Inhumanity writ SMALL. For the purpose of seeing it LARGE.
Please: In NO/ZERO way is this post positing an equivalence of a small example with the mass events going on in many different levels and venues that we are witnessing or have seen in world events before or have learned about from history.
So, there is this busy street near me. In their wisdom the City honchos launched a long range plan to open up crosstown thoroughfares for the efficiency of, uh, crossing town. The unforeseen consequences along with the population booming are that my fellow denizens have taken it as license to breakneck *speed* and ROAR their motors and blasting music. Now, there's this strip alongside my part of the street that falls to me to maintain (mow, weedeat) - all with the speeding and roaring a couple of feet away. In some parts this is called The Devil's Strip.
Where the rub comes in: Fairly often, some of my fellow denizens of the universe take it upon themselves to loose bits of inner evil at my hapless self. Forget the mighty torrent of Ben Hur chariot congestion. Some *HONK* with blasting horns, when upon me in my face or, for better amusement, at my BACK to watch me trampoline. And with their speeding by, are long gone without any possibility of response by cussword, flying finger, or noting the identifying models or license plate. Not to mention having a beer can flung out their window in front of my mower. Granted, almost never, it might be somebody who knows me honking a hello, who later in person tells me I didn't acknowledge them, like I would know them or their vehicle.
*** But on to the point. Yesterday/Sunday, pre-dusk, taking advantage of the least travelled day, I was there doing the thing, blithely taking for granted those named evils would not happen. But one did. In the mid part of the session without hap, the street empty, a extra large pick-up in the lane closest, came roaring up and *BLASTED* the horn in my face. Now, the back of the truck was filled with equipment and tools. It was a working, laboring truck and driver. Perhaps he had worked on a Sunday, as commonly happens and in the near dusk was heading to his well deserved rest and relaxation. What he saw was somebody doing a laboring little chore while most people are relaxing. Despite the imbalance of my little labor compared to his heavy duty labor, he didn't show a little empathetic fellowship by just passing by without blasting, just go the way. No, as he sped off knowing I was sputtering with detestation, he must have been chortling.
*** Then, bringing it down from the impersonal to the personal: My 76 years have been chock full of piddling negativity from some relatives - passive aggression, withholding, lack of support. Another trait, the always-taking-the-other-side. And there I am, always falling for the inevitable grinding-down. So in the Sunday night "keeping in touch," I did my story telling about the day's horn blasting. And here's the kicker: She asked, "Were you in the street?" Stop here; get it? She automatically assumed that I was in the wrong, that the horn blaster did it for a reason. She could not even imagine or recognize the existence of MALIGNANCE.
*** Magnify this to the universal and atrocity is seen.
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