A Message From Surgeon-General Mars In Virgo
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”
-Sun Tzu
Greetings, people of Earth. As you may know, I am the planet in charge of conflict. I am now in the Sign of “reason and logic, with a side order of medicine.” And when I look down on your planet I see a whole lot of people who are conflicted over matters of personal choice and medical science. By all means, let you me help you out with a little basic information. I may be in charge of conflict, but I also like winning. And I would like to see as many of you as possible “win” this current conflict.
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Let me tell you a true story from history about how a small group of people who valued their beliefs and their sense of superiority resulted in unnecessary death for millions of innocent people.
In the early to mid-1500s, Spain invaded Central and South America seeking both territory and the great quantities of gold that were found there. The Spaniards were up against some of the most advanced civilizations the world had ever seen. I am referring to the Aztecs and Mayans, among others.
The conventional story that is told in history classes is that Spain was able to conquer the Americas because of their Superior technology. The Aztecs knew plenty about metallurgy, but they preferred gold and silver to make a pretty shiny things as opposed to working with iron to make swords and armor. The Spaniards had horses. The Aztecs did not even have the wheel.
When Hernán Cortés conquered the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan in 1521, he did so with inferior numbers. Sure, he had steel and horses, but Aztec armor was woven from fabric and was almost as weapon-proof as what the Spaniards wore… and was much lighter. So much so that many Spanish troops adopted it. Let’s see you running around fighting in the jungle wearing a steel breastplate! And sure, Cortés had horses. Those are great for fighting on the plains, but not so much on hillsides. That, and if you know what you are doing when you throw bolas (as the Aztecs did), horses aren’t that hard to take down.
So by the time Cortés reached Tenochtitlan in 1521, he had a small force of men to attack a fortified city of over 200,000 people. So: how did he win?
Smallpox.
Smallpox had killed millions of Europeans over the centuries, and thus many Spaniards had at least partial immunity. Not so with the people of Central and South America. As one Spanish historian put it:
“As the Indians did not know the remedy of the disease, they died in heaps, like bedbugs. In many places it happened that everyone in a house died, and as it was impossible to bury the great number of dead, they pulled down the houses over them, so that their homes became their tombs.”
Once the virus had entered Tenochtitlan, its people didn’t stand a chance. Sure, the Spaniard were better armed, and the Aztecs were divided by petty squabbling over how to handle the invasion. But when you get right down to it? Viruses don’t give a damn about you bragging about your “all natural healthy immune system” or your suspicions about “Big Pharma” or that you didn’t pay attention in Junior High Biology class.
…and that’s why a LOT more people in Central and South America speak Spanish today, rather than Nahuatl or Quechua.
Now ask yourself who the real “enemy” is here.
Anyway, I can compel you but I can’t make you dance to my tune. As many of you like to point out, you have freedom. I’m just here to remind you the lesson that you should have learned in the last 16 months, if not in the last several thousand years:
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.“
-George Santayana
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