Humanity

Humanity.

When I think of what humanity is, what it consists of, I get such a feeling of hatred and frustration. The human race – with all of its accomplishments and destruction. I don’t know what to make of the human race, but with what I have seen and experienced in my short life, through my life and all the books, movies and television I have watched – seeing humanity through many different eyes and many different opinions – has led me to believe that we are a waste of space.

Humanity tends to create and destroy. And that we seem to create things in order to destroy. The amount of pain that we bring to those around us is astonishing. As a whole, we have irreversibly changed our planet and every other creature that exists with us. We have bent Mother Nature to our will, and now those that share this planet no longer adapt to the planet itself, but to our influence upon it. Many different species have become extinct, or have become very close to it, mostly because of our fear of that which can harm us (which is understandable) and of what we don’t understand.

Part of me understands that those that could not adapt to our influence would of course die. And in fact some animals and organisms have in fact thrived because of us. But what we have done to ourselves and everything around us is mind-boggling. We are the greatest thing that has ever come to exist on this planet, and look what we have done. The progress we have made in technology, agriculture, science, knowledge – is all undeniable. But as a whole, humanity has stagnated. Maybe even degraded.

Our moral fibre is questionable. In times of peace, we can afford to be kind and gracious, and there are systems in place to help people that are in need. This can be either from other countries, or from our own government, or maybe even the community. But overall, humankind still cant seem to be overall good. Our fear has too much hold on us. It causes us to be greedy, to be cruel. And then there is power. Power always corrupts – there have been a few good souls that have thrived under power, and have brought better things for their people – but they seem so far and few between.

We never seem to learn. We are so aware – of ourselves, of our world, of our galaxy. But we never seem to better ourselves. We continue as we always have, looking for power, money, a way of surviving. And people keep existing that bring harm, that are cruel, that hurt those that don’t deserve it or should be protected. In some ways I feel that humanity has adapted to the new things that technology and science have brought us, but are still the same simple creatures, all the while thinking that we are improving ourselves.

If you were to take away all of that money, that power and technology and “stuff”, humankind would be seen as cruel and strange. We are aware, so aware, of our history and nature. But how have we not managed to change it? How have we not managed to improve? I look upon this world that I am a part of and I cry at its pain and suffering. I know that there are people that wish harm on others and that do so, and I am reviled by them. But that is not why I cry. I cry because of how people live, how humanity sees and records and knows of all the suffering in this world, and how they do not change.

People feel that by improving the situation, by improving the living conditions, that this will improve what people are. And in some ways it does. But in the end, history keeps repeating itself – people still harm themselves and their environment. They still don’t care.

Apathy in this world is deep. And it is the worst part of the human race. That is what has replaced fear nowadays. Fear is still present, as there is much that can harm us in this world, and it will always be there. However, apathy in some ways is far worse. People hear all the time of the pain and suffering of people from different areas around the world, and even instances in their own back yard. And we have optimism that the world will change, that we will improve. But so far, in our long recorded history, which doesn’t seem that long at all, we still remain the same. It is only our instances that have changed.

We have optimism that humans are good. We would like to have this general belief that the human race is a good one. That we are kind and just, and that we help those that are in need. Sometimes we do. Overall however, this has not been proven. We have grown too large, have dominated too much, have changed too much around us to believe that we are good. We exist. We adapt our surroundings. But our core, our centre of humanity has remained the same. We have not become better.

Sometimes I feel that humans do not live long enough. That we do not have enough time to truly discover ourselves and what is truly important and vital in our lives. And by the time that we do, we are old and about to depart from this world. And the generations that are to come after us are not old enough to know what we know, and will not listen because they are young and full of life and believe themselves to be invincible. If we all lived longer, we would retain that knowledge longer, could learn from it and grow.

But in other ways – in fact most of the time – having humans live longer terrifies me. It is because of our mortality that we do learn, that we treasure our experiences and those around us even more. If we were to live longer, then the fear of death no longer applies. We could become even colder and crueller as a race than we already are. I do not fear death, though the dying process worries me. But I take comfort that every passes, that those is the world that cause harm and pain will eventual disappear, and their memory will fade from history, because in some way that is a form of immortality in itself. Only those that knew them will remember them properly, and when they fade, then their lasting remnants will only be words on a page that will not remember them correctly. If humans were to live longer, then these parts would do so as well. And we might not even learn from them and become better either.

These thoughts are hard to write, and even harder to sort through. I try to make them flow from one idea to another, but they are jumbled and linked to each other in ways that make it difficult to separate them. These are my thoughts that are written down here, and I want to make them as clear and understandable as possible. I want my thoughts to be followed properly so that the conclusion I have come to will be the proper one. But again, it is hard.

Its even hard to explain what exactly in humanity that needs to be changed. Something inside, something deep, something at our very core needs to change so that we can become better.

I hate that we are aware, that we have the higher cognitive function to know exactly how badly we are hurting ourselves and our environment, how we are changing and destroying the world. Why couldn’t we have just been born as animals? That way our struggle through life would not have such large repercussions on our planet. We would find some sort of equilibrium with our surroundings, and while our existence would not be as comfortable or as happy as it is now, at least we would not know of it. Our thoughts would be that of food, shelter and future offspring. In some ways we are like animals. But we are still so much worse. We are aware of what we are, what we can do.

Why cant we be nice? Why cant the world be nice? But it is only through people being mean that we even know what being nice means. You cannot have one without the other. I can accept that. We know how to be nice – it is taught to us, we like being nice to others most of the time. But it doesn’t seem natural. I see humanity, and I don’t see nice people. It is almost like our higher cognitive function doesn’t allow us to be nice, because we are aware, and we don’t have to be. We are not for the survival of everyone. We are for the survival of ourselves.

Being nice is a choice for us. It is not inherent. And that’s what hurts the most – that people, deep down, do not have a core of niceness. We will do whatever we can to survive. And as an entire species, that has harmed everything around us, and ourselves in the process. We will try to survive, at the expense of that which would ensure our survival. We will tear down what will keep us alive, in the selfish desire to allow ourselves to live, not that which would allow some but not others. If not all of us can have it, then we will destroy it for everyone else by trying to attain it. We are not better. We have not changed.

If someone gave me the opportunity to push a giant red button that blinked human existence out, then I find myself thinking that I would push it, even if this meant that I myself would also perish. I have no faith in humanity as a whole. We have caused so much chaos. Some of it good, some of it bad. But it is not our actions that I loathe so much – it is our inherent nature. What we are at our very core abhors me. I do not like humanity.

Which makes my next statement highly ironic, and almost hypocritical. I do not have faith in humanity. However, I do have faith in the individual. People, individually, can learn and change and grow. There are some individuals that are kind, that do help others, that have learnt. Not every individual has my faith – there are those that wish harm on others, those that are power-mad or greedy. But there are some that make me glad through their actions, of how they try to improve themselves and their situation.

And I am not nihilistic about myself – if I was about to be killed in some manner, I would try my hardest to survive. I know one day that I will die, but I would fight to survive. This life is mine, and I consider it precious – I will fight to protect it. There are many aspects about this world and humanity that are appealing, and that are worth living for. But as for humans as a whole, our nature still leaves much to be desired.

I hate humanity. I love some individuals. Everyone has common sense, but it seems to get lost in the masses. That common sense, that individual – if everyone was like that, then humanity would be the greatest it has ever been, and the core of what makes humanity, the essence of what is our species, would grow and become better. Or that is how I feel. Like I said, I have faith in the individual. And individuals have been known to influence the masses.

I guess even for me, hope springs eternal. It battles everyday with that despair that grips me over the general mass that is humanity. Our higher awareness means nothing. It only gives voices to our nature, which in my opinion could never be considered what is conventionally thought of as “good”. Humanity is not “good”. I’m not sure what we are. We exist, we live, we create and we destroy. We bring change, and we try to bring order to the chaos that is our own doing. I live in this world among the masses, and I observe. I have written my thoughts of what I have seen, and of how much it hurts to see the nature of my species.

I do not claim great knowledge of this world – my knowledge in fact is greatly lacking. And even now I am not sure that what I have written accurately describes what I feel about everything. But this will have to do. I will probably read over this one day and realise that there are many things missing, things that do not make sense, opinions that I have now which have changed over time. Things always change, that I can guarantee. Heck, what I have written may be completely wrong and not applicable in the least. But…

My head hurts and my heart cries. I want humanity to change, to be better. And my stupid optimism keeps thinking that it is possible, but I keep looking around, and I just don’t see it. Not in the masses, where most of the damage is done. Higher intelligence is a joke. I wish I was one of the common animals, scrounging out an existence through the plants and dirt. That way, I wouldn’t have to be aware of the world crying out around me.

We have grown so large, done so much. And yet we have learnt nothing.

Heh. The funny thing is…

I still have faith in the individual.

How weird is that?