Salvador’s requiem
So, now there are schools in England that don’t teach about the Holocaust, to avoid an antisemitic backlash. Which, of course, makes perfect sense, if you are an ostrich. A cartoon ostrich, that is, since the actual birds behave in a more sensible manner when confronted with danger.
Problem is, humanity often behaves more like cartoon characters than real life actors. Like Buggs Bunny we fully expect that our actions have no serious consequences. If we run our societies over some metaphorical cliff we not only expect a Micawber outcome, we are actually offended if things do end up in a million little pieces.
As a species we’ve always been more into problem solving than avoiding trouble to begin with. So, first we invent the sword - and then, only very reluctantly, we agree that making ploughshares might be a more sensible option; and then, of course, we spend most of the rest of history talking about converting one into the other without ever actually doing so.
We run from crisis to crisis, barely surviving this or that self-inflicted outrage, before creating even bigger messes - and then, again, complain about our troubles.
Still, it’s probably no use to curse our nature or try and stop the cavalries we always set in some, almost pre-ordained motion. We are what we are - and will probably remain so till we wipe ourselves out in one spectaculair way or the other.
However, if, in the maybe not too far-flung future, a God, or some E.T. wants to put something on our grave stone, he, she or it could do worse than state:
Here lies one race whose name was writ in Czech giraffes.
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