Heaven and hell are not features of the after life.
The gore and the glory, it's all played out on this earthly plane.
Revolutions abound.
Ideology is to Physiology As Bullet is to Bone.
A million people kill and a million more die.
For the cause, against the cause.
At the heart of the struggle there's only that. Always that. The Cause - informing the process, validating the madness.
And then eventually one day, when rhetoric has buried rhetoric and more blood than is merely tragic or obscene has been shed, one side wins - generally the oppressed.
Utopia is born. The footsoldiers of the revolution dare to dream of life, pure and plentiful, bought and paid for in blood.
But they forget - the balance of power may shift. It's nature doesn't.
Like a see-saw there are only two possibilities, and only one equation: up or down, oppressor and oppressed.
And sure as every new day is born, only to crust over and then ignobly die, the shine on the brand new republic quickly fades.
Strife sends up heroes and martyrs. Peace buries them and places a fat guard at their tomb to collect an admittance fee.
And The Cause...under whose tattered awning the throng once huddled to ward off a common enemy; The Cause is wrapped in parchment and mothballed away along with words like nobility, honour, duty, glory.
Words like development, progress, efficiency and bottom-line take their place.
'We' becomes 'me'.
And the dispossessed remain dispossessed...only under new management.
And then the vague realization hits you - Life really is only about 'Business as usual' and a Revolution is just a Hostile take-over.
Go read 'Animal Farm' now.
The gore and the glory, it's all played out on this earthly plane.
Revolutions abound.
Ideology is to Physiology As Bullet is to Bone.
A million people kill and a million more die.
For the cause, against the cause.
At the heart of the struggle there's only that. Always that. The Cause - informing the process, validating the madness.
And then eventually one day, when rhetoric has buried rhetoric and more blood than is merely tragic or obscene has been shed, one side wins - generally the oppressed.
Utopia is born. The footsoldiers of the revolution dare to dream of life, pure and plentiful, bought and paid for in blood.
But they forget - the balance of power may shift. It's nature doesn't.
Like a see-saw there are only two possibilities, and only one equation: up or down, oppressor and oppressed.
And sure as every new day is born, only to crust over and then ignobly die, the shine on the brand new republic quickly fades.
Strife sends up heroes and martyrs. Peace buries them and places a fat guard at their tomb to collect an admittance fee.
And The Cause...under whose tattered awning the throng once huddled to ward off a common enemy; The Cause is wrapped in parchment and mothballed away along with words like nobility, honour, duty, glory.
Words like development, progress, efficiency and bottom-line take their place.
'We' becomes 'me'.
And the dispossessed remain dispossessed...only under new management.
And then the vague realization hits you - Life really is only about 'Business as usual' and a Revolution is just a Hostile take-over.
Go read 'Animal Farm' now.
No comments:
Post a Comment