Something struck me as I was sifting through news articles on various websites today: they all made me disoriented with indignation. These include:
1. The decapitation of a Polish engineer in Pakistan by disgusting, lower-than-low Taliban curs.
2. The planning of the 85th birthday celebration of Robert Mugabe to include thousands of lobsters, prawns, ducks, bottles of champagne, portions of caviar, and boxes of Ferrero Rocher chocolates (gross) in a country where, according to The Times, "seven million citizens survive on international food aid, 94 per cent are jobless and cholera rampages through a population debilitated by hunger."
3. A poll of respondents in several European countries showing widespread belief in anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.
4. The so-called "Joe the Plumber" is still alive.
5. There is a piece in today's Red & Black, "Choose happiness, regardless of situation," by opinions editor and sob-sister Shannon Otto, that enjoins readers to be cheery, banal, and vacuous.
Reports like these make my blood boil (perhaps not the last two). I'm not deliberately pessimistic, but one comes to expect most people are dangerously ignorant. Would it be banal of me to say "The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity"?
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