We can't afford to be passive any longer.

Hi Ernst, I love it how you are a self-proclaimed pessimist, LOL. I dig that.

I used to say I'm an optimistic realist. Or was it a realistic pessimist? This was a while ago, I was a kid. I don't know any more what I called myself but I do still remember how I thought and felt. If I had to describe it now, I would say I had a heavy heart, didn't believe in humans but was ready to fight for the good in this world.

I still am. Not much has changed to be honest in that respect.

There were years in between, my whole twenties and thirties in which I tried to figure out what I want to do in my life after having lost myself in what others wanted me to be. I fell into deep depressions and wasn't even a pessimist any longer, I became nothing.

And in that nothingness, at the bottom of all bottoms, I found myself again. I was denying myself to even think of fighting for the right thing any longer, because life (and people) have 'proven' to me that nothing can be changed, that "it's not worth it".

But then I said to myself:"It doesn't matter any longer if I can change anything at all, in any way. What matters is that I live who I am. I'm a fighter, hence, I need to fight for the good even if it's completely pointless."

I love your story about your club and the cards and the discussions you had with your friend at 11.

You say empathy is hard. Maybe at first, sure. But once you get the hang of it, it becomes as easy as breathing.

That's why I think it should be taught in schools.

Meanwhile I've found many different ways on how I can improve our lives and have even met my fellow pirate, my husband, who I think would love your articles, especially on data, tech etc, I'll show it to him.

There is so much we can do. And if we all contribute for the right thing, in whichever small way possible, it will tip the scale over to true equality and justice.

Even if it's just greeting everyone on the streets for example, it makes a big difference!

I focus mainly on knowledge, general knowledge, on communication between men and women, knowledge about love and relationships, on educating our children and preparing them for life with useful tools.

My husband is more on the technical side of things, preparing for that side of the future.

We are heading towards an age of AI which, as my husband says, needs to be fed with sufficiently diversified data so it can be human enough not to destroy us.

I myself am scared of that technological future to be honest, I don't want to go to Mars, I'm more the woman who loves to stand barefoot in the sand, feeling the grains underneath her feet, watching the sunrise on Playa del Carmen and crying at the beauty of our magnificent planet. I want to stay here.

You are absolutely right, we can have different opinions and still have good discussions, balancing our different views out, finding common ground.

All these difference which have been created as you mention, they feel so artificial. They are yet another great distraction from what's actually happening in the background.

Every time I see someone shouting in the media, I look in the opposite direction and ask myself - what are they hiding? What's the agenda?

It's always the same agenda - exploiting us one way or another and robbing the country blind while we are busy fighting with each other about some artifical problems.

Brexit? Completely artificial "problem". Everyone seemed to be quite happy and content, until these politicians 'reminded their people to be great again'.

But up until then, British people were happy about us Europeans coming to do the dirty little jobs and doing them really well.

Everyone loved the different cuisine and London truly felt like the best and most vibrant metropolitan city in the world!

We all started to enjoy ourselves, life was good. Maybe too good?

So then there was a slow summer it seems and the politicians needed to do....something. So they asked a stupid question - do you want to leave Europe?

At first the reason being given was a quite logical one - the EU regulations didn't always make sense for everyone.

OK, fine, but then why aren't the countries discussing this further?

JUST before the actual referendum the media started to heat up the racial debate of course and Facebook manipulated those couple of thousand votes needed to get over 50%. Yes, it was proven.

But let's not forget. It was just a referendum. Nowhere did it say, the politicians HAD to follow it. They asked for an opinion, nothing more. The politicians still had the duty to decide what was best for the country. After all, they were voted to decide accordingly.

Suddenly they didn't want to let go of the idea.

Three years later now, you have to ask yourself, why.

My theory is this:

A discussion was OFF the table, a complete divide was aimed at and achieved, as you said, Ernst.

And my theory is, that while it's a lot of work to make a country truly prosperous in order to skim off some money into private pockets, it is far easier to ruin a country. As the UK has proven, it only takes a couple of emotional mottos in the media and ignoring the high courts and you can run a highly functional democratic country into complete ruin within three to four years.

Then you bet against the pound as you tank the country, take the billions you 'earned' on the stock market and run.

Meanwhile I just got a letter from our tax institution that if I can pay my taxes early please, I should do so in order to help the country recover.

So wait a minute...! There was no room for discussion whatsoever, no empathy for our businesses which were tanked nor people who were wrongly deported or are still being held in 'detention centres' which are worse than prison and three times the amount was spent on Brexit, to leave the EU, while the excuse to leave the EU was the money which had to be paid into the pot. When I say three times the amount, I mean three times the amount of ALL the years put together during which the UK was part of the EU, having to pay into the pot, from which a lot then came back for sciences etc....

After all these atrocities, no smaller than what Trump managed to do with the US, if not actually far bigger, WE, the little people are being asked to 'save the country' and pay tax before the 1st January 2021 - the date we are leaving the EU.

What is happening around the world is laughable. Yes, you end up being a pessimist. And while I no longer really believe in humanity, I will never stop fighting for that shimmer of possibility to turn it all around one day - SOON. Because this is not just about us. This is about the question, what kind of world will we be giving over to our children?

I do not expect them to sort out the mess we've made.

To unite in discussion and accepting - no! -rejoicing in our differences is paramount.

Let's not get distracted by all these loudmouths shouting hate and let's stay focused on the amazing things we can build together.

I would suggest...

Let's not wait for the right leader. We can bond and lead together. In fact, we all should be involved far more in the daily decisions being made for our future. Simply voting and then leaving it up to a handful of people where our future is supposed to go - that's so wrong and in part we are to blame just as well by not wanting to make the effort beyond our daily lives.

Look, I get it. We are all too distracted by simple and naked survival. But we have been put into this place, where there is no time for thought, no time to unite, no time to look up and realise what we need to do. This was by design. There is no blame. Pure empathy.

What I'm trying to say is, we will have to be more than that, more than "just" survivors. We will have to be the heroes we are watching on Netflix these days. There will be no miraculous hero to save us all. Impossible anyway for crying out loud. Even if we had Superman... It's like trying to think of how Santa can deliver all presents to all children in one night. Just the same, Superman could never save everyone and every day. Ridiculous. And yet we would like to stay on the couch, hoping beyond hope that someone else will do the work for us.

Nope, the sooner as many of us as possible get involved every day, the sooner we can create a wonderful world together. It's actually not that impossible. We have all the power. We have the spending power for example.

Nothing scares "the powerful" more than us not buying stupid stuff we don't need.

So simple.

Uf, sorry, this turned out to be a political piece. I guess there is no avoiding it any longer.

There is hope though. I've observed it with my husband. As he speaks up against the stupidity and racism, others dare to speak up against the right-wing extremist people as well suddenly and people are finding their voice.

More and more, not just people but also businesses, are starting to understand that simply ignoring those few loudmouths who are not insterested in common ground, but only hate and destruction if it was up to them, doesn't work.

Letting those few hateful people shout abuse online give you the impression there are a lot of them out there. But in fact they are actually in a minority.

The problem is that progressive people, peaceful by nature, stay silent (peaceful?) online and have automatically lost their lives to the few hateful ones - simply because of being passive.

We can't afford to be passive any longer.

We need to speak up and become a more active part of leadership.