Emotions run a little hot when you think about jobs, the economy, the housing crisis, the anemic dollar, the near extinction of the American manufacturing force, the outsourcing of American jobs overseas and, finally, the inability to throw a rock in an American store without hitting something labeled “Made in China.”
I myself have included words in posts along the lines of “stop coddling China.” That little gem was a fragment of a post on the failure of US politicians to live up to their obligations to American citizens.
I am frustrated.
I am disheartened that we turn a blind eye to a nation with a questionable human rights record as long as the cheap goods keep coming. I am baffled by our seeming willingness to sell our souls like crack-addicts for one more inexpensive children’s toy even if it comes with a double helping of lead paint on the side. But I want to make clear that none of my bitterness or resentment is directed at the Chinese people.
At the heart of my disquiet are the twin daggers of a nation without real freedom (China) and another nation with rapidly dissipating freedoms and economic strength (the US). I hold the governments of both nations accountable for their individual faults. But for the people, the citizens, the average man or woman just trying to scrape by, for them I have nothing but respect and compassion.
On Monday, May 12, disaster struck China in the form of a magnitude 7.8 earthquake which may have claimed more than fifty thousand lives. The devastation is indescribable, the pain and suffering, unimaginable.
I find myself humbled by the tragedy which exacted its deadly toll with indifference to borders, mindless of nationality and unsympathetic to age or race or gender. The men, women and children whose lives were extinguished could have just as easily been German, Iranian, Russian or American. This was not a democratic event. This was not a communist event. This was a human event and, for that, touches us all.
In time, wounds will heal. In time, men and women will go back to arguing about taxes, jobs, economies and politics. In time, things will return like they always do to long valleys of mundane minutia and triviality between sharp, punctuating peaks of defining or tragic events.
For now, though, we weep wherever we may be, on whatever shores we may call home, under whatever form of government we may toil, for our brothers and sisters in China. My heart is broken into countless pieces; for each life lost, for each person who lost somebody. May you find peace. Our thoughts and prayers are with you all.
