The Worktop of Doom.

Its bank holiday in England and The new Indiana Jones film is out. Still starring Harrison Ford, now aged 145, but with his son as the action man. And still fighting the same enemies. It's set in the 1950's so its still the cold war and Russians are the bad guys, Mcarthyism still rules America and its Ok to be sexist. It struck me that things haven't changed much. Fundamentalism has replaced Mcarthyism, Communists are no longer to be feared, but instead we have terrorists, and people still get blown up, shot, or otherwise traumatised by some 'ism or other. And because it the bank holiday the tv news will gloss over news of yet more atrocities.
In Indiana Jones good always triumphs over evil of course, and lots of baddies get squished, so thats OK. But is it ?
I am having a holiday at the moment. Not that I actually do anything remotely like work, but I was really relaxing and I was watching some ants. A brave little chap had found a piece of something on my kitchen worktop ( my cleaner has gone somewhere), and told all his mates, and they were lined up to cart it off back to the nest. I carelessly brushed some away, they all ran around madly , then formed a line again to get the bits I'd missed.
So I did it again; and they did it again. Impressive really. They didn't care about being squished, they were just doing their job - getting food for the tribe ( family? nation? – I'm not sure what ants collectively belong to).
It wasn't altruism - and it wasn't unselfish either, because they both imply some form of choice. They mean that when you could decide to look after yourself, you choose to put others first, AND you know the likely outcome of your actions. In the ants case the outcome was death, but they didn't choose it. They don't fear it, I bet they don't even have an ant word for it. I doubt they dream of ant heaven either. They just do what they do, and when one gets squished , another fills the gap. And I was doing the squishing ! I'm an evil threat to Antanity. Indiana Ant would squish me if he could !
Apart from ants, species generally try their hardest to live as long as they can. Animals don't know what death means, don't mull over the existence of a god or an everlasting soul, but they do try to stay around as long as possible.
Thankfully people aren't like ants are they? People do have a word for death and, mostly, they do fear it. They may act like ants scurrying to work, or on bank holiday trips to the coast, but they are individuals, not mindless automatons.
So how come people keep wanting to die for something? That one lot are forever at war with another lot. I find it strange that people who have developed, uniquely, the ability to think rationally, when they are faced with the realisation that death is the end, they invent or develop a belief in something beyond it to take away the fear. And then they promptly do what ants do - they die for something – for their 'ism, their tribe, their nation or their religion.
Having been given the ability to think , they try their hardest not to ! And Good and Bad alike get squished daily, in real life not movies.
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Penny