Us and Them

I think I am on the monkeys' side now.

(I started my first blog by re counting an incident of two monkeys invading my home and the ensuing battle of species)

Why are we humans so cruel? We kill animals, take their tusks, skin and whatever else that can be sold for money. Sure, animals kill animals too, but only for survival. The money the tusks and skins too buy food, some may argue. Not true. This money buys big cars, big lands and more big money ...you see, its big business. No hungry man has ever gone and killed an elephant, pulled out its tusks, sold it and had bought his meal with the money and said: ‘ Ah, I have my stomach full now, am satisfied’. Far from it, it’s the opposite of satisfaction that’s at work here : Greed.

As the superior species it is our duty and right to save and protect other beings and nature. But what do we do? We go ahead and destroy them, little realizing that we are digging our own grave.

The following piece of dialogue from the movie ‘The Matrix’ rings so true in this context. In the scene the robotic villain has Morpheus, the human leader in captive and chained to a chair. He is sermoning about his dislike for human beings. Listen to the dialogue without prejudice:

“Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops an equilibrium with the surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to an area, and you multiply…and multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism in this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease. A cancer of this planet. A plague. “

You’d say, ‘I’m not like that, not all people are like that.’

True. But what is also true unfortunately is that, as a community, the above observation is not too far from the truth.