BEHOLD THE WASTELAND WHERE WE GROW OUR CONSCIENCE

The moral gray area: that vast and expanding wasteland where society abandons undeniable truth in favor of destructive relativism. It is the place where civilization questions the objective 'good,' and the platform where humanity discards its past achievements (in becoming more human), and slips into an endless decline toward a former primitive mold- only made darker and senselessly ruthless. This bleak environment is the destroyer of any possible hope for future morality and signals the death of civilization.

Let's tap into this tension - war in focus. Generations continue to witness the muddying of the clear canvas of right and wrong — where leaders brandish American leverage to prolong conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East, turning them into proxy arenas dressed up as principled stands. The voices that rise are loud and consequent actions are markedly potent. It’s good news. It anchors with conviction, it fiercely instills the recognition that acts endorsed in the gray aren't just “problematic" but civilizational poisons. When societies lose the ability to call decay by its name — when endless war is “nuanced,” or both-sides-ed by domestic/international  politics — something vital decays in that analysis paralysis. Language, memory, and the will to defend scattered and blowing in the wind. And the wasteland spreads.

In our time, in this poisoned landscape stands poster boy Donald (Trump) — the consummate war monger — joyfully adding fuel to the fires (that he started), scrubbing salt on injuries he inflicted. He stokes the Iran-Israel theater of war. He feeds the endless meat grinder of the Russia-Ukraine conflict. American power, weapons, and strategic interests keep the slaughter cycling under the banner of “support.” He backs the escalation of this war and that war. He turns complex tragedies into profitable, perpetual confrontations that serve power and spectacle more than peace. He thumps his chimpanzee chest to show his dominance and might and not necessarily that of the US.

In the midst of all that both wars have become prime exhibits in the wasteland: clear aggression, immense human suffering, and moral costs rationalized away through partisan slogans, financial incentives, and “both sides” posturing that obscures the body count.

The moral gray. It’s a vivid, visceral image. It must be painted as a deliberate toxic dump site not as a subtle shading or humble uncertainty — where civilization takes the blade of truth, snaps it in half, and then pretends both jagged pieces are equally valid while the wound festers. The corpses of conscience piling up — whether from Ukrainian fields, Gaza’s ruins, or Iranian proxy battlegrounds — an endless slide back toward a dark primitivity, the death knell for anything good that might still grow – it’s the unfolding true story.

The moral gray monitor must build a frantic pace and a racing pulse; as a powerful rhetoric against the levelling effects of unchecked relativism that lets war mongers thrive under layers of justification.

All that said; Human history does witness moments of clear moral clarity. . A soldier deciding whether to shoot a civilian shield in war, a doctor facing triage with limited resources, a parent weighing harsh truth against protecting a child's fragility—these involve trade-offs where pure principle collides with messy facts. The ‘gray’ here isn't relativism (the claim that right and wrong are arbitrary cultural inventions with no grounding). It's cognitive humility plus conflicting values: harm minimization, justice, loyalty, future consequences. Good ethics tries to navigate that without pretending the underlying principles are liquid… or gas.

The Passerby Doesn’t Matter, He’s Just Passing By

You know you learn the wisest of things in the most random way. Take for example, something like the deeply contemplative line I randomly came up with below.

“The passerby doesn’t matter, he’s just passing by. Your life is going on. You’re living it.”

It was a hot Monday, and some official kept me waiting beyond the time he committed, so I took to where my car was parked, and put on some good old Thrash Metal. A passerby (some acquaintance, of course), says to me “STILL listening to Heavy Metal, huh?? Said in the local lingo, it has just that right dose of annoying twang to it. My response was of course a colorful rejoinder. “Yeah, want to see me do the air guitar riffs, full-on bass slams with drums rolling, and some head-banging vocal imitations while I’m at it?

Well, that dull moment passed, didn’t mean anything. But then I thought there’s a lesson that can be squeezed from this short dialog. After all, the world keeps saying, ‘nothing is without meaning’. To begin with, as an extremely picky aficionado of the sounds that I choose to listen to, the uninitiated passerby was clueless of the intricate variations that define different genre of music. Like what passes for #Heavy and how it becomes Thrash. But he still decided to pass that remark, with beaming confidence.

So, yes ’the passerby’ I wondered how much of him are we allowing into ourselves every day, to unconsciously change our options and opinions? I should say, a lot more than necessary; depending on the sensitivity of the situation you are experiencing in life and the frame of mind you’re peaking or depressing at. I guess that’s how people settle on option B, when, they actually would otherwise go for option A-plus if allowed to be directed by the uninterrupted independent mind. Depending on what the stakes are, I suppose that is also how we head down Door number NO, because a passerby’s passing remarks influenced us to avoid Door number YES.

That first puff of nicotine was probably the doings of a passerby who encouraged the impressionable youngster to detour and tread a pathway to all that comes after early teenage smoking. That bad choice of first date get-up was a disaster, because you listened… to the passerby. Your skin is a minefield of zits and your body is a scrap yard of tattoos because you listened to the passerby. You mouthed off the wrong anti-slogans at the right time, because you thought the passerby knew better. You’re trading in your life for a few cheap kicks because the passerby said Life is Short, Live Fast, and you believed him.

You aced that entrance exam because you didn’t listen to the passerby. You always make your deadlines; because you don’t do what the passerby wanted you to do. You’re not lobbying for kidney donors; your liver is intact, because you didn’t pay half a mind to the passerby.

The passerby is useless to you. Negotiate the bumps on life’s highway, in your own style.

On a bigger canvas, I presume the lesson translates to seeing those minimally important external voices and personalities as ‘minimally important external voices and personalities’. Their off-the-cuff remarks and suggestions are mere musings with no specific directions or any valid consequences.

The passerby is attempting to impact your life, and rob your quiet peaceful world. Shut him Up!!!

Logged in but signed out, Lights on but no one’s in

BW&Gray - Logged In but Signed Out, lights on but no one's in

We could all give ourselves a pat on the back if spending a good chunk of our life in the virtual world was a positive sign of development, but unfortunately it is not. There couldn’t possibly be more disconnect in action (in these times of high connectivity).

An electronic screen replaces what used to be living, breathing people with emotions participating in and, interacting through emotion-based conversations. No need to rustle for proof here because it’s an infectious trend and the sickness has landed.

It’s a common observation that a great amount of children and parents’ time go into television, playing with smart phones, computer games and social media. While the seniors set aside separate ‘screen time’ which is exclusively their time, the juniors, some of them as small as two or three years remain glued to ‘the screens’ for hours in a day.

Playing computer games, watching TV shows, surfing internet and hogging space and time in social media is most commonly how the youth/adolescents spend time, ‘in front of the screen,’ again. Most times these routines go unmonitored in households and therefore the ills that are impending with them also come rushing through the doorway. The few rules in place in this regard are usually to check if the homework assigned from the schools are being done or not.

Many experts in this field have said that a child should not be exposed to any electronic media until they are safely over two years of age. This is apparently because a child’s brain develops rapidly in these years and it is obvious that they would learn better from another human not an electronic screen or screens. At the same time for others too, the hours they put into television should be kept under check.

For a large portion of the population the country though, the message would serve little use.

In many households, the elders have most often than not just allowed the idiot box as a distraction for the kids, so that they at least remain indoors and away from getting dirty or sick. Also, the seniors themselves have their personal screen time. The television set does fill in as a nanny (although it’s a poor representation of one) as toddlers remain affixed to the idiot box.

Excessive interaction through electronic media which includes mobile phones, internet and social media, it is believed starts to create an artificial reality in the virtual world where much time is spent. The dedicated users then start to be tuned to this falseness of reality. That way when such things as ‘instant gratification’ (a trait strongly induced by excess use of internet, social media and related gadgets) is not possible, in real life, it starts to impact the users very negatively.

Although there is the goodness of meeting people from across worlds and oceans, getting information and knowledge by a mere flick of a switch or a click of a button, there are equally the unwanted aspects to be factored.

People who spend too much time online, especially the younger lot tend to become detached from reality of things – this is backed by many studies.

Anything and everything shared on internet and social media is never actually deleted permanently and most times, second thoughts are too late to undo those actions, which could be something like sharing contents that are personally damaging or could be damaging for others.

Published as Column in Business Bhutan on July 18, 2015 

BW & Gray or Black, White & Gray is a column published in the Business Bhutan and solely tagged with the pieces written by this writer