From The Top

Okay, maybe it's time to check our priorities.
There is currently a laundry list of catastrophes awaiting our review.
Let's begin with the global pandemic. It's a global thing, so it seems like maybe it could be the top of the charts. Still, it's primarily a human thing and if there wasn't climate change on the menu then there might be a way to bring all our focus to bear on that. The sad irony of these two items is that they are connected. Since the outbreak of COVID-19, there has been a reduction in global CO2 emissions. With everybody stuck inside, fewer trips to Burger King and Disneyland, the damage we were doing daily to our planet slowed down. It never stopped, but it was slowed. Humans were dying by the thousands, but the world breathed a sigh of relief.
Metaphorically anyway.
A couple of months into the shutdown created by COVID-19, George Floyd was murdered by a police officer. It is possible that if we all hadn't been locked away with our twenty-four hour news cycle which fed us the horrifying video and the tensions that boiled over, we might have simply stuck it on a list of racist tragedies that we would get to later. But once again, the virus gave us an opening. We could organize. We could assemble our thoughts. We could hold ourselves and others accountable. With just a little time to reflect, it became apparent that there really was no viable counterargument to Black Lives Matter. We even had a chance to consider other items like defunding the police. Election Reform. Restorative Justice.
Okay, not everyone spent their time focusing on some of these big picture bits. Some of us looked inward. Not necessarily in reflection, but more of a chance to imagine how all of this could be our fault. It couldn't possibly be our fault.
Could it?
Because that would be a much bigger problem. Personal responsibility for what happens to our world is starting to sound like a really big problem. Turns out learning to be human is going to take a lot more work. So, let's start by wearing masks. Treating everyone with respect. Limiting our CO2 emissions. Opening Disneyland.
Okay. Maybe it's time to start over again.
From the top.