The following is what Captain Picard told Worf in a Star Trek – Next Generation episode.
“We think we have come so far. The torture of heretics, the burning of witches is all ancient history and then, in a blink of an eye, it all comes back to start over again… she, or someone like her will always be with us, waiting for the right climate, spreading fear in the name of righteousness.”
Why do leaders seem to always have to be divisive to get power? Hitler’s was Jews. For today’s potential European leaders, its Syrian immigrants, for Madura Moros President of Venezuela, its elites, and the Philippine President, Benigno Aquino, he has people killing drug traffickers and users.
We have often, too often, had such demigods blaming an ethnic group or race for some problem. In our colonial days it was Indians and religious zeal. Later the focus groups were Indians and ex-slaves. In the last century it was Germans in the First World War era, Japanese in World War II, Asians in 1800s and most of 1900s, Catholics until John F. Kennedy and Hispanics during the 1900s and today. The most infamous was Senator Joe McCarthy’s communist witch-hunt in 1954. He scared Ronald Reagan into naming his friends and other people as sympathizers.
Today’s demigods are pillaring museums,, Hispanics, working poor, scientists and liberals. My Mother told me not to put other people down to get my way. Most of us do that on occasion, whether it’s a Pollock or a dumb-blond joke. It’s when we go past political correctness into national belief and phony survival policies that we become dangerous and away from our ideals.
Commentary About the Blue Marble 