The plot of a cult classic movie, ‘Clockwork Orange’,
involves the ‘rehabilitation’ (and this word is used rather loosely) of a
psychotic criminalistics teenager whose daily activities involve plundering a decadent
and post-apocalyptic Britain, he indulges in assault, battery, rape and
intoxication for the mere fun of it. He’s finally caught and put in a program
that involves the psychological breakdown of his mind so that he suffers mental
anguish whenever he thinks anything violent or inappropriate. The movie
questions the morality behind an action that curbs the free will of a human
being, even if a criminal is rendered incapable of committing crime, could the
action be justified? For it effectively removes a person’s freedom to think as
he pleases and puts him under the control of society and this is in effect, a
form of slavery.
However, I got thinking and wondered if it would be all that
bad. A society, in which people are incapable of committing heinous crimes, which
we so often read/see/hear about. We live in a world where abhorrent deeds like
human trafficking, poaching, extortion, fraud, and corruption has been going
unchecked and uncurbed since as long as history itself. What causes people to do
such things? To reduce themselves to such primal beings where the most basal
instincts of lust and greed causes them to act so repugnantly? The crime
awareness shows on TV show us would chill anyone’s bones and make anyone’s blood
boil, yet these are crimes that have been committed. What were they thinking
when they did such horrifying things?
Yet we refrain to dish out corporal punishments to such
people because it tarnishes our antiquated sense of morality. God forbid we
play god and end someone’s life or cause them great pain just because they
represent the cesspool of society. We’re content with confining them within a
prison system to keep them isolated from society; a prison system that’s just
as ridden with corruption and as flawed as the society we live in, where the
rich and powerful go and are able to treat it as a vacation but the poor and
sometimes wrongly-convicted innocents go to have their best years stripped from
them. Would it not be better to rid these criminals of their evil tendencies,
in a way lobotomize them, so they can rejoin society and live new lives? Would that
be so wrong? But alas, if only it were possible, or perhaps it is and I’m not
aware of it.
In Hindu mythology, the Kalkipurana states that at the end
of Kali Yuga will come when Kali cleanses the earth with his sword of fire. In
a world where the rich are apathetic to the poor and only think of getting
richer, where the poor use their ignorance as a crutch to commit their brand of
crimes, where vengeance gives way to justice and all efforts of compassion by a
person are rendered futile by the rest who’re selfish; would it not be fitting
that all of us be wiped out? Is this the only cure for the plague that is man? That
Friedrich Nietzsche’s brand of nihilism be dished out to all humans by an
incarnation of God? The complete destruction of humankind would lead to the
extinction of sentient being and sentience is so rare in this universe. It’s a
shame that version 1.0 must be deleted to give way to version 2.0, perhaps it
is for the best though. Maybe this is the grand scheme of things and that our
destruction would serve as an example to those that come later. Perhaps evolved
sentient dolphins would one day study the remnants of the human civilization
and ensure that their underwater civilization does not follow suit.
Unless we decide to set aside our differences and quell the
thoughts in our head that make us the bane of mankind, there is no hope for the
human race. The rich must relinquish their life of grandeur and live less frivolously,
ensure that their profits are distributed among those less privileged; the
powerful must bear more responsibility and not abuse or misuse their power; the
poor must adapt to changes and educate themselves so they don’t turn into sheep with blind
belief in superstitious rules; but most of all, the hatred that dwells in all
of us and the thoughts that make us bear ill on others must be removed from our
minds like the cancer that it is. I may sound preachy and hypocritical to you
reader, but I do the most I can and make sure I don’t fall so low, and if I
slip in a small way, it’s because I’m only human.
