What We’ve Forgotten: Remembering a World Where We All Eat

Somewhere between the overflowing dumpsters behind supermarkets and the empty plates of millions of children, we lost something. Something essential.

We live in a world of staggering abundance—technology that can map genomes and mine asteroids, delivery apps that bring ice cream to your door at midnight—and still, tonight, someone will go to bed hungry. Not someone in a far-off country we’ve been taught to pity, but maybe someone on your street. A child in your daughter’s class. The elder down the hall.

We throw away nearly a third of all food produced globally. Perfectly edible food, tossed. While entire communities ration instant noodles and pray that the power bill can wait another week.

And it’s not just food. It’s medicine. Shelter. Land. Education. Rest.

We’ve built systems that hoard instead of share, that reward accumulation over care. And at the root of it all? Greed dressed up as success. A cultural obsession with more.

More likes.

More money.

More square footage.

More followers.

More control.

We other to justify the imbalance.

“They’re lazy.”

“They didn’t work hard enough.”

“They’re not from here.”

“They should just pull themselves up by their bootstraps.”

But there is no they. There is only we.

And we—as a collective—have forgotten that the systems we move within were made by humans. Which means they can be remade.

But love, it’s hard to even imagine change when we’re exhausted, numbed out, endlessly scrolling. Social media is one of the most brilliant and dangerous tools of our time. It offers connection but often delivers comparison. We log on to escape the ache of powerlessness, the overwhelm of being awake in a world so broken. We dissociate to survive.

But every scroll numbs the truth in our bones: it’s not supposed to be this way.

Children aren’t supposed to be born into poverty.

Water isn’t supposed to be poisoned for profit.

People aren’t supposed to die because they couldn’t afford insulin.

The younger generations feel it most acutely.

They’re disillusioned.

Frustrated.

Watching the world burn—literally and metaphorically—and wondering why the grown-ups keep pretending it’s all okay.

They’re not lazy. They’re grieving.

And grief looks a lot like apathy when there’s no clear path to action.

So what do we do?

We remember.

We remember that we are part of a greater whole.

We remember that care is more natural than competition.

We remember that dignity is not a luxury—it’s a birthright.

We remember that we can’t wait for “someone else” to fix it.

Every time we choose presence over performance, generosity over gain, collective over individual, we plant a seed.

No government or billionaire or AI is going to save us.

It’s us.

You and me and the person reading this beside you.

This isn’t about guilt.

It’s about possibility.

We built this world.

And we can build another.

One where everyone eats.

Everyone matters.

And no one is left behind.