Today we laugh, often arrogantly, at those who thought the sun was circling around a flat world, because it looked that way. But some new thinking produced a magnetized ellipsoid circling around the sun. But, again our thinking came to a rest, not assimilating Einsteinean relativities and four dimensional time-space.
Tomorrow we may laugh, probably arrogantly, at those who think there is only one planet in the universe with life, and that life is a vertical pyramid with human beings, homo sapiens, on top. This kind of faith is any bit, or more, terra-centric than in the olden days, and the biblical-Darwinian pyramid from protozoa and amoebae to the humans on top as simplistic as the flat earth. Yes, humans control that niche, our earth, except that viruses challenge their rule as effectively as IEDs challenge the US empire. But the bible added to Darwin a condition for the top position: to be a good trustee of the abundance, not an owner (Genesis 1:26,28; 2:15). We are doing very badly; dolphins treat their niche much better. But Darwin, a true child of the British empire, did not include such criteria.
Imagine ETs, extra-terrestrials descending upon us, fittest not only in dominating but also in caring for Mother Earth, informing us that our time is up due to mismanagement. “Unless you improve your Darwinism to include care for all nature, abiota and biota. Failing that, we ETs will take over, placing you somewhere below dolphins and chimps on the chart you love so much, hoping for some evolution.
Sounds familiar. Look at what the West calls “discoveries”. There were USOs on the horizon, unidentified sailing objects. Hostile or friendly? They came to peoples living in harmony with Mother Earth by Western standards, and told them that they suffered from mismanagement, not exploiting all those resources, processing them, trading them, making money, economic growth, etc. So the ECs, extra-continentals, whites most of them, took over and placed them somewhere among animals for excessive harmony, hoping for evolution. The result is for everybody to see. So much for history.
In the future there will probably be ETs dwelling among us, and not only sightings. Some may be easily controlled by us, some may easily control us, enacting the scenario above. A future devoid of ETs sounds less likely than the opposite. And a major organization among us, the US Army, definitely finds a future with hostile ETs more likely than one without, according to a key book in the field, R, M. Dolan, UFOs and the National Security State, Charlottesville VA: Hampton Roads, 2002, also see http://www.keyholepublishing.com/. Different and equal, fascinating, reciprocity, is not on their mind.
The question put to American Indians, friendly or hostile?, is put to the ETs. Worst case analysis and security paranoia prepare USA for the latter, as evidenced by black budgets and DUMBs, deep underground military bases. ETs presumably have several races, more than two genders, several ways of procreating. Some claim to have been abducted by ETs. But what can we learn is not asked. Familiar.
Also familiar: US Army information monopoly and secrecy, with ETs seen basically as hostile in the countless depictions of wars in and with outer space–except in the sweet movie with that name, ET. Avatar is also more pro-ET, pro-Peace. But Star Wars not.
And with that comes the inevitable demand: everybody lined up under US leadership, in a big alliance for the defense of Planet Earth!
They would have a clever answer to the obvious question, why so many sightings in North America and so few in the rest of the world? Because, the USA would say, we are No. 1; ETs know that, and want to conquer the world through us. The heavy prize of being No. 1. Only in a US-led coalition can we withstand their conquest of the world; and any attack on the USA is an attack on us all, on all humans.
If that theory holds, and ETs are better informed than the USA, then sightings in China and upcoming regions are overdue. There are already many in Russia. How about another theory for overselection of the USA–leaving US hysterics and satan-sighting aside–the USA as a basic cause for world mismanagement? ET intervening not for or against the USA, but for a better world-with-nature system?
Sheer speculation, of course. But so are automatic assumptions of hostility, coming straight out of a world view of competition, struggle and violence as normal. The opposite would be at least two world views: cooperation, harmony and love; and live and let live, mutual tolerance. Positive peace and negative peace. But an alliance based on worst case analysis has taken a stand, the cold war is already there, a little spark may make it hot. Hence the idea of Dr. Jon Ebersole, an American with Swiss heritage living in Switzerland, of being neutral relative to ET, and more particularly of Switzerland keeping its neutrality as a service to the whole, in spite of the many US efforts to enroll the country in NATO.
To this the objection may be that for those exposed to Western, not Chinese, USOs five-six centuries ago a strong alliance might have been useful to survive intact. To which the objection might be that there was after all something to learn from the USO people. To which the objection might be that, well, but they never wanted to learn anything from us, in their arrogance. To which the answer may be to keep an open mind, learning and teaching, remaining neutral.
Johan Galtung
6 September 2010
