What is our culture worth if our history is not built upon family heritage but upon colonisation, slavery and (religious) wars? Our current society is built upon individualist capitalism, where a smartphone is the most dominant force.
Our culture is not build upon healthy habits, not upon old-fashioned ways of building, not upon a newfound heritage to hold on to. Without these, aren’t we doomed to slide off into the big great void? What will future archaeologists tell their society about ours? The one that had it all but was too busy comparing itself to notice? The society that was too focussed on the system to take care of its neighbours? The society that wasn’t a society but merely individuals living together?
Mostly, I am wondering what my roots are. My current surroundings are changing faster than ever, but my roots won’t change; they are the reason for my existence. Therefore, I should be thankful for those who stood before me, for those who walked this earth, worked this earth and formed a society with their own rituals, habits and crafted goods. I can only long for those eras before me, or I can enjoy what they brought me, still remember them, take all the good they offered and make my own contribution.
What strikes me even more that even our environment isn’t the same as our ancestors lived in, we’ve managed to conquer land back from the sea, turned a piece of sea into a lake and managed to cultivate every square inch to our advantage, none of that holds the history we live, it now mainly holds the future we fear or mourn or even scarier welcome. None of our environmental characteristics links back to ourselves, we only have the buildings and the rivers, and even the stories they behold are changed by every duke, king or emperor that walked these besides these waters.
Even our collective trauma isn’t enough anymore to bind us together, because everything else in our society is designed, engineered to keep us apart to find our own way, or at least to obey, as almost everything in our society is designed for, as long as we stay quite the higher class can do what they like best, live in the illusion of holding all the power. As long as we know, we create that illusion for them, it will keep me quiet for now.