The West In Crisis: Are "Human Rights" Our Right?

What's the worst thing about a global pandemic? No doubt at all for me: the restrictions of freedom. I know what I am talking about, having actually lived in a country that doesn't have freedom. Now we all know. Sure, we still have democracy but democratically elected restrictions on freedom are still enately not democratic and sure as hell do not prevent Jane and John Doe from the countryside thinking would have handled everything way better. I miss the pub as much as the next person does but the pivotal question I've been asking myself has been: are we entitled to freedom? It isn't friggin' happening right now, huh? But since it's us, the Free World, what is our right to DEMAND freedom to come back?

If you don't know what I mean with human rights, this blog will be questionable to you. Of course, there is a formalised document that states what every human being on this planet "has a right to" having: a place to sleep, freedom of speech and food to eat, to name a few. My country's Grundgesetz pretty much outlaws, in theory, the restrictions on our freedom right now, of course, with the right for everyone's safety taking precedence. But we know that's hardly the case for everyone in the world. So, in these times where us spoiled Westeners are losing all the the things we are used to having, and according to the UN are entitled to, how does the meaning of the word "right" change? The reality is that the moment I enforce myself having the rights I am told to have a right to, I am taking others ability to have the same (which, of course, basically is the same as always).

If I now want my freedom, for example to leave my house as I please, with whoever I please, as granted by all the dead people who made the laws of my country, I get fined (and, well, endanger my peers). Without the threat of a deadly disease and a governmental structure that has kept the country wealthy and peaceful for over 70 years now, I'd scratch my head, too. But someone who knows the situation better than me has asked me to, so I do it, the sheep that I am. My people chose Angela and her peers, I know the lady believes in the rule of law and science and that's all I need to know about her advise being better than my neighbors'. That is our system: you elect other people to make the big decision for us. It happens every day and we don't feel our freedom is at stake because yes, we are THAT spoiled. It makes zero sense to doubt this functioning system in the face of this crisis. Now things are unpleasant so it must be the government's fault. So what do we do: COMPLAIN! Yay!  Why now, especially?

Because we are affected, finally. Our rainbows are gone. And we want them back now. Of course, nobody really understands even the basics of molecular biology but we do know we want the pub back.  Fortunately, we have the big World Wide Web to express how much better we understand the Coronavirus than others. Unfortunately, the sheer amount of perceived intelligence in people is stupefying. Everyone has an opinion on the Coronavirus right now when opinions are completely redundant in science. If science is subjective, what's the point of fact then? If people believe they have a right to their human rights, that is a matter of opinion; but whether their subsequent action of carrying on with life, having parties, defying the state orders, is going to lead to the end of people's lives is no longer an opinion that needs believers, it is a basic fact. We cannot maintain our freedom as usual if we want our hands clean of causing other people's suffering (and really, we were already not really able to).

The bottom line is that we perceive human rights as something we have now lost, when most people on Earth never had it. Here we are mourning jobs lost, freedoms taken and even the food sometimes not being on the table when we were incredibly lucky to have had these things in the first place. The West is in a state of mourning while others have accepted. The terminology of the UN, calling these things Human Rights, so something we are entitled to, contributes to people's perception there is a choice of action available to them. As a result, we end up with people interpreting the right to decide as a right to reject a vaccine when, well, that's dangerous. It won't and shouldn't be a choice. There is fact and there is lie. Choose one. Believing vaccines are bad for the planet makes you scientifically proven wrong. What you feel about it is irrelevant. Yet, that's the right people claim. You can see where it will not get us out of this mess if everyone just claims their freedom as their blank check to be stupid (could bring up the people drinking Lysol last week, but let's just... move on).

We have to believe in the system, democracy, which should have a proven track record of attempting to acquire human rights for all, but no entity in the world can promise us human rights, not even Antonio Guterres (actually, especially not Antonio Guterres). I want every person in the world to have the rights outlined by the UN as human rights, yet, it isn't working is it? What's clear already is that the terminology is faulty. "Rights" can be acquired, I currently have no such option. Sure, I am entitled to my freedom, the UN says so, but I don't currently have it, do I? Nice of them to grant it to me but it's not a thing that can be granted. At least not in the world order we live in. Certainly not one that is designed by a virus. We should focus on the endeavour to attain human rights, but we certainly are far from achieving it. Right now, us mourning freedom-lovers, gotta suck it up although it sucks: we aren't as free as last year. Maybe the Coronavirus will make us see, learn, and possibly improve. I choose to believe we can do it. With the lack of existing research on what happens next, at least I still get to have an opinion about it... 

"Together At Home": What Artists On The Internet Taught Me During Lockdown

The Global Citizen concert last night was one of the biggest music collaborations ever, I'd say. Anyone in music who's anyone in music was in it (and Jimmy Fallon, ergh). I am biased because, well, you could say I have a career in both pop culture and internet video so I'm going all "ERMERGOD" at anything both Sir Elton John and Billie Eilish are part of. And while I do love my internet video, I did not watch the whole thing. People, I don't have 400odd minutes on a weekend to watch celebs thank health care workers from their villas, even I am bitter about that kind of behaviour. The music, however, made me ponder something very crucial about the Coronavirus: where does artistry come through at such a scientifically, and potentially politically, challenging time?

I am a hypocrite because my own artistry has failed this year. Maybe I was creatively challenged by the shitshow that is this planet in the last few years, and I don't want to be criticizing all the time anymore. This pandemic has made me busier than ever, with no such thing as a work life balance in the absence of a "life". I do realize I have nothing to complain about without being the most privilege person as all I have lost is the freedom to travel to Hawaii and to go to the pub which most people in the world don't even have in the first place. However, the loss of freedom is a crazy experience for me; one that makes me have feeling I didn't know before. And I, unlike artists, have failed to confront them.

To see Elton John blast "I'm Still Standing" painfully reminds me of my emotional inferiority to this man. Maybe comparing oneself to the greatest musician in the world is not a fair comparison but this man, with his ability that is nothing short of a gift, sings a 40-year-old song which suddenly sounds like it was always meant for this moment. His fingers fly over a piano like he's a machine. But he is not a machine that was created to do this for people, HE created it. Now, a thousand years into his career, there he is, STREAMING on YouTube to have people worried, sad and, frankly, fucking screwed, watch for three minutes and focus on nothing but the beautiful feeling associated to hearing his song. It's art, and only shitshows show us just how essential art really is.

Starts 1 min in, ignore the Beckhams who thank, you guessed it, the health care workers... 

This whole concert showed me a new face of music, arguably one I already knew, but never on this scale: We often speak about how music is personal, even if you haven't written the song, how it's what it means to YOU what matters, but every single song in this eternal celebrity carnival was written WITHOUT a global pandemic in mind. "You can't always have what you want", eh? Decades of truth suddenly in a whole new light. Man, I remember being a teenager thinking "how dumb is the song "Wake me up when September ends"", and now I wake up to that exact thought every morning. How did this happen: I suddenly respect Billy Joe Armstrong for his contribution to my day!

But the artistic exploration of my feelings around lockdown do not end there: I went on to watch The Phantom of the Opera from the Royal Albert Hall which Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber decided to broadcast on YouTube for free for two days. I know what you're thinking: it has to be lived in person, it's just not the same on a screen. I've seen it in person twice and I know this fully well, but that's not really possible right now, is it? But because there is a light in every darkness, this show was available to every kid from Armenia to Zanzibar for free, while even I, privileged white kid with a tech job, never had access to that STUNNING performance. I know nothing about musical theater but I know that The Phantom of the Opera is one of the best things ever written. I know that - and now 11 Million more viewers. This weekend alone.

Despite knowing the Phantom inside out, making Lloyd Webber appear almost superhuman to me, this masterpiece gets me where I didn't know I had hairs to stand up on my body. This superhuman ability I celebrate him for is a skill I, as a wannabe artist that would be lucky to have just an ounce of the emotional spectrum of someone who makes something so beautiful, deeply admire. "Softly" he says "music shall caress you. Hear it, feel it secretly possess you." Is this what's happening to me right now? And as if it wasn't relevant enough yet, the Phantom goes on to literally express what I feel, deep inside, behind my gut in whatever part of my body that beats out these absolutely horrendous quarantine feelings: "Open up your mind, let your fantasies unwind, in this darkness which you know you cannot fight!" Whatever I do in life, I will most likely never write a sentence so universally true for people ranging from a phantom in a dungeon and every thirty-something spoiled kid caught in a global pandemic.

I have discovered feelings brought to me the moment an amazing human being succeeds in making their feelings something beautiful. I can't even decide yet what I feel about this whole spiel. Am I sad? I don't know. Am I frustrated? Wouldn't really say that. What is this anxiety they all talk about, do I have it, too? I am finding nothing but disgraceful prose for my own feelings because I lack the ability these amazing artists already nailed: the ABILITY to feel all that. I might find the words once I have decided how I feel. I dread tomorrow when my therapist asks me "how I'm doing", a question I never had an answer for and hence always disliked. But for once I actually feel like I can find the teachers I need: musicians, filmmakers, actors, painters. And then, ultimately, I will have to become them.

Quite literally one of the best moments of my life!

I dare you to listen to it with quarantine in mind. Incredible!