5/5/16

Today's Horoscope

All signs:
Today the stars want you to know that it's not that bad. Really. Really really. The stars have been around for a long time. They've seen it all. Literally.
When you look at the world, it can sometimes seem like there's no hope. It can look from your vantage point that the evil is winning and it's all doom and gloom on a global scale. Prophets of doom have been decrying the end of the world for millennia, but we're still here. Even Jesus thought we were in the end times, and that was 2000 years ago and it hasn't happened yet.
We look at the news and world events and see that everything's broken and we may be on the brink, that it's gone too far and we can't find our way home.
It sure seems that way, but keep in mind that same sentiment has been shared by many people throughout every period of history. Sometimes the bad overwhelms us, but sometimes the good does too, and there's a lot more good than bad. The ignorant and the hateful and the greedy have been setting civilization back since day one, but that fact that we are still inching forward shows that they are losing the battle. The world is slowly wiping out intolerance, and rejecting violence and oppressive religious dogma, that's why so many people are clinging to things like a Trump candidacy. Their misogynist, xenophobic world is collapsing around them, and they are voting for a lunatic out of desperation. It is their death throes you are watching.
Trump is a good sign, actually. The bullshit bathroom law is a good thing. The Flint drinking water fiasco, our school system failing, hatred directed towards immigration are good things. The horrible hatred and racism surrounding Obama's presidency is a good thing.
Not the things themselves, of course, but the fact that they drag it into the light so we get motivated to bring an end to it. We need to be shocked and horrified before we act.
Slavery was fine until people were forced to look it in the face. War is okay until people see the images and start burying their children. We were content to send children into the labor force until we saw their sad and mangled bodies or their faces covered in coal dust.
Think about how fast social change accelerated once the unflinching eye of the camera was pointed at them. It is a long and terrible fight, with many setbacks, but look at the how much society has changed for the better in just the last 50 years.
We are winning the fight. We are kicking ass, and while it might not ever be over, there will always be more good in the world than bad. Always. If not, we would have all been gone a long time ago, consumed by madmen and greedy idiots.
Even now, when it seems we are exhausting our food supplies and destroying our environment and will all be underwater soon, remember that we are not there yet. Too many good people are working to save us, even as others work against it. And yes, sometimes we have to learn the hard way, but we learn. A million tough lessons that push us forward, granite scraping against granite, lubricated by the blood of those that went before us.
This is what progress looks like. This is what it feels like as it happens, but thankfully that doesn't deter the people that keep striving. It may not seem like it, but it is. You can point to many things today and talk about how some of us are on the wrong side of history, and that right there tells you that we are succeeding. There is a right side, and as long as we can see it and continually point out that time has borne us out to be right over and over again means something.
And if you're one of those people on the wrong side, frightened and controlled by your prejudices and own desires? Don't worry, the change you fear will free you when it comes. If it doesn't? If you cling to your outdated ways of thinking? You will be swept aside like so many in the past. You can't fight change or progress, and you are dying out. It's sad, but inevitable, and history is bloated with your numbers, but your stories are simply warning signs of what not to repeat.
So realize that our lives are occupying a tiny fraction of the overall arc of progress, and while we see increments of it over that lifetime, we can never grasp the full scope of what we have accomplished since civilization began, or what's to come when we are gone.
That is our curse. To live in exciting times and be part of something bigger but never fully comprehend it. We get the struggle, and the pain and despair that sometimes comes with it, but we are essentially building blocks to bear others we will never meet skyward, outpacing the darkness and bringing us to the light.
So keep doing your part with the knowledge that we do make a difference, that we are changing the world, that we are making it better.
The stars have seen the fruits of mankind's labor, and they know for us how painstakingly long it takes to come to bear, but is just a blink of an eye to them. Trust them when they look down with pride and amazement in all we have accomplished, and are accomplishing right now.
Just as they seemed fixed in their spots in the heavens, the stars are spiraling and expanding outward through space, and so are we, careening through history and changing the world as we go.