Once, somewhere far, far away stood a gate. Under mere stone and mortar multitudes walked; maybe. They walked all the way from paradise towards the unknown; otherwise known as civilization. Or so we say.
One could argue this region is the birth of a great shift Homo Sapien Sapien made (us), from hunter-gatherer to pastoralist, to farmer, to simplify thousand or so years that process actually took. Less than a hairs breath of time, though, considering the thousands, upon thousands, upon thousands of years where it is believed that we were mere savages on the plain eking out a bare subsistence living for ourselves.
Where Gopekli Tepe fits into all that, is anyone’s guess. That place is rewriting history, but I digress.
Some may say the Gates of Nineveh are just the last vestiges of a hedonistic past, best left to crumble into the sands from whence it came.
Well, those people got their wish.
The next step came when Russia’s Hermitage Museum offered to aid the restoration of Palmyra. Museum director Mikhail Piotrovsky declared that “restoring Palmyra is the responsibility of all of us.” Iran quickly followed suit. Syrian antiquities director Maamoun Abdulkarim called for “archaeologists and experts everywhere to come work with us because this site is part of the heritage of all humanity.” The Syrian regime liberated Palmyra and now seeks to present itself as a defender of global civilization. One group of reporters who visited Palmyra were even told by a Syrian officer that “The Syrian army is defending Rome and London in as much as it is defending Damascus.”
The author of the post is pointing out that bombs from both sides of a war are capable of destroying mere ancient monuments. I mean, bombs destroy whole nations, why not their monuments?
Certainly, we must know now that the good, the bad and the ugly of all great nations have at one time or another gone out merrily seeking to destroy another civilization in order to get what they want? Right? Don’t we already know this?
Well, nothing really has changed. The story remains the same, only the players change faces. Perhaps different words, but within each is the same refrain.
People want to see threatened antiquities saved. Those who save them are hailed as heroes. Western minds and their media have a deep need to find a good guy and a bad guy in every conflict story.
[ibid]
Here we all are, dancing naked on the head of a pin, and the great clock of homo sapien sapiens brief sojourn thus far on earth goes tick, tock, tick tock. Though, I’m not sure how long it will last at this rate.
Now all the nations surrounding Syria and Iraq, swarming up into Europe, have had to decide how many to take, if they can take, how to take, or if they ever got a choice in the matter that is. Some of them, 25,000 or more, made it here.
And the world spins differently on its axis now I guess because so much of the polar ice has melted that the earth has tilted. Yep. A sign perhaps?
I suppose this planet would just as well we destroyed ourselves and got off it’s now stinking, putrid back so it can breathe a little; like a bad cold, that won’t go away.
We are dust in the wind.
No more, no less.
We should get over ourselves and decide how long we want to stay though, I’m thinkin’.
Polar Bears in the Arctic are hoping not long, I’m sure. But they too may go way of the Dodo before humanities done with this 3rd Rock From The Sun.
Well, planning today to make my way down one or another paths that run along the river. Get out and enjoy this here and now I have before me. Blessed, thankfully, to be born where I can sit back and reflect on the fragility of life, rather than having it smack me hard in the face every morning.
Posted in response to The Daily Post Discover Challenges – Risk
by PaulaB 