Humans are capable of better
THE SPECTATOR’S VIEW
Do any lives matter? The bloody history of humanity indicates they do not. Some, however, matter more than others — that much is clear. But in the end, none matter except our own, for the most part.
Yes, family is important. But, apparently, not always. After that, friends and colleagues are important too, but they are secondary.
If push comes to shove, our compatriots matter more than foreigners, but sometimes only if they look the same as us.
If they have a different skin colour, or speak a different language, or dress differently, they don’t seem to matter as much.
And if they don’t make as much money as us — or they make considerably more — they don’t matter as much. If they don’t live in our neighbourhoods, don’t favour the same leaders, don’t drive the same vehicles, don’t eat the same food, they don’t matter as much.
If they don’t worship the same gods, they apparently don’t matter as much, and in many cases, they don’t matter at all.
If they have different abilities, or have different sexual orientations, a different world view, they often don’t matter as much.
Homo sapiens are not just the planet’s top predators. We are cold-blooded killers, the likes of which are nowhere to be seen in the rest of the animal kingdom.
We are not only wiping out other species at an unprecedented rate, we are also doing what we can to wipe ourselves out. We are conquerors, subduers, vanquishers ... We have always sought out things that are different, and tried to change them. If we cannot change them, we try to overrun them, corral them, eliminate them ...
This behaviour goes back tens of thousands of years, to the extinction of Neanderthals, whose disappearance was quite probably the result of the arrival of Homo sapiens (that’s us) in Europe. They were, after all, different.
Humans are alone in the world. Unlike so many other animal species, there is only one genus of Homo. All others disappeared tens of thousands of years ago, under mysterious circumstances.
Modern governments and “civilized” leaders have for millennia been waging war on each other — and their own citizens — for dubious reasons (mostly because they are “different”). Neighbours, friends and family members have been slaughtering each other in smaller feuds and fights for longer than that.
Lest you think there is no hope, consider that humans are also capable of deep empathy, courage, heroism, and remarkable acts of charity, nobility virtue, decency and integrity. At a time when the world seems to be descending into a morass, it’s all worth consideration.