Christian Eriksen collapses on the pitch. Hearts stop worldwide. Then a device, a defibrillator, jolts him back to life.
We celebrate. We should. But let us pause.
This is not just a medical victory. It is a parable of our age. We have become so adept at patching up the individual that we ignore the collective cardiac arrest.
Our institutions falter. Our public discourse flatlines. Yet we obsess over the single man, the single calamity, the single technological fix.
Eriksen’s defibrillator is a marvel. But where is the defibrillator for the West? For a society that has lost its memory, its nerve, its sense of continuity?
The Romans had their gladiators. We have our footballers. The spectacle distracts from the rot.
We cheer as one man is saved. We should weep for the millions who have no such device—spiritually, culturally, politically. The heart of our civilisation is fibrillating.
And we are too busy applauding the ambulance to notice.
