What I learnt from The Butler

This is a little different to the other 'What I learnt from...' series, with a little less frivolity and silliness. I saw The Butler by default, as the Chinese movie I wanted to see had finished, and so had apparently Percy Jackson. So I went to The Butler because it was on at the right time - I really liked it, though it didn't show me much I didn't know, except maybe that Bobby Kennedy was a little more influential than I realised. I'm not going to talk about this shameful historic period of time. The biggest thing I learnt from that movie, is that human beings have so much potential to be truly supreme beings, and yet we are still routinely doing horrific unthinkable things to other human beings.

And I mean here. In Australia.

Think of our current stances on Marriage equality, on Refugees, on a myriad of fund cutting the services for lower socio-economic groups, our blind-eye consumerism and the list goes on. I don't really have a solution, but I'm pretty sure twenty years from now, we'll be embarrassed by what we currently considered acceptable.

There is a line in the movie, 'We turn a blind eye to what we do to our own, but sit in judgement of the rest of the world'. I think that is the nutshell of human nature. Perhaps we need to pay a little more attention to our own behaviour. I don't know how we start change, but I know raising it to the consciousness as a problem has to be the seed of thoughtful living. How to make that seed take root and grow will take time, but it is definitely something worth considering.


PS The other thing I learnt is that I totally LOVE Oprah - I don't care what anyone says, her heart was in the right place with that show. (and yes, I did nerdily take that photo in the cinema like a weirdo)

Linking also with I must confess - head over and tell Kirsty how you feel.