I woke this morning with the words “Noam Chomsky” in my mind, someone I rarely think about. In the current Covid-19 crisis there are a lot of different ideas and opinions about the crisis circulating on the internet from various expert and non expert sources and no doubt Noam Chomsky is one of them. Given the enormous amount of opinion being generated at present about this topic it is difficult to even know where to begin.
In my own journal entries, I receive a ‘dream message’ daily, which I then interpret and express in my own words. For me these messages are guidance from spirit but at the end of the day they are still my own interpretation of the message. In truth they are in essence an expression of my light because they come with an intention for healing.
This morning in researching ‘Noam Chomsky and Covid-19’ I found an article in the “Independent Global News” dated 17 April 2020 titled “Gangster in the White House” : Noam Chomsky on COVID-19, WHO, China, Gaza and Global Capitalism. Interesting!
Noam Chomsky is a world-renowned political dissident, linguist and author and in this article he responds to President Trump’s cuts to U.S. support for the World Health Organisation and the surge in deaths in the US to another record high, and discusses conditions in Gaza, the rise of authoritarianism around the world, and the progressive response.
Noam Chomsky is quoted as saying ” This is typical behaviour of autocrats and dictators. When you make colossal errors which are killing thousands of people, find somebody else to blame,” say Chomsky. “In the United States, it’s unfortunately the case, for well over a century, century and a half, that it’s always easy to blame the ‘yellow peril.’”
Here is a video link here to hear Noam Chomsky speak about these issues: https://www.democracynow.org/2020/4/17/noam_chomsky_coronavirus_trump_gaza_palestine
The theme of ‘Divide and Conquer’ has long been used as a military tactic in human history but in today’s political world , not only political leaders but leaders in many other areas of life continue to use this strategy to make themselves, their organisations, their country’s right and others wrong. But what are the consequences of this action?
Jesus is quoted at Luke 11:17 saying that a house divided against itself cannot stand and that strength comes from unity. I’m not sure that Jesus had in mind ‘my unity against your unity’. Surely at a time when Covid-19 has shown us that the virus knows no boundaries, no borders, no human difference, more than ever as a human race we need to stand united.
For me, in watching the unfolding crisis, there is an area where sanity and good will is prevailing and that is within the scientific community. Globally scientists have found a single topic to work on that has unified them and while political leaders have locked their borders, scientists have been shattering theirs, creating a global collaboration unlike any in history. Covid-19 is changing the way that the world does science bringing together hospitals and laboratories around the globe.
According to Dr. Francesco Perrone, who is heading a leading Coronavirus clinical trial in Italy, “My nation, your nation. My language, your language. My geographic location, your geographic location. This is something that is really distant from true top-level scientists.” [1]
The energy of unity rather than division is what is needed in the world today to solve many of the global problems that we face as a collective human species. The time for making others wrong and ourselves right must end or our house will fall. That means that we need leaders who can unify not divide and it is our job to position ourselves as people of unity. An example that comes to mind was New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Adern’s response to the shooting tragedy in New Zealand, which was compassionate, responsible and unifying.
In a forum I was at, I heard the Dalai Lama say that there are two levels of human existence, a cultural level and a common human level. If the purpose of life is to be happy, as it is considered to be by the Dalai Lama, we need to understand people’s basic human need to feel that they have an identity and a sense of belonging, which occurs at a cultural level. But we also need to develop compassion for each other at a human level without levelling hatred and fear at what is different.
For me, everything starts at home with children. If they do not receive proper affection, in later life they will find if very difficult in life to not only love others but to love themselves. They need support from their parents, teachers and child care workers. They need education programs that teach not only about ‘facts’ but about well being inclusive of physical, emotional, mental and spiritual good health. And children need to learn about the need to respect difference which can begin by teaching the true history of the places they live in and where they have come from. How can we change the future if we are not taught about the truth of the past?
The Dalai Lama’s answer to a happy world is that it comes by developing compassion and I believe that we need to have compassion for the past as well as the present. We have witnessed so much compassion in the continued presence of our essential and front line workers in the midst of the pandemic.
The world deserves, needs and must have leaders who at the heart of what they do are compassionate.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/01/world/europe/coronavirus-science-research-cooperation.html