knowing is half the battle?

Because in much wisdom there is much grief, and increasing knowledge results in increasing pain. Ecc. 1: 18

This verse was in my daily bible study email today. It was written by King Solomon thousands of years ago. Arguably, he was the wisest man ever to have lived, and he goes through the book of Ecclesiastes recounting how life under the Sun is meaningless, a chasing after the wind. Later on he talks about life in a different format--that life under the Sun is not all there is, and there is hope only in knowing that Life. I enjoy Ecclesiastes so much because it reminds me of my favorite music by The Cure and the Smiths--depressing, poigniant sometimes, well aware that "putting on a happy face" is a denial of reality.

Not that people really are putting on a happy face. There have been lots of studies lately about how unhappy, lonely, and isolated people are in the Western world. One study found that people have half as many close, intimate friends as they did ten and twenty years ago. I'm sure there are thousands of factors, including sitting at computers and having conversations with people around the world and ignoring the very real people who are, say, playing with a Playmobil manger scene as they write...not that I am ignoring certain people... But even out in the "world" I could go maybe the whole day, do all my shopping, and not talk to anyone (those self-checkout lines, for example which annoy the crap out of me). If I didn't have a three-year-old chattering the whole time, that is. One is never able to ignore others when a toddler is present. Usually they soften the most disgruntled faces. Usually.

I think the verse above applies so well to our contemporary situation. We have information at our fingertips, about all of the worst tragedies, upheavals, wars, injustices (very real or very imagined), and anyone with the will to vent their spleen has a forum for it here. I stopped watching TV news ages ago, because I was so frustrated with the limited amount of time and thought given to the context around a story, around a three-word quote, even. The text of an entire newscast would only fill the front page of a newspaper. But here, on "the internets," I have encyclopedias of misery to consult, if only it were fact-checked.

I used to watch G.I. Joe every day after school, and each episode ended with some moral lesson on safety or honesty or some such feeble attempt to justify the laser-shooting-carnage from the past twenty minutes. The average kid who learned his lesson would say, "Thanks, Gung-Ho! Now I know!" and he'd say "Great, Johnny! And Knowing is half the battle!" *G.I. JOOOOOE! A real Amerrrrican Heroooooo!*

I don't think Knowing is half the battle, really. Ignorance is bliss. I'd rather not know about genocide in Darfur, worldwide sex slave trade, millions starving to death in North Korea. The events of history are equally disturbing. But they had the advantage of no telegraph, no fiber optic cables, no satellites interrupting their butter-churning to alert them of Breaking News. Average people, not in the halls of power, rarely had their peace (or war) disturbed by news of others' plight around the globe. It was hard enough surviving as it was.

They didn't have the advantage of help from people around the world, though. More and more, people can no longer keep their misdeeds, acts of cruelty and injustice, in the dark. Someone with a camera or a website is increasingly present to catch them in the act. This is by no means universal, but it's a start. I'm not talking about putting surveillance cameras on every streetcorner and creating an atmosphere of paranoia--just as oppressive as the high crime which put them there, but where there is oppression, disaster, or upheaval that warrants outside help from average Joes, it is great to have technology.

Just this week, I listened to a talk by Juan Williams, an NPR correspondent and author of several books about race and civil rights issues in America. He was talking about the civil rights movement of the fifties and sixties, and how it wasn't the case of Martin Luther King Jr. being The Leader, the mover of all the events of that time, but it was thousands of people who had their conscience awakened and decided to do their little part to achieve justice. Most people in charge of the movement, including King, were under 30 years old and had no political clout. But the thing that really struck me was how adept they all were at using television to reach all Americans. There was a televised confrontation of a black pastor with a white sherriff, who was trying to make the black people who were trying to register to vote, go home. Instead of personally attacking that sherriff, the pastor talked about their status as human beings, and what was he afraid of? People watching this argument, and the terrible beatings and fire hoses and police dogs to attack marchers, saw the absurdity and cruelty of it. It led most to believe that yes, this is wrong, and we will not tolerate it anymore. Without the media there, no one would have seen it and it would have continued.

"increasing knowledge results in increasing pain." I believe this wholeheartedly, but I also know that without pain, one would not know one was hurt, and therefore be unable and unwilling to heal. Being exposed to worldwide pain forces me out of the comfortable suburban utopia in which I live, and compels me to pray for these people, give money to groups who ethically address the ills of our world, and look forward to the day that we can study them only as historical blights on the past.