When past is forgotten, it is meant to repeat itself
I was thinking … have we learned anything in the last 80-100 years? If not, do we deserve what is to come? Spoiler: I believe that, looking at the international situation, we most certainly do.
We live in one of the most (if not, the most) prosperous time in our existence. Access to the basics required for living (water, food, shelter) is getting to more and more people and my sincere hope is that this trend will continue until everyone on this planet can live a life without worrying for tomorrow. That is at least, the hope of naive me…or naive you … who want what’s best for the one next to you.
Let’s address nevertheless one of the elephants in the room. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. The problem is that our positive trajectory is contradicted by a new trend where the wealth of a few constitutes more than sometimes entire countries GDPs. And the trend, looking at the international situation, does not seem to go back to prosperity for all mankind but more on stupid amount of wealth for a few. This is becoming clearer by the day with the repercussions being that people are starting to get fed up and demand a change.
Looking first on our own backyard, in Europe tensions are felt in many countries with people voting for the populist party in the hope that the promises they make will bring back, the positive trend in their country. The message promoted from far right parties is getting more and more votes, and can no longer be ignored as people are starting to believe it. Why wouldn’t they ? In the end they promote solving all our problems (migration, price increase, wellbeing for everyone) with a small catch. They don’t offer also the solution how this can be achieved. People like the unknown candidate in Romania, which almost succeeded in winning the elections and planed a Coup d'état while yelling “They took our freedom“ or the fact that the AfD in Germany doubled their votes in the last years, should show us that people want a change but are misguided by these “they took our jobs“ people or parties, which instead of bringing us together they try to divide as much as possible. (maybe Divide et impera ??).
That brings me to our friends across the ocean, who are “Making America great again“. It is almost inconceivable for me how people who are rallying behind that slogan are failing to see other points of view which honestly should scary everyone. I believe that everyone in America wants to make it great again, nevertheless the way of doing it, from the persons in charge, should ring all the bells. Since the new administration took the office, it seems to have a single goal in mind. To centralize the power into the hands of few! We are slowly no longer talking of a change of party but more like a hostile took over with one, sending and signing new orders almost daily. One can argue that democracy is still there as some orders were made null by some judges, which I can understand … my question is nevertheless how long such approach is viable? The struggle for keeping democracy in America at float is fierce. If we go back in time, and we make a direct parallel with what happened to Germany 80 years ago, we can see connections in style and approach. People were sick and tired of unkept promises, had a similar feeling that Germany was not occupying the right place after the World War 1. They got one “savior“ who promised them everything they wanted to hear, with a small caveat that in a few years, Poland was invaded. (one year earlier Hitler was declared “Man of they Year“ by Time Magazine).
Having casual discussion of annexing Canada or Greenland are not things that a country with a solid democracy would claim. Starting a trade war with your closest allies makes no sense, at the surface. Firing thousands of people then rehire them because a judge ordered it should at least raise some eyebrows. Endorsing far right parties across the ocean that promote separation from the EU and closing the borders, should also not go unseen.
Looking back to the last 50 days of the new regime in America, only made me think back to the lessons which we should have learned from our history. That we shouldn’t put all our trust in one person, regardless of the promises he makes. That we should come together and try to solve our world problems not make additional ones, flexing our muscles who has the most nuclear bombs in his garage.
And if we did not learned anything, if we continue on this trajectory and fail to gather together around the idea of peace and prosperity, then we deserve our faith. We are being dragged to something none of us simple folks want but which most of us feel it is coming: a Third World War.
We should hear the words seemingly said by Albert Einstein and think if this is the future we want to leave to our children:
"I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
Until next time, TFG