, you are stupid and have been successfully used as the sacrificial, unimportant pawn. Not even the one that exchanges itself in return for a queen. You are the pawn that is used as a distraction to weaken and infiltrate the enemy and is easily killed without any sense of loss or victory. These bloodthirsty megalomaniacs are playing against humanity, using humans as pawns to destroy it from within. To weaken and lessen our right to live, to learn, to prosper. Do not let them fool you, manipulate you and break you.

Nobody's God needs saving, neither Saffron nor Green, nor any other colour, symbol, idol or idea for that matter. It is the people who need saving, their hopes, dreams and livelihoods. There are enough troubles in the world, without the need to save Gods and Goddesses. If one believes so much in their versions of the Supreme Power, it should be safe to assume this power can save itself. Do not let the Ellsworth Tooheys of the world manipulate you into believing that their agenda is some holy plan.  

Save yourself from stupidity, your gods can save themselves.

“There is only one sin, only one. And that is theft. Every other sin is a variation of theft. When you kill a man, you steal a life... you steal his wife's right to a husband, rob his children of a father. When you tell a lie, you steal someone's right to the truth. When you cheat, you steal the right to fairness... there is no act more wretched than stealing.” ~ The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini

Sulky Days, Sunny Smiles

   It was one of those days, when one sulks. For no rhyme or reason, or at least, none that one wants to acknowledge. Or worse still, address. Where if you ask me, what’s the matter? I would probably blame it on you, and your incessant chatter. So, one of those days it was, and I was coming back from school. In our old fiat, white where it still was, rusted brown in the rest. An embarrassment then, a long gone loved one now. Mummy had made some snack for me and I had reacted by complaining, ungrateful that I mostly was, on that day, however, I was downright cruel. I feel sick sometimes, thinking of the shit I put my mom through my teenage years, mummy being mummy let me be. I chewed and swallowed the offensive food as if doing a great service to society.

   As I contemplated my depressing existence, the wrongs done against me and my boredom of school, home, and school again, the car stopped at a traffic signal. Great! First there wasn’t an air conditioner in the car and now this! Couldn’t we get one of those sedans, like esteem? I looked out, hoping to distract myself from the wet Calcutta heat, which was making my eyeballs sweat. The stupid sports bra, sticking to the godforsaken boobs that had decided to grow while I was still trying to get rid of the “baby fat”. Big boobs, bigger ass, waist length hair, I was a middle aged woman in a sweaty school uniform and my mom kept giving me more food. Life wasn’t fair.

   Suddenly, I heard a whoooosh. Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh! Giggles and shrieks of pleasure. Right there, on the footpath, near the wet ground by the hand pump, amidst vegetable peels and egg shells. In the sweaty heat, and stinking filth, a brown frail child. Shirtless, bare-footed, with tattered shorts covering a protruding belly. Not baby fat, but a sign of malnutrition, we had learnt at school recently. A photo of such a child, in our text book, explaining why nutrients are important. Diseases, symptoms, food chains and classifications. Text that would fetch us marks, marks that were a number, a number which was never enough. This child, just a picture out of that text book, depicting disease, poverty, was playing with a broken kite. Dragging it on the filthy ground, making noises and laughing, shrieking, enjoying despite everything.

   Despite, nothing. For there was nothing. No house, no clothes, no food. No snacks made by his mother, probably the woman in the tatty saree, with the torn blouse, sitting near the hand pump, staring into nothingness. Nothing to shield against the scorching sun, not even an old fiat, with patches of white paint missing, revealing shades of rust just as the boys skin.

This child was happy. Why? Because he focussed on the broken kite he had, not the kite he didn’t, which could have flown. He ran around in the heat, because he could. He laughed, because what instead was he to choose? Tears? Anger? Defeat?

   The car started, and traffic trudged on, slowly at first, I kept looking at the child, craning my neck as I did so. He looked up from his game and grinned at me, all yellow teeth in full glory. I smiled back, hesitating at first and grinning as the fiat sped by, the wind on my face, the boy a brown speck amongst the grey, noisy traffic on that humid, yellow day.

I turned to my mom, who had drifted off to sleep. Probably tired from running around all day, for us. I gave her a peck on the cheek as I kept the finished tiffin box between us and she smiled with her eyes closed.

   Why wait to be happy or look to be sad? Usually, what we have is much more than what we don’t. I don’t know if that boy grew up to make something for himself, or if he wastes himself away. But, on that day, he was as happy as happy could be, which is more than what we can say for most of our days. I remember him, sometimes, and he reminds me to smile.