The collective ‘we’

The human capacity to act destructively makes the most dangerous on the planet and we, as individuals, are the product of what we have already condoned. We are all part of the collective impact. And now, if we want to step away from what we’ve become, we might find it hard, because our common behaviour binds us together with friends, family and colleagues. If we step away from them we may find our self in no-man’s land, where whatever we do is futile. The fear is that there may be nothing we can do to change things. It’s as if we are part of something so big and so fast moving, that it continually overtakes any effort any individual makes to try to stop it. It’s as if we have to stand by and watch. We can either participate or stand aside, but the result will be the same … or so it seems.
The collective ‘we’ trashes the environment, and ‘we’ proceed, like an unstoppable juggernaut, towards the ultimate calamity of climate change and an unliveable planet. Our collective ethical standards couldn’t be lower. We damage the physical planet and hurt the most sensitive beings on it, by ruining the habitat of wildlife and letting our animal farms become modern day death camps! We’ve let our bodies go haywire too, by losing control of our health on rich foods and over indulgent lifestyles. We continue to over-consume goods and squander resources, and we see millions of kids dying for want of food right next door to our own kids who have too much and suffer from obesity. We in the West have the capacity to stop this happening and yet we are letting it happen. And ‘we’ act as one.
It’s time to separate from the collective ‘we’, distinguish between our personal selves and our group-selves. Otherwise the shame of not standing up for what is right will haunt us for the rest of our lives and disable those who follow us. They need to know from us that we did everything we could to stop the rot and to speed up the transformation of our species into a less dangerous more altruistic type.