Is peace a bridge too far?

Has there ever been a generation, or a century, in which there has been so much change? It’s genuinely unsettling how every day we wake up to new revelations, new discoveries, new faces, new challenges, and above all, new anxieties brought on by all that change.

I don’t think that most of us would say we fear each new dawn, as such, but we are surely concerned about this ‘hamster wheel’ world that simply will not offer us the opportunity to “wake up and smell the coffee,” as we would all wish to do, and as alluded to by American gossip columnist Ann Landers. From 1943 to 1955 her “Ask Ann Landers,” was a ‘must read,’ for America’s Stepford Wives set, as she encouraged her readers to become more aware of what was happening around them, to ask hard questions, and not be satisfied with casual, or facile, answers.

The reality is that, for a start, we want to be safe, and to know that our children, and their children are safe. Yet, beset by Covid-19 in its many forms, climate change, global warming, starving millions, illiteracy, and human rights failures, global leaders are once again leading us down that well-trodden pathway to war, and it’s just not good enough! The holy Quran 5:32 says something along the lines that “Whoever kills an innocent human, it shall be as if they kill mankind, while whoever saves one, it shall be as if they have saved all mankind.” We need, as a generation, as humanity, to hear those words.

Civil wars and revolutions that have ruined the economies and societies of a myriad of nations around the world are proof that revolution, no matter what the cause, in today’s world, is little more than anarchy in disguise. Can you think of one country in recent years that has been enriched either economically or socially, by revolution? And yet right now we have the terribly uncomfortable spectre of the Russian motherland seeking to exert its will on a neighbouring former Soviet ally. I can understand that the homeland is uncomfortable about maybe having Nato on its doorstep in some future time, but whatever has happened to the wisdom of “keeping your friends close, and your enemies closer?”

Wars, and how often do we have to learn it, achieve nothing but to appease the hawks, enrage the doves, and bury our young? George McGovern might not have measured up to much as a politician, but he did say, in his later years, “I’m fed up to the ears with old men who dream up wars for young men to die in.” Only in the movies, when nobody really dies, is war glamourous, noble, or heroic. In fact, the Dalai Lama said, “War is neither glamorous, nor attractive. It is monstrous. Its very nature is one of tragedy and suffering.”

Even the greatest mind of our time, Albert Einstein, raged at war at the expense of peace, at control at the expense of liberty, which only go to show that democracy is failing those who have sought it, as the quality of global leadership is enough to make even the most pragmatic of us tear out our hair, weep with frustration, and pray for genuine salvation. We grow up knowing that we will suffer if we have emotional reactions to all we hear, to reflect, and restrain ourselves, because if words can control us, others can control us... to breathe... and let it pass... to make time our friend. However the frustration of being led down yet another ‘garden path’ by those who forget their ‘duty of care’ to their people simply continues to erode our trust.

The pragmatist in me says words, my words, will make little difference, while the romanticist urges me to continue the journey. We, the people, deserve more and better, of the presidents and prime ministers in whom we invest that trust.