Current Affairs: for the first time.
Thursday, July 06, 2006
♥ Thursday, July 06, 2006
Pyongyang to the world: Beware. I aint just a piece of green on the map anymore.
Looked through the Straits Times and was suddenly moved to do a personal take on things happening in this world. Particularly on the North Korean side, haha.
When i was abt sec 1, i began collecting newspaper articles pertaining to this 'war'. I had a certain fascination about weapons in my younger days. And guess what i dug up now? That the nuclear program in Pyongyang began way, way back. It seemed as if they never really wanted political stability in the first place. Though the Taepodong-2 launch was a failure, it still echoed what was about 10 years back: that their dying need to establish itself as a political identity in the nuclear world is continuing. And thats a scary thought. Remember M.A.D? Remmeber the Cold War?
M.A.D stands for Mutually Assured Destruction. Simply, its when countries start stockpiling weapons of such force that when one country decides to use it, destruction is mutually assured to both. Seems like history is only for those who cant fail to see its repetition. World War 2 resides in us probably like nothing ever did. So, the world is at a dilemma, continue making appeasement, or begin an aggressive attempt to stop the aggressor? Seems ironic that one has to become the aggressor to keep the peace intact. Or, (yes definitely came to mind), use the United Nations to tell Pyongyang to cool off?
Right, the UN. Dont get me started. I was horrified at the UN's 'intervention' in Rwanda's massacre. So much for the world's police and safekeeping. Its like you intervene, after the tragedy, wearing your blue caps to tell the world to be safe, after like ten thousand atrocities are committed, after the world becomes resigned to the sad fate it belongs to. And that, people believe in the newspaper or tabloids that peace is actually restored?? No, you see peace in more ordinary days actually, when people dont speak retrospectively of loss.
So, the world's answer? Patriot. I meant missiles. Patriotism in today's context have been demeaned to who would dare to push the button and suffer worldwide condemnation for the outbreak of the next epidemic or world war. Yes, missiles. Antimissile-missile. Ah! The sheer stupidity of it. Like antivirus-virus. This is a world where people refuse to see the anarchy it already is in. Where responsibility is conveniently ignored, because it does so no economic or social good to itself. As if peace is no longer any virtue to fight for. Thats what patriotism have fell into the category of; benefits. Monetary or recognition or political, there have to be something 'in it' for them.
I am speaking of power. The power of Voice. The power of the voices whom the world shudder at. Those who can say definitively what it means to have peace. All one has to begin with, is a disarmament. Is it really so bad? Is it a myopic attempt to stop peace? HAve u read the book Arc Light? A tiny mistake from some rogue general and the world spirals into abyss. Sounds possible? Sounds familiar? And of course, lets jolt back some nostalgic desperation from Michael Jackson's cry to the world, " Heal the world, make it a better place for you and for me and the entire human race. There are people dying, if u care enough for the living..."
Where people see division, i see provision. And thats important. In the perceived 'division' of religions, i see a common call to peace. A common call to truce. Most importantly, a common call, with a common voice. Regardless of god or deity, people know what they want. And guns pointing at each other is not it. This is provision. We are providing what we call a means. A means to the end, and the end is liberation. Where the common voice is no longer heard, its understood and lived. At sept 11, people began to acknowledge the reality of that common voice. At suffrages, at movements, we all see common voices! Voices that cry for tolerance, for peace, for understanding, for forgiveness.
The outrage of communism, nazism, fascism all led to a certain evolution that democracy have become. So the world does have its share of improvements and credibility. And with that credibility comes a certain hope. But hope, without further action, is fruitless. You, leaders, who have become so self-absorbed with power; get past yourself for one solitary second and you can see the immense truth in my message. Albert Einstein revealed this, regretfully,"i have no idea what the 3rd world war would be, but the 4th would be back to people fighting with stones and spears."
Democracy. And whats on the other side of the spectrum? Chaos? Anarchy? No. Terrorism. People dismantle people not with riots or bombs, but with ideologies. Terrorism has become an ideology, no longer a facade of what extreme religions are. To promote terror, for sheer terror's sake? Sounds pretty damn stupid to me. Democracy is the people's power. Well, it definitely aint perfect, but rather give this power to the despotism of terrorism? You must be nuts! When u see the mercilessness of attacks, or the Holocaust, or murder, you will realise that the ideology of terrorism is so self absorbed, the people in it achieves no distinct self gratification
, only absorbtion. I perhaps have addressed too superficially your ideology of terror. But im entitled to my point of view, so... :)
See, if we begin dismantling political ideologies to its crux, i wont deny it maybe fundamentally good. But what happened? Gee..historians would shudder at this, i'd think. There're tonnes of arguments on what actually went wrong, they probably would go to war over it. :) George Orwell's Animal Farm began with the idea that people just wanted to be equal. Equality as the common ground, as the common voice, and as the common goal. But, people's uniqueness demanded 'more' equality. There begins the sad onslaught of despotism, and dictatorship. With that, comes less equality, sadly. Seemed that Stalin was such a cold leader, he had a child's father shot for the sheer vanity of it.
We all shall see. Communism's the past. Terrorism's the present. We're all hoping Democracy's the future. But, as i said, we all shall see.
We have Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Bush, Blair, Saddam, Mao Zedong, Kruschev on one hand. We have Wilde, Marx, Tolstoy, Dostovyevsky, Kundera, Pope John Paul and the Nobel Peace Prize on another. The world's fate lies thinly on whose hand is heavier, who has more say and who establishes this demand more effectively.
