A tale of medieval barbarians and modern Israelis
We don’t live in medieval times anymore. Do we?
We don’t live in medieval times anymore. Humanity has come a long way from medieval times. Those were not good times to live in.
During medieval times, cruelty was widespread. Killings were common. Torture was the norm. Rulers were evil. Bandits roamed the streets. Children were decapitated. Detainees were abused, stripped naked, and urinated upon. Women were violated. The king’s men would do as they wished without fearing reprisals, knowing the rulers had their backs.
Those were the medieval times. Those were bad times to live in. We left medieval times a long time ago.
In medieval times, the conquering hordes were messy operators. They would decimate entire populations and properties by razing everything that came in their path down to the ground. Men, women, children, livestock, huts, clothing, crops, trees, everything in sight. They would lay waste to entire regions. They acted like barbarians.
We don’t do that anymore. These are not medieval times. We act according to the rules of war. When we wish to take an area for ourselves, we merely beat the inhabitants mercilessly, trash their belongings, steal their stuff, force them out of their houses, scare them into leaving, and kill them. We also uproot their cherished centuries-old trees. And we lay waste to entire regions, but we send warnings before doing so. We are not medieval.
In medieval times, the rulers would snatch away young peasant children from their families for a variety of purposes, including selling them into slavery, training them into soldiers, personal servitude, etc. They acted like barbarians.
We don’t do that anymore. These are not medieval times. We kidnap the children from their families and put them behind bars for years without any charges. Our prisons this year hold nearly 150 children. We use the children as human shields. We also beat them and torture them. We don’t sell them into slavery or train them to become soldiers, or keep them as servants. We are not medieval.
In medieval times, to get rid of pesky populations or enemies, they would poison the wells of potable water, causing severe illnesses and deaths to the natives. The poisoning would often be done by throwing the bodies of those who had died of transmissible diseases in the wells. The natives would die in huge numbers as a result of the poisoning of their wells. They acted like barbarians.
We don’t do that anymore. These are not medieval times. Thanks to the inventions of modernity, like running water, for example, we simply turn the taps off. And completely blockade the food supply in their habitations. As a result, the natives die of thirst and hunger instead of transmitting horrible diseases like the bubonic plague or tuberculosis. We also drop biological and chemical weapons from warplanes that cause a great deal of harm to the victims, but none of the bubonic plague or tuberculosis of medieval times. We are not medieval.
In medieval times, the rulers would try to control the lives of their subjects in every way they could. They would cordon off the areas their subjects were allowed to live in, make available only certain routes to go about their business and assign to them specific wells from which they could draw water. They acted like barbarians.
We don’t do that anymore. These are not medieval times. We are inclusive. We make sure that we live among our victims even if they don’t want us to live among them. In fact, we have started living so closely with them that they feel suffocated and ultimately leave. Can you believe that? We have built roads for them to go about their business, but since we are living very close to them, we have built checkpoints to ensure that they only use their roads. We don’t control their lives. We are not medieval.
In medieval times, despotic rulers would force the ordinary folk to do their bidding. And they would lay claim to anything the peasants possessed. The poor, hapless peasants could not deny what their rulers wanted of them. To exercise such control, the rulers had men keeping an eye on the peasants, monitoring them, and tailing them. It was all rather inefficient. They acted like barbarians.
We don’t do that anymore. We are not medieval. Again, thanks to the inventions of modernity, we have devices that tell us in real-time what the peasants are up to, who they are meeting up with, who they are getting married to, what they are planning to do, when their taxes to us are due, how much they owe us. We get data all the data on their activities without ever needing to go into the areas they live in. Based on the data, we decide how much electricity they get, how much food they get, how much water they get, how much employment they get, which of their dwellings we need to bulldoze or drop bombs on, and whether they do or do not get critical medical care. We are not medieval.
In medieval times, in a bid to get rid of undesirable populations, they would send hordes of men to set fire to entire villages of the natives, incinerating everything. The men and children would be killed. The women would be defiled and then killed. Their livestock were burned. Their belongings were torched. Those who survived had no option but to become subordinates to their new overlords or get away and try to restart their lives elsewhere. They acted like barbarians.
The womenfolk and children and those who couldn’t participate in this orgy of violence would only hear stories once the conquerors returned home.
We don’t do that anymore. These are not medieval times. We don’t even need to leave our cushy chairs and state-of-the-art offices to drive a population out. We have explosive devices so destructive and incendiary that when we drop them over a building, the whole building turns to rubble and ash in a matter of seconds. Everyone inside dies a swift death. We don’t even have to be near the people we are killing and turning their healthy bodies into charred remains. We can do that from a vast distance at the mere push of a button. We are not medieval.
And we have turned this whole process into a spectator sport. Our womenfolk and children — and everyone else who couldn’t participate in this sport — grab their favourite beverages, climb to the hills with assorted meat for the barbecues, and clap, celebrate, and pose for selfies against a background of explosions as they watch our bravery in swooshing missiles into the natives’ enclaves, and blow the savages to the smithereens at the mere push of a button. Our women and children don’t wait for their brave men to return and regale them with stories of their conquests. They watch it live and cheer us from the top of the hills. We are not medieval.
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Spot on perspective