Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Sages are dragons and unicorns

I realized something the other day when I was reading about rBGH (recombinant Bovine Growth Horomone), the horomone they give milk cows to make them produce 10% more milk but causes infections and cancer in cows...and humans. Well, anyways that's not the point. The point I have is that we trusted the grown ups, our parents and grandparents to protect us when we were young, to teach us about the world. We relied on them and trusted that they would solve the problems of the present to ensure our future. It turns out they were just looking the other way for most of our childhood, or getting involved and making things worse. Turns out milk and dairy, not good for you at all and it makes sense if you think about it. Why in the fuck are we drinking the food for a baby cow? It's simple things like that which should tip us off that not everything we were told and learned is right.

And here I'm mostly talking about the stalwarts, the conservatives, the authoritarians that are afraid of change. When I look at issues like rBGH, BPA toxicity, global climate change, a decade plus long war and crashing stock markets. These are all problems, they knew would be problems but their generation covered them up, brushed them under the rug and looked the other way in the name of profit and upward mobility for themselves. In some cases they started them expecting us to finish them and clean up their mess.

It is time for this to end. I think the new generation, the next generation, the Millenials, Gen Y and forward have a different calling. We have a calling to cirlce the wagons, to unite and collectivize in the name of solving these problems for sake of ensuring our future and the future of our children. The grown ups, the false sages, we have trusted too long have failed us. It is time for them to get out of the way of the solutions and stop causing problems. Part of the problem is that we are taught to trust our elders wholeheartedly and without question. Give your grandma an iPhone and try no to laugh the first time she turns it on...if she can get it on. The bottom line is they don't know any more or any better than we do, and if they do they've done a horrible job at applying that knowledge or they have been hiding it.

Look at the relics of their generation we now have to contend with. Our air and water is poinsoned. Our "food" is poison. Global climate change is destroying ecosystems. Our economic system has essentially taken our country's wealth from the middle class and given it all to the top 1% rendering capitalism and democracy virtually useless, only giving us the illusion of choice. Really, what is the difference in voting for a Republican versus a Democratic. It's a lesser of two evils scenario.

Our generation has an opportunity to be smarter. Our generation has an opportunity to take power now. Our generation has the ability, with that power wrested from the control of the insane, to address problems head on instead of turning a blind eye to make an extra buck or get that next promotion. This is not just in the US. Look at the uprisings of the middle east where the people our age and younger have finally grown tired of the old men telling them that everything is fine because it is as it has always been, when they can look around and see that what has always been is not what they want for themselves or their neighbors.

Deference for the sake of age is a tradition, a legacy, that we can no longer afford. They had their chance and they, for the most part, have failed to solve anything and have only created more problems.