Tributes

Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide. -John Adams (Works)

I never wanted to watch the Hunger Games movies. They sounded too brutal. But after some friends assured us that the series contained some redemptive themes, we borrowed the first release from the library, and of course got hooked. In a futuristic setting, an oppressive regime punishes a past rebellion by selecting citizens at random to fight one another to the death in a controlled arena. These citizen warriors are called "Tributes." The victor is lauded and rewarded, and the public is treated to the annual spectacle with its attendant celebrations. Of course the series ends with a long expected revolution.

HG Wells wrote The Time Machine in 1895. His protagonist travels thousands of years into earth’s future, where he finds the Eloi, a naïve race of pleasure seekers who live off ample vegetation and have a remarkable lack of curiosity or intellectual ability. The hero eventually finds that there is a race of underground troglodytes (Morlochs) who capture and feed on the Eloi like cattle. In some movie versions, the Traveler leads a rebellion, and everyone (except the Morlochs) lives happily ever after. But the book sees the Traveler flee in his machine without a resolution.

I loved Watership Down (Richard Adams, 1972). I read it several times. In it a small group of discontented rabbits escape a warren that is run like a fascist police state, and set out on their quest for freedom and security. On their way they stop over at a warren of very friendly rabbits, well fed, and given to poetry and philosophical speculation, with just a hint of resignation and fatalism. The bubble bursts, however, when a random rabbit, feeding in the field, is caught in a snare, and is ignored by his fellow philosophers. Turns out, the local farmer who owns the land keeps the warren fed on fresh vegetables, and harvests it according to his need. Our heroes beg their new friends to leave, to no avail. The warren is willing to pay the price for its prosperity.

These communities I described are diverse: a dystopia, a utopia, a cornucopia. So, what do they have in common? They are willing to pay the price, not just to maintain the status quo, but to protect their underlying worldviews. Some things are apparently worth the sacrifice.

Western liberal democracies are committed to compassion, love, openness, welcome for the oppressed and disenfranchised. They also have great faith in the innate goodness of man. I am writing this a couple of days after Brussels (March 2016). I have not heard any rhetoric from western leaders that varies from these themes. There are flowers and notes and burning candles in public places, just as in Paris, New York, San Bernardino, Boston, London, Madrid, Turkey, and places we have already forgotten. The Eiffel Tower is tri-colored again, and I keep hearing the word “solidarity.”

Worldview? Solidarity? I keep thinking about the victims, which is too weak a term. Let’s call them what they are: sacrifices, collateral damage, the acceptable statistical price to pay for the western view of mankind. But could we please recognize that fact, and honor the dead and wounded with something more than candles and flowers. A memorial in national capitals would be nice, with room for additional names. And let’s dump “victims.” “Heroes of the Republic” would be nice. How about “Random Citizen Soldiers,” “Keepers of the Flame.”

But I prefer “Tributes.”