of Fireflies and the human condition

After reading reviews citing it as one of the most depressing movies ever seen by users, and with an IMDB user rating of 8.2, plus a top 200 slot in the IMDB Top 250 movies list, I finally got down to watching Grave of the Fireflies. Yes, it’s an anime movie (fairly short, about 80 minutes long) and while I generally get quite depressed over movies displaying the lamentable human condition and the general apathy of society to this condition, I was underwhelmed.

It saddens me to think that our species as a whole and myself as a single unit of said species may have, in the name of art that oversteps its own chalked lines in terms of depravity and pathos, desensitized itself to suffering in general. I cannot speak for anyone apart for myself, which is why I rarely bother speaking at all, but to be desensitized to the suffering of your fellow man, in my opinion, makes one confirmedly set themselves apart from the rest of the species as a whole and judge outside ourselves. In order to judge in this way, one must either me tremendously concieted, be the holder of delusions of grandeur of the highest order, or simply be mad. Which of the above most accurately describes my own condition, I have yet to determine, due to a lack of an objectivity about the self.

… work calls, as always. Musings to be continued another day.

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