The Problem Of The Twenty-First Century

In his most magnificent of books, the great Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois pronounced: "the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line." The striking fact, of course, being that he wrote this in 1903, with still 97 years of said century still to run.

I am not so bold. As I write, there are only 93 years of the twenty-first century to appear in the present, before becoming history forever.

He was the greatest educator of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. His work for the immediate social up-lift of the African-American deserves credit of the highest merit. A man who inspired both Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr -- leaders closer to our own generation, who spoke a language closer (sometimes eerily so) to that of our own. Oh! what joy we have in knowing he lived through the civil rights era, and to consider his spirit still in our society today!

A man of vision, Du Bois certainly was. It would be easy to categorise his foreseeing of the troubles ahead as in the same bracket of those of a certain Greek mythologist. A bold prediction it was, but the signs and signifiers were all there. Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois merely framed them in a sweeping generalisation of a sound bite, which every gentlemen could comprehend.

But should he be alive today, he would have to turn his back on the issue of race when trying to consider the great problem of the next century. The century we shall have to live through. Oh! the pain, for the issue of race did not end in 1999, the second the clock took us into years beginning with '2'. Race will always be in our society, so long as there are always people of different colors, creeds, origins, &c., all jumbled together in the social sphere of Great Britain. And Britain is most certainly Great -- the greatest, one might so far as saying -- for she is the least likely of the Western nations to turn 'race' into 'racism'. A problem, of course, which befell the largest most dominant nation to span this earth. The Empire of the West could only wriggle with the pain of racism, as it threatened (and to a lesser extent did) tear the country in two. And I don't mean the civil war. I mean the 1950's.

The greatest leveller, though, is time. A healer, I have heard it called. Healing, yes, is one of the abilities of time. But it can also bruise. Time has scarred us in a way every man should fear -- indeed, in a way Man should fear. For the problem of the twenty-first century is the problem of the climate.

The problem is, like racism, sadly embedded in our society, but it isn't one concerning philanthropy. The gentlemen gathered in Paris, with all their PhD's hanging over their heads, and told us what we already new. An act of greater symbolism than of real value -- the problem became official. The problem became real. If we do not change our habits soon, the racism wins. The racists of 1950's America slam down the civil rights movement and the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr and Malcolm X are glorified. Go far enough back and the confederates win the civil war. Go further, and the slave trade cannot be abolished. As you can see, we must act now.

Were all the efforts of the great great men mentioned above in vain? Did they only make society better for less than a century. The debate on race is a healthy one to have, but it will be meaningless if it cannot impact upon the future. For it to do that, we need to make sure we have a future.

I arose this morn to see the bird table, just feet from the window. As the blind went higher, I could see the struggling garage. But beyond that...... nothing. Nothing. Only thick fog forever more. There had been a disaster on an apocalyptic scale, but my habitat remained in tact.

Like looking through the fog of this morn, we cannot say for sure what the future holds for Mankind, but the problem of the twenty-first century is the problem of climate. We must act now. The time for talking was yesterday. The time for actions was today. But still our politicians sit in the House of Commons, the House of Representatives, the Senate &c. debating what is to be done.

Fools! All of us! Waiting for a solution. We could be waiting until we slowly burn to death under the heat of God's great sun. We are going about this the wrong way. We need to learn a lesson from the civil rights movement, and we need to learn now! The solution to the problem of the twentieth century was bottom-up. From the ghettos of the Northern cities, and from the densely populated areas of the racist south, they went and marched on Washington, in a show of change, in a show of defiance, in a show of anger, in a show of unity! And why? To force change!

The solution to the problem of the twenty-first century is bottom-up! We need to act now! We need to make the changes. In moments of great crisis, politicians do not make the magnificent gestures of brilliance, the people do! Act now and the future is ours, secured by us.

Yours, wherever you may be,
Daniel C. Wright.