My sister was driving when her car came to an intersection. The stoplight turned amber and she slowed to a stop. The car behind us honked angrily urging my sister to drive on. My sister ignored the other driver’s reaction. “Look at this fellow,” she commented. “He is such in a hurry. That is why we often have accidents.”
When the light turned green, again the driver behind us sped and cut in front of my sister’s car. In the process, he gave my sister the finger. Both cars drove on up to the next stoplight and there was the other driver. He was not able to go very far because the traffic was quite heavy. “Don’t look at him,” my sister advised. “He is very mad.”
The other driver continued ahead snaking through lanes until we lost him. Meanwhile, I kept on praying that he would not have any accident and to arrive safely at his destination in one piece, car and driver.
As we proceeded in our travel in the car, I marveled at how skillful drivers are in keeping in their own lanes and observing all the signs. I could see how some of them crossed solid lines or drove in the lanes intended for cars with two or more passengers when there was only one in the car. I observed some of them with the cell phones when I know this is prohibited. I also noticed a woman putting on lipstick and drawing her eyebrows in brief stops. I could afford to watch; I was not driving. I was a mere passenger.
At the same time, I appreciate what the government has done, promulgating all the laws and posting all the road signs to keep us safe.
Traffic laws are just a minuscule part of all the controls governments impose on their residents and citizens to produce an organized, systematic and peaceful society. In doing so, some of us sometimes feel that our rights are being infringed. We resent the traffic created by road constructions and the taxes that are getting higher and higher. The barriers that were put up during the G20 Conference in Toronto made many people feel that their freedom was transgressed. But those limitations were intended to keep the public safe.
If we would look back, we would recall how these organizations and controls started in the history of society. People organized themselves into groups for survival. Tribes were formed, property ownership was recognized which led to the formation of land divisions and recognition of countries. This process usually resulted after wars between or among groups. To identify themselves, banners were created, uniforms were worn.
Each group formed defence forces that were made known to warn opposition leagues to beware of them. All these movements led to the creation of ways of distinct identification.
Through all these from the time of the cavemen to the age of technology, the power of brawn and the power of the brain have played significant roles, both in the smallest unit of society, the family, to the tribe, the country and at present, in the international level. Certain symbols have emerged that those in power have controlled. The most significant has been money usually measured in terms of gold, diamond and other precious metals and stones. Those who possess the most of these precious treasures possess power that can control those who do not possess any or very little of them.
In our present society the marks signs and signals of power are manifested in the ways we dress (are you wearing polyester or silk, wool and fur?), the kind of car one drives (or plane, one flies), the jewelry one wears, the university one graduated from, and the friends one keeps. But there is another sign added, usually the power of the brawn, owning a gun and belonging to a powerful gang.
Everyone has a sign or a mark of his source of power. In the latter part of the twentieth century and more evidently, in the beginning of the twenty first, another mark of power has become evident; the black gold or oil. The tragedy of 9/11 was a proof of the rise into international power of some groups that obtained their wealth from oil. The need for this precious fuel has intensified with the development in technology.
All the marks, signals and signs created by men were intended to organize, systematize and make people live peacefully and comfortably together. In the process, competitions arose that led to the need to defend one’s creation for survival. Nuclear inventions have useful applications in industry and other aspects of living. But now, it is the number one threat in annihilating nations.
I was in my teens when the Second World War ended. My family suffered in that war, losing my eldest brother and having very little to eat. I thought that after the atomic bombs dropped in Japan, no other war would take place again. In a few years after, there was the Korean War; then the Vietnam War, civil wars in different parts of the world, then the Middle East conflicts, the Persian Gulf War and lately the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The United Nations organizations have been powerless to control these conflicts.
What signal, sign or mark would ever be created to stop men and women from destroying one another?