“Few are the giants of the soul who actually feel that the human race is their family circle.” – Freya Stark, explorer and writer (1893-1993)

Imagine that a survey had been taken annually since the inception of the nation, in which 1000 randomly chosen Americans were asked if they agreed or disagreed with Melville’s statement here. I’m guessing that a large majority would have agreed with only a few exceptions throughout U.S. history, e.g., perhaps the Second World War….until about 1980, with the onset of neoliberalism, along with all its components and derivatives: greed, selfishness, indifference to others’ suffering, robo-consumerism, hatred of immigrants, the rapid decay of ethical standards, and the return of socially acceptable overt racism.

Of course, this is represented in the type of people we elect to lead us; we’ve gone from Jimmy Carter to Donald Trump in just 40 years.

Some of us have not given up.  My email signature is the title of this post.  Please feel free to make it yours too.