It was cold and snowing yesterday, and I spent the afternoon playing video games. Some Assassin’s Creed: Origins, a bit of Warframe, but mostly Civilization VI. The latter is full of historical references and quotations. With real-world headlines in the back of my mind, I paused for a long time when this came up on my screen:
The real use of gunpowder is to make all men tall.
— Thomas Carlyle
I don’t understand…….
Guns are an ego trip for a lot of people.
and so many men think this is true.
A lot of women too, I’m afraid.
Avoiding regular tv and many screens recently, I’ve noted a good many points/quotations from historically based shows and books are eerily applicable today. Universal or classic human condition – don’t know but that “those who don’t know/understand history are doomed to repeat it” seem more and more true as the current era passes across my eyes.
I think often about that “doomed to repeat it” saying, and the longer I live, naturally, the more repeating patterns I see. Maybe retrospection is something for the older generations, while the younger forge ahead with what they see as “progress.” Personally, as I observe our current president, I can’t help thinking about the fall of Rome and other great civilizations brought down by rot from within rather than external forces.
It started around Vietnam era perhaps.
To recognize the patterns you have to have a combo of experience, time, and multiple sources. Education, vocabulary, and critical analytical skills meshed with real life experiences.
When tv car ads shout things like “progress is never blending in” (trying to say our car makes you different and that is terrific), no wonder people get muddleheaded. Doing it all to ourselves. sigh. Stay warm up there – spring will arrive eventually…maybe then the rains will stay up there for a bit. Talk about rot. Sigh
Rain? Where? We sure could use some. We have snow on the ground right now. That’s something. Has only happened a few times this winter, and never more than a few inches. But yes, it’s a bit brisk right now. About 20 degrees.