Things Have Changed!!!

One of the worst things that modern civilization has done to society is that it has slowly eroded our need for compassion. Especially in this part of the world, being a good person is steadily being discouraged, and in other cases, when you decide to actually do something that doesn’t benefit you, you’re seen as foolish.

Like, this is the world we live in now. Where doing the right thing is lame, but being a criminal is cool. Being a troublemaker is cute, but being a good little kid is just average. That is the kind of life we’re living, and the more that we encourage it, the more we keep getting more experiences like this.

In society now, if your neighbor’s child is hungry and you have food, you can’t dare to give them. Because that could land you in trouble. In the past, this was never the case. When your child’s friends came around, you could easily feed them all, but today, na small thing dae lead to police case. That’s just how bad it is.

Also, thanks to our wack police system that rarely does any proper investigation, the worst thing that can happen to you as an individual is to be a good Samaritan, and it doesn’t work out. You could help an accident victim to the hospital, and if the person dies, your freedom will flash before your eyes. I’ve seen Good Samaritans held in jail for days until they were able to prove that they were not involved in the accident. But that’s the thing, something as devastating as an accident shouldn’t take that long to prove! But it happens!

This is also the place where, if you found money and returned it to the right authorities, an entire community of people would step out of the woods to mock and shame you, calling you foolish. But those same people will never come for you when the scale tips and you get in trouble. They’ll always fall quiet.

Society is a mess right now, and it just seems like you can’t afford to be a good person. There seems to always be a price for putting other people first, and meanwhile, every selfish and stingy person around us gets to slide on just about anything. But then, what can we do? Should we allow these wicked practices to dictate our lives for us? If we’re innately good people, why the hell should we change just because society wants to punish us for it?

You wanna know how much of a mess this is? Many families that used to share food during religious festivities (both Muslim and Christian) no longer do. They only give select family and friends, because being generous has come back to bite them in the ass. Not the economy, but because they got into one trouble or the other. Maybe something that was a simple allergy was escalated and turned into food poisoning that led to a police case involving attempted murder. Crazy things are happening!

And now, everyone is more focused on taking care of themselves and their families. Children no longer come out to play because their parents no longer trust their neighbors. Yeah, you could say it’s insecurity; that’s one of the issues. But it’s also simply a lack of trust.

Every family believes they have what it takes to raise their kids, forgetting that, naturally, a village is what’s required to raise a child. But then, can I blame the individual? No, they’re only acting in their best interests according to the dictates of the time. But I can blame society as a whole, because that is the single engine driving this distrust among friends and neighbors.

Of course, there are also issues like jealousy, envy, pride, and arrogance, which can also play a huge role in all this. But that, my good friends, is a post for another day.