Culture of Death

Today on the way in to work NPR was running a story about overweight children ... one third of all children in America. I only heard the tail end, but you can listen to the whole thing here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90880182. This isn't just about kids being to fat, children overweight are unhealthy and more susceptible to disease and other major illness. Guess who is working on this issue for us ... the government. Schools are making major effort to help children assess their problems and training them on diet.

I am not opposed to this, but feel like there is a giant elephant in the room that no one will admit. The powers that be (global economy and intelligencia) have decided that all individuals must be liberated from any obligations ... that freedom means autonomy and choice. Parents have been severed from their children in search of a cheap and ultimately destructive freedom and so the children now have to make it on their own (with the help of public school). But no one can chastise the parents (and on some level they shouldn't) because we don't want to make anyone feel bad for divorce or careers or whatever.

And the real problem or the root of the problem and what makes me angry is the academy, philosophers of culture ... whatever you want to call the people that make up foolish ideas without any concern about how they will affect living people and popularize them without concern of their effect. In our "scientific age" we have more subjectivity than ever ... their is no objectivity when obvious dangers and problems are completely ignored because they will upset our passing fancies. I feel more than ever that our American world is a highly crafted one ... full of tons of unsubstantiated assumptions.

And as intelligent and honest critics admit, all of this comes at a great cost. The cost is falling upon our own children. It would seem that some form of survival of the fittest has shaped our worldview ... perhaps the most insidious version, one that is will to sacrifice its own children on the alter of personal happiness. Pope John Paul designated this "the Culture of Death, a culture that holds human life cheaper and cheaper until it drains it of all intrinsic value, a culture that transforms people into objects or even obstacles." (Fox-Genovese; Marriage, P. 160).