Sometime around the year 2000 I bought a book entitled Millennium Year by Year, an account of the previous thousand years.* When I read it, I saw one recurring event: War. For a thousand years no year was a year of peace. Somewhere on the planet a war or a battle or a violent clash occurred, leaving no year untouched by conflict. The first vignette in the book is the story of Thorvald the Viking who was killed by an arrow during a conflict with the native people of “Vinland.” And then in a series of newspaper-style reports, the book entails the annual suffering and loss of life that continues even today. After only two decades at the beginning of this millennium, the pattern shows no sign of changing. Some 1,000 years from now, if humanity survives its own brutishness, another volume called Millennium Vol. II will detail ours and our successors’ legacies of hate. Big wars, little wars, skirmishes, coups, tribal conflicts sometimes going back more than the past millennium and threatening to stretch well beyond the next one as an endless highway of death. Underlying it all is an apparent seething anger, anger that the world isn’t an Interstate built for a single car, yours, or his, or hers, or… Anyway, rage on the road of history is the norm, and it often leads to crashes in clashes.
As the actual roads have emptied during “sheltering” during the pandemic, a virtual road of life has become the ribbon of collision. Want some advice? Wear your psychological seatbelt if you expect to merge with a string on Twitter or in some chatroom. The crowded highway of communication built on the avenues of electronic media is littered with verbal collisions. Unaware that they traverse an emotional path that millennia of people have traveled, today’s electronic travelers continue humanity’s wreck-full tradition: Respond to one another with hate, judgment, and condemnation. That doesn’t speak well for the supposed nobility of our species. It does speak volumes about a driving force in society, however. Where did this penchant for mental and physical violence originate?
I’m reminded of a statement made by Sir James Hutton, the “Father of Geology.” After his unsuccessful attempt to pinpoint the origin of rocks and natural processes, Hutton wrote, “We find no vestige of a beginning, no prospect of an end.” Where do I look for the vestige of war’s beginning? Do I go back 500 years to the massacre of Aztecs by Cortez’s conquistadors in 1520? To Thorvald’s death a millennium ago? Farther back in time? To the reported Battle of Mons Badonicus and the rise of mythical Arthur in the year 500? “Keep going,” you say.
We don’t have record of the conflicts perpetrated by our hominin ancestors, but we can reasonably assume that they, like us and Jane Goodall’s chimpanzees, fought their share of battles and probably left us an inbred legacy of hate, or violence, or anger.
In the context of history, all who seek peace do so on the roads of humanity’s persistent and ubiquitous battlefield, a war ground people have paved as they have widened their geographic reach. if not dripping actual blood through copper wires and optic fibers, the new highway of injury and death is littered with intentional crashes among individuals or groups. Not being a pessimist is an ongoing and difficult task for anyone who wishes to build inroads of peace and wellbeing.
And here’s an example: The Surgeon General during the current pandemic is Dr. Jerome Michael Adams, an African-American (Why I need to give that qualification will become evident in a moment) anesthesiologist and Vice Admiral with B.S., B.A. MD, and MPH degrees. In addition to his studying at the U. of Maryland and U. of California, Berkeley, he studied in the Netherlands and Nigeria. Before becoming the US Surgeon General, he served as Indiana’s State Health Commissioner under two governors and as a member of a number of commissions, including the Tobacco Prevention and Cessation Commissions and wrote several academic papers and chapters. In short, Dr. Adams is an accomplished individual whose career centered on the health of not just a few patients but of millions: That “PH” in his MPH degree stands for “public health.” And then Dr. Adams, driving down a highway no one in the current generation ever personally experienced, the Pandemic Road, was involved in an unexpected crash. The background is relatively straightforward: Given that no one had any scientifically based information on the way Covid-19 spread and that there were shortages of face masks for health care workers, Dr. Adams asked American’s not to rush to buy masks. It was advice other doctors had given until the asymptomatic spread of the virus was confirmed. Adams, open to change, then changed his advice about face masks as so many other doctors had. Put that part of the controversy aside, however, and understand this one. In his attempt to reach the African-American communities hard hit by Covid-19, and with a professional career centered on public health, including anti-tobacco and anti-opioid drug overdose efforts, he used his family’s terms for “mother,” “grandmother,” and “grandfather,” after which the Internet highway crashes increased. He had simply asked people to stop smoking and using drugs and alcohol, especially during a time when some in the medical profession believed their use had deleterious effects on infected people, effects that exacerbated the disease. From one who had written a paper on the opioid crisis and who had served on a tobacco prevention commission, such a message seemed reasonable to most: It was a precaution.
Not so. The Surgeon General’s plea to the African-American community to avoid “alcohol, tobacco, and drugs,” for the sake, if not of oneself, for “abuela,” “big moma,” and “pop-pop,” elicited accusations that the African-American doctor was racist. Makes sense, doesn’t it? An African-American concerned about the safety of the African-American community is certainly the model white supremacist! It really doesn’t matter how well-intentioned one is to those living in egocentrism. The highway of opinion and good intention is a dangerous road to travel. Dr. Adams was driving an ambulance on roads no one had ever traveled when he encountered angry drivers at every onramp.
It makes me think, too, of Doctors without Borders and charitable medical staff members who have gone into danger zones to help people only to find themselves victims of hate groups. Such has occurred throughout the world. Or, take the famous story of Amy Biehl, the Caucasian-American who went to support victims of South Africa’s apartheid policies only to be killed by a black mob as she drove three friends to their homes outside Cape Town. Yes, another road covered in the blood of one dedicated to help others.
In spite of my belief that good intentions and actions drive many people along their life's pathways, I'm driven toward a pessimistic conclusion: History’s road is a continuous crash site. I see no vestige of the road’s origin, and I see no prospect for its end. Drive safely.
*Mercer, Derek, Ed., 1999, New York. DK Publishing Company.
As the actual roads have emptied during “sheltering” during the pandemic, a virtual road of life has become the ribbon of collision. Want some advice? Wear your psychological seatbelt if you expect to merge with a string on Twitter or in some chatroom. The crowded highway of communication built on the avenues of electronic media is littered with verbal collisions. Unaware that they traverse an emotional path that millennia of people have traveled, today’s electronic travelers continue humanity’s wreck-full tradition: Respond to one another with hate, judgment, and condemnation. That doesn’t speak well for the supposed nobility of our species. It does speak volumes about a driving force in society, however. Where did this penchant for mental and physical violence originate?
I’m reminded of a statement made by Sir James Hutton, the “Father of Geology.” After his unsuccessful attempt to pinpoint the origin of rocks and natural processes, Hutton wrote, “We find no vestige of a beginning, no prospect of an end.” Where do I look for the vestige of war’s beginning? Do I go back 500 years to the massacre of Aztecs by Cortez’s conquistadors in 1520? To Thorvald’s death a millennium ago? Farther back in time? To the reported Battle of Mons Badonicus and the rise of mythical Arthur in the year 500? “Keep going,” you say.
We don’t have record of the conflicts perpetrated by our hominin ancestors, but we can reasonably assume that they, like us and Jane Goodall’s chimpanzees, fought their share of battles and probably left us an inbred legacy of hate, or violence, or anger.
In the context of history, all who seek peace do so on the roads of humanity’s persistent and ubiquitous battlefield, a war ground people have paved as they have widened their geographic reach. if not dripping actual blood through copper wires and optic fibers, the new highway of injury and death is littered with intentional crashes among individuals or groups. Not being a pessimist is an ongoing and difficult task for anyone who wishes to build inroads of peace and wellbeing.
And here’s an example: The Surgeon General during the current pandemic is Dr. Jerome Michael Adams, an African-American (Why I need to give that qualification will become evident in a moment) anesthesiologist and Vice Admiral with B.S., B.A. MD, and MPH degrees. In addition to his studying at the U. of Maryland and U. of California, Berkeley, he studied in the Netherlands and Nigeria. Before becoming the US Surgeon General, he served as Indiana’s State Health Commissioner under two governors and as a member of a number of commissions, including the Tobacco Prevention and Cessation Commissions and wrote several academic papers and chapters. In short, Dr. Adams is an accomplished individual whose career centered on the health of not just a few patients but of millions: That “PH” in his MPH degree stands for “public health.” And then Dr. Adams, driving down a highway no one in the current generation ever personally experienced, the Pandemic Road, was involved in an unexpected crash. The background is relatively straightforward: Given that no one had any scientifically based information on the way Covid-19 spread and that there were shortages of face masks for health care workers, Dr. Adams asked American’s not to rush to buy masks. It was advice other doctors had given until the asymptomatic spread of the virus was confirmed. Adams, open to change, then changed his advice about face masks as so many other doctors had. Put that part of the controversy aside, however, and understand this one. In his attempt to reach the African-American communities hard hit by Covid-19, and with a professional career centered on public health, including anti-tobacco and anti-opioid drug overdose efforts, he used his family’s terms for “mother,” “grandmother,” and “grandfather,” after which the Internet highway crashes increased. He had simply asked people to stop smoking and using drugs and alcohol, especially during a time when some in the medical profession believed their use had deleterious effects on infected people, effects that exacerbated the disease. From one who had written a paper on the opioid crisis and who had served on a tobacco prevention commission, such a message seemed reasonable to most: It was a precaution.
Not so. The Surgeon General’s plea to the African-American community to avoid “alcohol, tobacco, and drugs,” for the sake, if not of oneself, for “abuela,” “big moma,” and “pop-pop,” elicited accusations that the African-American doctor was racist. Makes sense, doesn’t it? An African-American concerned about the safety of the African-American community is certainly the model white supremacist! It really doesn’t matter how well-intentioned one is to those living in egocentrism. The highway of opinion and good intention is a dangerous road to travel. Dr. Adams was driving an ambulance on roads no one had ever traveled when he encountered angry drivers at every onramp.
It makes me think, too, of Doctors without Borders and charitable medical staff members who have gone into danger zones to help people only to find themselves victims of hate groups. Such has occurred throughout the world. Or, take the famous story of Amy Biehl, the Caucasian-American who went to support victims of South Africa’s apartheid policies only to be killed by a black mob as she drove three friends to their homes outside Cape Town. Yes, another road covered in the blood of one dedicated to help others.
In spite of my belief that good intentions and actions drive many people along their life's pathways, I'm driven toward a pessimistic conclusion: History’s road is a continuous crash site. I see no vestige of the road’s origin, and I see no prospect for its end. Drive safely.
*Mercer, Derek, Ed., 1999, New York. DK Publishing Company.
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