"Oh, The Humanity"

2039:

Self development is a wonderful thing when it involves consciousness-raising. It means we’re becoming more deeply aware of our surroundings. As we go through each developmental stage we can feel ourselves growing up. Predominantly, it’s the ‘humanity’ we feel growing inside us, and that’s surely where the real hope lies for humankind.

We see ourselves as being ‘human beings’, and refer to ourselves quite accurately, if hypocritically, as ‘humanity’. And when the Hindenburg airship burst into flames in 1937 the news commentator famously said what everyone was feeling, “Oh, the humanity”. It was as if, collectively, we in-breathed a shocking event and out-breathed compassion for the loss of so much ‘humanity’. People understood what he meant, as if we humans are the embodiment of ‘humanity’.

It’s a delicious idea, as if we are all part of the common soul. In practice though, we are nothing of the sort.