buggery.org

I suppose an intoduction might be polite…so…hi Bugger. I’m Cyrus, and I stumbled across your blog some time ago, and have been lurking around since.

At any rate, I totally get where you’re at. I wrote a little while back about now considering myself a retro-futurist, because I often reminisce about how the future used to look.

I too despair at the direction our world is taking. Some of the concerns you have I share. I spiral into depression (I find it especially hard at night).

I despair the growing sense of individualism; the focus on self-interest and material comfort over care, concern and *real* action to help other groups less fortunate. It saddens me that Australians are less concerned about AIDs, poverty and the destruction of the environment and more concerned about foreign ‘invaders’, interest rate and petrol price rises.

I’m concerned about the increasing division between the haves and have-nots. Australia was a much better place when it had a bigger middle-class and fewer people at either ends of the economic scale. I believe the policies and attitudes of our conservative Federal government accelerate this class divide. Changes in ‘Industrial Relations’ policy seem to favour big business and obscenely high executive pay packets over workers at the other end of production. As someone with a not too-shabby salary ($60-70K) I would rather those with less income get a tax relief before I get a tax break. I’m happy forgo private health insurance and to pay the Medicare levy. We could do more to support the public health system – by sharing the financial burden we all benefit. (I’ve almost saved enough for a deposit to buy my own small apartment. It has taken many years of careful saving to get to this point. Yet I feel a great deal of shame and guilt that so many others can’t afford to buy their own place).

I don’t think we value scientific and artistic endeavour – we could do so much more to encourage pursuits in science. There are so few arts and science programs on television! Instead we consume hours and hours of crime drama each week (The crimes seem to get more twisted each week. How do people find this entertaining? I find these programs quite macabre).

And while Australians (on-the-whole) enjoy a relatively affluent lifestyle we don’t work hard enough to assist less fortunate countries overcome poverty or reach a truly democratic state free of corruption. We aren’t doing enough to protest and influence the terrible injustices in Africa (Mugabe’s land grab and destruction of homes in Zimbabwe).

I find it interesting (and with a degree of reserved optimism) that US Administration policy is shifting away from propping up dictators and power lords in Africa. The theory was that propping up corrupt dictators would provide some stability, sure-up oil supplies, favourable trade and cheap labour. It is encouraging to see that the US Administration is slowly acknowledging that this policy has failed (for the US and foreign countries). New policy seems to be cautiously favouring democracy as a better way to provide stability (As with Egypt). Either way the US Administrations will want to continue to have a strong influence on global trade and secure IT knowledge (including patents on medicine) so that it can guarantee a good supply of oil and cheap foreign labour.

I can’t bare to watch commercial television ‘news’. Commercial television presents news as entertainment. ‘News’ items are selected by measure of drama rather than any real importance or relevance. I find it bizarre that commercial ‘news’ programs are promoted on the appeal and popularity of news-readers. But there comes a point when I can’t take in any more real news (SBS) because of the sickening violence. After a few days of regular viewing I have to switch off. At night I find it difficult to not picture bodies being ripped apart by bombs.

I feel powerlessness to affect change: local, national and global.

Often I revisit a Leunig drawing that had a big impact on me:

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“The things that will destroy us are: politics without principle; pleasure without conscience; wealth without work; knowledge without character; business without morality; science without humanity; and worship without sacrifice.” Mahatma Ghandi

“The things that will destroy us are: terrorism, greenies and higher interest rates.” John Howard

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I get some comfort that at least some of my thoughts are shared by others. Thanks.

Or take that advice a step futher. Shut that window and move to the outside of it. Someone out there needs your help and if everyone in the entire world stopped what they were doing and helped just one person…
…complete peace.
Hands full of help don’t have room for rifles.