Many of us like to think of the 1990s as a decade of distractions.
Monica. Whitewater. OJ. The list goes on and on. Little stories meant to distract us from prosperity and the building problems of the day.
But if a history is written of this time, I think it’s this decade that will be seen as the true Age of Distraction.
As I have written before, the whole War on Terror bullshit is a giant distraction from the real problem of this world’s dieing in front of our eyes. Everyone who has participated in this charade — from the Administration to the press to the blogosphere which takes it seriously — will be seen by history as fools, or worse.
Who gives a fig about Osama Bin Laden, the casualties of 9/11, the War in Iraq, or the budget deficit. Your grandchildren will not survive into adulthood. We are rapidly approaching a crisis greater than any man has ever faced before, a mass extinction which will take most of us with it, and leave the rest with a dieing, rump planetoid. They will race to get off this rock and, if they succeed, they will take the virus with them, having learned nothing.
So they won’t get off this planet. Not a very pretty ending, is it?
Allen Steele has written a great fantasy about mankind getting off
this rock, despite ourselves. It’s called the Coyote series. In the first book, a regime much like today’s Republicans try to get their spawn off the ground, but the flight is hijacked by Democrats. In the second book, a newer technology brings a later colonizer down right on top of the first group. In the third book,
the Coyote pioneers try to protect their planet against full Earth
exploitation, and discover that the forces they must really contend
with are inside themselves.
It’s a great series, from a man best-known for his hard sci-fi, that
is, books written based on real science, and real extrapolations of
where that science may go. But the fact is, this is just as much a
fantasy as Lord of the Rings.
Before we can get off this planet, before we reach another star
system, we have to earn our right to travel by saving the rock we live
on now.
And so far, we are failing that test miserably. Steele’s grandchildren, and yours, and mine, will die with us.
And if it happens that way, if we choose to commit suicide because
distractions are more fun, then the last word will be written by God,
in the words of the King James Bible.
And it was good.
Pull your head out of your ass, America. Final warning.
