Op-ed: 'Poor humanity....'

by Apostolos Kouroupakis

Whatever I write about culture, I believe, would be out of place and out of step at this time, since the drums of war have sounded in the heart of Europe. Vladimir Putin decided to invade Ukraine, citing various justifications, reminding Cypriots of Turkey's "peace" operation that divided the island.

I did not believe that Russian President Vladimir Putin would put his people in the guise of history, I did not believe that he would decide to invade Ukraine, that he would satisfy his bigotry. Honestly, I did not think that the Russian president's 'leontarianism' would happen. Simply because for a moment I felt that the times of war were over.

For centuries, from the caves of Altamira to the present day, man has struggled to build a culture, to learn from his mistakes and to advance by correcting them, and to build more and more ... to primarily meet his needs and then that of his society ... From stone tools, we reached artistic strokes along with video projections and hybrid representations. From the Hesiod plow to the smartwatch that tells us when we are healthy. And finally, where did we end up? Letting humanity hide underground to be saved, as the citizens of Ukraine ... and in the end, smart watches, e-books, or anything else are unnecessary ... we ended up in turmoil while living in the light. We want to go into space, to show that we are omnipotent, superpowers,

Someone will say aphorism, technology is here to help us, the arts have been upgraded to elevate our minds, to fly as soaring eagles in the heavens and here comes to mind my favorite verses from the poem "But the Nights" by Tassos Livaditis: "Then they discovered the scope to die elsewhere and the greed to stay dead forever."

I have no solutions, I have no suggestions, I could not, after all, that is not my goal. I do not want to say anything more than to express my despair and disgust for what is happening around us.  And we as individuals, as units, as personalities, do not manage to put a single stone in what is called a good life. Not to eradicate world hunger, nor to overthrow arrogant leaders and prevent wars, we can not do that, no matter how hard we try, but we can at least try to talk about what we can change without blinders and a priori of certainties.

Between us, we are the bedrock of civilization and not the important ones of the earth ... as long as we are not sure that we can chat quietly and simply, then I am sure that the powerful ones of the earth will sacrifice to their Moloch arrogance, hundreds of oxen, who fatten them with fat words, creating millions of victims, so that they can then erect monuments and order shields, honoring the fallen with parades ...

Do not laugh, the arrogant leader is not only the Russian president, he is not the only ruler who applies the statute: "Legal arguments have value when those who invoke them are almost equal in power" (Thucydides, 5,89). There are many, and unfortunately, the basis that we are, our grandparents, our fathers, our grandparents, our grandmothers, our sisters, we can do nothing, or so they taught us to believe. Dozens of generations have been "castrated", we and our grandparents were convinced that only the strong can, a cuckoo does not bring spring, so they said and still tell us, and they yelled at us, and we did not understand that we can react as a herd, but unfortunately, we can not because they made us a herd, an obedient flock, that goes where the shepherd tells him, so as to find the water,

The end of civilization has not yet come, the end of history has not yet come, I do not know if we are close to the end of anything, but what I understand is that we have reached the age of absolute decline, because the demon of arrogance has seized us and we are sure that we possess the knowledge of not repeating mistakes, but in fact, we have advanced to the point of erosion and debauchery.

While some in the year 2022 are hiding in the subways, in basements ... as if we do not remember the bombings of London in the Second World War, Yugoslavia, Iraq, Kuwait, Syria, Afghanistan, but also Cyprus ... ... Poor humanity ...

[This opinion piece was translated from its Greek original]