In the light of the crazy world we are living in…
‘Do not forget,’ the BFG said, ‘that human beans is disappearing everywhere all the time even without the giants is guzzling them up. Human beans is killing each other much quicker than the giants is doing it.’
‘But they don’t eat each other,’ Sophie said.
‘Giants isn’t eating each other either,’ the BFG said. ‘Nor is giants killing each other. Giants is not very lovely, but they is not killing each other. Nor is crockadowndillies killing other crockadowndillies. Nor is pussy-cats killing pussy-cats.’
‘They kill mice,’ Sophie said.
‘Ah, but they is not killing their own kind,’ the BFG said.
‘Human beans is the only animals that is killing their own kind.’
‘I is not understanding human beans at all,’ the BFG said. ‘You is a human bean and you is saying it is grizzling and horrigust for giants to be eating human beans. Right or left?’
‘Right,’ Sophie said.
‘But human beans is squishing each other all the time,’ the BFG said.
‘They is shootling guns and going up in aeroplanes to drop their bombs on each other’s heads every week. Human beans is always killing other human beans.’
He was right. Of course he was right and Sophie knew it. She was beginning to wonder whether humans were actually better than giants.
The BFG – Roald Dahl (p. 70-71)
I can’t imagine a more appropriate setting to describe what amounts to genocide. In my lifetime, millions of people slaughtered in death camps, from Europe’s Holocaust to Darfur, are proof of what our species is capable of.
Paul Martin, a paleoecologist. The World Without Us – Alan Weisman (p. 66)
The glorious dead? There is nothing glorious about dying in a war. A bunch of starving, freezing boys killin’ each other so the rich people can stay rich. Madness.
True Blood S01E02
Now, when I hear that somebody is dead, I simply shrug and say what the Tralfamadorians say about dead people, which is “so it goes”.
Slaughterhouse-Five – Kurt Vonnegut (p. 20)
How do we stop this madness, do you reckon?
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