What is happening at present is a bit of a “Day the Earth Stood Still” moment”. A pandemic has circled the earth. One would have thought it would have been a moment for all nations to come together to deal with its cure and control. Several vaccines were researched and produced in record time. The production of these vaccines is being undertaken all across the world. Again, one would think, that the distribution of the vaccines would be a world wide concerted effort to cover the globe, thereby eliminating the need for quarantines and isolation measures to be put in place. Instead, we have a conflict of rich and poor nations, and vaccines being produced on a commercial contractual basis, whereby nations lucky enough to have put in orders early would get the vaccines first, rather than those areas of the globe most in need. It also helped that the richer nations had a health system more or less in place, with the capability of distributing the vaccinations swiftly.
However, because of the lack of co-ordination of nations, the distribution, even in the richer countries was haphazard and ran into difficulties. Squabbles developed and third and fourth waves of infection seem likely to continues all across the globe. This could endanger the effectiveness of the vaccine program in all countries.
On top of the pandemic, there are serious issues of racial tensions coupled with international tensions, which are fuelling protests, demonstrations, racially directed violence, and gun violence. Seven such shootings in the United States alone over a period of seven days. Governments and legislators are having serious problems deciding how to deal with the unrest of its populations, frustrated by lockdowns, curfews, social distancing and significant abuses of human rights in many parts of the world, as well as possible economic catastrophe. There is little being done to create any real unity of purpose between nations, rather the opposite, with suspicion being voiced far more than conciliatory rhetoric, by various national leaders.
A vague return to normal life hovers on the horizon, assuming that, what passed for normal life before the pandemic, is what we are hoping to get back to. I am not so sure that is the case. It’s as if the computer has gone down, we’ve keyed up repair software, and we are looking at the screen about to click on the icon to “Restore System”, only we’re not quite sure what date to restore it to. We are on the brink of something but we know not what that is.
Even before the pandemic, the world was leaning towards a sterner and more dictatorial approach to political life. Never before have liberal policies come under such furtive attack, which brings me back to “The Day the Earth Stood Still” Its final message, delivered by Klaatu, is a tad worrying: fascism, benevolent tyranny, peace, order and tranquillity? Is it deus ex machina or diabolus ex machina ? I leave it to you to decide.
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