A letter to the future
Dear Future,
I've been thinking about this a lot lately, and I decided I have to write this. I owe it to you. I owe you a big apology.
To my grandchildren, yes, you were cute and showed so much promise. I'm sorry I didn't protect you from the people who pumped all that poison into the air. I'm sorry you had to suffer so much before you died, unable to breathe because of the asthma. I wish I could say, "Had I only known, I would have stopped them," but I promised myself I would tell the truth in this letter. So here it is: I did know. We all knew. I was just too afraid to do anything. Too afraid to even say anything, lest my friends think I was some kind of radical freak.
You can understand why being thought well of by my peers was so important, can't you?
To my great-grandchildren, what few of you didn't end up dead of obesity before fifty because of all the horrible food we pumped into you since you were too young to talk, I'm sorry. Honestly, I have trouble really caring too much about you. Its not like I'll ever meet you, and even when I do you'll just be a baby, so you honestly don't matter that much to me. Thats why I supported all those tax cuts. Sure, I knew the money was actually a loan, and I know loans come due, but I really wanted to feel like I would be able to keep as much money as possible once I reached the upper income brackets. Sure, I never did, but what if I had? I hope you can accept that I had more empathy for the living rich people I wanted to be than I had for the unborn poor people I was handing the world over to.
And to the generation who will have to fight and die and spill an ocean of blood to win back their rights goes my biggest apology of all. I'm sorry I didn't make the small sacrifices now to stop the beast when it was young and weak. I'm sorry I didn't rise up, rally my fellows, and take back control of my government. I know that it was my duty as a citizen to oversee the government, but I just couldn't be bothered to change things. I didn't think they'd really pass the neosedition laws. I didn't think they'd really use their new powers against their political enemies. I didn't think letting them interpret the constitution to mean they didn't have to follow it was a very big deal. I didn't think they'd come for me.
Sometimes I made mistakes. Sometimes I simply chose the easy road. In the end, I traded your future for my present, your blood, sweat, and tears for my greed.
I don't expect you to forgive me. I don't deserve forgiveness.
All I hope is that you can learn from my mistakes. When the time comes that tyrants raise their head in your era, do not give them a single inch to hang you with. When the beast rears its head, chop it off without a moment of hesitation. When you are faced with a choice between an illusion of security and the hard road of liberty, don't choose the way I did.
Don't make my mistakes. I failed. And I'm sorry.
Regards,
Everyone
I've been thinking about this a lot lately, and I decided I have to write this. I owe it to you. I owe you a big apology.
To my grandchildren, yes, you were cute and showed so much promise. I'm sorry I didn't protect you from the people who pumped all that poison into the air. I'm sorry you had to suffer so much before you died, unable to breathe because of the asthma. I wish I could say, "Had I only known, I would have stopped them," but I promised myself I would tell the truth in this letter. So here it is: I did know. We all knew. I was just too afraid to do anything. Too afraid to even say anything, lest my friends think I was some kind of radical freak.
You can understand why being thought well of by my peers was so important, can't you?
To my great-grandchildren, what few of you didn't end up dead of obesity before fifty because of all the horrible food we pumped into you since you were too young to talk, I'm sorry. Honestly, I have trouble really caring too much about you. Its not like I'll ever meet you, and even when I do you'll just be a baby, so you honestly don't matter that much to me. Thats why I supported all those tax cuts. Sure, I knew the money was actually a loan, and I know loans come due, but I really wanted to feel like I would be able to keep as much money as possible once I reached the upper income brackets. Sure, I never did, but what if I had? I hope you can accept that I had more empathy for the living rich people I wanted to be than I had for the unborn poor people I was handing the world over to.
And to the generation who will have to fight and die and spill an ocean of blood to win back their rights goes my biggest apology of all. I'm sorry I didn't make the small sacrifices now to stop the beast when it was young and weak. I'm sorry I didn't rise up, rally my fellows, and take back control of my government. I know that it was my duty as a citizen to oversee the government, but I just couldn't be bothered to change things. I didn't think they'd really pass the neosedition laws. I didn't think they'd really use their new powers against their political enemies. I didn't think letting them interpret the constitution to mean they didn't have to follow it was a very big deal. I didn't think they'd come for me.
Sometimes I made mistakes. Sometimes I simply chose the easy road. In the end, I traded your future for my present, your blood, sweat, and tears for my greed.
I don't expect you to forgive me. I don't deserve forgiveness.
All I hope is that you can learn from my mistakes. When the time comes that tyrants raise their head in your era, do not give them a single inch to hang you with. When the beast rears its head, chop it off without a moment of hesitation. When you are faced with a choice between an illusion of security and the hard road of liberty, don't choose the way I did.
Don't make my mistakes. I failed. And I'm sorry.
Regards,
Everyone
posted by WalkingShark at 3:54 PM
3 Comments:
My kids, who are now in their late 30's, will say of their dad, "He fought the good fight, and died the death of a patriot, and we're proud of him."
As will, I'm guessing, your kids.
Humans have become the scourge of the Earth. We were given a paradise to live in, with everything we needed to survive. But that wasn't good enough, we could improve what the Creator made. How do you improve perfection? You don't, you just screw it up.
I have no faith in the long term future of mankind. Unless we get our exploding population under control (worldwide), Nature will do it for us (Aids, Ebola, bird flu, etc.) As a species, we destroy and alter the landscape with no concern for the fellow creatures who also call this planet home. Mankinds selfishness and greed is surpassed only by the evil it inflicts on it's own kind and any others in it's way.
I apologize every night in my prayers for the disrespect and disregard we as a species inflict on each other and all flora and fauna of Gaia.
In response to jenbsad: I don't think the earth is necessarily a paradise; Nature, and life can be brutal: natural disasters and other predators and the inevitability of death...I think civilization was an attempt to cope with that harshness; if we would have known what we were doing though, (especially when we centralized our power and allowed the priests and kings to run the show) and had had enough foresight back then, maybe we would have tried things differently; my interpretation of what he wrote makes it clear that NOW we do have enough foresight and intelligence to know what we're doing and how it will affect the future, and therefore, giving up hope is stupid because we have a chance to change it's course....it's just a matter of enough people getting off their lazy asses and thinking about what they can do as an individual and collectively on HOW we can make things better, RIGHT NOW, and for the future people that will live on this planet.
Post a Comment
<< Home