The Rant of An Indifferent 'Human Being'

I have always heard of Anne Frank’s Diary but never got the chance to read it. What I learnt from my mother was that it was written by a 13 year old girl from Germany who was killed a few days after her 15^th birthday in Auschwitz concentration camp. At that age it was difficult for me to apprehend the trauma she went through and the best I could do was to merely feel bad for her. Later on as I got to read from other sources I could have an idea about her life, her time and most importantly the atrocities committed a long time back.

These days almost all of us have got used to living with a constant threat to life. Anything and everything around you can be plagued with explosives posing a constant threat to your survival. It’s been over a month since the bombing of Mumbai. We mourned the loss of lives; we condemned this act of terror and have moved on with this world. Things like this have actually stopped rocking our lives. Earlier we used to hope that things would get better with the passage of time. And they have indeed. We have stopped pondering over such ‘trivial’ things for long.

It’s not about terrorism only. It’s about any act that defies the common men the right to live in peace. Violence is nothing new to this world – the Afghanistan war, the carnage of Iraq are just a few in the list. But the Israel-Palestine war seems to outlive even the longest running soaps on our TV channels. Frankly speaking I still don’t understand why the hell they are fighting their lives and time out. To some extent their so-called cause is similar to the Indo-Pak tension. Both the feuds are over a f***ing piece of land. And both the issues have resulted in thousands of casualties. What surprises me is the attitude of the world community and also the UN. Come, on … I say there is a limit to everything. What the hell is UN doing? And what about the rest of the world? I agree that after a certain point of time you are bound to get used to a thing. But does that mean that you become too numb to feel anything? If Kashmir is a ‘game’ played under-cover, Israel-Palestine is all-out war.

At times I feel that all of us have become impotent. We just take things flatly on our faces. Why don’t we openly criticize the mother f***ing American government for its stand and role in the whole affair? And there is nothing to say about the UN I guess. That’s a bloody organization of eunuchs who can only ‘condemn’ things and send peace-troops all around the world with no effect. All you do is just shut up, and see pictures of blood-soaked children on the newspapers over the cup of your morning-tea.

I have heard some people arguing that the Jews have gone through hell during the World War. I agree and I sympathize. But does that give the Israelis the right to carry out such cold-blooded murders? At times I feel they are using the sympathy of the general people for what they had gone through in the past. Not to mention the backing they are getting from the U.S.

But then, it’s useless to rant about such things, as ‘bade bade desho me aisi chhoti chhoti baatien aksar hoti rehti hai’. The best possible option is to close your eyes and mind your own business. Because no one is going to listen to you and there is never going to be an end to this constant threat to human life.