Apocalypse Now #2. (July 2020)

"..so this is not a sorry tune, but heaven help me."

-The Choir, "To Bid Farewell"

    In a way, 2020 is the ultimate test of your mental disposition. Is the glass half full or half empty? Or broken? Blame whoever you want, the events hitting us right now have been in the works for a long time. 

    Whether you're talking about the globalization that helped a virus that seemingly started in China make it to the US in a matter of weeks (I'm no scientist. As far as I know, it started in Wuhan, but I don't pretend I have any actual knowledge), or the ongoing ripples and remnants of slavery and Jim Crow laws, or a natural environment that we've abused until it "fights back" (that's like digging a cave and shooting at the roof with a fire hose, then feeling attacked when it collapses), none of the issues we're facing this year are ex nihilo ("out of nothing"). 

    But to return to hope, or the lack of it, what's dreaming, what's realistic, and what's just being pessimistic? Will this pandemic go away? You have to believe it will. Historically, all others have. Eventually, it could reach a point where anybody at all vulnerable will have fallen victim to it. Or a vaccine will be found. Perhaps a little of both. But do we really want to wait that long? Do we really want to let it get that far? But more to the point, do we have any choice? If the population is seen as 10 people, and 9 wear masks and stay home, but 1 refuses to, will the one infect all the others? I hope I'm being overly simplistic in my thinking, and it makes some difference that 90% are being safe. Because I don't think there's any way to get that 10% to change. Not any way that Americans will accept, anyway.

I'm off to find some plastic!

Will America ever stop being racist? There is unquestionably a reckoning going on that's long overdue. I respect the risk a police officer takes when pulling over a stranger that could do literally anything when they walk up to the car. But I also wouldn't want to be a black person getting pulled over. I won't say "all" or "every," but there are clearly some rotten apples.

    But keep digging, and  you ask why is it that the police get involved in the first place? Sure, sometimes they directly pull people over, but you can also be a birdwatcher or a little girl selling water and, somehow, the police get involved.  The common denominator in  these cases is that white people are the ones calling the police on black people. 

    And that's if they're "lucky." Sometimes, white people just take the law into their own hands. Like the men who killed Trayvon Martin and Ahmaud Arbery (whose names don't deserve to be mentioned).

    I hope that what we're witnessing are the last desperate acts of the dying beast of racism in this country. But I'm far from sure that's the case. 

 

Can we stop global warming? Stop it? We still can't even agree that it's happening! Let alone that we're the reason. It seems as if some people believe that sea life is sneaking onto our city streets at night and eating our plastic on purpose (or possibly porpoise) to set humans up and make it look like we've polluted the oceans. 

    No, these two environmental crises aren't directly connected. But the link is the lack of care that lets them both happen. If we can't even stop polluting the side of every road and throwing plastic into the ocean (pick the most desolate and isolated road or beach, and give it a look for yourself), how can we discuss increased recycling and reuse? And yet, we're already seeing melting glaciers, increased coastal flooding, and "mysterious" weather events that are "unexplainable." What will be happening by the time we all see there's a problem? 

    But then, I never thought wind power or solar power would be at all accepted, and that does seem to be happening. Maybe I could be wrong?

    I don't have the answers to any of these questions. But I know that thinking about how our actions affect others would be an awfully good start.