As we’re approaching the final hours of 2024, it is a good time to take a step back and remember what this year taught us. History might not repeat itself, but it does rhyme, as the saying goes, and the past is always the best teacher to prepare us for the future.
For many of our fellow humans, 2024 was yet another turbulent year, filled with terrible strife, war, death, pain and indescribable suffering. The two ongoing war fronts and the images that reach us all directly and live through our phones, have proven that war is indeed the health of the State. There is no other explanation as to why these conflicts are still raging and why the human death toll is still climbing to this day. Over the last year, humanity has once again been defeated by special interests, politicians, lobbyists and all kinds of other misanthropes. However, those who know me also know that I am a hopeless optimist. Even in the face of such destruction and carnage, I still believe in our shared human bond and I am convinced that in virtue, kindness and decency will eventually prevail.
I also see the silver linings, faint as they may be. For example, this past year didn’t only bring us darkness: it will also proved to us that rays of light and hope still exist. Many brave individuals did their best to make difference, either though their actions or their words. A lot of others, that normally wouldn’t even dream of questioning the State narrative, whatever it might be at any given time, started to do so.
Many of them realized that if the evidence of their own eyes doesn’t match the “official version of events” that is being pushed by their governments and regurgitated by every mainstream media outlet, then they should rather trust the former. And we must all keep in mind that this is no small feat. Opposing these narratives or even asking questions about them is becoming more and more risky these days. As the notion of free speech now already seems like a thing of the past, as citizens in the West are getting fines and even prison time for social media posts and as any sort of dissent is being brutally crushed by any and all means available, raising basic objections and concerns is becoming a dangerous act of rebellion.
However, thanks to the global interconnectivity and sense of borderless community that the internet has brought us, these rebellious voices can no longer be that easily stifled. Social media platforms may try to silence them, but they still find each other, they debate and learn from each other. This gives me great hope for the future, as like-minded, freedom- and peace-loving individuals can come together and empower one another to break free from the State’s shackles and they can leave behind the all the absurdities, the deception and the exploitation of the current system. They can cooperate, “opt-out” of the sociopolitical and economic order that the State has to offer and build something much better, much more productive, innovative, and most of all, free.
Over the last year, we saw a lot of steps in the right direction. Chief among them, is the the massive political shift in the US, but also in Europe too. The Trump victory was a reflection of the frustration of the masses that were being asked for way too long to reject the evidence of their own eyes. The economy was not booming as they were told, at least not for them. Inflation was not under control as their political and institutional leaders insisted. The average voter’s paycheck was shrinking as the stock market was soaring, fueling their justified anger and resentment toward the “ruling class”, those connected to the State and all its institutions. Crime, inequality, education and healthcare and other very long standing structural problems were also not getting better, as the politicians and the media insisted.
This is why a clear majority of the US voting population decided to bring back President Trump. A lot of people around the world also rejoiced at the victory, believing it would mean better days ahead on the geopolitical front at least, as Trump has always maintained his intention to end both wars as soon as possible.
However, we must all remember that the least of two evils is not the equivalent of good. Just because the extreme Left was defeated, with all their absurd economic and social interventions, as well as their hawkishness, it doesn’t mean that one should embrace Trump as some kind of messiah. He is still a politician, he sought power (quite fiercely as well) over others and he is still just one piece in an enormous State machine that really doesn’t care who wins the election. The machine hums along no matter who is in symbolically at the helm.
This is a lesson that Europeans need to understand too, and everyone else for that matter. Freedom doesn’t come from above, it isn’t merely handed to us by some benevolent dictator. It comes from within, as it is the individual mind that must be liberated first and foremost.
That is my wish to all of us for the New Year.
P.s. Photo: Ascona, Ticino, Switzerland, December 29th, 2024
Claudio Grass, Hünenberg See, Switzerland. www.claudiograss.ch
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