Who wants things to go back to normal?
I don’t. I never liked the normal. What was normal was wrong. After this pandemic, I can only hope we find a new normal, a new way of living.
The normal consists of appearances over character. Conformity over change. Fear over love. Money over principles. Self over others. Humans over nature. Luxury over right to live. Power over lives.
Normal is a world where people are incapable of putting the trash in the litter. Where people look away in face of harassment, bullying, transphobia, homophobia, xenophobia, sexism, pedophilia, human trafficking, wildlife trade, rape, violence.
Yet, these happen all around us.
Normal, is the world where people run over stray cats and never stop. Where sharks are hunted for their fins, visons are created for their fur alone, bulls are killed for entertainment and rare species hunted for pride.
Where pigs, cows, ducks, and chicken are fed up until they can’t, in places where they can’t even move. Where animals are skinned, boiled, and eaten alive. All because of our excessive consumption, greed, and ego.
And here we are. Complaining about staying at home, when we never cared for caged birds that don’t know what flying is. Mad for having to use masks, when we silenced dogs with muzzles for ages. Angry to see our freedom taken away, when we invaded seas, lands, and air of others.
We blame leaders and dictators for the current state of the world, but we were the ones that allowed them to rise. We blame others for the trash at our doorstep, but are incapable of cleaning our own house.
We blame a few for this pandemic. We point our fingers to the governments, the markets, the politics, the system, the health organizations, the news, the people. But all those deaths are on us.
This is only the result of our actions in this world. This pandemic is here as a direct response of the way we treat animals and nature.
We’re all fighting a virus we still don’t know yet. Humans.
Humans, a “rational” species that never owned this world. That never owned itself. That never owned anything. Humans, so capable of love and yet so filled with hate. So thirsty for meaning yet so willing to destroy. So capable to give, but so eager to take.
There’s only one way to survive: evolution. If not, extinction will be upon us one day, with no mercy, and rightfully so. We were given so many chances to reflect, to understand, to make emends. And we just don’t learn…
Normal is not right. Normal is exactly the state we must avoid going back to. The normal we know is primitive, mundane, savage. We need to spread knowledge and information. Too much harm was caused for lack of education, for lack of support, for lack of sense of community.
We have to stop putting animals in heartless cages, where safety is over quality of life. We can’t continue to support animals being used for entertainment purposes. We can’t continue to launch balloons and expect them to stay in the air.
We can’t use loud fireworks and hope no one will listen. We can’t throw plastic and expect nothing will eat it. We can’t just spit and pretend nobody will take the hit.
We can’t keep pretending this is our world. Like any home, we must take care of its foundations and garden.
We must do our part, so the rest does theirs. The planet had enough of us, as it should. We’re the real virus here, with our greed, lust, ego, and excessive consumption. Our endless means to whatever ends.
We need a refresh, a restart, on our way of living and thinking.
We need a new normal. We need to breathe. We need to live. And we need to care for everyone and all things.
We need to understand we are as important as a dog, a cat, a cow, a bird, an ant, or a tree. We’re as important as a mountain or a waterfall, a wave, or a grain of dust.
We are all one. Transcendent, eternal, energy, and universe.
16th November 2020
