The tsunami last December in the Indian Ocean ultimately claimed some 220,000 lives!
The tag team of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita amounted to one of the worst natural disasters in U.S. history, and claimed...just a little over a thousand lives?
Still, media images of the suffering on the U.S. Gulf Coast and the suffering in Pakistan are virtually identical. The numbers say something bizarre, but aim a camera at the individuals directly affected and there is no difference in the looks on their faces.
But then looking at things in the big picture, scientists are warning of a global flu pandemic that might mimic the one in 1918 that claimed over 50 million lives worldwide. 50 million! Holy shit!
But quite honestly, I never heard of the 1918 flu pandemic until scientists recently re-created that strain of the virus. 50 million lives within a century of my time, and I'd never heard of it.
News reports are warning that we're not ready for a huge flu pandemic, there's not enough vaccine going around, not enough vaccine being created. If the virus mutates to be able to be transmitted from human to human, that's it, boom.
What are we supposed to do? Be paranoid? What are we supposed to do if it starts? My thinking is if 50 million people are going to die, 50 million people are going to die. It might be horrible, it might be a tragedy, but in the big picture, who cares? Big deal.
So I don't see it as this horrible looming tragedy waiting to happen. How did my life or attitude change from before I recently heard about the 50 million dead in 1918 and after? Quite honestly, it didn't.
We are human beings, we are of the nature to get sick, we can't avoid getting sick. We are of the nature to die, we can't avoid dying. People who weren't one of the 50 million who died in 1918 still eventually died.
What are we ultimately doing worried about protecting and preserving a thousand lives, 20,000 lives, 220,000 lives, 50 million lives? What is this modern day obsession with protecting and preserving each and every little human life on this planet? On the individual level, I understand it, you act to help yourself and your loved ones and people in need, but once you start talking about abstractions and numbers, I lose it in the big picture.
Maybe I'm just out of touch. My opinion can't amount to much since I'm looking forward to the experience of dying. But then I don't believe that dying is an end, not even an end of life on this planet, in fact, life on this planet is a trap, not necessarily a good thing.
People who think that this one life on earth is the only shot they have, I can see why they might be all uptight about death. Sucks to be them. Same with people who have a strong attachment to it.
