I am sure I have said this before and I am probably far from doing anything significant to change things, but it still makes me tear up. When atrocities against poor people don't even bother those who have the power to change things. When corporate entities take precedence over human life or death.
This week a judge in Manhattan dismissed the case against Union Carbide (UCC) in the Bhopal gas tragedy, the world's worst industrial disaster. The reason? UCC only consulted on the strategic direction but had no direct approval power over UCIL (the Indian subsidiary)'s operational decisions. Legal minutia, no doubt. Exactly the kind of stuff that overpaid lawyers craft so that those who sign their cheques will be covered, come what may. Whether they maim and kill thousands of human beings or completely devastate natural resource by setting up faulty industrial plants. Whether they force governments in poorer countries to agree to strategic policies that benefit these international conglomerates, all the while backed by their kind and loving home base countries.
When did things get this way? When did we become so inhuman and develop such myopic vision that only the green pastures we live in, as denizens of rich countries or rich parts of town, became the only reality for us. Why is it that the parts of town or the parts of the world where our 'servants' or the scores of unseen hands that clean our cities and sewers come from, are almost alien planets to us? And even with that, why do we call ourselves civilized? Is appreciating classical music and art the only kind of culture and civilization that matters? Why doesn't it matter that someone who had no fault other than that they could only afford to live next to the UCIL plant in Bhopal, was crippled and turned into a monstrous looking being or died a violent death? Why doesn't it matter that the suffering continues?
I wonder when this happened. Did we not want a world that was fair and good? What happened? When did we grow up into these semi-human self-serving beings?
This week a judge in Manhattan dismissed the case against Union Carbide (UCC) in the Bhopal gas tragedy, the world's worst industrial disaster. The reason? UCC only consulted on the strategic direction but had no direct approval power over UCIL (the Indian subsidiary)'s operational decisions. Legal minutia, no doubt. Exactly the kind of stuff that overpaid lawyers craft so that those who sign their cheques will be covered, come what may. Whether they maim and kill thousands of human beings or completely devastate natural resource by setting up faulty industrial plants. Whether they force governments in poorer countries to agree to strategic policies that benefit these international conglomerates, all the while backed by their kind and loving home base countries.
When did things get this way? When did we become so inhuman and develop such myopic vision that only the green pastures we live in, as denizens of rich countries or rich parts of town, became the only reality for us. Why is it that the parts of town or the parts of the world where our 'servants' or the scores of unseen hands that clean our cities and sewers come from, are almost alien planets to us? And even with that, why do we call ourselves civilized? Is appreciating classical music and art the only kind of culture and civilization that matters? Why doesn't it matter that someone who had no fault other than that they could only afford to live next to the UCIL plant in Bhopal, was crippled and turned into a monstrous looking being or died a violent death? Why doesn't it matter that the suffering continues?
I wonder when this happened. Did we not want a world that was fair and good? What happened? When did we grow up into these semi-human self-serving beings?
