Ukraine is stirring us out of our stupor. The West suddenly has had a ringside seat, watching a European country fighting for its life. The Ukrainians are not frightened so much as outraged. Somebody is trying blowing up their new democracy – their country, their towns, their home, their relatives.
To the Ukrainians, a fight for liberty, sovereignty, democracy and self-determination is a fight worth fighting for, a fight worth dying for – nothing less than a classic battle of good versus evil.
So imagine for a moment, that your country were invaded by a major military power seeking to take over and create a totalitarian puppet state. What would you be willing to do? Would you stay in order to defend the cause of freedom, sovereignty and self-determination as well? Would it even matter to you?
In fact, would it be that important to you that you’d allow some members of your family to flee while you stayed behind? Or even having already left, would you turn around, grab a gun and run right back into the eye of the storm in order to fight for those freedoms?
A recent US Quinnipiac poll asked just that question and found that 52 percent of Democrats and 25 percent of Republicans said that if invaded by a military power seeking to take over America, they’d pack up and get the hell out of the country.
Overall, some 38 percent of those polled said they would hightail it to the border and beyond.
I’m not judging, and I certainly can’t tell you what I’d do when faced with those circumstances.
I also don’t think this result suggests that Americans are selfish (I remind you – I am an American).
But it begs the bigger question of what values, besides the desire to care for our own loved ones, we would be willing to defend, even die for.
The results suggest that Americans no long find such values in their country.
That feeling may have a great deal to do with what we’ve done with our own democracies and also what we’ve failed to do with them.
Virtually all developed countries have been founded on a culture of individualism and individual gain. This paradigm of competitive individualism offers us a view life as a heroic struggle for dominion over hostile elements and a share of strictly limited resources. There’s not enough out there and others may be fitter than we, so we have to do our damnedest to get hold of it first.
The representation of life as a race to the finish line has been used as intellectual justification for most aspects of modern industrialized society, which regards competition as society’s perfect shakedown mechanism, separating out the economically, politically and socially weak from the strong.
The winners have a right to winner take all because the race as a whole would benefit from it.
Although our vantage point has afforded us technological mastery over our lives, on a personal level it has left most of us with a distinctly hollow feeling, as though something profound — our very humanity — has been trampled over, in our daily wrestle with the world.
Although one of the wealthiest countries in the world with half the world’s billionaires, America has far and away the highest level of all social problems — crime, lack of education, mental illness, suicide, disease of all varieties — of twenty countries, and the United Kingdom is the third worst. Although one in every thirty-nine Americans is a millionaire, one in seven, or 39.1 million Americans, live below the poverty line.
So most of us feel that democracy has failed us.
As Sherelle Jacobs recently wrote: ‘The challenge for Western civilization is. . . to construct a new system that can deliver progress and freedom to all within it, not just a privileged few.’
But Quinnipiac raises something even more fundamental. It suggests that we’ve gotten so complacent that we’ve forgotten just how essential individual freedom and free speech actually are to our lives and how we can no longer take for granted the incredible gift we already have.
In the wake of recent crises like 9/11 and Covid, we’ve allowed our governments to impose certain restrictions to our freedoms that may have been necessary at the time, but are no longer necessary now.
We’ve allowed the passage of laws that curtail the right to assembly and free speech – laws that are no longer necessary but haven’t been repealed.
What is happening in Ukraine is an opportunity for us to assess how important and essential freedom and free expression is. And how easily it can be taken away.
We urgently need to revise the story we live by, but also to hold tight onto the most important chapter at the heart of it.
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Wow. This is huge. I believe many of those who would flee feel the United States has already been taken over by wealthy corporations and individuals. And it's kinda hard to fight that as the money is speaking to the individuals who wish to win elections. I feel as though the US has led this charge in the survival of the fittest, and the fittest believe they are fit because the have money. The rest of us just aren't fit for money, never mind the inequity that has developed as a result.
So what would it take to make it worth fighting for our country? For me, a massive change in the Zeitgeist of society's values, brought on by a massive change in the Zeitgeist of individuals. Each of us--wealthy and non-wealthy alike--must return to understanding our place as part of the whole body mechanism of Earth. Let's quit being the cancer cells.
Where would the 38% run to? What would that say to the invaders? We're leaving - catch us in the next country you invade? Or the one after that? Not looking to die soon but would prefer fighting for my loved ones' and my freedom to running, scared and hunted, till the bullies leave us no place to run to. We really are all in this together and together is the only way we all get through it. As an American, I enjoy many privileges not afforded all countries and their citizens. I believe no one is truly free till ALL are truly free. And that would be worth fighting for. If we cannot build a world that works for everyone we will end up making a grave that works for everyone
I think some of us have become tired of commenting on this subject as dealt with by Lynne. Who is this somebody trying to blow up what new democracy in the Ukraine? I am trying to read between the lines and I don't like what I read. Yes, it is a battle of good versus evil. It depends on who one sees as evil, and who as good. I agree democracy has failed the USA, it probably hasn't been a democracy in a long time, the truth of it is just coming to the suface. Having recognized this, one also has to open one's eyes to the truth in other countries, e.g. the Ukraine. Who is the victim and who is the perpetrator? I leave it at that.
The biggest victim is the aggressor because he is the one who is sickest. Those who attack are like a cancer cells that attacks their own body. It's like a cell that doesn't understand that it's attacking and destroying itself too.
"To fight/die for something" is very euphemistic, because it actually means "to murder someone else for something".
And from my point of view, you cannot establish peace and freedom by murdering other people.
The only way to establish peace is to stop dividing into good and evil, and move towards each other.
I think it's very complex. A war is a failure of all politicians involved ...
Thank you Lynne, for this post. I strongly believe there is no place to run to anymore. We have come to the point where WE have to look inward, each and all of us, and start there. With ourselves. We owe it to ourselves, to the children, to the planet. We have to start asking, what can I do to heal my deep pain or hidden little wars and then, what can I do to stop the destructive paths in the world. Even if it means not going to certain shops anymore, not consuming certain products anymore, not building that ridiculously big house anymore...And then during war, getting together and helping each other. Especially the children.
I have had the thought that when what is happening has 'played out' that it will be Russia who leads the way to a better 'political' system.
I agree with you entirely. Those who have eyes to see, see, and those who have ears to hear, hear. Do not go with blinkers through life. About 57 yrs ago, a very wise person said that in future Russia will lead the way spiritually speaking. Since then, I have observed, watched, listened, and experienced, and yes, this remark is true, it will happen.
Yes, this has been said by several prophets. A lot of Good will come out after the evil. Now Russia is in the grip of darkness and will spread evil across the world and punish humanity for its sins as predicted.
Last Friday the pope made the conversion of Russia to the Sacred Heart of Mary as requested at Fatima in 1917, but it is too late and probably Russia will spread war, oppression and persecution throughout the world. USA prepare yourself, because you are Russia's main target.
If you live in an area close to Denver, if you can, run away from there because I feel that something very, very tragic is going to happen in that area.
I think if you delve a little deeper Lynne you will find that all is not what it seems in Ukraine. There are two sides to every story, or maybe three in this case as it would appear the US has been funding biolabs in Ukraine.
As you said, individualism and egocentrism guided the destiny of Western countries whose freedom of expression became more dependent on opinions than on truth and objectivity.
Unfortunately, I feel that Humanity will be punished for its sins and one of them is for not knowing how to use freedom of expression. As we didn't use it well, it will now be taken from us.
I am sorry that the US population had not put strong pressure on the US government to give up nuclear weapons. It would have been an important step in preventing war if the US had set an example to the world in completely banning nuclear weapons. Now it's probably too late…I'm very afraid that the US will be hit by a nuclear bomb especially near the Denver area. I hope I'm wrong but I pray for the United States and that may God forgive the Karma of the bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.