It is an understatement to say that the world today is full of contradictions, immorality, hypocrisy, and sanctimonious humbugs. I am talking about aberrant idiosyncrasies possessing the potential to destroy us. These are worldwide deviant behaviors I am talking about. There is politics without principle, knowledge without character, Christianity compromised by fake Christians, leadership without compassion, personal ambition without humanity, Islam rife with fanatics, exigency of reelection campaigns eclipsing the fact that citizens are dropping like flies, clergy not lacking in pastors preaching what they don’t practice, lying without compunction, education without tolerance, and becoming filthy rich amidst lingering mass destitution and squalor. I recall Mahatma Gandhi’s true statement that Earth provides enough to satisfy every everyone’s needs, but not everyone’s greed. At no time in recent history has this assertion been more spot on than now. The rich are definitely getting richer and the poor getting poorer. Just like it says in Matthew 13: 12: For to those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. Consequently, the gap between the rich and the poor has widened into a gulf of social injustice.
More often than not, the socioeconomic conditions, or the problems of a place, are created by those who benefit from them. In most cases, the masses who bear the brunt of these socioeconomic problems are not aware that the problems they are facing were willfully created by those only pretending to be working for the resolution of the problems. The irony of the situation is that the suffering masses ignorantly show gratitude and support to the very architects of their predicament. They are grateful for the pocket change and dead-end jobs from those responsible for their unenviable state of affairs. Meanwhile, the conspirators behind their penury pantomime to be assiduously at work to improve conditions. Why would anybody sane believe them at the same time as they are splurging in conspicuous consumption and opulence with privatized public money? Even the poor are not that gullible; they may be powerless, but not gullible. The stark reality, however, is that when all is said and done, more is often said than done. In other words, the more things change the more they remain the same.
Anyone from the outside who comes in and attempts to enlighten the masses who their oppressors are, becomes a threat to those behind the problems. Needless to say that such a person is seen as an interloper that must be silenced or even eliminated. They wait for the opportunity to do him in for being truthful and compassionate. No one is more hated than he who speaks the truth, Plato once remarked. It was George Orwell who also observed before me that the further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those that speak it. The same George Orwell asserted that during times of universal deceit, the truth becomes a revolutionary act.
The fact is that doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result does not only denote insanity, but is also deceitful. You see, problems cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them in the first place. A higher level of thinking is definitely needed, a level of thinking which those that have been maliciously labeled interlopers can provide. Well meaning citizens of the place that are willing to bring their expertise home from the diaspora to alleviate the suffering of the masses are often frustrated, resented, and threatened with harm.
Because the architects of the dehumanizing socioeconomic conditions will go to any extent to maintain the status quo, the sad socioeconomic conditions continue on their downward trajectory or spiral. This corroborates what has been said that a bad system doesn’t appear wrong to those who benefit from it. They do everything to defend it to the detriment of the larger society.
These internal conditions of poverty and squalor are not only beneficial to the internal oppressors or the elite class, but also to their external collaborators or coconspirators. These are Western country governments. The governments of some Western countries, especially the erstwhile colonizers and the United States, benefit as well from the repugnant socioeconomic conditions. They and the native oppressor maintain a quid pro quo relationship: the native elite class keeps unbridled access for the Western countries and their corporations to the immense mineral and material resources of their countries. In their turn, the Western country governments provide the elite class with protection against insurgency, coups, and inattention to the perennial object poverty and squalor. And the vicious cycle of poverty and infirmity of the masses continues unabated!
Finally, there may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest, says Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel. Power, Frederick Douglas says, concedes nothing without a demand; it never has and never will.
Anthony Akubue, St. Cloud, MN July 27, 2025
