As the year begins

The massacre of School children in Peshawar was perhaps the most tragic of the incidents that marked the last year. No doubt, a tumultuous year by any standards, 2014 did end on a sad note. As the trigger happy terrorists, claiming to be soldiers fighting the cause of a religion mowed down school children by wiping out an entire class IX of an army school in Peshawar in Pakistan a basic question cropped up. Is it the ascent of man or descent? When paeans were sung about the advent of twenty first century and proud boast of the rise of the humanity being trumpeted from roof tops, all of us were carried away by the hullaballoo. So the class homo sapiens is shedding much of its basic animal instinct. Is it? There is no question of a doubt. Man is still as barbaric as he, was. Rather more. Man today is more inhuman than in the ancient times. There is a popular catch phrase – The more things change the more they remain the same. Well it needs to be amended. The more things change, the more they get worse and there is no need of any proof. Or else, how do you describe what happened on that fateful day in Peshawar. Killing innocent children is in no way pardonable. With due apologies to Christ, I now pray, ‘Punish them O’ lord they very well know what they do.’ But, that apart it is time to ponder and yes reflect seriously. Just to prove something very inconsequential the Taliban killed 132 children. And look at the way they did it. And this is not the first time children have been targeted. A decade ago in Moscow Chechen rebels had killed 186 children. Why are human beings becoming so insensitive? Why do they kill? It is not a question of a religion. Nor even a country. Not ideology also. It is the question of the entire humanity. At this rate the entire humanity is being threatened. By its own ilk.
Where do we go from here? Perhaps the human mind has to be reexamined. The streaks of violence are definitely the act of diseased minds. Aggression world wise is on the rise. Impatience world over is on the rise. Unreason world over is on the rise. In fact, in the prehistoric days the human beings behaved better. They were called barbarians. They were called uncivilized. Yes they were ruthless. Yes they were savages. They did not know how to dress. They were not educated and they killed to. . But they killed for some reason. It was out of rage or revenge or self protection. If history is any indicator the medieval scourge has dehumanized man. His greed, his ambitions, his expansionist design, may be his desire for something he himself is not sure of.
Any clues as to what can be done. Not very sure at this point of time. But there is still hope. The tragedy of Peshawar struck a human chord across geographical boundaries. The pain was felt worldwide. However, there is need to move ahead from here. Our greatest problem has been to try and remain politically correct. It is time to be humanly correct. That is to think as one entity. The means are there. The social media has provided that connectivity across humanity. Bigotry cannot be jehad, naxalism cannot be a cause. Let us look forward to the present year with the resolve to arise for just one cause – Humanity.