My brother’s kids are growing up at the speed of light. And to think that these little person did not exist just a few years ago. Me and my girlfriend are talking more and more about having one of our own. I know it will mean a lot of changes in my life, and I know i just cannot expect or imagine what it is to live as a parent and no more as a kid (as long as you don’t have any children, I guess you’re still a kid, well, most of you is). Still, at 32 now, I feel more than ready to experience my life going upside down. A part of me (my brain) keeps asking me why on Earth would I want to put a kid into this troubled, maybe declining world. But the brain has not much power over this instinct we all share as a living being: being part of the life chain, give life. Biologically, that’s what we are made for I guess. That’s the whole point of eating, sleeping, staying alive long enough so we can shoot some arrows. Personnaly, i would not feel complete if I never become a father.
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Yes. And moreover, maybe your child will NOT think that this world is troubled and declining. Maybe he’ll love it and be happy to be part of it.
The more time I spend in my books or travelling, the more I’m thinking that, well, thinking that our world is SUCH in a bad shape is maybe just a cultural feature. We lost confidence in the human being but it’ll come back. It was there already – France in the 1700s, Europe in the 1800s, North America in the 1950s… and now what ? India, Brasil ? Let’s think that our children, lucky them, will perhaps be part of the next « good times ». The world and the history of humanity are not meant to stay static. Nor to disappear.
We are not a cancer, and this planet is OURS – THAT is the only true reason to take care of it. Not because it was so beautiful before we came – why care ? There are trillions of trillions of planets around here, why would we care about Earth, specifically ? Just because this one is OURS. OUR house. If we don’t take care of it, WE are the ones who are to suffer, not Earth. Earth doesn’t care, it’s just a pile of matter.
Conclusion : it’s worth giving birth. I’m confident : these little humans will be part of a nice shift in history – and us too, if we’re lucky enough. Optimism is the beginning of the end of that dark era we’re in. COME ON !
Oh and by the way, you HAVE to have a child because he’ll be TOO gorgeous.
I completely agree, and a shift in history wont happen with nobody around to make it happen. 🙂 It’s true that nowadays, being pessimistic and scared of the future is in l’air du temps. I went to the movie a few days ago to see Religulous. Wow, I really loved it, seeing religious zealots being ridiculed is really a blast. What do they expect? They’re a bunch of clowns. You see those people believing in the end of the world and that it might even happen in their lifetime. Unbelievable! UN-fucking-believable. These guys really have a problem, and i’m happy i’m not in their shoes. Shit what’s the matter with them? It means they think: « oh, you can do this or that, pollute all the way, create weapons that have the potential to wipe out the Earth in one stroke, doesn’t really matter, the end in nigh. Jesus will come down and sort out everybody. » So that means that for them, seeing their world being wiped out by a bomb, flooded by melted polar ice or poisoned by polluted air prooves to themselved that they are right, that they were right all along, and boy are they self-righteous. I mean, it’s almost as if they WANT it to happen, deep in their fucked up, twisted, brainwashed, I-had-a-childhood-deprived-of-love mind. You laugh in this movie, like you laugh in Jesus Camp, or Who killed The Electric Car?. You laughed but it’s not a satisfying laugh. It’s more like, is this a joke, how, in a modern, civilised, common sense, post World War 2 country, can this fucking be? You have this whole part of the United States, some of them being senators and accountants and lawyers, hell, presi-fucking dents, that are both very intelligents (I mean they must act rationally, in their daily life, most of the time) and at the same time so gullible, naive, childish, and downright stupid.
!!! No comment.
The guy hosting the movie says something that I really loved in the end: « Grow up, or die. »
The only reason so many things are going wrong these days, like in the past (since the human race is around, in fact) is that so many people don’t grow up, but stagnate in some kind of immature, brain-dead state. But you’re right, during all humankind history and endeavors, you could find lots of reasons to believe that world would soon end (the world of human that is, if humankind goes extinct one day, the Earth will remain what it is without a care in the world about it). I guess that means that there are also lots of reasons to believe that this world is a beautiful one and worth it. So I think that believeing our world is in a bad shape might be a cultural feature, but it’s not rubbish either. Being a grow up doesn’t mean acting as if nothing is happening. It doesn’t mean being an alarmist either. I guess it means being aware of what’s going on, and looking for ways to improve things, while enjoying what’s good and precious about our world too.
Thanks for your comment, I especially liked your « COME ON! » finale. Felt great. I would add another one. COME ON! GROW UP OR DIE. »
Yeah, grow up or die.
The human race is like a university student, saying to himself : « I have to do it, I have to do it », but not doing it until two days before the exam. So when the pressure will be higher, suddenly…
The bad thing is these two days before. What a torture ! Probably a lot of suffering because of so much delay, if we stick to our comparison with taking care of Earth. And who among us will suffer? The poorest of the globe that doesn’t have any resources to face ANY disruption. Things will just go great for us.
La future maman en moi sourit très fort en lisant ces lignes. Tu seras un papa magnifique!