Jaded yet Optimistic

September 18th

The unltimate cruelty of development. Over the ages billions of human beings have lived and died, unconscious of the world around them and the lives of those in far and distant places. There point of reference in society was what their neighbour was doing, what was going on a few farms down the way. Sameness of activity bread a fair, equal inclusive society even though that society perhaps endured hardships beyond our imagination. Reading and writing is less important if nobody can do it or if that ability has little impact on everday life. When the average life expectancy is 50 years old or everyone dies from this particular undiagnosed disease then that's life and we can accept that. When we or they are dying at 50 and we live until 80 due to different accesses to medical treatment and nutrition, when the disease is called AIDS and you are only sentenced when you can not afford the treatment...then it becomes unbearable. The ultimate cruelty of development is making promises, whether explicity or implicitly, that it can not or does not keep. The transformation of a world full of global individuals implies equal opportunity, access and rights through necessary measures of balancing historical priviledge and deprivation. But it also creates an invisible wall between the undeveloped and developed which now both are aware of. Instead of looking inwards and changing what is in our grasp our eyes are drawn to the other side of that wall and what lies beyond. Like those bad infomercials promising extreme weightloss in 3 days we are buying into instant fix development promises instead of the lifetime gym membership full of sacrifice and discipline.