In 2018 we discovered that there's mineable ice on Mars, we found a way to grow vegetables without earth or daylight, we discovered a warm blooded fish called Opah, we created a DNA Nano robot that can kill cancer cells, and we did tremendous advancement at the level of using stem cells to cure many diseases and open windows of hope for MS, Leukaemia, Alzheimer, and blindness.
So many interesting, intriguing, and positive developments! I ought to be hopeful and happy about 2018. So why am I down and depressed?
I am afraid of the rise of intolerance all over the world, populism in the US, the Putin syndrome, Brexit, and the rise of the national socialism or if you want the extreme right in Sweden, Austria, Italy, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Czechia, and many more.
I feel hopeless when I see the world turning a blind eye to the rehabilitation of a dictator that barrel bombed and gazed his people to stay in power in Syria.
I am saddened by the lack of empathy to the haunted looks of so many children living in refugee tents. These children are Rohingya, Syrian, Yemeni, …. many in Europe say "not in my backyard!"
I am angry at the erosion of women rights in the Middle East.
I am angry that the Russian Parliament adopted controversial legislative amendments that decriminalized first battery offenses among family members – a serious setback that in 2018 reduced penalties for abusers and put survivors at even greater risk.
I am angry that in Europe women rights are eroding.
In Poland women’s rights activists live in climate of fear as they work in the shadow of a government that denies that domestic violence occurs in marriage and disdains efforts to advance gender equality. Less than 20% of Romanian MPs are women. Levels of violence against women remain shockingly high in Europe and depending on the country women are more or less protected by the justice systems, which still struggle to remain impartial in rape cases, for example, even those involving violence. Women in the UK risk losing hard-won equality and human rights protections, including employment rights and funding for women’s services, when the UK leaves the EU.
and so much more….
I just hope, because I need to hope, that in 2019 we will witness less violence, tolerance, empathy… in short, sanity!
How far we are from the dawning of the Age of Aquarius as I dreamt of it in the 1970s!
Lyrics
When the moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
Then peace will guide the planets
And love will steer the stars
This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius
The age of Aquarius!
Aquarius!
Harmony and understanding
Sympathy and trust abounding
No more falsehoods or derisions
Golden living dreams of visions
Mystic crystal revelation
And the mind's true liberation
Aquarius!
When the moon is in the Seventh House
And Jupiter aligns with Mars
Then peace will guide the planets
And love will steer the stars
This is the dawning of the age of Aquarius
The age of Aquarius
Aquarius!