The reading I've done this past semester has very much served to "open my eyes" to the suffering we, as human beings, have inflicted on each other throughout history. My historical journey, from the fifteenth century through the modern twenty-first century, has had a profound impact on the way I look at humanity. I have repeatedly been challenged to look at not only history, but also my own beliefs through a different lens. Much of what I have learned about the path human beings have followed, has left me wondering, "Why?" In the last five hundred years, the world has witnessed, and in many instances suffered irreparable damage from, the formation of just a handful of "super power" countries. The bipolar world that we live in today didn't just happen - many countries have suffered the indignity of serving those more powerful than themselves. I have learned through the efforts of several authors, just how we have come to this place in time.
The question posed for this assignment is "How do I feel about the world and humanity?" "What is my impression of humanity of today and tomorrow?" When I consider the world and humanity of today and tomorrow, I can't help but think back again, to the path we have committed ourselves to. The question of where humanity is headed, I think, cannot be satisfactorily answered without first revisiting where humanity has been. I beg my reader to indulge me as I recall some of the more significant events that have taken place throughout history before I begin disentangling my thoughts on the future of humanity.
The building of nation states is a European ideal. Nation states, those areas clearly demarcated on maps, help to arrange and secure the peoples and ideology of differing groups. The European landmass, as depicted in the fifteenth century, was divided into these nation states. Although these borders never guaranteed non-offensive acts by other groups, they did significantly enhance the nation state mentality in European countries and their people. In Ronald Wright's Stolen Continents, I was made aware of the total devastation caused by the European nation state mindset. When Christopher Columbus stumbled onto the Americas, he irrevocably altered the fate of humanity. Europe's might swelled, in just a short time, to such significant proportions, that the world was decisively divided between the "haves and the have nots. " In their feverish haste to carve out areas of control in the Americas, the European settlers gave little, if any thought to the rights and beliefs of the indigenous people. Land was there for the taking, and it was the Europeans with their advanced weapons that finally won the battle to own the continents. As the white men marched their way into the remote interiors, so too did their diseases, and in little time the indigenous population was nearly eliminated. I discovered that some of the great founders of our country such as George Washington, Andrew Jackson, and Thomas Jefferson were not the infallible heroes that I had learned to revere in grade school. These men were just men and they helped to ensure the destruction of an indigenous people. With little resistance, the white invaders were free to act upon their impulses and the United States of America was born. I was particularly struck by the stark accuracy of a statement made by Chief Sitting Bull of the Hunkpapa Sioux tribe, in regards to the mentality of the white man. Chief Sitting Bull, in 1880, said, "The white man knows how to make everything, but he does not know how to distribute it. The love of possession is a disease with them" ... "They take tithes from the poor and weak to support the rich who rule. They claim this mother of ours, the earth, for their own and fence their neighbors away." 1 The very ideology behind the creation of the United States, "that all men are created equal," is a fraud. The leaders of the United States, along with a tiny handful of other world leaders, were not interested in embracing their own creed - only the wealthy landowners were created equal.1
Imperialism and the race to dominate other areas of the world became common practice with the age of industrialization. Japan, many centuries older than the United States, was unceremoniously "opened up" to the modern age by the junior Nation in the nineteenth century. It was the idea of "conquer or be conquered" that launched a whole new identity for Japan during the Meiji Restoration of 1868. Instead of becoming just another colony of the Western powers, Japan decided to immerse itself in the white man's way of thinking. Never to be colonized themselves, the Japanese government, in 1937, shrewdly sought to expand their domination throughout Asia and the pacific. Korea, parts of the pacific, and much of China, soon became victimized by Japanese colonization. In The Rape of Nanking, by Iris Chang, I was struck speechless with the horrors committed by the Japanese army in their country's quest to take control of China. As a woman of both Chinese and Japanese blood, I found The Rape of Nanking extremely hard to read. The book made me take another hard look at my distorted view of the world and the people who inhabit it. I was shocked to discover how erroneous my knowledge was of the Asian theatre of World War II. I felt again challenged by another author to "discover" the world for what we have made it. My mother, a woman of Japanese descent, raised me to perhaps blindly honor Japanese culture and I have always been reminded of the pride and strength of Japanese character. I could not imagine how this same group of people, lauded with unshakable faith by my mother, were capable of committing the crimes against humanity that they did. Ms. Chang's book chillingly reminded me how, in order to save ourselves, we can with such ease, shave off the thin layer of human character that we call humanity.
From the ravages of World War II, I was invited to explore the history of the great continent of Africa. Philip Gourevitch's We Wish to Inform You that Tomorrow We Will be Killed With Our Families took me back to the 1994 massacres of the Tutsi minority by the Hutu majority. The rationale used by the Hutu power party, as irrational as it was, was an outright result of the total destruction caused by Western imperialists. The European media, tools of the imperialist nations, worked hard to portray Africa as the most sorrowful place on earth. Africans were "scientifically" proven both mentally and spiritually inferior to white men, and by way of craftily written articles by the media, the native "inferiors" almost seemed to beg for their "superiors" to subjugate them. In the race for total domination of the world, Western powers converged on and divided Africa into mostly independent areas of foreign control. Profit was to be made in Africa, but only after the natives were duly subordinated could the realization of profits begin. The masters in Rwanda, the Belgian government, slyly took advantage of a temporary hegemony by the Tutsi minority and turned the oppression of the Hutu majority group into state rule. As human beings, we have the ability to use reasoning, a powerful tool, to cope with the situations we find ourselves in. Starting in 1959, with the hint of independence on everyone's mind, the Hutu majority used this awesome power of "reasoning" to declare their independence and to justify the extermination of Tutsi people. I struggled with this book, not only because of the graphic manner in which it was written, but also because I felt Mr. Gourevitch forced me to question my own beliefs concerning Africans. I was not very comfortable coming face-to-face with my own prejudices, but by reading the book, I can at least realize something for myself: HUMANITY includes ALL PEOPLE, not just those whom I choose to recognize. Not an easy thing to admit, but absolutely essential if I am to start to dismantle my own archaic notions concerning how I define the word "humanity."
In The Ends of the Earth, Robert D. Kaplan forces his readers to learn, shockingly, that much of the world in the twenty-first century is facing near anarchic conditions. While most Americans have the luxury of decent dwellings and food, great numbers of people in other areas of the world barely eat enough to exist. Anarchy, as defined in the dictionary, means "a social structure without the government or law and order; utter confusion." While Mr. Kaplan visited several areas of the world that are experiencing turbulent political and social conditions, Africa, by far, is suffering incredible hardship and because I found the situation so unbelievable, I chose to focus my thoughts on this continent. Mr. Kaplan traveled throughout the region of West Africa and his "straight to the heart of the matter" writing approach had me squirming with discomfort in my seat. Never before had I read about such appalling living conditions as the people of West Africa face today. Although most of the African countries were liberated from imperialist powers in the twentieth century, Mr. Kaplan writes, "But the greatest burden inflicted on Africa by the Europeans was probably the political map, with its scores of countries, each identified by the color of its imperial master. This map, with which all of us have grown up, is an invention of modernism, which began with the rise of nation-states." 2 The arrogant Western imperialists failed to consider that tribal populations in Africa, as explained by the author, mostly run horizontal, as opposed to the VERTICAL lines that were arbitrarily used by the Europeans when they REINVENTED Africa as we see it. It amazes me, that in the forty plus years since its independence, the map of Africa that we recognize today is the same map that was agreed upon by these imperialist landlords. Groups of people, though ethnically and culturally identical, no longer live in the same country. It requires little effort to imagine the bitter frustration and animosity of a tribal people stuck in a "country" that has no meaning whatsoever.
West Africa is experiencing a breakdown of both social and political systems. Poverty is at such extreme levels that a viable solution to their problems seems impossible. The human population is almost too incredulous to believe, with the average West African woman giving birth over six times in her lifetime. Mothers are often unable to provide enough to feed their offspring and the author observed the distended bellies of many hungry children. With little else to do, children play amidst strewn garbage and filth - with flies everywhere. Youngsters live mostly without their fathers, and as a result, precious customs, morals, and values have been lost. Young girls learn hard work at an early age and the United Nation reports that young girls are more frequently dropping out of, or not attending at all, primary and secondary school.
The deforestation of Africa is an environmental disgrace. Mr. Kaplan witnessed logging trucks filled with trunks of hardwood "stretched for miles along the road, en route to huge depots...being collected for shipment to Europe, where they would end up as modem furniture." 3 Slash and bum agriculture adds to not only the destruction of the forest, but the erosion and loss of soil due to the inevitable flooding and mudslides that follow such abusive agricultural techniques.
The oppressive heat and filth coupled with deforestation and flooding has made possible the creation of an insidious by-product: a mutated strain of malaria that has proven unresponsive to Western medication. The disease-carrying mosquito, once confined to the forest, has ingeniously evolved so that even though its natural environment is being destroyed, it can survive anywhere. As the soil erodes, life in the rural areas becomes almost impossible and masses of people are migrating to the cities. As the masses move out of their traditional homes, so too does the mosquito.
Life in the city means living in the same unsanitary conditions, but with an unexpected twist. The author explained the "culture shock" that hits rural Africans upon their entrance into "city life." "You see ... in the villages of Africa it is perfectly natural to feed at any table and lodge at any hut. But in the cities, this communal existence no longer holds. You must pay for lodging and be invited for food." 4 Homes in the city are put together with what materials can be found. Mr. Kaplan described the miserable shantytowns of West Africa like this: "a patchwork of corrugated-zinc roofs and walls made of cardboard, cigarette cartons, and black plastic wrap." 5 There is no electricity, no clean water, and no proper way to dispose of human waste. Confronted with this miserable existence it is no wonder that young men turn to crime. The author described how young men and women resort to committing crime in order to live. "When young men find out that their relations cannot put them up, they become lost. One step leads to another. They join other migrants and slip gradually into the criminal process. They steal. The women become prostitutes, whom the men beat mercilessly." 6
Diseases thrive in the filthy atmosphere of Africa. Polygamy, prostitution, and malaria all contribute to the spread of HIV and the AIDS virus, and although there is a staggering list of communicable diseases in the continent, healthcare, in some regions, is allotted only fifteen cents per capita annually.
Governments, either legitimate or not, are incredibly weak. The local police cannot be trusted, as rampant corruption is the norm. Wars continually take place, and the majority of guntoting "soldiers" are untrained young male Africans.
There is no logical way to disagree with what Mr. Kaplan wrote about - he merely informed his reader exactly how West African men, women, and children are living in this day and age. As Mr. Kaplan put it, he was visiting a "failed society." 7 The book reflects, for me, just how low humanity has fallen into dismal disrepair. From the fifteenth century through the twenty-first century, I feel that humanity has acted with little prudence. West Africa represents the "end of the road" on the path humanity has taken and Western powers must be held accountable for a good deal of the problems. We are deluding ourselves if we do not take the situation in West Africa seriously. Water, forests, and food producing soil are all finite resources and the eventual scarcity of these resources will affect not only Africa but the entire world as well. The diseases that are mutating in Africa will find their way to other countries, and the scary thing is, Western medicine may not combat them. The process that leads toward the breakdown of government and social systems, I believe, is inevitable. We cannot ignore what happens in Africa because what happens there today will affect the world tomorrow. I share Mr. Kaplan's concern for the future of humanity and I applaud his efforts to bring these facts to the larger world.
