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ホントに下着に火がついた!
昨年暮れのクリスマスに米デトロイトで発生したテロ未遂事件は、容疑者の下着に火が付いただけで大惨事にはならなかった。
しかし、われわれ人類はいつまで、自分の信念を無理やり他人に押し付けようとするのだろうか。
隣人を尊敬し、助けることが大切ではないかと筆者は考えるのだが…。
Part Eleven — "Liar Liar Pants on Fire" (... no really)
There's an expression in English that children use when they're playing. They say, "Liar Liar Pants On Fire!" when they think someone is lying. Last year on Christmas Day a man on a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit decided to try to detonate a bomb just prior to landing. Luckily, it didn't go off, instead he set fire to his underwear and the seat he was sitting in. Not a lie, pants on fire.
Why did he wait until the end of the flight? Why didn't he set off the bomb in the bathroom where he had just spent 20+ minutes? And why in his underpants? Wow, that has got to hurt!
There are all kinds of beliefs: personal ones, religious ones, nationalistic ones. For some reason, we seem as human beings to have a hard time keeping them to ourselves. Religious zealots attack other religious zealots. On a grand scale, countries attack other countries. It seems for thousands of years all we have done is think of new and better ways to kill each other. A collective mentality that believes it is the only answer to the world's problems more often than not creates more problems than it fixes.
But it's not just organized groups. As individuals we spend a lot of time trying to convince others to be like us and not enough time using our knowledge to help the people around us, regardless of what they believe. What good could have resulted if in fact the Christmas Day underwear bomber had killed himself and hundreds of people on that flight? No one would have cared about his beliefs or his social plight. We would have just thought it was dumb and very unfortunate, not to mention annoying, now that it will take even more time to get through airport security.
Come on. It's 2010 and we need a new mantra. Enough with the selfishness that allows us not to consider the person next to us or the one on the opposite side of the planet. We are intelligent, highly capable human beings, so we at least should be able to clean the planet, and respect and help our neighbors. After that, different belief systems are fine (and actually quite necessary), until we start forcing them down each other's throats.
- rants
- 長広舌
- raves
- 熱弁
- Liar Liar Pants on Fire
- 「やーい、うそつき、うそつき、パンツが火事だ」という子どものはやし言葉
- no really
- いや、ホントに
- flight
- (飛行機の)便
- detonate
- 〜を爆発させる
- just prior to 〜
- 〜の直前に
- landing
- 着陸
- go off
- 爆発する
- set fire to 〜
- 〜に火を付けた
- underwear
- 下着
- set off 〜
- 〜を爆発させる
- bathroom
- トイレ
- 20+ minutes
- 20分あまり
- has got to hurt
- さぞかし痛い思いをしただろう
- beliefs
- 信念
- have a hard time keeping 〜 to ourselves
- 〜を他人に押し付けないことが、なかなかできない
- zealots
- 熱狂者
- On a grand scale
- 大きな規模では
- more often than not
- しばしば
- fixes
- 解決する
- convince 〜 to 〜
- 〜に〜するように説得する
- regardless of 〜
- 〜に関係なく
- What good could have resulted
- (if以下が実現していたら)どんなよい結果がもたらされたというのか
- No one would have cared about 〜
- 〜を気に掛ける者などいなかっただろう
- plight
- 問題
- dumb
- 愚かな
- not to mention 〜
- 〜は言うに及ばず
- now that 〜
- 〜なので
- get through 〜
- 〜を通過する
- Come on.
- さあ
- mantra
- スローガン
- Enough with 〜
- 〜はもうたくさんだ
- planet
- 地球のこと
- belief systems
- 信念体系
- forcing 〜 down each other's throats
- 互いの〜を無理やり押し付けあう