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more on Immorality on the March - Michael Kelly
From: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Thu, 20 Feb 2003 13:36:00 -0500
He is a student not from France or Germany and rather mature djf ------ Forwarded Message From: Date: Thu, 20 Feb 2003 12:26:45 -0500 To: dave () farber net Subject: Re: [IP] Immorality on the March - Michael Kelly -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 If you want to publish it on IP, please take off my name. An obviously foreign name would make most Americans dismiss the validity of any argument I try to make as "anti-american". Since when is critisism of a state's politics an attack against the nation? What is this country becoming? On Thursday 20 February 2003 04:35, Dave Farber wrote:
------ Forwarded Message From: Einar Stefferud <Stef () thor nma com> Date: Wed, 19 Feb 2003 21:47:34 -0800 The Seattle Times - Wednesday, February 19, 2003, 12:00 a.m. Pacific All they are saying is give tyranny a chance - By Michael Kelly PARIS - Last weekend, across Europe and America, somewhere between 1 million and 2 million people marched against a war with Saddam Hussein's Iraq.
Grossly inaccurate if we consider what global media reported. 1-2 million people in London. Another 2-3 million in Rome, and the streets were filled (and people driven away) in New York, Athens, Tokyo, and many other major or minor cities. The numbers are much more significant than US media reports, obviously hinting at a much more widespread dissapproval of yet another US-initiated war than the US government would like Americans to know about. <snip>
Of course, not all the marchers can be counted as 99.9 percent pure moralists. Some -perhaps many- marched out of simple reactionary hatred: for the United States, for its power, for its paramount position in a hated world order. London's paleosocialist Mayor "Red Ken" Livingstone, a featured speaker at that city's massive demo, comes to mind. His enlightened argument against war consisted chiefly of calling George W. Bush "a lackey of the oil industry," "a coward" and "this creature."
Is the author trying to laugh off the legitimacy of people's frustration by pointing to a politician's choice of words? <snip>
The situation with Iraq may be considered in three primary contexts, and in each, the true moral case is for war. The FIRST context considers the people of Iraq. There are 24 million of them, and they have been living (those who have not been slaughtered or forced into exile) for decades under one of the cruelest and bloodiest tyrannies on Earth. It must be assumed that, being human, they would prefer to be rescued from a hell where more than a million lives have been so far sacrificed to the dreams of a megalomaniac, where rape is a sanctioned instrument of state policy, and where the removal of the tongue is the prescribed punishment for uttering an offense against the Great Leader.
This "US will rescue the oppressed people" argument is as old as dirt. Wasn't it even used in the Vietnam campaign? Wasn't the Great Freedom Fighter (TM) waging war against the Red Evil Tyrants (TM) that massacred many of the Good People of Vietnam? Does the US government really believe that such a smoke screen will convince once again? Are American people willing to be lead to another massacre once again?
These people could be liberated from this horror - relatively easily and very quickly. There is every reason to think that an American invasion will swiftly vanquish the few elite units that can be counted on to defend the detested Saddam; and that the victory will come at the cost of few -likely hundreds, not thousands or tens of thousands- Iraqi and American lives. There is risk here; and if things go terribly wrong it is a risk that could result in terrible suffering. But that is an equation that is present in any just war, and in this case any rational expectation has to consider the probable cost to humanity low and the probable benefit tremendous. To choose perpetuation of tyranny over rescue from tyranny, where rescue may be achieved, is immoral.
The world has seen how effective the US is in "liberating" oppressed people. They did it in Bosnia, where they bombed a whole country to the ground - making financial and technological dependence of the "just liberated" ruins that remained, a safe bet for favorable US partners.
The SECOND context considers the security of America, and indeed of the world, and here too morality is on the side of war. The great lesson of Sept. 11, 2001, is not that terrorism must be stopped -an impossible dream- but that (set italic) state-sanctioned (end italic) terrorism must be stopped. The support of a state -even a weak and poor state- offers the otherwise deeply vulnerable enemies of the established order the protection they need in their attempts to destroy that order - through the terrorists' only weapon, murder. To tolerate the perpetuation of state-sanctioned terror, such as Saddam's regime exemplifies, is to invite the next Sept. 11, and the next, and the next. Again, immoral.
So, the author supports this administration's policy of christening everyone "a terrorist" and appealing to the so-laboriously-cultivated feeling of threat that has been implanted in this country's heart. Manipulating a whole nation with FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) tactics reminds me of the Nazi-driven Germany. Obviously 70 years are enough for people to forget the implications of such a state. There wouldn't be any Americans to tolerate another war across the globe today, if their hearts and minds hadn't been systematically filled with terror. A fear-driven nation is the easiest to manipulate, and the last to dare exert healthy criticism upon the state's choices.
The THIRD context concerns the idea of order itself. The United Nations is a mightily flawed construct, but it exists; and it exists on the side (more or less) of law and humanity. Directly and unavoidably arising from the crisis with Iraq, the U.N. today stands on the edge of the precipice of permanent irrelevancy. If Iraq should be allowed to defy the law, the U.N. will never recover, and the oppressed and weak of the world will lose even the limited protection of the myth of collective security. Immoral.
Again, the argument of the US boldly resolving what other cowardly nations/organizations dare not. Also, another attempt to convince (by chanting "the truth", but no arguments) that this war is what will save the legitimacy of what's good in this world (present example, the UN). "The oppressed and weak of the world will lose even the limited protection [they currently have]" ? Oh puh-lease!
To march against the war is not to give peace a chance. It is to give tyranny a chance. It is to give the Iraqi nuke a chance. It is to give the next terrorist mass murder a chance. It is to march for the furtherance of evil instead of the vanquishing of evil.
That's right, marching against war is: [0] Making the task of The Freedom Fighters (TM) harder. [1] Advocating tyranny, because of course only a democratically selected government like the one the US will install in Iraq will do. [2] Making nukes in the wrong hands possible! Of course, we forgot to mention that - unless you bomb them to the ground, they will nuke you! (Of course the thousand-fold arsenal of "weapons of mass destruction" of our approved allies is not an issue, since we know they'll only use it against "the bad guys") [3] Giving terrorists a chance! Well, the terrorist threat had to be somewhere in here anyhow. Yes, no links have been established between known terrorist groups and Iraq, but what the heck, let's bomb them anyway. That way we'll never again experience another Sep.11 attack, because people will love the US for protecting what's good in this world. [4] Last but not least, it's giving EVIL a chance to survive! Don't all these millions of people get it? The White Cross of the Freedom Fighters must crush all that don't abide. It sounds terribly like the "arguments" used against Christians, Jews and Blacks at different points in history. You don't bow your head to us and accept our superiority and authority. Therefore you're a threat to the status quo. Therefore you're EVIL, because of course we're the representatives of goodness in this world. Therefore we will pursue you, weaken you, marginalize you, and kill you.
This cannot be the moral position.
I cannot believe such trash gets published. ------------------------------------- You are subscribed as interesting-people () lists elistx com To unsubscribe or update your address, click http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
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