The More Things Change

I must admit I had only ever heard of the guy.  I had never heard him (which really would have meant nothing, as he speaks another language) or read a translation of what he had said.
I have now.  Vaclav Havel.  The 1st President of Czechoslovakia after the communist dictatorship.     He had been imprisoned several times and then came the velvet revolution.  Afterwards the country became two countries.  The Czech Republic and the Republic of Slovakia.
He was a playwright.  It seems anything can happen and often does.  In one European country a comedian has become Prime Minister, while the US had an actor as President.
I like a lot of what I am reading of what he said.  He had opportunity to leave his country when it was ruled by the communists but he stayed.  His reason was “the solution of this human situation does not lie in leaving it.”  I like that.  Sometimes it seems invalid to leave.  Sometimes seeing it through is the best way for me.
That was the first thing that got my attention.  It was what I read later that resounded in me.  He shocked the people listening to him by implying they were all guilty.  To have worked for the regime was to have propagated it.  It was though, destined to fall apart.  He likened it to a plane held together by nuts and bolts.  When the nuts and bolts fail, the plane crashes.  The people were the nuts and bolts and they were wearing down holding the system together.  “We are all …responsible for the operation of the totalitarian machinery; none of us is just its victim: we are all also its co-creators.”
I don’t know how often I hear it.  Blaming others for my problems.  Sure they may play a big part, but being a “victim” seems to me often to be my choice thing.  To blame others seems to be an abdication of my responsibly. 
Havel was talking about politics and governments but even in that arena changing the government was not a panacea.  The communist revolution saw the getting rid of the monarchy.  Change was needed but was the change really for the better?  The regime that replaced the monarchy makes me think that in many ways no.  Apartheid had to go.  It was abhorrent.  Now majority rules.  Is it better?  It certainly can be better now, but by the number of South Africans that have moved to this country now, I can’t help but think a lot of people are voting with their feet.
It seems so often I replace one imperfect system with another.  It is one of the reasons I do not believe a change of government is the answer.  I may support one party over another, but it is really just a case for me of seeing one party as less worse than another.
Mankind’s long history of wars and violence makes me believe it is a change of human nature that is needed, and not just a change of government.  Time and again it appears to be that the more things change, the more they stay the same.