What's Going on?

The war in Iraq has resulted in the death of more than 4,000 U.S. soldiers and nearly 30,000 wounded. According to the Energy Information Administration, today’s average price per gallon of regular grade gasoline is $3.29. Truckers have threatened a massive strike with diesel pricing nearing $4.00 per gallon. The cost of living for Americans continues to rise while income stagnates. In 17 of the 50 largest cities in the US, high school graduation rates are below 50 percent. Coincidentally, Marvin Gaye released the “What’s Going On?” album nearly 37 years ago. The album title as well as the title track poses a contemporarily apt question, “What’s Going On?”

It would be difficult to assume that Mr. Gaye was in some way prophetic given that the societal problems and struggles he lyrically discussed were all present at the time his album was released. “What’s Going On” was released in May of 1971 amid the Vietnam War, a country struggling with extreme poverty, heavy drug abuse, and political corruption. We find that history really does have a way of repeating itself. As much as we would like to think things have gotten better, we end-up with a vacuity of facts to support such an assumption. In fact, one might argue that society is worse today than years ago.

“Mercy Mercy Me”, another track on the album, confessed, “thing ain’t what they used to be…how much more abuse from man can you stand?” These lines help to paint a true picture of a society where people abuse themselves by becoming financially over extended with mortgages they cannot afford. On the other hand, there are those that are abused by predatory lenders offering subprime home loans to people that they know are likely to end in foreclosure. In either case, thousands and thousands of people around the country are losing their homes while banks are continuing to prosper and the housing market continues to decline. Consequently, even those who do not fall prey to predatory lenders, are credit worthy, and are able to make consistent and on-time mortgage payments suffer depreciation of their own homes as a result of foreclosures in their neighborhoods.

It is extremely hard to believe that something discussed in music almost 40 years ago has any application in a society that thrives on technological advances. Forty-years ago, I would assume that even the idea of hybrid automobiles was only a thought shared by a handful of visionary thinkers. Likewise, performing a surgery from Los Angeles on a patient in Toronto using mechanical arms, cameras, and lasers was probably the farthest thing from the minds of medical professionals. Undoubtedly, society has progressed, but it seems that only a privileged few have progressed along with it. We are again at war, we continue to struggle with drug abuse and addictions, political corruption is rampant, and poverty rates are astronomical. We also have nearly 47 million people without health insurance, sharply rising gas prices, and a host of other social problems.

With today marking the 40th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., how might our consistent downward spiral be turned upward so that we may all realize his dream? How might our question of, “What’s Going On?” be one of pleasant surprise rather than hurt and disappointment? © Keydron Guinn 2008