What's your age?

I get quite upset when people around me mouth clichés. It becomes obvious that they have put their mind in neutral, and are on intellectual cruise-control. For instance, often I hear about the "good old days", as if the times that we live in, are less than ideal and that the best days are already past. I am sure that you all have heard stories about the “good old days” when there was no traffic, or vegetables used to cost only a few pennies, or life was less stressful, or something similar. If it is not to do with rising costs, then it is the nature of modern life that takes flak. We live in very dangerous times, or what is happening to the world? It almost seems as if the proponent would have preferred to have been born and lived, in some other age. Even people, who were born just a couple of decades ago, talk about current times with an unwarranted (to me at least) degree of pessimism.

If you share the above sentiment, the question then is, when would you rather have been born? Which age would you have liked to have lived in? Would you have liked to have been born in the early 20th century, or maybe the 19th century? What about 500 years ago, or maybe a 1000? This question makes you pause, does it not? Now you have to go out on a limb, to defend an age, and a way of life, that you have no idea about. It makes you come to terms with the idiocy of mouthing statements without having thought them through. I like to ask this question whenever someone is complaining about the harshness of current times, be it labour exploitation, terrorism, climate change or geopolitical tensions.

Of course the person being asked this question, immediately goes on the defensive, and starts spouting gibberish about how great it must have been during the times of the Pharaohs, or maybe even just before the First World War. Life was simpler, there was less violence, no drugs, less crime etc. One can almost sense the pastoral paradise being visualized, a life of quiet ease and contentment in times past. Dreams of a Wodehousian life of privilege in the country, with the only issues to disturb the mind, are caused by annoying relatives or house guests. People in days gone by, were not as materialistic, where as now it is a rat-race and everybody is in it for the money. There is no family life to speak of, and friends will turn on friends, to make a quick buck. Nobody has the time for a pleasant word, and there is no caring left in this world.

Can you blame people for thinking this way, considering the brainwashing that takes place almost constantly? Our songs, our culture, our traditions all look back fondly - they glorify the days gone by, elevate past practices and deify mindless customs. How often does one come across someone who talks with bated anticipation about the future? One who talks with unbridled optimism of what is yet to come? How often do you hear someone say that mans greatest age is yet to dawn?

I recently had a conversation with a friend, who seemed to live in regrets about decisions that she took a long time ago. Her tone and outlook seemed defeated, her best days were past, and the remaining days were to be endured. And she is not even middle aged! All I could say to her was that I pitied her if that was the way she really felt about her life. It is in our hands to better our lot in life. Humans live and hope for the future, we are optimistic of the days to come, and look forward to a better tomorrow. Having spoken to others, there was unanimous consent that we all individually aspire for a brighter future for ourselves and our families. If this attitude of pessimism is not acceptable at the individual level, why do we so easily accept negativity for our entire race?

We are living in the greatest age of man – so far. Never before in our history have so many people, had the means to make fundamental choices in their life. Never has there been so much information so easily available. Over the last 50 years a huge swathe of population around the world has been raised, from abject poverty to plenty. Access to decent living conditions, education, and food has been broadened. Technology has heightened productivity, reduced infant mortality, increased life expectancies and provided opportunities of livelihood that were not envisioned a few years ago. However, we look at pictures of starving children in Africa, of floods in Asia, and war torn villages in the Caucuses and come to the conclusion that the world is getting worse. We are made to believe that Nina, Katarina and Gonu are a direct result of mans greed for natural resources. We get swept away by the negative spin given by the press on a daily basis. It is ironic, that on one hand every natural calamity, be it an earthquake or a hurricane is blamed on humanity’s consumer oriented society, and on the other hand, advancements in health, diet and general well-being are taken as a matter of fact and blithely ignored.

Imagine the life of an average person a couple of centuries ago. It meant backbreaking work from morning to night, no time for rest, leisure or recreation. It meant a parsimonious diet, difficulty in getting an education, and impossibility of changing your circumstances. It took just a small nudge to go from a life of middle class penury to abject poverty. In most parts of the world, family status dictated opportunities, and for the vast majority was severely restricted. You were either born into a life of privilege or were excluded from participating in any form of social betterment. Nobility, monarchy, feudalism, casteism, un-touchability, female infanticide, bondage, servitude, inquisition, slavery were the order of the day. All of these would touch and impact, in some way or the other, every living human being, no matter where they lived. The Declaration of Human Rights had not yet been drafted, all were not equal and human life was cheap. Your family could be torn apart in the name of Religion or the King. You could be burnt at the stake for your beliefs or enslaved because of the color of your skin. The accident of your birth into a lower caste family was enough to make life a living hell, and there was no legal recourse. Any attempt to escape these chains, to try to better your condition, was dealt with severely.

If you were born in the early 20th century, it is quite likely that you would not have escaped the effects of the two great wars. Millions upon millions of lives were lost or displaced as the sub-continent parted ways. The ravages of the Khmer Rouge, the Vietnam conflict, the Cold War, all of these consumed scarce resources that could have been channeled to more needy ends.

All historical monuments, from the Taj Mahal, the Pyramids of Giza, to the Great Wall of China and the great Palaces of Europe were built by slave labour. They were testament to the will and whim of the Rulers of that time, monuments of sin, paid for by the blood of the very people who worked on them. Entire lives of hundreds of thousands of humans, and their descendants were spent, in erecting these structures and many others, to feed the inflated egos and desires of Kings, whose only claim to royalty came from being born into it.

Contrast the above to the greatest city built in the 20th Century, New York. Every building brick and mortar was laid by free men, paid for their labors. Every skyscraper is a tribute to the human spirit. Every structure screams of the ego of man, as he strives towards the realm of the Gods. It took America, and its capitalistic free economy to show the path for disenfranchised people to attain middle class comfort, and for the pursuit of individual happiness to be enshrined in a country's constitution. That is the reason why for the last 150 years, America has been the country of choice for both economic and political refugees. That is why it is called the land of milk and honey. That is why with the collapse of Communism, and its obvious flaws, most countries are moving, admittedly or not, towards a similar economic model.

That is also why I prefer the modern cities of New York, Hong Kong and Dubai, to the pomposity and exaggerated grandeur of old palaces in Europe and the Far East, or the crumbling ruins of a decrepit fort in Asia. When I look at historical palaces and monuments of the past, all I see is slave labour and the bent backs of helpless humans beaten into the ground. I see chain-gangs of slaves, whipped and goaded to build an edifice that is corrupt from its very conception. When I look at the great modern cities I see free men, standing tall, looking up and aspiring through their buildings, to reach their full potential.

Humanities greatest day is yet to dawn. Technologies are breaking barriers as we speak, and the artificial divides of race and geo-political territories on a map, will not stand in the path of the tidal wave of progress, yet to come. There is a vast amount of untapped human potential, just waiting to be unleashed. There are Picassos and Einsteins of the future, being born at this very moment in remote corners of the world. There will be many more Mandelas and Gandhis to prod our collective conscience, and show us the correct path to walk on. There are infinite possibilities ahead and our inexorable march will continue till mankind sits amongst the stars on a throne that it so rightly deserves.

I have no doubts in my mind that I was born and raised in the correct time. That the good old days were good but these days are better, and that the days to come will be better still. Have I convinced you, and if so what’s your age now?