If You Remember The Sixties You Weren’t There
If You Remember The Sixties You Weren’t There – the rallying cry of the counter culture. The Beatles and the British Invasion – the killing of the Kennedy brothers and King – the Vietnam war – the Bay of Pigs – Timothy Leary and LSD – women and The Pill – free love – Woodstock – rebellion – street protests and marches – sitting in and dropping out – occupying government buildings and going to jail – being arrested for a cause – hippie hair, love beads and communes.
This decade had it all. It was life changing politically and culturally. Things changed for women and life changed around the world.
Now – 54 years later we are still waiting for humans to become conscious enough and smart enough to connect the dots and demand that change happens for our planet and the environment – our oceans and the atmosphere – and the animals with whom we share the earth. There is a finite amount of abuse that the planet can take.
I offer another saying – “If We’re Not Part Of The Solution – There Will Be Nothing To Remember”. The 60’s pale by comparison as humanity continues to worship greed – rape and pillage the earth – wage wars – murder one another and self-destruct on a scale previously unknown in human history. We kill people by the MILLIONS – we slaughter animals by the BILLIONS – we slash down rainforests and displace indigenous people – we plunder the oceans – we pollute and destroy and create mayhem wherever we go.
Political corruption runs rampant – criminals, thugs, gangs and drug lords buy off the police – terrorism now has an accepted and common place in the vernacular and technology has turned people into self-absorbed idiots – running around with their “smart” phones and their “apps” and their ever-so-important and busy little schedules.
Not only are we living in a bubble – we have become so de-sensitized and inward focused – that we are controlled by electronic devices. Big Biz and Big Gov love it – no one is paying attention. There is not one global political leader with real courage – the game is to stay in power – not to do the right thing. Our leaders bow and scrape to big corporations and big money and call it “looking after the people” and “growing the economy”. Europe and the West bow to the behemoth China and cave in to Putin and Japan. We “the people” still believe that democracy exists. Religious corruption breeds hatred and creates chaos – and we sleep on and on and on …
Do you – as an individual – understand yet that there is a massive global problem and that you have a moral responsibility to help solve these global problems? Kindness and compassion are dying – relics of the past. Respect for life is all but lost. Cruelty is protected and hidden behind closed doors – so we can pretend that is isn’t there. WE (all of us) tolerate cruelty – the sex slavery of children – barbaric treatment of animals – the destruction of entire species and the greed that is killing the planet. International laws are violated and the UN and CITES are busy with their useless “resolutions”. Humanity has become a joke!
We need to stand up for our planet and get involved. But we don’t because we are comfortable cowards with our electronic devices and Google glasses and our cute little home stacays and our European vacays – our trivial little lives – our celebrity worship – reality TV and sporting events where we cheer on over-paid gladiators instead of getting off our butts and participating ourselves! Is this the best that we can do and be? Is this really the world that we are going to leave to the next generation? How will we explain that we could have gotten involved with something more important than our own lives but we chose not to?
So thumbs up to The 60’s – people then had the courage to act. The best we can do today is to get thousands of adults to weep over an irrelevant FIFA world cup loss while the world goes to hell in a hand cart.
If everyone did something small every day for the greater good – together we could move mountains. When are we going to wake up and what are we going to do? “If We’re Not Part Of The Solution – There Will Be Nothing To Remember”.
