The Usurpers

Have you ever seen any of those movies where a highly advanced life form, whose planet is no longer habitable, attacks our Earth with the purpose of colonizing it, and in some, moving on towards other planets to devour?

I have always wondered why so many of these movies have the same pattern. I believe it is because these cinematic depictions are nothing but digital projections of the human subconscious’ foretaste.

Let me elaborate.

Us, humans are one of the youngest, the smartest beings on the planet, sitting on the top of every food chain and so further evolved than any other species on the planet, that for an onlooker it would be very hard to believe that we could be from Earth itself.

We have single-handedly changed our planet so much so that we are very close to causing a mass extinction. Before humans evolved, less than a single species per million went extinct annually. Today, the rate of extinction is a 1000 times faster, mostly due to human-caused habitat destruction and climate change.

Oh yes we are also saving a lot of species from extinction by spending millions of dollars every year, but we choose our favourites to save. And the cute and fuzzy mammals receive the maximum funding. On a grander scale this bias might just pass off as a half-hearted attempt to purify our dark conscience.

We also are taking baby steps to start living on Mars since we see no future of our species on this planet.

To put things into perspective - We slowly devour this planet for our greed and convenience and then move on to another planet to do the same.

Alas! Unlike the humans being destroyed in the blink of an eye by the demonic aliens on the big screen, we torture our victims to a slow and painful death.

Alas! Nature would not be as kind on these other species as to gift them with a superhero who will save their world. Fate has left them at our mercy and we have already left faith in the fate of earth.


Manthan Mehta