Everyone talks of saving the planet earth for future generations. I doubt if they know what they are talking of! The methods of saving planet earth include: Planting trees, no plastic, less co2 emissions, and thus the list expands. I am rigorously brain washed by the social media and the governments that it is my legal and moral responsibility to save planet earth for the well-being of future generations. The classic argument is: it is our forefathers’ sacrifice and foresights is what we are alive & enjoying today! I find the very thought of saving the planet childish and stupid.
Let me talk of my great grandparents and other ancients of my own family. From whatever little knowledge I gathered of my great grandparents, I can conclusively state that they never bothered about the future generations. My great grandfather (GGF) had three wives, many children and enjoyed his life. He felled forests, burnt forests, killed many wield animals for fun, drank liquor and had a blast of life. My grandparents or parents too did not bother even to give lip service about the future generations, let alone saving the planet. For them the future is now. The future is here. They had no moral or legal responsibility.
Similarly, I do think I do not have any for future to bother. Nor do I wish to save the planet earth. You may ask, it is your children and grandchildren who are in the future. Don’t you feel ashamed to say you have no responsibility? My reply is as follows: Your question is logical and appears 100% correct. But when I am no more, how can my children be? How do I know that they continue to live on? Are you crazy to think I believe in this yarn?
We all have to die at some point of time or other. It is natural that I too will die. I know this well. The question is who is dying? You say ‘It is I who will be dead’. You think that I die. You are looking at the issue from your perspective. Please do not look at the question of my death from your perspective. Look at it from my perspective. When you look, you will find me saying ‘It is the world that is dead’. You say I am not. I say you are not. Death becomes a perspective. A game that can be played either way!
How can I ever believe you when you say ‘It is I who will be dead’? You have no proof to offer. You can never offer it. Hence, from the perspective of the dead, it is the world with all in it that died. You think an individual person is died. The person who died or a person with clarity of thought thinks it is the world that dies. I know we do not have any proof to prove each other either wrong or right. This is an impossible situation. We both are at the cross roads. It is a stalemate.
Let me come to the point: When the world is dead for me, how can I have responsibility to its future? The world became non-existent. How can you call that which is non-existing as responsibility? Even to think non-existing as my responsibility is absurd.
Let me present from yet another perspective. Let me agree, for the purposes of argument, I am dead and the world will continue to exist. I am dead. Why the hell should I care about the world? When I am not there why should care for all of you? How can your wellbeing be my responsibility? What did you people do for me, when I am alive? I lived my own life. You lived yours. Our interactions are almost NIL. We lived in our own islands. We lived in our own self-centered universe. We did not care for each other. Now you expect me to care for you in my death? Have you gone crazy?
I wish to conclude by saying this once more: When I am no-more, the world is dead for me. Let the world go to hell. Who cares? I am not there to see. You suffer. It is your funeral. You people are such selfish bastards to expect me to sacrifice all and suffer when I was alive; and suffer by caring for you all in my death! You may say I am illogical. It is you people who are illogical. You may even say I have gone mad. For every mad man, others appear mad, what can I do? It is not I who is selfish; it is you. Even if I were to be selfish, what is wrong in being in selfish?
In my death I do not die; I continue to live. Sadly, it is the world that dies. Hence, I have no responsibility either to the future generations of to the planet earth.
About the Author
Dr. K. Raja Gopal Reddy is a seasoned internationally qualified Insurance professional. What you are reading here, may not answer all the questions we have, but has the absolute power of asking unsettling questions which increase the interest in the strange world, and show the contradictory wonders lying just below the surface of the commonest things of life. Look at this disturbing but beautiful thought of Friedrich Nietzsche “God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him”.
Dr. Reddy can be reached at: raja66gopal@gmail.com
