For those of us in the LGBT community, women, and racial minorities even just being accepted for who we are; the battle to be treated as equal can be a frustrating and sometimes dangerous. Hope is a powerful force that spurs us on.
For those too poor with or without jobs to be surrounded by the never ending media fantasy world that having more will make you happier; or at the very least validate your existence. Hope is a powerful force.
For those who struggle each day with hunger and the long trek for potable water the daily grind leaves no time for self pity yet say; "that tomorrow will be better". Hope is a powerful force.
For those under brutal repression who glimpse a fairer world through the chinks in the fence and dream of a less menacing future. Hope is a powerful force.
The meaningless promises that often bind and pacify until breaking point.
"The rule is, jam tomorrow and jam yesterday - but never jam today."
- Lewis Carroll
It is pretty much the golden rule of maintaining power:
It was better when....or....it will be better when...avoid today.
We live and breath hope every day even if what we have is already sufficient, in hoping we often turn a blind eye to others suffering and say "there but for love of god [luck] go I"; or the more prosaic "they are not trying hard enough".
Promises of paradise are powerful, the end of our suffering [real or imaginary] is at hand, yet every vision of paradise is different, one man's/woman's view of paradise can be hell for another.
Even I; an atheist at heart sat for a few minutes yesterday evening and thought "what if it is true" and "where do I stand in the grand judgement of it all". The thoughts then turned to those who hoped for the return of a paradise lost
Of Paradise, so late thir happie seat,
Wav'd over by that flaming Brand, the Gate
With dreadful Faces throng'd and fierie Armes:
Som natural tears they drop'd, but wip'd them soon;
The World was all before them, where to choose
Thir place of rest, and Providence thir guide:
They hand in hand with wandring steps and slow,
Through Eden took thir solitarie way.
One could say "poor fools" since the whole fiasco was roundly mocked; and some still will promise jam "since god will choose the day"; but who can say that they do not; "hope one day fairness will reign"?
If truth be told we can but live today; as most of us a powerless to change the great injustices we see [or refuse to see] or bear.
Reality is hard; let us do the best we can....
Paradise can wait.