do you want to win the war on terror?
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marlinssuperfan — 16 years ago(April 30, 2009 06:28 PM)
God forbid we should ever surrender our military.
Correct me if I am wrong, but it seems like you are saying that because we can't win the war on terror, we should just give up. And on top of that, completely get rid of our defenses?
I can't help but wonder, how many of you have actually been to Iraq, Afghanistan, or in some military confrontation. Have you actually witnessed the horrors of war, or are you speaking from a naive, inexperienced opinion?
Coming from one who has that experience, we can never give up. It's one thing to apply western culture to situations here, its a completely different story to apply it to the eastern nations. -
acbryan — 16 years ago(May 06, 2009 12:23 AM)
Your original question is framed illogically, and cannot be answered in its current form.
The correct question may be: "Do you want to end violence?"
I think, or at least I hope, that the moral majority desires peace, or desires the end of violence. But I could be wrong about that. Perhaps out of a global population of approx. 6.5 billion, 3.25 billion or so prefer violence.
Let's assume for a moment that the majority of the population desires the end of violence. If that's true, then the question must be, "How do we achieve the end of violence?" (If most people want it, we should probably try to achieve it.)
To answer this question, I think we must first analyze the origin of the violence.
Why do people commit violent acts? There are a number of reasons. Vengeance, rage, dogmatic principals, pathology, self-defense, and many others.
The United States, since WW2, has taken it upon themselves to police the entire planet, and to impose their idea of morality on the world, whether the world likes it or not.
(This is the US's ostensible strategy. It couldn't possibly hurt that Americans who are in positions of power themselves, or in collusion with lawmakers stand to make vast sums of money from this "policing" by being stakeholders in defense corporations. But this is tangential to my main point.)
Could it be that there are those in the world who are motivated to commit violent acts, particularly against Americans, for the simple reason that they do not wish to be policed, and that they object to having someone else's moral code imposed upon them and their fellow citizens, typically by violent means, in their own independent sovereign nation?
I think it's possible.
When those people, who feel oppressed, become motivated to commit violent acts against Americans, people in the world seem to like to brand those acts, "terrorist acts." When Americans commit violent acts against anyone outside of America, it is somehow seen as noble and justified.
Any act of violence, provoked or not, regardless of who commits it, is wrong and abhorrent. (Except for ultra-rare exceptions, such as self-defense against imminent threat of immediate death, though the Christian and Buddhist philosophies would argue even against this as a justification.)
The next question is, "How does one respond when an act of violence occurs?"
The answer is in the law. One investigates thoroughly, locates and arrests the person(s) directly responsible, tries them, and sentences them. (If we were a humane society, we would recognize that it is important to isolate violent criminals, but always try to rehabilitate them if possible.)
The answer is not retaliation with further violence.
It occurs to me that Americans, nor most citizens of the western world, do not consider that acts of violence are triggered by some specific motive, or provoked by some specific act. To avoid this analysis is ridiculous and a logic failure.
Let us awaken from this dream where western cultures are pure and noble and beyond reproach and simply the innocent victims of "terrorist acts". Let us recognize what is more likely the truth: that western cultures are targets of retaliatory acts from people who have been oppressed by our pathological need to impose our military might, and our supposedly higher moral standard, upon them.
We are wrong for policing. They are for retaliating. We are doubly wrong for retaliating back.
In order to end violence, one can begin with this kind of analysis, or something like it.
This kind of process may obviate further retaliation, which by its very nature, does absolutely nothing to end violence, but in fact, achieves the exact opposite. The cycle is perpetuated indefinitely until the species is finally extinct. -
marlinssuperfan — 16 years ago(May 11, 2009 06:10 PM)
Acbryan First I want to thank you for maintaining a civilized discussion.
As far was what you said, I agree with you on some points but I think you have missed a few others. I will start by saying I am a christian, but I whole-heartedly support the use of violence by the law to punish the evil. This includes using the death penalty.
A humane society is not one that always rehabilitates criminals. Our jails do very little to rehabilitate those that truly need it and very little to punish those that truly need it.
I firmly believe that sticking murderers and rapists in jail is not a just punishment. I believe that nothing short of death is justice. But on the other hand, people who steal minor objects or smoke weed get sent to prisons where they are only turned into real criminals.
On another note, I also agree with you that Americans and western culture are not infallible. We have made some situations worse. We have made some situations better. After all, we are only human too.
But,I do believe that it is our job as capable humans to intervene when there are no others that will. For example, the Jews that were massacred during World War II were helpless to defend themselves. Seeing as our help was needed to fight off the evil, it was necessary defend them. As you put it, a "humane society" must be the defender of the weak. -
acbryan — 16 years ago(May 13, 2009 10:04 AM)
Thank you for your thoughtful rebuttal.
I must stand by my earlier assertions. When I referred to rehabilitation, I was referring to a penal system that does not exist today in America. One reason for this may be because prisons are used as a weapon to conduct class warfare in America. The overwhelming majority of the prison population in America is poor and disproportionately ethnic. America's prisons house 25% of the global prison population. There may be a possibility to develop functional rehabilitative infrastructure in a system like this, but I doubt it. And if there were, the US is certainly not taking advantage of it. In short, there is no rehabilitative infrastructure in prisons. I said that a humane society would rehabilitate its violent criminals. By logical extension therefore, I do not count America as a humane society. I don't know which country is.
I am not surprised that you, as a Christian, justify the use of violence, though it is in direct contravention of Jesus Christ's philosophy and teachings. It is only one of the glaring and baffling hypocrisies of that particular religion. (In my view, every popular religion is deeply flawed in the way it is practiced, with the possible exception of Buddhism.) Christianity is particularly blessed with this oddly post-modernist mania that they can do whatever they want to anyone they want, and it is all magically forgiven because "Jesus died for our sins" If Jesus knew what rubbish was transpiring in his name, he wouldn't have waited for Pontius Pilate to give the order, he would have taken his own life long before.
I don't believe that this is the justification you are referring to, but you do not seem to acknowledge that there are wide-ranging consequences when an act of violence occurs especially when that act is not justified in fact, but only in perception, which I believe the overwhelming proportion of violent acts are. What if someone you never met summarily and wrongly accused you of posing a direct threat to their life, and proceeded to take aggressive and violent action against you. Imagine they in fact tortured and killed you for no good reason. Think of the consequences, beyond the obvious ones to yourself personally. Your family and friends, your job or school, your entire community might feel the trauma: dozens or maybe hundreds of people impacted. Well, that is exactly what happens hundreds or thousands of times per week in any policing action that America involves itself in.
The problem with reacting to violence with violence, particularly in the case of western civilization, is that it is too difficult to demarcate what constitutes a justification for intervention, or what constitutes a threat to "national security." Understanding the wide breadth of this fuzzy area, there is simply too much temptation for abuse abuse by, for example, defense companies, who absolutely require conflict to survive as economic entities, and who are willing to invest millions in political contributions, for the probable reward of billions, when their political proxy makes the decision to intervene. There is no oversight of this kind of abuse. It follows that when intervention occurs that is not actually needed, innocent people suffer. The final result can only be a world described in the works of George Orwell.
How does one avoid this abuse? One can stand on principal. Not some exotic principal that requires a weird contortion of logic or morals. But in fact, the Christian philosophy. "Turn the other cheek" "Thou shalt not kill" "The meek shall inherit the earth" Are these just catch phrases with no meaning? Or do you find it more convenient to only abide by the tenets of the religion that suit you under certain circumstances, and then ignore the rest that are too onerous? Or are those tenets suitable only for other Christians? -
acbryan — 16 years ago(May 15, 2009 09:21 PM)
I prefer not to underestimate my opponents in a debate. Nor do I wish them any ill. In my personal view, violence in all forms, is wrong, and I find it absolutely inexcusable (with the possible exception of imminent threat of immediate death). But I'm happy to get other viewpoints about issues surrounding violence or social justice.
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bcelts12 — 16 years ago(August 27, 2009 10:10 PM)
I'm sorry but "ending violence" would be about as easy as ending kisses or crying. It is an expression or re/action of basic human feelings. Most sane people would love an end of global violence but the bottom line is violence, or most importantly the threat of violence, is a means to accomplish what you want, especially when it comes to foreign policy. Its a sad truth.
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marlinssuperfan — 16 years ago(August 28, 2009 11:04 AM)
I had completely forgotten about this thread and happen to be looking at some of my other posts when I stumbled across it. I shall do my best to explain beliefs in light of your argument.
In your second paragraph, you talk about how "Christians" do whatever they please in the name of Forgiveness. I must agree with you that this is a very bad philosophy. And most certainly one that is not preached in the Bible, unfortunately there are many people out there who call themselves Christians due to some experience that they have had in the past, but I would call into question whether or not they are actually Christians. Because, we are told in the Bible that by "their fruits," meaning actions and good deeds, we will see that they truly are Christians. Sadly, this is something that people see in the Christian church and rightly so say, "it's just a bunch of hypocrites" There is no one perfect except for Christ, but you are right in seeing that there is definitely something wrong with that philosophy. And God help me when I think that way.
Your analogy in the third paragraph seems to be slightly ill-fitting. While I do agree that it presents a valid problem, I am not sure that it fits the bill. For example, the Iraq situation, Saddam Hussein repeatedly threatened the United States and other countries. perhaps I am misinformed, but I am not aware of cases where innocents have been tortured and killed. While I will admit I am not the most up-to-date with the situation, I have not read or heard of that being the case. As a whole, I do not think that is what the United States' policies were going, nor have they ever become that. As far as whether or not any individual soldier has ever done that, I cannot imagine that there would not severe repercussions. Being as you cannot hear the emphasis in my voice allow me to repeat myself as to the severity of the penalties for such behavior.
You say that violence is in direct contravention of Christ's teachings, but I cannot help but wonder how much of the Bible you have read. This is one of the most common misconceptions about Christ's teachings. I am no Bible scholar, but I do try to read and understand as much as possible. First, the verse quoting "do not kill" is a gross translation error that particular version which has become one of the more popular arguments of pacifism in the Bible. The correct translation (if you recall the original text was written in Aramaic, and the new testament in Greek) is "do not murder." This can also be reflected in the commandments that God gave to the Israelites in the old testament. Also, I view the Bible as a whole, the new testament and the old are both part of the same book. Christ did talk about how he came to complete the law, rather than abolish it.
Now, the verse mentioning "turn the other cheek," this has to do with insults. A back handed slap in the time of Christ was a deep and provocative insult. If you were to be slapped on the cheek, turning your face would allow the slapper to have a backhanded slap opportunity. I do not believe that it can adequately be used in an argument against violence.
Thirdly, you mention the phrase "the meek shall inherit the earth." Forgive me if I am missing the point, but meekness, especially how it is referred to in this case, is about a spiritual state. Not being proud or arrogant. But understanding that I as a human am fallen and do commit sins. I am failing to see how it construes an anti-violence message. -
Midwesternman — 16 years ago(November 21, 2009 10:51 AM)
The only problem with your use of the Holocaust is that our involvement in WWII had nothing to do with that. Years before the US entered the war a ship with 930 refugees was turned back from Cuba and the US. The US involvement in WWII was purely self interest, nothing more.
every day may not be good, but there is good in every day -
thepartydjz — 10 years ago(October 12, 2015 01:02 AM)
acbryan is correct. The american idea that they are the only "proper" humans in the world is part of the reason terrorism occurs. You can't solve violence with violence. If your civilian family was killed by US bombs you would feel the same way as the terrorists.
The only way to stop terrorism is to remove the hate that causes terrorists to take action against the US. But most people are far too narrow minded to grasp this concept. -
ellextreme — 16 years ago(September 04, 2009 07:11 PM)
HAIL to you "marlinssuperfan"! Couldn't have said it better myself.
As I have never been to Iraq nor have I been in military service, my life or role in life does not fit YOUR demographic. But I am observant and am intelligent enough to grasp the content of what this Non-Western enemy of ours states with their own mouths.
My hearing is not hampered or hindered when I hear their words exclaim that every American is "the great Satan or infidel" and that we should be anihilated for our very way of LIFE. THEY MEAN EVERY WORD OF IT!
As many have realized (those who have their eyes open in any case) as I have, that I would much rather our fight be on soil outside the United States or the continent of North America. And it is critical that we maintain our strength as "one nation, under God, with liberty and justice for ALL".
We must deal with and realize that our enemies, who are non-western, do not see life on earth this way. They view it as quite the contrary.
By their standards or way of LIFE: There will be NO LifeNO Liberty, NO Justice, NO Freedom
And ultimately (if they had their way through terror) NO Just Pursuits which lead to: Life, Liberty, & Pursuit of any kind of happiness.
Keep all our troops in prayer DAILY and in conscious thought and meditation. I am grateful for all our troops' efforts, sacrifice, work, lives, etc.
"Speak softly, and carry a big stick."
By: Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt -
geniuskmc27 — 16 years ago(September 01, 2009 04:54 PM)
depends on what you define as terror, who you define as the victim.
anyway, i guess you want to win iraq and afghanisthan. donno about iraq but afghanisthan? are u kidding? no one was able to do that. mongols, alexander,mughals and in modern times british, soviet union and taliban. now it's america's turn to face the humiliation and retreat. the sooner the better, i guess. -
thinker1691 — 16 years ago(September 08, 2009 05:51 PM)
Peachesxo:
The answer is simple, no! First of all, how can anyone win a war
against something which does not exist. True, there are fanatical
people who do what you and I consider stupid. But they have no
established or central government, no state, no appointed
leader/spoke's man who can and will stand before world governments
and explain who, what and why they do the unthinkable. A shadowy
bearded man hiding in a cave is not a represenative leader.
In addition, winning is impossible as no one can say or describe
what constitutes a victory. Some would argue, that victory is when
these terrorist are dead. That would only be true if with the
death of the last terrorist, they leave no student who might want
to avenge them.
As for terrorism, that is an American invention. I challenge anyone
to offer a definition of Terrorist which does not apply to a history
of America which cannot apply to the native Americans, blacks or
Japanese, anything which Terrorists do today.
"If you make the world your enemy, you'll never run out of reasons to be miserable"