Who Are We?

Who are we? This is the question posed by Michael Moore in his latest documentary Sicko (see Ben's review here). Who are we indeed. Who are we to allow people in this country to get sick and not be able to get the treatment for that just because they can't afford it? I'm not a believer in hand outs. When I see a bum on the street I don't give them money; there are plenty of services provided where they can get the help they need. But I do not consider keeping the citizens of your country healthy a hand out.

A lot of people want to portray it that way however. They want you to think that someone who doesn't have health care is someone not working hard enough or is someone who is doing something wrong. And that attitude is stark evil. Since when is it a crime to want to live in a society where everyone is taken care of? Or educated? Since when is it a bad idea to have your citizens be healthy and smart?

Talk about terrorism. America is its own worst enemy. With the best he could muster, Osama Bin Laden killed 3,000 people on 9/11. Now think of all the people that are dead or dying because they couldn't afford heath care or were denied coverage. We are like a giant oak tree sitting atop a hill. Large, beautiful and impressive, but rotting on the inside. When a real storm comes we will not stand. And if that storm never comes we will topple over because our roots can no longer support us.

Under funded, dumbed down education on precipitates the rot, leaving every successive generation less and less equipped to handle the world around them. Instead they are taught that a winner is one who stabs his brother int he back to get ahead. A winner is the man who lies and cheats his way to the top. Quality sacrificed for quantity of sales.

However its not money that has corrupted us. It is the degradation of the mind. Creationist argue that we are losing god and that Darwinism teaches us to behave like animals which is the cause of violence and moral decay. I say it is the opposite. Creationism demands a simple world view, as does Capitalism and corporate profit making. Instead we need to understand that yes, we are animals but because of our evolution we have developed minds capable of love and compassion. We have build cities and technologies that have taken us out of the caves and the dirt and put us on top of the chain of life as this planet's most successful and powerful species. We are more powerful then any other animal could ever hope to be.

Who are we? We are human beings. We belong to each other and to this planet. Do not ever give that up, not to an government, any corporation or any god. We only do ourselves a disservice by harming each other. The human race as a whole is like every human body that makes it up. It has many parts working to their best efficiency; working to attain their specific goals no matter what. But always working for the good of the whole. This is why we must keep each other healthy and educated. Would the heart deny the kidney blood if it were ill? Should we deny a person the right to be healthy because they are poor?

It is not smart for a government to deny these rights to its people. It is like injecting yourself with poison in order to sue the syringe manufacture. America is many things, but in our quest to be on top we have become stupid, from the top to the bottom. Every starving person wants a chance to be on top so he can starve his brothers and sisters the same as he was.

The power of the individual mind working towards the advancement of man has taken us so far in so short a time that it can only get better. Mother nature has passed the torch of natural selection over to us, as her prize achievement putting the power to shape our future directly in our hands.

Who are we? We are responsible.