WHEN the Twin Towers fell, I watched Cowboy Bush, turn his guns to the left and right, and as grief stricken Americans looked for revenge, he trained same guns on Iraq, blamed them for concealing weapons of mass destruction, and committed a gigantic error in upsetting the balance of power in that region.
Why just Bush, look at what you and I do: If you were rushing to work and slipped, in your hurry, you would train your guns at almost everybody; from your missus, who made you rush, because breakfast didn’t appear at the breakfast table on time, to the cleaning woman who didn’t come early enough to have had the floor dried for his excellency, you, the man of the house as you rushed to your car! And if there was room in this column, I could cite a hundred more people including the builder and contractor for uneven tiles or what not, on whom you could blame your fall. We love to train our guns on someone, for catastrophes, calamities and common casualties, don’t we? Like suddenly, everybody’s blaming China!
That’s just what the world wants. Someone to take the brunt of all our anger and frustration over all the coronavirus has caused. We always need someone to train our guns on: Which reminds me of this lady who was filling out an accident report. She had dented the fender of a parked car, while trying to park her own. One question on her form was, “What could the operator of the other vehicle have done to avoid the accident?”
She wrote, “He could have parked somewhere else!” Blaming seems inbred in us! Can we lower our guns this time? And instead of unloosening our basic feelings of revenge and retribution, just press the ‘pause’ button on the trigger. Just imagine what a golden opportunity, the world has got: A time when we are all hurting and can come together home, to heal! When colour, race, religion, rich or poor are all being treated the same, and we look at each other as similarly afflicted!
But with ‘pause’ pressed, world leaders have time to right a wrong! This could well be our ‘come together moment!’ Because we humans need that friendly handshake, that comfortable bearhug, that intimate kiss. And in the missing of it through social distancing, we will never let go of it again. Some countries are turning their guns at China, some at certain religious communities within their borders.
STOP! Put those guns down. Let us, come out together, bonded, connected; a fused ‘come together’ world. Let’s live for those who died, that those hundreds of thousands who have lost their lives will not have died in vain..!
