People from the early or primitive type of civilizations were people that unlikely decided to favor themselves. Imagine using swords, burning of houses, and more activities that, according to their primitive assessment, were not bad at all. They did things that were supposedly not happening in present times.
However, these activities still exist. Picture the infamous Al Qaeda network lead Osama bin Laden. Years ago, commentators described the Al Qaeda attack in the United States as “barbaric,” done in modern history. The terrorist group used two planes that were enough to topple the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York.
But come to think of it, it’s just an obvious barbaric move. How about the not-so-obvious?
The barbarian types of actions were and are not done by the notorious terrorist group alone. Many people in the planet, including the “intellectuals” still use that mode of thinking. They (or we) reflect a black-and-white manner in choosing. They decide or make other people decide with few or limited options. In its basic ways, true or false, yes or no, and agree or disagree are commonly used. In the advent of computing, there is the zero or one. Sometimes, people use A,B,C or D options that is still actually limited. What’s wrong is that we apply this limited manner in our daily lives as we relate to people within our society.
Society commits this mistake of labeling one entity that will not support them to be someone or something as an enemy. Sometimes we consider these entities as nuisances. See the stereotyping on physically-challenged persons by the non-physically-challenged, teenagers by elders and homosexuals by ‘straights’, etc. Many members belonging to any of these groups committed mistakes of not taking part in any common solution. The most frequent action is to negate what the other party wants.
This mistake is reflected on pros and anti-Eraps, ethnocentric people and conservative priests among others. Here in the Philippines, it is shown on how the government seems to react against the NPAs. Some rebels also commit the mistake. Bad is the NPAs retaliation with arms just as bad as the all-out-war against them by the government without addressing the original plight of the former. The 9-11 event in the U.S. also brought this mistake. U.S. President George W. Bush may look strong, but he committed the fault when he announced, in context, that a country that won’t support their campaign is an enemy.
Imagine life if this idea will continue to resolve several matters in the international, national, municipal and down to family level. We might expect another world war, national instability, abuse, corruption and broken homes.
We can’t just choose between black and white. There is a large grey in between.