The Superman comics I enjoyed in my youth had this very weird place that the "man of steel" used to visit; a cube shaped planet called Bizarro World (also called htrae or "earth" backwards) where everything good is bad and vise versa. Bizarros used to say that they "hated beauty" and "loved ugliness." In that world, one could be arrested for buying something but admired for stealing the same item. Reading the news, I can't help think that we live in an age of opposing world's - the "Bizarro" world where some show little compassion or respect for their fellow man, and one of good where we help each another - each being polar opposites with seemingly nothing in between.
Think of the stories that we read about in the just the past few months:
A CEO who runs the major oil company that is completely fouling the Gulf Coast, forever changing the lives of those that depend on the area for their livelihoods, remarks that he "wants his life back" and then proceeds to go sailing on his yacht, in the pristine waters halfway across the world.... A young girl, whose dream of sailing around the world is shattered by a storm that cripples her vessel, is saved by Australian and French responders who state they would hope that another country would do the same if one of their citizens's where caught in that situation.
Two opponents running against each other for the Republican Party's nomination for Governor of California, spend a combined $100 million on campaign ads that are nothing short of mutual character assassinations. Their Democratic foe claims "off the record" that the winner is planning a Nazi style propaganda campaign against him, while the Republican candidate for a California senate seat is caught "off the record" mocking the hairstyle of the Democratic incumbent...One of the biggest blown calls in all of baseball robs a young pitcher of one of the rarest of all feats; a perfect game, on the last play of all things! Afterwards, the remorse stricken umpire admits that he blew it and took away the pitchers chance at immortality. The next day the ump, with tears streaming down his face, and the pitcher embrace at home plate as tens of thousands of fans cheer.
At an anti-healthcare rally, tea-baggers heckle a man who is down on the street holding up a sign begging for them to support healthcare reform so he can get his Parkinson's disease treated. As they continue to shout him down, some begin throwing money at him crying out, "Is this what you want, free money?.....As several states move to block the healthcare reform, a group of doctors and dentists set up shop in Los Angeles to offer free medical care to those who don't have insurance and thousands gratefully show up.
I am sometimes ashamed at the one world I live in, but very proud to be a citizen of the other.
Coda: As I was working on this blog, two major music stars announce that they will be performing a concert fund-raiser to benefit the victims of the Gulf oil disaster while at the same time; several major country stars announce that they will be performing a fund-raising concert for the victims of the recent Nashville floods.
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