Most times when I meet someone I assume that person is just like me- with no agenda in mind just pure goodness. Maybe I am tooting my own horn but in general I assume everyone has the same intentions as I do and I am sure most of you are the same way. But then you meet those one or two people that make you change your perspective. Your entire understanding of the world changes and maybe that is when we grow up. When we are younger we think the world is all dandelions, blue skies, and all smiles and for a while most people still believe that in their adulthood. Nothing was more of a wakeup call to me than when I watched the movie Blood Diamond. Watching that movie made me wonder if we are living in a world called hell and until I watched that movie I wonder if hell blinded me to see the truth of the way others are living in this world and people like us are enabling them to live this way without knowing it.
For those who are unfamiliar with the film Blood Diamond let me give you a brief summary. The movie is based on what it takes to get a diamond from Africa which is pretty much where the diamonds come from. Mix injustice, slave labor, corrupt governments, war, blood, missing limbs, and people like us who want that pretty shiny diamond ring when we get married and you have one of the world's most horrific nightmares of a mess. Diamonds are made to seem rare because if they weren't made to seem that way then value of a diamond would go down and perhaps people would care less for diamonds. But diamonds are not really rare like most of us think they are. To know more about this, I really suggest you watch this movie and do some research on it. After watching this movie I looked at my once prized possession of a wedding ring in disgust. Had I watched this movie before I asked for the big shiny rock, a band with no diamonds would have been just fine with me. I am one of those people who supported this war for diamonds unknowingly and I am disgusted with myself.
Not to get off subject too much but the title of this blog entry is 'Are people born evil?' and I titled it this way because it has been something that comes to mind when people put their trust in their governments and their governments fail them. Government is suppose to protect its people, work for the people, and be just for the people as we need to follow a code of law...a civil law code. But don't you think it has been an injustice upon us that things like blood diamond wars are happening around the world with us enabling these things to occur without us knowing it? Crimes are committed in our names but our heads are stuffed with MTV reality shows, face book Farmville games and the latest who wore it best show that we do not see the truth of what is really going on around the world in our names. This is not to put blame on any one country or one specific government. But how many of us can say we truly know what is being done in our names? How many of us can say I trust my government to use my name in everything the government does both domestic and internationally?
Now how does this title for the blog entry fit with all of this? Simple- the people running the governments are people, people just like us. Who should have the same bodily functions as we do with a heart beating, blood pumping through veins and a conscious just like the average person. Were these people who sign off on bills to start or fund wars not born the same way as we were from our mothers giving birth to us? My point is are we born evil or did society make us this way? The people who have these backstage involvements in crimes committed in our names this heartless when they come into office? Or do they become this way because the people around them, the policy is laid out this way, or scared to show an ounce of humanity out of fear?
Would any of us today be the same way as most government officials if we had the title as ruler? Would we turn the other cheek when villages of innocent people are being killed just because it would mean more money in our pockets? Is this not evil? And when does the pure goodness come in? When we say please and thank you, and send money to charities for Haiti while we commit crimes in other places? Are people born evil but disguise it until their true colors find a place to come out? Or is anyone truly good?
NoSeYintellectuals2010
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