A Thought: The Changing Face of Humankind!

At most times during the last few months it gets unbearable for the humans. From where the heck this unique virus has sprung up and why? First part of the question is answered easily enough: it is a novel strain of the existing Coronavirus and it has proved to be highly contagious, concentrating or rather specializing on human-human transmission. As to the ‘why’ it is very complicated, and correct answers could never ever be found. Before thinking about that part let’s get into another ‘why’. Why has it chosen the most crucial parts of the human anatomy—the Face, with its constituent profiles of the mouth and the nostrils, and the pair of hands that obeys all the basic commands of the humans?

It is said that excess or too much of anything is bad for well-being and health. Therefore, as to the ‘why’ explanation it can be said that, basically, the virus aims at teaching humankind a terrible lesson for all their misdeeds, particularly in the past, perhaps, two centuries. That it has chosen the face means that the mouth, the main organ for communication, has largely been responsible for most of the misdeeds: too much of misinformation; too much of propaganda; too much of agenda; too much quarrels from the petty ones to the most devastating ones; too much of eating; and too much of biting others. The nostrils or rather to nose, meant basically for breathing to live, has largely been responsible for smelling too much into everything and harmful nosing around in the affairs of others. And the hands, the tools for all the physical and manual activities have largely been responsible for activities done in close association with the above stakeholders, with, of course, the supreme authority of the grey cells, housed in the skull that, in fact, defines the contours of the face.

In the process, we have already explained the more philosophical ‘why’, though partly. The ‘teaching a terrible lesson’ can be upheld as the ‘action taken’ of the Authority controlling humankind through an invisible remote. Super clever of the Authority to not resort to the complex cosmos annihilation strategy that implied total destruction instead of giving more time to the earthy souls to learn from mistakes. Therefore, It has decided to take the much easier option of just changing the strain of an existing virus, but thereby inflicting the maximum and the most humiliating damage. Isn’t it clearly displayed by the humans across the globe?

The activities of the inflicted stakeholders have been severely restricted, making it limited only to the interiors of the homes: you can open your mouth to indulge in communication or abuse or propaganda only to the closest members of your family; you can go on eating the monotonous dishes, home being the only service provider and the ambience; you cannot attend social/political/cultural/multinational parties where you always enjoyed the variety and the exotic quality of the dishes: you grudgingly miss physically confronting your friends/accomplices/neighbors/others in the marketplaces or the clubs or the offices/banks/business places or the shopping complexes; you cannot go out for your physical cinema halls or the multipurpose auditoriums; handshake has become a past pastime; you cannot even breathe freely outside; you have got deprived of so many legal/illegal/evil/good/illicit jobs that your hands are capable of doing and the most powerful ones too, not able to pander to their usual tasks in full glory.

However, humankind cannot be made fool-proof in respect of wrongs and evil, even by the Authority. Being confined to the four walls, sometimes very congested and unhealthy, the dominant males, particularly in a patriarchy like India, have become putrid-malevolent squarely contributing to the increasing domestic violence. On the other hand, confinement to home and the kitchen for months the female segment has also become suffocated, frustrated, angry and neurotic, often bursting into avoidable rants. Essentially speaking, conjugal bliss, say ‘peace’ to be less romantic, is dependent on the concept of ‘mutual relief’ which means that, kind of signed into a life partnership, spouses need a break from each other’s eternal company. Now, the most of the males not going to office and females unable to go out shopping or dining this primary ‘mutual relief’ is being denied to both of the stakeholders, leading to increasing stress, tension, quarrels and violence.

On the other, clever humankind has found the way of eking out a virtual existence in terms of the web and the social media to indulge in some of their pastimes like misinformation or propaganda or gossip or some productive things too on the positive side, to some extent. But, the continuous lack of the integral ‘physicality’ makes it unbearable for most stakeholders. Their patience has been fast running out with the disturbing reports that the virus is here to stay for a long time, with no solution in sight for the near future. The ‘how’s, ‘why’s and ‘what’s are tormenting humankind like never before. The philosophical ones who are used to the concept of ‘maya or illusion’ of earthly existence are also severely perturbed, trying feverishly to differentiate between the existential ‘virtual’ and the existential ‘reality’, having no answers in the bargain. Therefore, it can be safely surmised that the Authority has been spectacularly successful in teaching humankind a terrible lesson. However, humankind is after all a creation of the Authority itself, and is immensely endowed with resources to wriggle out of the crisis, sooner or later. History would prove if, indeed, a precious lesson has been learnt by humankind or not. This discourse is the expression of a thought only, so no solutions searched for or tried.