Given how unempathetically we have been responding, rather reacting indifferently and with apathy, to the current International War in West Asia, which seems to be raging like a wild fire across the region and expanding further, therefore, potentially impacting the entire world, economically and militarily — or the ongoing bloody conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine — would it be entirely unreasonable to claim that we have been transformed into unemotional robots, sans empathy and compassion? From now on, therefore, shouldn’t we call ourselves as ‘humanoids‘?
Aren’t humans being replaced, at both subtle and not so subtle levels, with more robotic humanlike individuals — the ‘humanoids’ — controlled remotely and programmed to respond quickly to commands received on phone?
What used to be expected from each one of us as default common human courtesies and mannerisms, politeness and care, are now seen — albeit for all wrong reasons — as (rare) acts of ‘kindness’. Really? A steady erosion of humanness and the human conscience — undertaken deliberately by the wealthy powerhouses in the world, via media and the AI, using malicious propaganda machines — has significantly undermined our human morality and the traditional value system, and filled us insidiously with a selfish, angry, and hateful mindset, ready to go to war anytime, for any crook or devil who commands us, and destroy the lives and properties of other people, howsoever, innocent they could be.
If the human freedom and capability to think critically and independently, and stand up and boldly ask questions and challenge when they must, is taken away from them — with or without their knowledge, by coercion, oppression or propaganda — what remains of them is just programmable robots, reduced to the level of slaves.
How sad it is that we now live in a strongly polarized and uncertain world where a person, who is naturally a kind, generous or forgiving person, is seen as naive, weak or cowardly? Common traditional moral and ethical values, which were supposed to be ingrained in the human conscience — now require conscious enculturation and deliberate efforts by those very few responsible humans — who have somehow retained their intrinsic humanness and saved themselves from undergoing a steady robotic metamorphosis and, thankfully, can still think independently, and with an open mind, and are able see the world with their very own open eyes — even in this dark, dismal and confused day and age of warring materialism, driven actively by toxic capitalism.
Blatant lies and deception are spread across the world incessantly via media, which is within an iron grip and airtight control of the wealthy and the powerful. As such, it is not very easy for a common person to separate untruth from truth, or facts from fiction. The reality is that a relatively handful of cons and crooks, and powerful megalomaniacs, have taken over the entire humanity through a malicious design and with a sinister aim to enslave it, only to harvest their own selfish material gains, unhinged and without challenge.
Needless to say, such bad wolves hunt together!
At our grass roots too, in schools, our robotic transformation is happening very quickly and that too under our very nose. Disappointingly, many of us take pride in what is happening with our children’s basic ‘literary and numeracy’ skills. How many 10-year old students can spontaneously write a legible essay on a given common topic (without plagiarizing), by hand, using pen and paper? How many 14-year old students can solve a mathematical problem (relevant only to their grade or lower), without using a scientific calculator or looking up on the internet or plagiarizing?
Is this really our progress over the last 300 years, since the dawn of the Industrial Age, that we are so proud and boisterous about? Aren’t we so very close to a point of our total annihilation? How long can we afford to exhibit an ostrich-like behavior, or close our eyes to the reality, before we are devoured by the beast chasing us? Is this the kind of (toxic) post-truth world that we want to be living in where the ‘means’ are misused to justify the ‘end’, regardless of how utopian or dystopian that ‘end’ may be?
Isn’t this the time when we must take a deliberate pause from our robotic daily lives and think deeply and critically, without bias, about the course of our future direction before we lose our relevance and, most importantly, our remaining humanness and the humanity?
Bill K Koul, from Perth, Western Australia (22 March 2026)
Copyright – Bill K Koul