- Emma Goldman
I feel like I have made the same mistake. I was too eager to condemn the current state of affairs, the fickleness of the current human nature, mis-utilization of all that is available to us. I guess I was trying to feel good about myself by showing that most around me are plain dumb. But come to think of it, as a society, human have nothing but progressed.
We have phones more powerful than the computer that took man to the moon for the first time. We have come so far from the medieval ages, where the most common job was war and conquest and hence death and disease for even the meager luxuries, to now when we live with hundred-fold more luxury by just working at a job which just requires us to sit on a comfortable (sometimes customized lumbar-support-whole-shebang) chair and look at a small screen and push paper around. Most (at least in the developed and developing world, we are getting to there, albeit slowly) can provide for our family without having to kill, pillage or rob. We, as a species, have progressed so much. For the times when conquest and colonies were common occurrences to now where the people of Tunisia brought down the 23-year old reign of a dictator to give power to the people and get real freedom. If you think about it, the current situation in Tunisia is the kind of inspirational stories which make you hopeful in the otherwise usually-facepalm-inducing stupid-stuff-people(mostly men)-do chronicles of human history. (Sometimes I feel I should start adding references to these post but its just too much work for lazy-me).
But that said, to be honest, Tunisia will now invariably go through a stage of political turmoil while the world watches. And it is hard to decide how anybody should intervene if they should in the first place. Take the case of Cote d'Ivoire where the UN and a coalition of African nations are trying to facilitate a peaceful transition of power (from the current president who does not want to give up his position to the new one who is supposedly won the latest election and hence has been put under house arrest by the current president - the details are still sketchy, please read the story at a reliable news source). But on one hand, parts of the population is pleading the world for help, a counter propaganda is going on which claims that it is a French conspiracy which wants someone in power who can be a puppet to the French government and let France take advantage of the resources of Cote d'Ivoire. Although at first sight, this does seem like a bunch of bullocks, I would not be surprised if there was some amount of truth in it. So what is the best way to deal with the issue of helping a country - how, how much, when do you stop helping, how you stop,..., so many issues. Once you poke your hand, it might be a very sticky situation.
As is apparent, I have been listening to the news lately. And since nothing much has been happening in my life (other than the usual), I do what I like best. Giving my opinion about everything I have heard. But during this flow of information into my head, I came across a story which really made me happy. It was about how Brazil (the now 5th largest economy, one of the largest democracy, overall emerging world player) was on the brink of economic collapse with 40-50% per month only a couple of decades ago and was saved by this bunch of 4 guys. And the most amazing thing about the story to me was that this was a group who were in graduate school together and came up with the idea when they were all doing their Ph.D. And this idea pretty much saved Brazil. So moral of the story to me - Ph.D.s save the day. People who say that doing a Ph.D. is useless can suck it! Although, if you think about it objectively, where else could the idea have come from? Most finance ministers are not economists themselves. They function with their posse of smart people.
Enough said, I am just happy to be living in a time when I can hide in the womb of graduate school and still feel good about myself and garner respect from others. People will always do stupid things, I just need to learn that for every person doing something stupid, there are more people not doing that stupid thing, and as a species, we are doing lesser and lesser stupid things.
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