What will it take?

Today I am having a hard time being optimistic about our species and its ability to rise to the many challenges it faces. Partly because of yet another senseless act of savage gun violence. But it's bigger than that. I truly wonder what it will take for the human race to look itself in the mirror, accept that it's made many bad decisions, and start making better ones. For the sake of future generations. For the sake of our world. For example:

There is overwhelming evidence that more guns and less gun regulations lead to more gun violence. It's a well documented fact. Yet every time we witness yet another barbaric act of gun violence, there are plenty of passionate people who insist guns aren't the problem, and some even claim more guns are the answer.

There is overwhelming evidence that deregulation of industries leads to better outcomes for a few people and much worse outcomes for everyone else. Yet half of Congress still argues that less regulation is what we need to achieve prosperity.

There is overwhelming evidence that trickle down economics have never worked, except to make a very small minority of rich people much richer, and everyone else poorer and less financially secure. Yet many on Capitol Hill are still speaking with confidence that this is what this country needs.

There is overwhelming evidence that we now have a food system that is killing us. Heart disease, diabetes, cancer, obesity and many other ailments are directly linked to the way we feed ourselves and what we allow corporations to put in our food and drinks. National mourning follows when an act of public violence takes innocent lives, yet hundreds of thousands of people are being killed by their food every year with hardly any outrage.

There is overwhelming evidence that our energy and industrial systems are rapidly warming our planet and destabilizing our climate, leading to certain catastrophic outcomes especially for the most disadvantaged people on this planet. Yet we fail to act.

What will it take? Why is it that we've been conditioned to be more afraid of things that are very unlikely to happen to us (like shark attacks or snake bites or plane crashes) than to take proven steps to prevent things that are very likely to happen to us (like cancer, climate change, etc...)? It's beyond comprehension for the left-brain thinker that I am.

Some of the problems we face will not all easily be solved. But they will certainly not be solved if we can't even accept them as problems and accept that we need to work on solutions. 

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Anger Management

It fascinates me to observe what makes people angry these days.

Am particularly interested by the rage inspired in so many by the idea that more Americans should have access to healthcare. Hard to understand, especially since it's still pay-to-play and still controlled by private insurers, so these people's beloved illusion of  'free-market magic' is still safe-and-sound, thanks to close to $200M of bribes from insurance lobby. These are the same angry people, by the way, who are usually the ones waving signs saying 'Don't mess with my Medicare'... The irony is lost on them...

At the same time of course, a whole host of things are happening before our eyes, and it baffles me that not more people are in a permanent state of outrage over them. A short list would include:
- Our air and water are being poisoned and our planet's life-sustaining resources are being fast depleted in the name of profits.
- Our food is filled with cancer-causing chemicals and obesity-causing additives while robbed of brain-developing nutrients. Also in the name of profits.
- Our political and judicial system is now fully controlled by private money.
- The US Constitution is now considered by many as a quaint historical document mainly useful when needed to somehow justify that every citizen should have the right to arm themselves to the teeth. All these other inconvenient articles and amendments are just guidelines, not rules, right?
- Our war machine is a tool of industry aimed at controlling the flow of natural resources at artificially low prices (if you exclude the cost of war of course, but businesses don't get to pay that, taxpayers do). Where are the old days of fabricating wars just in the name of ideological superiority and as a way to enrich the military industrial complex?
- America believes the world's most dangerous religious extremists are somewhere in the Middle East. The rest of the world believes they are in the US. And not Muslim.
- The real problem with taxpayer-funded welfare in the US has to do with the hundreds of billions given away to large, rich private interests in the form of all kinds of subsidies, right to unfairly exploit public lands and natural resources, tax breaks and the like.
- The American dream is dead. Best predictor of a man's lifetime income is his father's. The country's wealth is gradually and increasingly being amassed by a smaller number of people, who then use their immense wealth and power to ensure nobody interferes with that wealth and power.
- We love to say US is #1. At what? Not quality of life. Or education. Or health. Or freedom. Or opportunity. Or democracy. But obesity and other preventable diseases? Household debt? Pollution? Cost of healthcare? Cost of higher education? You bet!

So if giving more people access to healthcare is what really pisses you off, turn off Fox News and whatever hate-radio you listen to, and pay attention to what's really happening. Our country's future success depends on it.

Hope and Despair

A few days ago I was trying to offer the following advice to one of my daughters as a path to happiness: Let the positive in your life outshine the negative. Indeed, at any given moment, there are things we can focus on that make us feel grateful, proud, hopeful, joyful; and others that make us feel hopeless, horrified, angry, helpless.

I use this a lot in my own life. I have so much to be grateful for in my personal and professional lives, I consider myself truly privileged. And yet there are things I care deeply about such as social and environmental justice or warfare and institutional violence and their devastating impacts on entire generations around the world, and there is seldom much to rejoice about in these domains. These things are so heavy, so fundamental, how can I stand to be happy when our planet is being raped every day in the name of greed, when innocent populations in so many places have to endure the brutality of war and persecution, again in the name of greed, or dogma, or both?

It's a tough balancing act not to fall into apathy and become numb, while not letting a state of permanent outrage completely consume your peace of mind and the joy you can bring to others in their lives.

Yesterday was a good day in several ways. President Obama gave hope to a large number of aspiring American citizens who have lived under the label of 'illegals' because of the way their parents entered the US. France won their soccer match. I got to spend quality time with my teenage daughter. I got to exercise a little even.

But then I learned of a tragic event unfolding in the life of someone I care about. And at that point, it is so hard not to let the despair and hopelessness outsize everything else. In the end, the quality of our lives are defined by our personal relationships. We are social creatures by design. And when tragedy strikes someone  close, we feel it so much more strongly.

Someone wrote recently that if everyone got to personally experience the horror of war, the pain of starvation, the devastation of environmental destruction, we would all be more committed to making these things end. Maybe. In the meantime, I will carry on trying to use all the good in my life as positive energy to deal with that which I want to see change. Knowing that one some days, that balance just can't be achieved.