Came back from a night of doing my visual essay. As usual, barraged with stories of the inadequacy of humanity, the lack of compassion, the irony of forgiveness, the monstrosity of the malleable form of the soul... There's little respite from the onslaught of such news. And everyday I must write about it from an objective, academic standpoint when all I feel like typing is "I don't know why the fuck people do these things".

The worst part is most times when I have these bouts of sadness, of disbelief, I start to lose hope. I fear there's no turnaround for us anymore. No more escaping the killings, the rape, the unexplainable mechanisms of mob justice, the unpredictable flutterings of terrorism, the poverty. It only goes downhill. I've even stopped blaming governments or corporations and wall street and whatnot. It's not as if people haven't been seeing the writings on the wall... Marx splashed the dark paint of the reality of capitalism on the walls a long time ago. But is there any other alternative? Like I said, there is no ideal society we can model ourselves after. We're just stumbling around in the dark, experimenting, hoping, praying.

People say we have advanced as a people by leaps and bounds since the barbaric days of evil monarchs or monster dictators... But comparing Hitler to the Marines who killed civilians for fun and then posed with the bodies??? What leap, and what bound. If anything the power of the dictator hasnt disappeared. It has merely taken on a new form and figure, calls itself "the responsibility of a superpower" or the "fight for democracy"...

Let me tell you something. Democracy is a bullshit concept. It's flawed and naive and idealistic in a reality where people don't know shit about what is good for them. Anything and everything about the dynamics between developed countries and the third world have only to do with luck, the fortunate or unfortunate way Pangea broke up, the masses of rock shifting and moving to provide land and oil and gas, the sperm and the egg that meet to create a cruel ruler or a saving fighter, a stupid statesman or an intellectual politician. Not democracy.

The sad reality is that the world works this way: you win some and you lose some. Or rather, you win, someone else loses. Perhaps you could say the moment Eve bit into that apple, the gears were in motion to lead to this.very moment where someone is dying or hunger, or a bomb, or something. There is nothing we can do about it, except try to alleviate the pain those in suffering, thank God we're not the ones, go through the motions of a human life and then die.

I have a theory that every life will have its moments of epic hardship. I'm not talking about your anorexia or your failure to get into uni. I mean epic, epic hardship. For instance your grandparents had to witness the Japanese occupation. Your parents had to live in poor financial conditions, riots, endure the saga of the cold war, fight in Vietnam, so on so on. And until now, my generation (in Sg) has experienced none. So when? What is going to mark our generation other than laziness and blatant frivolousness? Or a stupid race to get good grades? There is nothing that defines us.