When John Lennon wrote "Imagine", he was dreaming of a world with
no religions, no countries, and no possessions...a world that would lead to
a "brotherhood of man". No greed or hunger, and the world would be as
one. It's a beautiful dream.
But what would the world be like with the "brotherhood of man"? Can you
imagine a world without different races, different cultures, different ethnic
groups, and different genders? What if we were all just "people"? What if
we were all just the same?
So much of what we fuss and fight over today is about the difference
between "us" and "them". What if there was only "us"? Who would we
blame, if there was only "us"? Not "them". The world would really be as
one.
No whites. No blacks. No Hispanics. No Asians. No males. No females.
Imagine, no race relations to have "conversations" over. Imagine, no more
"wars on women". No more "ethnic cleansing".
But, if we really were all the same, all just "one", would the world be
different? Wouldn't we all still be looking for meaning and purpose in our
lives? Wouldn't philosophy and religion still be searching for answers to
the unprovable mysteries of life? Wouldn't people still differ over the
answers to those mysteries?
Wouldn't there still be brilliant people and stupid people, ambitious and
lazy people, mean people and kind people, those who cheat and those who
follow the rules? There would still be those creative people obsessing in
their garages to create automobiles and telephones and computers. There
would still be people who prefer to veg out smoking dope. There would
still be good guys and bad guys.
Wouldn't we all prefer to live in a beach condo over a sweltering, mid-city
tenement? Wouldn't there still be limits to the amounts of resources
available? Wouldn't there still be limits to the amount of time one can
allot between their profession, their family, their studies, and their
recreation? Wouldn't individuals still have to make their choices?
Who decides how much (or little) value each person adds to society, and
how much they would be rewarded for it? Would every location in the
world choose to make the same decisions, or would there be a world-wide
government enforcing mandated choices?
Would it be "from each according to their abilities to each according to
their needs"? If so, that usually works out much better for the elite few
who get to decide, than it does for the multitudes whose incomes get
distributed between those who have abilities and those who have needs.
A few well-connected politicians get to decide the distribution of the
workload and the income.
It seems to me that, even if "the world would be as one", we would
still be here, arguing over politics and religion and each other, just like
we are now. We just couldn't blame "them" instead of "us". We would
be forced to focus on "us" as the source of the problem.
The source of our problem is the human condition. It's our quest to find
something to believe in. It's the conflict between those who lust for power
and those who yearn to be left alone. The conflict between those who
think they have all the answers and those who want to find their answers
for themselves. Between those who want to control others and those who
want to live their own lives.
Our problems are not ethnic, racial, or gender-based. At heart, our problems
lie in finding the fairest and most efficient ways to improve society, and to
fairly reward the individuals whose contributions add the most to our society.
Socialism? Communism? Democracy? Theocracy? Monarchy? Democratic
Republics? All are attempts to organize and control societies and balance the
scale between totalitarianism and individual freedoms, some allowing far
more individual freedoms than others.
Until we can resolve the philosophical differences between these competing
governmental structures, and until we can temper the human desire for
power and control, it's hard for me to imagine "all the people, living life
in peace".
To me, the closest we can come to living that dream remains in protecting
our Constitution, our Bill of Rights, and our Rule of Law, to ensure that
our enumerated individual rights and freedoms are protected from those
who would usurp them.
