our world in a fogged box.

When I googled war, the first site to come up was for the movie War, the second a Wikipedia definition and the third, a band website. This is our world. A place where entertainment comes first, people like their news and definitions easy and light, and songs speak louder to the masses than the politicians. Clicking through each website to the next was like traveling through the emotions of this entire country for the past 5 years. War, the movie, glorifies war where vengeance is the greatest weapon. But in real life, the war is not over in 90 minutes, the plot continues, and the director, instead of wasting money on extras, wastes lives. But we, the public do not notice the millions of dollars spent on the hit blockbuster of the summer, instead we ignore the technicalities and enjoy the movie with our overpriced and overindulged butter popcorn in a lavish theater on a Sunday afternoon. We get pumped up on the righteousness of our actions, the pride we have in our country, and in defense of our bruised ego and broken hearts. But then, we start to see the headlines and hear the news and suddenly the band wagon has taken a turn for the worst. Body counts, bombs, and lies hit the nightly news and America gets swept up in the gray area of what is right and what is wrong. Then, a light bulb flashes on and people realize we cannot listen to the newscasters any longer because each person sponsors this party or that one. We start to do our own research. Type Google, ‘war.’ Some may even be as ambitious to type ‘Iraq war.’ We find Wikipedia. So as the wave of reality, woops I mean “negativity,” crashes down on us and sweeps all thoughts of ‘we can make a difference’ out of our minds, we sit numb. But, do not feel redeemed yet. Because we do not feel numb to the images of war torn countries, hanging bodies in the middle of the street, or starving children, we are numb because it is not us. Not our home. Not our bodies. Not our responsibility. Then someone clever decides to reveal to the country, that hey, it is US fighting these wars. Those are our dead soldiers. These are our families. That is our money. That last one is what grabs most people’s attention. So we get crowds of bands proclaiming their love of peace and happiness and damning the government this and that. And once again, the people are brought together, this time, rejoicing a way to make the world nicer, not vengeful. Knowledge and learning did not bring us together, violent movies and hopeful songs did. This is our world.