NOVANEWS
In the absence of critics: Introspections on human rights
By Kevin Galalae
Many past civilizations grew beyond their food supply or resources and collapsed. The people of Easter Island, the Mayas and the Mycenaean civilization provide compelling examples. The modern world is also on the brink of self-destruction and this time it will be global unless we act decisively at this eleventh hour.
The approaching collapse is foretold by the depletion of natural resources and violent competition for them, environmental damage, global warming, conflict, poverty, desperation and the impotence of God and science to rescue us from ourselves; all of which impinge in one way or another on human rights and civil liberties. The ultimate cause for these dire effects or at the very least for their unprecedented gravity is our overwhelming numbers. There are simply too many of us, we are multiplying too fast and place too great a burden on the planet.
Overpopulation is exacerbating the scarcity of natural resources, placing impossible demands on science and technology, causing environmental damage beyond the planet’s ability to regenerate, making life hectic and stressful and over regulated, and igniting ethnic and cultural conflicts the world over.
The prices of staple foods and basic commodities have nearly tripled in the last decade and are increasingly out of reach for the three billion who earn less than $2 a day. That is how economic rights have been washed away en masse by increasing poverty. The votes of citizens are losing their value because the big decisions are not made in the national assemblies but in the boardrooms of transnational corporations and international organizations where the people have no representation and no say. That is how political rights have been diluted to mere shadows of their former selves. The norms and values by which we live are losing their meaning because they are based on dated loyalties, old knowledge and false comforts, which is why we blame others for our shortcomings and sense of disorientation and impotence, taking out our anger and frustrations on the people who are least like us and most vulnerable. That is how class and civilizational rifts have come to dominate our times and cloud our judgments and outlook with dire effects on cultural and group rights.
And this happens not because there is a lack of will and compassion but because we are in a catch 22 situation, the better we do the more we multiply and the longer we live, with disruptive consequences for the social, economic and environmental balances on which our well-being depends and to which we have become accustomed to. This forces us to think and work smarter than ever before, to forge consensus and cooperate deeper and wider than ever before, and to restructure and build a social, political, economic and environmental architecture that for the first time in our history considers the entire planet and all of humankind. We live accelerated lives that place unfathomable burdens on our ability to cope and adapt to these global demands. And because we are still developing the global consciousness we need to cope with these demands, we feel overwhelmed and inadequate.
The argument that there is enough for all of us if only we shared is no longer defendable. We are 7 billion strong and at current fertility rates we are adding a billion more every twelve years. Half of us are living in abject poverty and there is nowhere to expand to without destabilizing the last remaining healthy biotopes.
Those who want to do something about it are caught between two futilities: on the one hand, trying to empower, motivate and educate the inert masses so they act of their own volition; and on the other, trying to overcome the entrenched interests, conservative positions and rapacious instincts of those who occupy positions of power and influence and who want to pursue global solutions only so long as the burden falls on the majority while the benefits are theirs alone.
But is it really that simple or this oversimplification hides far more than meets the eye? Are the masses inert because they do not care enough to know or because they do not know enough to care? Are they disempowered because they have willingly given up their right to self determination or because that right was systematically usurped? Are they unmotivated to act because they are lazy and afraid or because their hands have been tied and their ability to act curtailed? All these statements seem equally true.
And what about the leadership? Are those in power willing to sacrifice the future of the planet and the wellbeing of their fellow-men and of their own children because they are too greedy and power-hungry or are they simply restricted by the limitations of their office and the demands of society for immediate gratification? Are they too conservative and rapacious to act with foresight or are they held back by local and national interests, to say nothing of religious beliefs and social mores? Are they reluctant to use their power and influence for global, long-term objectives because they fall outside their proper duties or are they prohibited by the democratic promises they made to the voters or by the pressing responsibilities they have towards employees and shareholders? Again, all of the above is true because our systems are outdated and imprison us all.
Everyone agrees that overpopulation is the primary global problem and that unless we solve it everything else we do is futile.ii To solve the overpopulation problem we need a comprehensive plan and a central agency to coordinate it. The agency is the UN but the plan is hidden in Agenda 21 and the Millennium Development Goals – the world’s roadmaps for sustainable development and the eradication of poverty, hunger and disease – rather than isolated and given the attention it deserves. That is so because the UN coordinated Conference on Population and Development held in Cairo, Egypt, in 1994, and its Program of Action, which is the steering document for the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), encountered such fierce opposition from religious and conservative groups that it was never repeated.
The bottom-up effort, however, will not materialize unless our leadership removes the barriers it has erected to keep us ignorant, indifferent and impotent. Our potential for action will remain unrealized unless the media is allowed to educate rather than forced to deceive; the Internet is used to let the truth out and not disseminate lies; industry satisfies legitimate needs not unnecessary wants; political leaders lead instead of leading us astray; and unless man’s need to believe is guided to trust in himself rather than divest responsibility onto God’s or science’s shoulders.
And none of this will happen unless enough people have the courage to jump over the triple fence of economic exploitation, political manipulation and religious indoctrination erected around us by our own leaders, histories and cultures and open the gates for everyone else so that together we can shatter the matrix of control. We must in other words earn the right to be masters of our own destiny and to do so we must be able to stand on the shoulders of giants not hide in their or God’s shadow. People who refuse to act with Earth and mankind in mind deserve to be cut out from the decision-making process. They cannot be trusted with the destiny of man and the planet’s wellbeing.
Yet if we fail to rise to the challenge in sufficient numbers we are doomed to a bleak and brutal future. The wealthy and the elites that buttress them will only accelerate an ongoing covert plan that uses food and water as weapons of depopulation and genetic degeneration. According to this plan, the rich eat organic and whole foods while the poor are relegated through economic deprivation and food industrialization to excitotoxin-laden and chemically altered foods, genetically modified organisms, ammoniated meat, and to fruit, vegetables and grains grown in soils depleted of minerals and enzymes; a diet that condemns us to obesity, sterility, neurodegenerative brain diseases, mental retardation and premature death. The rich drink mineral water bottled at source from the world’s cleanest aquifers while the poor are relegated to drinking fluoride laced and heavy metal laden tap water that lowers fertility. The rich live on large tracts of land away from pollution and stress while the poor are corralled in ever denser urban environments where life is increasingly restrictive, hectic and dehumanizing.
Our devolution and depopulation are being engineered to turn eugenics into self-fulfilling prophecy and divide mankind into a physically and mentally distinguishable upper class that lives long and well and an inferior underclass that lives less and poorly. This outcome is being foretold by evolutionary theorist Oliver Curry who predicts that the human species will split in two; a handsome and smart elite and a retarded and goblin-like rabble.
It is science now and not the Church that issues indulgences to those who seek absolution for their economic and political sins. And the United States, where the Hard Solution I spoke of in my previous article is well on its way, needs a lot of indulgences.
This is not by accident but by design, which is why the US is the only developed nation where the poor are deprived of medical insurance while the rich enjoy the best care in the world, where income inequality is seen as a God-given and immutable reality, and where toxic food is deliberately promoted for mass consumption. Not surprisingly, the US is also the only country in the world where the lowest socioeconomic class is already distinguishable at a glance from the upper class by their physical appearance, language use and mental characteristics.
Economic, social and political policies are used to create genetic inequality, which in turn contribute to greater social and economic disparities, so much so that in the not so distant future there will be a “parting of the ways between the genetic ‘haves’ and the genetic ‘have-nots’”, which will in time give rise to two varieties of humans, “the ‘gracile’ descendants of a genetic upper class and the ‘robust’ descendants of a genetic underclass. The genetic ‘halves’ will tend to be tall, thin, symmetrical, clean, healthy, intelligent and creative. The genetic ‘have -nots’ will be short, stocky, asymmetrical, grubby, unhealthy and less intelligent.”
Paving the way for this outcome are technological and social factors that are rapidly changing the characteristics of our species. The more advanced our technology becomes the less directly dependent we are on our fellow-men and this is diminishing our moral sentiments and making us more selfish and self-centred. Furthermore, the more restrictive and regulated our society becomes, as it must, due to constantly increasing population densities and growing urbanization, the more we begin to resemble “domesticated animals: enfeebled, ineffectual, pampered, homogenous, spoilt, and juvenile”.
It is safe to say that the rifts within and between nations, as well as the widespread disintegration of families, reflect both our growing selfishness and our domesticated attitudes and that it won’t be long before there will be a goblin-like underclass relegated to a life of misery and servitude and a God-like upper-class claiming divine rights. The destruction of the middle class and the emergence of a global society made up of billionaires and paupers augur this very outcome.
Will we allow overpopulation to push the elites towards extreme forms of social Darwinism and eugenic solutions that render our rights null and void or will we assume control of our destinies and bring about an era of equal and universal respect for human rights? If we continue to be selfish and act like domesticated animals the first outcome will occur by default. But if we awaken and start acting like rational, free and engaged human beings then the latter outcome is inevitable.
One thing is certain; we will get what we deserve.
One other thing is equally certain; once we run out of fossil fuels, in a century or so, we will no longer be able to sustain the existing population levels. If by then we will have succeeded in transitioning to renewable energy sources and using natural resources sustainably, we will be able to at most support 2 billion people. This gives us just enough time to reduce our population to that level within one hundred years if every couple on earth voluntarily agrees to have only one child.
If we let it come to that because we are to obtuse to exercise voluntary self-restraint on the procreation front and shared sacrifices on the economic front, the world as we know it and with it all our rights and liberties will come to an abrupt and miserable end.
Those unlucky to survive will look upon the past with envious nostalgia, be they goblins or gods.
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