Stopping for a Breather — Archived from March 2009
“Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety”
- Benjamin Franklin
As I type this, a city of more than 6 million is being held at ransom by gangs of power-crazed hooligans. The battle grounds of Mangalore have shifted a few hundred kilometres away to Bangalore, the capital of the state of Karnataka. Professional, independent women from all walks of society are being targetted, beaten down in open streets. Acts that occur only in B-grade Bollywood flicks are being played out all too often on the streets of Bangalore. And you know that humanity has sunk to a new low when people are afraid to counter against these monsters, when the law-keepers turn a blind eye and the government and the opposition use the incidents to land blows against each other instead of countering the violence and protecting the citizens.
And if you do not raise your voice and get into action today, right now, the attacks will continue until one day you find yourself at the receiving end of the stick. Picture your own family being a subject to this madness and ask yourself whether you will stare back in meek submission even then, or will you roar like a man possessed and either uproot the evil right from the roots or die trying. Are you afraid to fight back out of fear for your family? If you cower in fear, your family will be no more than vegetables, leading a life dictated by these madmen. You say it does not interest you because you live far away from Karnataka? Bombay burned upon the rubble of the Babri Mosque in far away Ayodhya. And there are hooligans all over our country today, willing to bring the people to their knees, to enslave them for selfish gains. It is only a matter of time before you see a similar incident being played outside your front door.
Human society has been plagued by despots all throughout its history. But those dictators did not come up by public will. They came up because the people were unwilling to do anything to stop the rise. Inaction will be costly. Fight back and reclaim your life and dignity.