Day 24 - On the value of Life

In Europe we are proud of of our laws prohibiting the death penalty. In our Human Rights Treaties this is called ‘the right to life’ and that is said to be a sign of our so-called ‘humanity’. 

The historical truth is that the death penalty became problematic for governments to uphold, especially in cases where a convicted criminal was afterwards proven to be innocent. In other words, the ‘death penalty’ became a political time-bomb because within putting innocent beings to death the governments were placing themselves at risk of civil disobedience and civil war. 

It was seen as much less ‘risky’ to simply imprison criminals for life as the ‘harshest sentence’ instead of putting them to death. Hence it was not an insight into the intrinsic value of a human life that caused the death penalty to become problematic. It was purely political ‘pragmatism’. 

This is why in todays world governments have no problems putting a gun in the hands of their nationals and sending them to war, even if that means an extreme probability of them being killed or of them killing others, even children. Clearly: life has no value. My conclusion is that schools and mass media are a threat to world-peace because the governments have used the schooling system and the media to continue brainwashing entire generations into accepting nationalism and state-authority as something actually worth dying for, instead of humanity realising our interconnectedness and oneness.

What is the solution? Civil disobedience? Dropping out from school? No, the answer is you take responsibility for yourself so that you may walk this world free of brainwashing and stand as an example of what it means to care for another as yourself. 

Investigate Desteni, investigate self-forgiveness. 

Day 23 - Planned Obsolescence is of the Past

In an article in Le Monde Diplomatique, a solution was suggested for the problem of overconsumption. Overconsumption is a relevant problem to study, because it gives us an overal indicator of the time that the human species has left on earth. All creaturs on earth 'consume' in some form or shape - but what sets humans apart is that we have started to 'overconsume'. We use more things than ever before but we also throw away more things than ever before. Our consumption is overall generating an imbalance in our world. Some research suggests that the rate of consumption per individual in the industrialised world, is the determining factor behind the environmental crisis (global warming, deforestation, pollution of the oceans, pollution of the air, extinction of the majority of animal species, etc.).

The solution in said article tacles one issue in particular: planned obsolescence.

What would it take to go from a throw-away society to a society that honours it's environment and it's recources? Stopping planned obsolescence seems an obvious place to start. If we start producing and building items that are made to actually last - then we remove one of the causes of our widescale pollution. This in itself would undermine many of the current frameworks on which the world economy is based - yet, this is a decision that will one day have to be made.

A shift in this direction would allmost automatically uplift local economies as production, repair and maintenance of products, will result in more localised models of production. Herewith replacing 'globalised' models of production (where products are produced and shipped from lowcost countries overseas.) The article points out that in Europe for instance a minimum 2 year warranty exists on products, as per EU legislation. The article then suggests that warranties should be used to create an incentive for stronger and better products. Consequently the minimum warranty on products should be at least 10 years by law. 

From my perspective this idea has a lot of potential and should be explored and discussed.

Who would you be if you bought items that last you for 10 or 20 years because you know you can always find services that repair your broken items and replace broken parts? Is life really about buying new stuff - or is there some other meaning to it all which you have not yet discovered? 

Note to the reader: this blog was written several years ago, but never published because I was uncertain of myself. The blog remained saved as a draft and I had forgotten that I even wrote it. Amazing how that works... Today I post it, without having altered a single word of the draft. It's a good blog, no need to doubt myself.