Tags
Declaration of Independence, Fourth of July, Independence, Independence of the United States, Man’s relation with the world, Mother Earth
Declaration of Independence – 4 July 1776
Detail of Painting by John Trumbull in the U.S. Capitol
Photo Credit: U.S. Library of Congress
This Fourth of July, I joined the people of America in celebrating 238 years since the nation’s Declaration of Independence from the British Empire. In 1966, when my native land, Guyana, gained its independence from Great Britain, the British Empire was already in decline. The United States was in ascendance.
Growing to adulthood in a young independent nation, I learned that the word independence was a misnomer. We were still tied by our navel string to our former colonial masters. With a struggling economy, we endured power outages, water cutoffs, and food shortages. Help from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) brought more austerity. Independence had led to new forms of dependency on international bankers and on other masters.
Perhaps, only isolated communities worldwide are self-sufficient. The majority of humankind depends upon others to grow our food; to make our clothing; to provide housing; to supply energy and water; to educate us; to care for us when sick; and to do much more. In other words, we are interdependent.
The propagation of our species depends upon the union of the male sperm and female ovary, making men and women co-dependent.
Then there is Mother Earth which makes life possible. Without the Sun, oxygen, water, and other living species on our home planet, life as we know it would cease. We are part of the natural world, not separate from it.
We fool ourselves with our words. Independence is an illusion. We trade one master for another and create new ones. In the United States, we have decreed that man-made corporations are people who can also have religious beliefs. (Do they have souls too?) It is not enough that our corporate masters control our free market economy and our government. They must also control our private lives.
Our belief that we are independent beings and independent nations is driving us towards self-extinction. The moment we perceive the illusion of our independence, the sooner we will become truly free as individuals.
We are one with the Universe.
Three Worlds One Vision 
Reblogged this on Guyanese Online.
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Thanks for sharing my post, Cyril. Blessings.
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Yes, Rosaliene, the truth is there is the illusion of true independence and freedom. all societies are an extension of the medieval manorial system with the lords and the serfs, now its the government and the people. Previously, the serfs work for the lords of the manors, now the people work for their government. The difference between medieval times and now is that the business of working and living is done in a more civilized way.
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Deen, what I find disturbing is that, over time, nothing has changed, only transformed. Our moral evolution has not kept pace with our social evolution.
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You forgot to mention poor political leadership beginning from the early days of independence. We had an effective colonial type administration in place. The trick was to turn it around so that it benefit the Guyana situation. We just did not have the people who were willing and able to manage Guyana for our benefit.
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Thanks for filling in the blanks, Albert.
In sharing my thoughts on America’s Independence Day, I didn’t want to focus on the reasons for Guyana’s struggling economy.
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Countries, like individuals, may need some illusions. Those raised when I went to school here (in the USA) taught that the early British settlers came here to escape religious persecution. In fact, they arrived only to impose such persecution on others who differed in their beliefs. Independence may be another such illusion, once more true and necessary here than it is today, as you have stated. The balancing act of independence/dependence first requires the understanding and humility to admit that peoples and countries cannot escape their interlocking fate, especially when the planet is at stake. Lip service to actions that might or might not create jobs will be of little help to our grandchildren if they are living without enough water, in air that is too hot or too cold; if destructive storms multiply and coastal areas are uninhabitable. Man does learn, but too slowly. Until the first industrial revolution centuries passed with little change in the way people livied. Now we are in a race with unfettered energy consumption, unprepared by our history in this Second Machine Age. I hope the technology optimists are right that scientists will find a way to save the planet, but I’d be more hopeful if the politicians first agree there is a problem, and that it will require working together to solve it.
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Thanks for sharing your concerns for humanity, Dr. Stein. I share your view that “man does learn, but too slowly.” We keep making the same mistakes, expecting different results.
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