editorial
ODYSSEY 6
•
DIGIMAG
2016 began with a bang. Wild
stock-market swings and some
major crashes, notably China's.
Currency and exchange rates
moving in equally exaggerated
and unpredictable ways.
recent COP21 conference hold-out nations like the
The global economy staggering along, its future
thought for the consequences both immediate and
uncertain. Oil has come tumbling down to sensible
long-term, is on its way out.
figures, but consumers are, for the most part and in
In its place is coming a new way of being – but the
most places, including here in South Africa, not seeing
chaos is such that it is hard to see and hear the birth
the benefit. Donald Trump, despite a loss in the
of that new way through all the confusion and noise
opening round of the US Presidential party nomination
caused by the dying throes of the increasingly useless
battles, is still riding high – at least in his own mind
and damaging 'old order'.
and that of his weirdly loyal supporters – presenting
Which is what makes things appear very complex,
the planet with the truly awful aspect of 'The Donald'
because what part of what we see and hear each day,
and bizarre hairstyle strutting about the world stage
as the world around us changes at a rate never before
pumped up with arrogance and aggression. Syria
experienced by humanity, is to be warmly welcomed
remains a disaster zone, with refugees fleeing in
and which are to be thrown into the waste-bin of
ever-greater numbers to overwhelmed neighbouring
history?
states and to ever-more conservative European
No-one, or at least, hardly anyone, seems to know.
countries, some of which are on the verge of
And so most people, including many who read this
closing their borders. Putin continues to flex his
magazine, are confused, anxious and deeply worried
bullying muscles to show that Russia is resurgent in
for their children's lives – and even their own lives
international geo-politics.
and livelihoods.
All this while at home things are sliding from bad to
Such is the nature of global change at the most
worse as far as governance and proper administration
fundamental level – the level, in this instance, of the
goes – as readers of this edition will discover when
human consciousness which gave birth to the old way
they read our definitive story on what exactly is
of seeing in which the entire universe was 'made for
happening with regards to the Zuma government
mankind' to exploit and despoil as 'he' saw fit.
trying to make out that dietary supplements and
The new consciousness speaks instead of 'man' –
healing herbs, most of which have been used for
being a hold-over of a paternalistic, male-dominated
centuries and millennia with complete safety, are
past which, to be frank, cannot be over soon enough
suddenly equivalent to thalidomide.
– but of humankind, with the emphasis on the 'kind'
So what on Earth – or in Heaven or even Hell, for that
part of that word. Instead of the standard 'he', or the
matter – is going on?
masculine form in all instances, people are realising
It is a good question and not merely on South
the power of the archetypal 'she', the feminine divine,
Africans' lips, but on those of many people around
so long suppressed in Western culture and still so in
the world.
large parts of the world.
The answer is both simple and complex. The simple
In the new awareness, both men and women are
part is that we are literally witnessing the death of
being called to rise to a much higher order of ethics
a system of economics, politics and a way of doing
and thoughtfulness about how they live their lives,
'business as usual' which is so outdated that at the
what they do with their time, how they spend their
United States and Australia had, finally, to admit that
global warming was not only real, but that it was upon
us already and causing widespread devastation.
The old way, in which mankind treats the natural world
and its inhabitants, and routinely many members of
our own species, as mere resources to be utilised,
ravished, depleted and discarded at will, without