You never thought I would advise someone to be like Scrooge, did you?
Well, Scrooge is better than most of us in terms of the repentance he went through and the changes he makes instantly to his life. And that is a good thing. We usually don’t notice that part of Scrooge.
Charles Dickens’s Christmas story has been a staple of Christmas time reading and celebrations ever since it was published in mid 19th century until recently. Not any more, which is a bad thing.
Dickens identifies two scourges of humanity and root causes of all evil – ignorance and want. What invariably follows from world systems of capitalism, feudalism, communism, theocracy and so on is cruelty. Dickens has clearly painted the picture of cruelty.
What we fail to notice is the unwitting participants like Scrooge himself! The rich and famous do indulge in unwitting cruelty like Krugman says in this New York Times OpEd. I don’t think the Republicans are cruel by intent. It is their ignorance that makes them so. It can happen to anybody.
I think the best Christmas message is to embrace Scrooge’s attitude of learning and change.
Will we fight ignorance and want wherever we can, particularly to ourselves?
www.nytimes.com/2019/12/23/opinion/ebenezer-scrooge-trump.html
Chathoth family, Vallamkulam, Kerala, India 