TOUGH TRUTHS
a way of surviving…
We, normal people, live in a world constructed by lies.
Many of us know things are not right,
things just don’t figure,
as for instance, working a full week and finding there is still not enough
to pay the electricity company,
not enough to buy decent fresh food
and not enough to pay the rent.
Some of us remember that 40 years ago,
when the country was poorer,
working people could afford all of these things.
A fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work.
That was when the unions were strong.
That was before the neoliberals
took command of our economy,
our employment and unemployment,
our schools and our culture.
That was before the neoliberals used austerity to wreak our welfare state.
That was before they decided to teach us
that greed is good,
that communal reliance and help is for weak people
and that materialism (what we own, what we buy, what we display with pride)
is more important than our souls.
The Tories, like the US Republicans show a disdain
for those whom they supposedly serve.
What seems clear is that the Right in both countries
continually lie to the public,
misleading us into believing that they are concerned for our wellbeing,
while in fact they are only concerned
with how much wealth they can extract from us
in the form of interest on our credit cards,
mortgage repayments,
bank overdrafts and loans;
how much additional they can extract from hidden taxes
and fees for what were previously free government services;
from lowering or freezing wages in relation to the cost of living
thereby making larger profits;
and finally by inflating the price of food, medicine, fuel etc.
As they thrive in their success
while watching us submit to their mendacity,
they disguise reality with fancy worlds
like ‘inflation’, ‘trickle-down’, ‘austerity’,
the ‘gross domestic product’ measurements etc.
Historically the Italian fascists, Russian communists
and German National Socialists (Nazis)
believed having faith in their ideologies
defined them as being a cut above the rest.
They were certain they, the party members,
were superior to those who could never accept
their red or black fascist truth.
Then and still today they, the party bullies
believe that the rest of us,
including the unbelievers/dissidents/rebels
are innately incapable of understanding
their road to some Nazi heaven
because of the defects of our blood, race, culture or class.
Also, as the right defined us as subhuman, they believed we could consequently
become subject to any of their violence, torture or extortion
without their recourse to questioning their own morality or humanity.
I think the above goes some way to explaining their lies,
their name-calling, their love of phony masculine values
as well as their ignorance of and care for those who are weaker
by virtue of age, illness or poverty.
Should the right be sufficiently educated
they could call upon Aristotle who wrote,
“that some men are slaves by nature,
and have not enough human quality to give orders themselves…”
These are the same people who determine that their right to own military grade automatic weapons is more important than the lives of children.
Today, yesterday and tomorrow we continually have heard ,
do hear and will still hear
the lavish, preposterous lies of Putin, the Israeli government and from the Hamas rebellion as well as from the Boris Johnsons, Trumps and Farages.
The mass is almost always ruled by a gang of thugs
who believe they are the carriers of the path to perfection.
But this is no longer acceptable
because as long as we allow our current leaders to rule,
we will witness and suffer from the inevitable horrors
begotten by the ever evolving climate crisis,
let alone the horrors of Gaza and Ukraine
along with the invisible starvations in Africa.
We can avoid looking at the tough truths
and therefore accept the lies
that will defeat us as they destroy our beautiful precious earth.
Is it not so that all of us ask at one or another time in our lives,
‘how is it we should live’?
‘What is our life’s purpose?’
‘Who are we in relation to others?’
At the end of our lives will we not ask,
‘what is it I accomplished and was it good enough, sufficient, well meant?’
What we can surely see now is that they
(the ‘they’ of wealth and power)
have very different aims than do we.
These differences lead to violence
between religions, nations, individuals
and certainly our own emotional violence towards ourselves
in the moral conflicts we cannot solve.
At the end of last year I had to face what could have been my death.
In the eleven days of suspension
between learning I needed an operation and having it,
I resolved that my atheist convictions were sadly true for me,
that there is no hereafter, there is no heaven or hell
other than the ones we have made on earth for ourselves and others.
That the only universal truth I could hold onto
for comfort was that I had truly loved and still love,
and the rest, the efforts to do good, to be good, to help others,
to live a moral life
were rusted by an overwhelming self-doubt
in my ability to touch others with my images and words.
Are these things true?
I don’t know but I did take some comfort in understanding
how I am a speck in the universe,
inconsequential but someone who has tried to live a moral life in an immoral world. The great satisfaction is to meet others
who also try to live up to these humanist values.
It has always given me great joy to see the goodness and kindness in others.
But again, should I have sought power, wealth or fame?
I think not,
I think seeking true love is the highest value and the greatest reward in our lives.
THIS is a URL to a 4 minute film I made for Ricky Roman,
a dear friend who asked me to attempt to support the essence
of this beautiful and beautifully performed piece of music.
This work is not only a tribute to the music and the power of music,
but as well to the power of collaboration.