Nightmarish Vision

Sometimes I wish aliens would attack our planet. Redemption for mankind breaking up into fragments by narrow political religious, racial, ideological walls seems to lie only in such an invasion. I have learnt in history classes that a common enemy can unite a divided country. So an ET invasion might unite this fractured world. Not that mankind does not have common enemies. What else are poverty, disease, natural disasters? Unfortunately, these enemies are no longer seen as enemies but as issue that befriend those who thrive on divisive politics.

And hence this desire for an alien invasion. But I’m not sure that this will unite all the nations. That happens only in movies I think. If Martians come with superior military technology, the chances are that the big players in the world power politics will vie with each other to ally themselves with the alien invaders to do in the rest of the world.

Can’t help being this cynical. We live in a world where developed countries connive with MNCs whose sole goal is to enlarge their yield. Commercial morality and humanitarian concerns are laughable notions for these MNCs. Giant corporates set up factories without proper safety measures in far away underdeveloped lands, in areas where the poor and the helpless and the voiceless live. Should there be an accident like, for example, the toxic gas leak in Bhopal which claimed tens of thousands of lives besides creating havoc on the unborn generations, the poor countries can be bought off to save the neck of the officials whose negligence lead to human disaster of such terrible magnitude. We saw this happen in the case of the Bhopal gas tragedy, where the powers that be in India shamefully waived every rule in the country to help escape that rogue official whose refusal to pay heed to the warnings of safety audits was responsible for the terrible human tragedy. While the debate rages on in India on the identities of the individuals responsible for helping Anderson to get away to the safe haven of his own country out of reach of the hands of justice of the land of the victims, Anderson enjoys the full protection of the US, the chronic Big Bully in the global power politics. Instead of treating him like a criminal and mass murderer, his country has made it convenient for this brutal merchant of death to live in the plush comfort of his Madison square apartment, in the lap of obscene luxury. Apparently, in the Big Bully’s scheme of things, the life of one of its citizen is worth more than the lives of the tens of thousands of the wretched of the earth from the poorest regions in the Third World.

WE live in a world where human worth is measured in terms of the part of the world to which human beings belong, their race and their utility to the corporates.

We live in a world where there is much talk of justice, but none in practice, where there is much talk of egalitarianism, but none in practice. Giant corporates rule the roost. They manipulate governments across the world and sell their values through media and their suave agents. Wolves in lambs’ clothing rule the world. They have a way of networking with those of their own ilk in all the countries across the world.

When the aliens invade, the world would still be divided – but on different parametres, I guess. Big bully and its power-mongering coterie comprising the corporate world drawn from every country will gang up with the aliens to make the world safe for their nefarious activities.