Lev Lafayette's journal

For a pantheist such as myself, every moment of every day is a divine experience; good or bad or sheer magic of existence itself is never prosaic. In the past few days, however, I have had at least two gatherings that could more readily be defined as "religious", and others in which cultural and subcultural diversity seemed particularly striking to me. Starting on Wednesday, I practiced one day (no, not a month) of Ramadan and joined Wajeeha K at a local Pakistani restaurant for Iftar, although as a pair of heretics we stood out somewhat. This morning I attended a local meeting of the Society of Friends (Quakers) who, rather charmingly, operate out of the building that I used to work in over twenty years ago for the State Member for Melbourne. Rather charmingly my old office is now the Quaker library, which is a pleasing evolution. The night previous I attended a charming gathering of the subcultural (you know, the goth and metal kids) variety hosted by Jon M., and Tabitha B., in Richmond and met two new friends, Rachel and Rafe, who happen to live in the same building as my apartment. The night before that I was with Brendan E., to watch the two-part epic Chinese war film Red Cliff, and the evening before that Erica H, and I took up a place at a Docklands restaurant to go rakali spotting because we love the Australian water rat. We spotted two, and maybe a third.

But being the miserable person that I am, I cannot help but be struck by how fragile all this pleasing diversity is. It is certain that with the combination of communication tools and technologies that aid the movement of people that the world has become a smaller place; and a better place too, I will argue. Often grudgingly different people have learned that people all have the same basic needs, that our environment is a shared responsibility (and a shared source of commonweal), and whatever differences we have are less than what we have in common. Alas, where such a "unity through diversity" message is not accepted and reinforced within one's self, the destructive flames of difference and division are fanned by powerful propagandists, eventually reaching the capacity of literal conflagration on the battlefield, such as we are witnessing every day in Ukraine. It is all too easy to imagine how safe and happy lives can suddenly become subject to the sort of violence enacted by terrorists, whether State-sponsored or otherwise, and whatever fanatical ideology of hatred is preached, so often there is the lure of wealth through power behind the scenes. A genuine peace, that is peace with justice, will only be enacted through fairness and the removal of such enticements. Happy May Day; wars will end when classes and the State are abolished and not a moment beforehand.