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A Guru's View of World Government (Cont.)
(With world government being such a controversial subject these days, given the
United Nations' abject failure to address humanity's problems, World Citizen
News continues the serial reprinting of Guru Nataraja's 1956 Memorandum on World
Government, which treats the subject holistically or, as he wrote,
"geo-dialectically." Viewed within the context of the guru's wisdom-though he
passed away in 1973 and despite his gender-exclusionary language-readers can
enjoy a fresh and timely perspective on an engrossing subject.)
PREAMBLE (continued)
6. Anomalies, absurdities and dangers of the mechanistic approach
The non-dialectical, non-unitive, mechanistic or unilateral approach which does
not respect the integrated personality of nations or individual citizen gives
rise to many anomalies, absurdities and disasters. If the case of a mother is
taken up without including with it the case of the child, if the case of a ruler
is taken without considering the ruled, or the master's case without the
servant's, and even if we should forget to take into account that the one and
the many are interdependent or reciprocally inter-related in a subtle
dialectical manner, we invoke disasters large or small and sow the seeds of
injustice and consequent suffering. Each man consists of what he is
subjectively, and what he holds as dear as life itself, such as his money, his
family, or even his faith. These adhere closely and result in the happiness
that each person craves for. National and cultural groups also have integrated
personalities of their own which cannot be subjected to a mechanistic treatment
which is merely based on quantitative statistics or facts, without injury. Such
roots of integration lie deeply buried in history. The partitioning of nations
has resulted in genocidal tragedies.
Operating through decades or centuries, historical necessity gives the raison
d'etre to the jigsaw puzzle patterns of the differently colored patches on the
mapped surface of the globe which school children are taught to distinguish as
self-contained or autonomous political units, entities, states, countries or
nations. Sometimes such patches tend to mark merely an area where an amorphous
mass of people live who are dictated by external forces. Even while the child
is being taught political geography, the patches change their outline or
encroach on each other with a strange irrationality. These patches are not the
result of any scientific ordering of the world, but are arbitrary and haphazard
in their origin and growth. They have been traced by wars old or recent,
whether just or unjust, and de facto status of certain units do not correspond
to their de jure status in the present set-up of nations. The status of member
nations in present day international bodies such as the United Nations depends
on the veto or whim of the powers that be. No public or objective norms prevail
here. Neither the natural law of the jungle nor any law consciously formulated
in a manner in keeping with the much-vaunted dignity of man regulates
internationalism at present.
7. The zero hour for the declaration of a
World Government is past
In the days of chivalry willing combatants fought duels in strict accordance
with certain codes of honor consistent with human dignity as understood in those
olden days. But the day has now come when a brave general is reported to be
proudly contemplating the extermination of 'whole sections of people' by the
latest weapons which human intelligence itself has placed at the service of
irresponsible adventurers. Instead of the knight errant helping women and
children in distress, humanity today hears of threats against the innocent and
the unarmed. We hear of war criminals punished after wars have ceased, when we
are not sure whether the punishment or the crime violates human codes of honor
or justice. While their children wait for the horrible news outside the prison,
parents get the electric chair for not keeping their own intelligence from
helping those whom one nation or other suspects for the time being. Politics
too strangely keeps changing its own complexion from day to day. Concentration
camps and the lot of millions of displaced families who are denied 'papers' year
after year, making illegal even their right to work and earn a living, and thus
in effect taking away their de facto status as fellow human beings, prove that
the days of barbarity and slavery are not over. Exposed to fear and insecurity,
humanity knows not which way to turn for consolation. Helplessly, it looks on
with impotence when the dignity of humanity itself is at stake. The zero hour
for the declaration of a World Government, at least in principle, is long past.
Such a Government must voice human honor and self-respect. It must preserve the
wisdom-heritage of humanity and hand it down to coming generations. Those who
love humanity and absolute human values at every level and department of life
must be protected. Those who hate their fellow men for reasons that are not
universally valid are as good as not existing. Those who adhere to rival
relativist values are bound, in any case, to cancel out one another. There is
no real need to name the enemies of humanity because their days are numbered if
humanity has any hope of survival at all. That humanity will survive, the
supporters of World Government do firmly and solemnly believe. Therefore the
time has come for all lovers of humanity to take a definite stand, avoiding
double-talk, duplicity, compromise and doubt.
SECTION I
GENESIS
1. The World Government is an accomplished fact
The World Government came into being (in principle at least) at Long. 63o 25'
West, Lat. 44o 32' North on Sept. 4, 1953. Utter Necessity was its
justification. Very special states of stress, both personal and global, ushered
it into being when a stateless person was forced into a closed territory against
his own will or consent. Even a de facto citizen of the world already, with a
fine record of service to the same closed territory or 'nation', was denied the
right to make a living or pursue his own happiness. There was no Government to
represent him or stand by him. The World Government had therefore to be
conceived as though "immaculately", though neither illegitimately, disloyally,
nor dishonorably, born. Time waits for no man. Better now than never.
Necessity knows no law. All is fair in love and war. These are some of the
sayings that held good here. It take only two to start a quarrel or sign a pact,
and only one to tell the truth. It is not numbers that can justify a
government, but its intrinsic quality based on Absolute Truth or Justice. It
takes but one to steer the ship to safety, though hundreds may weep and wail in
vain.
...To be continued
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