In lieu of the Newtown tragedy and all of the talk about the impending doom scheduled to overtake the world on this very day, it seems more and more people are buying into the idea of the end of life as we know it. Not because of the end of an ancient calendar, or because of some rare planetary alignment that only an educated astronomer can explain (and prove to be untrue, by the way).
Rather, it seems we could survive the end of the Mayan calendar, the line-up of the planets, and no one would blink an eye. We would still be left with people who are mentally capable of committing such horrific acts as the one that devastated Sandy Hook, or the ones scaring half of their student body into not going to school on the pretense of yet another death threat.
Let’s say we do survive Dec. 21, continue writing plans on our modern day calendars, and the world keeps turning; must we continue to live in the kind of fear that enveloped the country exactly one week ago? Many people would answer yes.
So maybe life as we know it is coming to an end, not because the Mayans say so, not because the astronomers say so, and certainly not because it appears that a small percentage of our global population lacks appreciation for human life. If life as we know it ends, it would be because a much larger percentage of the population is willing to give up hope so easily right when we need it the most.
There is no argument that what happened at that elementary school wasn’t tragic, and there is no guarantee that it won’t happen again. But it seems many have forgotten that the world has never been perfect. Our history books are full of world wars, genocide, attacks on innocent people in unexpected places, and yet here we are, on what could be the last day of the world. It seems impossible that we made it this far by doubting our own humanity and living in fear of the damage today may bring. It is the way of living in hopes of a better tomorrow that has helped us survive tragedy, and we must do just that today.
We can not make a deal with the Mayans, nor can we ignore astronomical studies, but we can help eradicate our own evils by not succumbing to the ones around us, even when it seems nearly impossible. Clichés aside, we are the ones capable of making significant change, and life as we know it will only end if we let it.