Joan Marques - MBA, Doctoral Student
Burbank, California - June 2002

Now here's an article that just touches a little bit on this and a little bit on that - possibly leaving us all as clueless as the critique itself in the end.

If we stop for one moment and glance around us, we can only conclude that the recent world developments are indicating that we have landed at a point in our civilization where we might want to prefer eliminating our ability to think. For thinking will only lead to the realization that the entire chain of current events terrifyingly resembles what pessimists have always marked as "the beginning of the end."

While there seems to be no peaceful solution possible to the age-old war in the eastern part of the world; the western part suffers from air that is so polluted, that one could wonder why people still choose to live there! (And yes, I am one of the ones you could frown upon, because I live there too!) According to local newspapers, Los Angeles has been crowned - for the third year in a row ? (drum roll...) the queen of smoggy air. Simple conclusion: if you don't have iron lungs, L.A. is not your lady!

While in the Netherlands a promising politician is murdered shortly before the elections that would probably bring him more power than many of the so-called liberal and broad-minded Dutch citizens might have wanted, Germany is trying to recuperate from one of the deadliest school-drama's in its history.

While one aggravated person is placing bombs in innocent U.S. citizens' mailboxes, just when the Anthrax scare has seemed to subside; another lunatic is burying rusty razorblades in children's playgrounds!

And while companies continue to lay people off by the thousands, everyone keeps wondering why the number of car-chases, bomb-placements, razor-burials, and school-shootings keeps increasing?

And in the midst of this all; board members in a California school district suddenly decide that High School graduates at certain schools will not be allowed to participate in the commencement ceremonies, to be held in a couple of weeks, if they cannot submit a document that proves their enrollment in a college, university, trade-school, or national service.

So much for freedom in a free world. Now tell me... do YOU still have a clue? Is there any positive way of looking at this? And where exactly are we going wrong? Is our civilization really crashing? Or will some miraculous spiritual purification process heal our earth and its citizens? It will be interesting to see how we get ourselves out of this impasse...that's for sure!