This was shared to me.
A very good friend of mine related to me a very unnerving story. He is an expatriate in a foreign land.
One day while driving home, he witnessed a man literally on fire and running from a horde of spectators. This shocked him.
When he asked his driver, a local, the response was that the man most probably was caught in the act of arm robbery. And since, this place is known for corruption, the people just burned the man. Why? Because if they turned over the criminal to the authorities, he will just bribe the police and be set free. Thus, the fire incident.
Street justice.
Justice served.
Though this may seem unnerving to our 21st century sensibilities, it happens, and I am afraid it will happen, when good people clamor for justice and the powers that be instead of serving the people, serve themselves.
Do our politician know this? No, not the type that went to Harvard. That politician that we see everyday. The one we meet in the streets. The one who attends our fiestas. Does he know this in his heart? Does he know that when bribery overcomes the system, we will start to see bad men being burned on the streets? What will he say to this children when the time comes when his beloved little one grows up and start asking the question of why and how it came to this when his Dad was on the watch?
Do our police know this? No, not the general that has earned his stars. That police that we see everyday. The police that we see when the police with stars wants police visibility. Do they know this in their hearts? Do they know that when bribery overcomes the system, we will start to see bad men being burned on the streets? What will he say to this children when the time comes when his beloved little one grows up and start asking the question of why and how it came to this when his Dad was on the watch?
We are so enamored with societies that has made wealth creation a skill, a natural thing, a skill that can be taken for granted. Have we forgotten that we can also learn something in studying societies that was once wealthy and now in the quagmire of poverty?
How I wish and pray that the education system makes the study of the history of the Roman Empire a required course = )
"... why think like mere men?"
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