WE are too selfish to trade personal safety for the good of our society. We? Yes, every one of us has a share of that guilt, as long as we remain silent, and await the next event. We did it on December 14, 2012, in Newtown CT. In the first post from this series, Zombie Apocalypse Now, I alluded briefly to this horrific phenomenon of human sacrifice, which people today foolishly dismiss as a relic of the historical past, or unique to primitive cultures. Oedipus, in fear of his own inadequacy, called for a scapegoat because a plague had come to Thebes: “Whoever he may be, cast him out!” And his mandate did not stop short of murder. In short, they only exaggerate, but they do not change the basic truths. You must understand: Literature and film only present extreme manifestations of what regular human beings endure every day. “Are we prepared to say that such violence visited on our children year after year after year is somehow the price of our freedom?” These words, asked of the American people less than a week ago by President Barack Obama, echo a plea repeated by civilized peoples, and dramatized in literature, at least as far back as the ancient Greek city-states.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |