History repeats itself

Post 136 The love of money is the root of all evils

A friend of mine migrated to a foreign land with his family a few years ago. We met when he came back for a short trip. It was a gathering of old friends. We exchanged notes and updated one another with our latest developments. We talked on every topic with politics being the core subject. We came to the same conclusion as our high school Chinese literature teacher had told us 50 years ago: If the leaders of a nation are corrupt and without integrity, that nation must fall sooner or later. Otherwise history is wrong.

Our teacher told us that in the 5,000 years of history in China, kingdoms fell due to poor governance and incompetence of officials. Our much respected teacher warned us that under no circumstances should we bring shame to ourselves and to our family members. We also concluded at our meeting place at Kopitiam (meaning coffee café in Hokkien dialect) that our teacher was prophetic. History repeats itself. We see greedy leaders falling into their own traps and bringing shame to themselves. Our friend who is now a foreigner in his former home country added that not many people will learn from history, especially when one is blinded by greed.

Indeed in a multitude of crooked deeds, self-respect and a sense of shame are grossly lacking. To make our society devoid of malpractices, family education is of vital importance. Parents who fail to nurture their children to be people of character are doing injustice to the society they live in.

White-collar thieves and robbers are the manifestations of a failed family education.- Quote by Ho Nee Yong

20 March 2011