Could we mess this up any more? A looming debt crisis, the weather out of control, resources like food and fresh water growing scarce. The worst of it is there won’t be any miraculous rescuing from our tragedy. No aliens will land and tell us they know how to fix it, or take us to some brand new world. Even if Congress somehow manages to come to a compromise before August 2nd, it’s delaying the inevitable. That’s because no one seems to understand what is happening. Raising our debt limit just lets us borrow more. We have to cut spending, go back to living within our means, but no one is willing to make the sacrifices necessary for that to happen.
It is time for us to ask ourselves the tough questions, and to make the tough choices. Do we really need the big screen TV’s, the latest, fastest cars, or the best fashions? Our educational system is on a downward spiral, but our priorities are focused on the NFL season and whether Lindsey Lohan will go back into rehab. We’re worried about what Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt are doing this week. Meanwhile, our leaders can’t seem to get their heads out of their rears long enough to put aside their differences for the greater good. Most of the country is withering under an intense heat wave, while people die from natural disasters like flooding, tornados, and this past winter, record breaking snowfall. Last year, Russia experienced record highs, droughts, and fires, while Pakistan nearly washed away from intense flooding. Have we forgotten so soon? The data has been analyzed, and the results revealed. Yet, climate change is just a myth…
Denial. It is our greatest weakness. Not poverty, sloth, greed, or hate. No, denial is our sin. Everything else is a symptom. We are in denial because we fail to learn the lessons of the past. All great countries, empires, nations eventually fall. Rome, the British Empire, the Mayans, the Incans, the Egyptians. They fall because of corruption. They fall because of greed and human frailty. They fall because we deny we are the cause of our own demise. If we wish to survive our own tragedy, we must stop denying we are the cause. We need to re-evaluate our priorities. Should we give it all up? We might not need to, if we can just accept that we don’t have to have it to survive. Long ago, our forefathers survived by working the land, bartering with others for what they did not have, and remembering what was most important in life. And before you say the quality of life back then sucked, ask yourself: is it really any better now? Are we any happier, more fulfilled, or content? I doubt it.
No, we struggle under mountains of debt and worry about whether what we’re eating is good for us. Now we work 60 hour weeks for little in return, suffer from ulcers and worse, lose our homes and our jobs, and live in constant uncertainty. Meanwhile, our health fails from polluted air, polluted food, and polluted water. We find we cannot make ends meet, can barely afford the bread and the milk, and watch our children face the possibility of not getting that college education we always took for granted.
Still we deny.
It’s time to wake up. It’s time to take a stand. It’s time to choose a future where there is still an earth that can sustain life. It’s time to realize that money isn’t everything, and ultimately, we can’t take it with us. It’s time to sacrifice for our families, for our children, and for our future. We can’t look to our leaders to do it. We have to save ourselves. Because folks, it’s not a matter of if. It’s a matter of when. We’re already in the hand basket on our way to Hell. We can still get out, still find our way back.
But we have to stop the denial. Now.
G. A. Lanham
