Thursday, November 11, 2004

Special delivery: Fear, just like you ordered.

The heated debates and opinions about Theo van Gogh's death are quieting down a bit. Instead, people are blowing up buildings now. Nice.
I dunno. I get queasy when I see the masses of people getting afraid. People do the weirdest things when in fear - they get so easily manipulated by leaders, or they group against other people, or they get violent.. all rational thought and action goes straight out the window. All they can think about anymore is fighting 'the enemy' and somehow restoring their own illusion of safety that way again. Once the bad guys are gone, all will be safe and we'll live happily ever after.
I think if Michael Moore showed us something (with Bowling For Columbine), it's that that won't happen. We'll always find something else to be afraid of. And if we don't, the media and our leaders will. I'm sure in some ways fear keeps us in line, makes us decent people amongst (most of) our fellow man, or something. But can't we be decent without fear ? I know I'm fairly decent, and I chucked all fear out the window about a decade ago (I replaced it with rational, realistic thought - yeah, I know, revolutionary stuff, where do I get this crap from huh ?) so why can't we all ?

Why can't we all... just stop fearing each other ?

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