JUST DESSERTS!

You might be thinking this is a story for the Cooking Channel, or, perhaps a story of intrigue and vengeance. Or both! I enter this arena with some trepidation because I know it will expose my biases without any careful evaluation of any rationales for justification. With current events crowding into our daily news, we can’t but help re-appraise our realities.

I am thinking of the vast span of human history and how it shows that many of the human achievements we know about to-day were ill-rewarded. The Assyrian, the Babylonian, the Persian hegemonies, came and went, their contributions swallowed up by human history except for the odd remnant in a museum.

In more recent centuries, we know how much we owe the Greeks for so many gifts, from philosophy, to drama, to democracy, perhaps even the written word from Cretan origins, yet their presence in our world of today is minimal, a tourist destination. Is this their just desserts? Is this their reward for the contributions they made to human endeavor?

What of the civilizing Romans, and their far-flung empire? Corrupt as some of their leaders were, theirs was a massive civilizing influence. In the end, though their leaders killed Jesus for disturbing the status quo in a minute principality, they spread Christianity across the globe as well. When we think of Italy today, we talk about pizza, fashion and gelato. There is Rome and Venice for some. Has Italy received its just desserts for their contributions to human endeavor?

Spain and its empire brought us Christopher Columbus, and Mexican and South American, for many, corrupt irrelevancies. France and its pride generated African and Middle-Eastern hates that are still with us today. Will they yet pay the price of overweight Islamic immigration as their punishment?

Shall we speak of the British Empire and the Raj? They ruled the seas for how many decades? What do they represent for us now? Isn’t their biggest gift to the world their inflexibility and the American Revolution? Their recent opting out of the European Union was an effort to take control of the immigration wave washing on their shores from the Middle East, Africa and mainland Europe.

Britons have chosen a dessert of a slower economy as the price. Is there a lesson for the price other European countries will pay for the wave of immigrants they are receiving, welcomed for their economic impact? Could it be that the price may be too high?

China looms large in human history but only recently is a force dictating world events outside its territory. Some would argue strongly with that. Their one-party rule, which threw off European influences, has, at huge cost, brought better lives to millions. The rule they imposed of one child per family, recently changed, will make for declining population for at least a decade. What will that do to their economy? That is a just dessert for banishing diverse thinking.

What of Russia, once a red scar across the world map? Russian leaders used the worship of another Jewish messiah, Karl Marx, to exert their influence globally, and to conquer Eastern Europe. Now Russia is a world pariah under the leadership of a tyrant that subverted the democracy he inherited. Does anybody believe that Russia has a future after Putin passes from the scene? Is what we are experiencing just desserts for its past sins?

Japan is another example of just desserts. Their government has opted to eliminate immigration. They have survived their Imperial phase and accepted the price of an economy that will decline in the face of Japan’s ageing  population.

Dare I mention the Hebrews, commonly called the Jews? Are they receiving their just desserts for their philosophic gifts to the world, monotheism, justice and the value of a human life above all? After two thousand years they have realized the revival of their ancient democracy. Jews outside of Israel, and inside Israel, have made contributions to humanity out of all proportion to their numbers. Yet many nations and millions of other humans want to see them disappear. Is that their just dessert?

It doesn’t seem right to me, but doing good work in the world seems, from historical experience, to be a bridge too far. It seems that you get punished by history. Of course, that happens to the bad guys, too.

There ain’t no justice in the world! Enjoy the sweet things in life while you can!