Russia is in dark times today. And it is falling deeper and deeper and no end is seen in this dark abbys.
If we look to world statistics, Russia takes the first positions in most scary categories such as number of orphan children, suicides among children and youth, number of alcoholics and drug addicts, bureaucracy, etc. These numbers do not shock, however, as much as when you hear about another crime comitted in your district.
Just a couple of days ago a schoolgirl was raped and badly brutalized not far from her school. And this is nothing new to our provincial city. Such cases occur here and in the neighbour villages quite regularly. And what is worse, nothing is said about this in media. Local TV-channel (owned by the region's governor by the way) is created to transmits good news only. Even if there is nothing good, they are skilled enough to represent any news as positive. And what about the regular crimes? Media shuts eyes to it, government shuts eyes to it, society shuts eyes to it... And as long as all of them shut eyes to the growing problems, we'll be falling deeper and deeper...
Optimists (or I would better call them ignorant individualists) would say "things are not that bad. Crimes and poverty are everywhere. As for me, I live quite well." And here is the main obstacle: individualism. As nowhere else it is seen that our society is a society of individualists: no one cares about the others, everyone thinks about him/herself only, everyone pursues only his/her interests. What is the most favourite phrase of the 21st century? "It's not my problem!" And no one ever thinks that one day everyone gets a problem. And society which does not help to those in need turns into a jungle. Italians have a good proverb for this: Ogni magnio ha un guadagnio et non si magnia (Every bug gets its earning and doesn't complain). This is the same situation with the society of individualists - fragmented individuals servive as they can, some do better, some do worse, but all of them shut their eyes to the problems hoping that they do not reach them, they shut their mouth because they instinctively know that they are alone in this soсiety of individuals.
How easy it is to govern a country of a bunch of isolated individualistic optimists! They do not even see how deep in shit they are. Even if they see it, there would be no one by their side to support them.
However, if we all practice pure individualism, the problem doesn't appear at the first place. The Golden Rule is fundamentally individualist: the self is the reference for what is good and what is bad. Maybe we should start with this: think of oneself thoroughly, ponder on what one wants and doesn't want for oneself and live according to that. Strange enough, many of those criminals profess a certain belief to some God. And how will people do anything when they believe that things are happening for a reason and some invisible guy will sort things out?
ReplyDelete