I’ve put a post I wrote in 2007 back up as a permanent page in the right column on this site. Â It is entitled, “About War“.
It seems as topical today to me as the day I wrote it.
You might show it to the young men in your family, all full of testosterone and patriotism, who want to go and have a great adventure and fight the good fight.
I’m a liberal – I make no bones about it.  I believe women are my equals and that people of all shades and sexual proclivities have the same rights that I do. I believe that governments should exist to serve their people and not merely to maximize opportunities for Capitalists.
In short, on most questions, if there’s a liberal and conservative axis, you’ll find me on the liberal end of things.
But, I have some exceptions – places where liberals might shun me.
If an individual’s committed violent crimes repeatedly and is obviously incorrigible, I see no point in the state locking them up and feeding them for the rest of their never-to-be-paroled life.  Terminate them – and let’s move on.  When you’ve got a cancer, you cut it off.
Guns?  I’m not at all sure that we all need military assault rifles.  But, I do like what the U.S. Second Amendment says … and why it says it.  When governments lose their way, citizens need a way to have their say.
Nanny States?  I think they go way too far sometimes.  As the Buddhists say, ‘Everything in balance’.  Laws should be balanced and mete out the same punishments to both the rich and the poor. And victim-less crimes should be recognized as the oxymorons that they are.
And I’m all for cultural diversity – to a point.  If your culture believes that you are one of the chosen or the saved and you also believe that I’m not, or if your culture believes that women belong to men, or if your culture believes in slash and burn agriculture, or female genital mutilation, or in casual and needless cruelty to animals, or that some men are just better than others and thus have a right to rule them, then I think it’s probably time for for your culture to go – sorry.
But, if you like to wear a small square hat and dance outside at the new moon, or paint your house bright red, blue and gold, or if carrying a dagger and wearing turban are your thing, or if you are a strict vegetarian or anything else that doesn’t mess with our common biosphere or with other’s folk’s rights, then good on ya, I say.
We all need to live and let live, honor and respect each other and realize that this small planet belongs to all of us.  If your cultural beliefs deprives some people of their freedoms, if your cultural beliefs are messing the with common environment we and all of our descendants are going to have to share, if your cultural beliefs are all about trying to corner and monopolize money, knowledge, political or military power over the rest of us – then bugger off.  How can I make it plainer?
➡, ➡, ➡, ➡, ➡, ➡, ➡, ➡, ➡, ➡, and ➡ are all examples of what I’m talking about.
So what, you wonder, is this little rant about?  Well, it’s about a couple of things that have come together in the last few days.
Just the other day, The U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, pointed out that the government of Pakistan is buckling before pressure from the Taliban.  The most recent and telling example of this was when the Pakistan government ‘allowed‘ the Taliban, who control the Swat Valley and, indeed, much of the northwest of Pakistan, to practice Sharia Law there.  And they, of course, did this hoping that it might result in peace with the Taliban.
Then, just days later, we hear that the Taliban are now taking over areas adjoining the Swat Valley and forcing the people there to adopt the Taliban’s rules and killing or driving off anyone who opposes them.
The Pakistani government, in deep denial, is losing ground against the Islamic insurgents and it badly needs to decide which side it is on and get focused.  Clinton said, speaking to U.S. lawmakers, that Pakistan’s government has abdicated to the Taliban in agreeing to impose Islamic law in the Swat valley and the country now poses a “mortal threat” to the world.
I don’t think she’s exaggerating the ‘Mortal Threat’ business.  Pakistan has nuclear weapons (are you paying attention here?) and Pakistan is a weak state literally crumbling before strengthening Taliban insurgent forces.  If that’s not the definition of ‘Mortal Danger’ for the rest of us, I don’t know what is.
Then, finally, a friend of mine sent me the a link to the following video.  I encourage you to stop now, click on the video and then return here to continue reading after you are done.
Got that? A suitcase full of four pounds of Anthrax?  This guy has very little idea of how to try to get along with other cultures.  And, as someone who considers himself pretty liberal and tolerant, I find myself seriously wondering what we should do about people and movements like this.
Yeah, right!
I have a little movie of my own that plays over and over in my head when I think about this stuff.  It involves a time in our not too distant past when other tyrants were on the loose and wanted to take over the world. Back then, a lot of time was spent trying to appease the beast, trying to see their good side, assuming that if we were nice, they’d be nice to.  And in my little movie, I see Neville Chamberlain getting off the plane from Germany over and over again and proclaiming, “Peace in our Time“.
There’s a nice biography/documentary around about the life of Winston Churchill and it makes your skin crawl to see how very long and hard the British tried to ignore the Nazi monster and how, in the end, it almost cost them their freedom.  And without a doubt, it did cost them the loss of a lot of British lives that were lost unnecessarily because of how trusting and unprepared they were when the German Nazis finally took of their ‘Nice Mask’ and showed the world who they really were.
And here in the U.S., we refused to get involved until the Japanese literally brought the party to our shores and, like the British before us, we then suddenly had to get over our idealism and isolationism and start a massive and desperate game of catchup.
So, what am I saying here?
First, let’s be clear.  I am not anti Islam.  Of the many millions of Islamic people in the world, it is only small fundamentalist core which wants to push their agendas by any means possible, who believe that terrorism is a valid tool in their struggle to make the world over in the image they want and who believe their every action, no matter how reprehensible, is blessed by their God. But, I believe that the vast majority of Muslims in this world would simply like to live and get along just like we would.  So understand, please, that it is only these intolerant crazies that I am on about here.
Weapons of mass destruction have changed the face of warfare forever.  The leverage that can be exerted by the use of a biological or nuclear weapon can be totally out of proportion to the size of the group wielding it.  We’re not in the world anymore where we need large armies to fight our conflicts.   We’ve all been very lucky since the end of the Second World War.  Because, in spite of our many conflicts, we’ve managed to keep the nuclear and biological genies in their bottles so far.
But ask yourself, if the Taliban take over Pakistan and gain control of the weapons there, do you think it is going to turn out well for us?
Yes, I’m a liberal – but I have limits and I think for our own survival, we all should have limits.
If we think we can cure the cancer of radical Islamic fundamentalism, then by all means, we should try.  But, if we don’t think we can cure it, then we are only wasting valuable time while it spreads and becomes more and more intractable.
That’s a tough question. But, while we think about it and consider various half measures, those who want to destroy us and make the world over into a prison of intolerant fundamentalism, wherein women are property and human rights are irrelevant and where we all have to worship as they tell us or die, are moving inexorably forward towards the possession of nuclear and biological weapons.
This is not a place we can allow history to go.
Their culture is toxic to our future and to the future of a world based on multiculturalism, tolerance, sustainability, science, democracy, religious freedom and human rights for everyone.  They want to take us back to the 7th century – and I, for one, don’t want to go.
In truth, I don’t know what we should do nor when we should do it.  But I see what some have called a ‘clash of civilizations‘ coming.
Some folks think that there must be something more we can do to defuse their animosity.  But, when I look at the deep roots of why they do what they do, I despair that there’s more we can do – save move forward to the final chapter in this story of human history. The chapter in which we realize that there can be no reconciliation with a blind faith determined to convert the world to its vision or die trying.  A chapter in which we see, finally, that they will keep coming at us relentlessly until they have either won or until their vision of Islam is extinguished from the world.
We are too nice for our own good.  We will wait and wait, hoping for a way out of this quandary, and all the while we’ll be risking that they will acquire deadly weapons of mass destruction.  We may, in our tolerance and goodness, wait too long and suddenly find ourselves in a very desperate world.
But if they cannot be turned from their course, in the end, we will, we must, use whatever force it takes to eliminate their threat to our survival.  In the end, we’ll recognize that if human civilization has a cancer and we want to advance rather than regress, then the cancer must be cut off for the greater good of the whole.
These are tough thoughts for a liberal to espouse.  But, if you’ve got better ideas, I’d love to hear them.
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– Blogging has been good very for me.  Not financially but, rather, in the connections I’ve made to people out in the world whom I would have never met otherwise.
– In addition to writing for this Blog, Samadhisoft, I also publish occasional articles over on The Seitch.  I like what they are doing there and I feel honored that they let me use their site to express some of my thoughts.  A number of people contribute to The Seitch and two stand out in particular to me; the Naib, who founded the site and who is its most prolific author, and Keith Farnish, who also writes extensively there.
– Keith also runs various Blogs of his own, including The Earth Blog and The Unsuitablog.Â
– Recently, Keith published a book entitled, “Time’s Up! an uncivilized solution to a global crisis“. He announced his new book on The Seitch here.
– His new book can be read on-line, here.  I’m reading it now and enjoying it. It’s full of keen analysis of the world’s current problems and what we might do about them.  Recommended.
– On another front, I’ve recently become on-line friends with a fellow in Germany named Clinton Callahan who is the driving force behind an intentional community called Possibilica. Â He also runs the Callahan Academy and has written a book (which I’ve not yet read) called, Radiant Joy Brilliant Love.
– In a recent E-Mail, Clinton included a list of things people can do if they want to directly and personally address the world and the state it is in. Â It is radical and courageous stuff, just as the recommendations in Keith Farnish’s book are.
– These are creative thinkers and people who believe that words must be matched by action if one’s convictions are to be graced with integrity.  In truth, I am still playing “catch up” in this respect.  Thus far, I’m long on words and a good deal shorter on action.  But, as they say, all of the rest of my life still lies before me.
– So, I encourage you to follow and explore the links I’ve scattered here and I also encourage you to have a good look through the list of actions Clinton suggests, below. Â
– Not all of us will be able to rearrange our lives so powerfully as he suggests but all of us can benefit, I think, by becoming aware that there are folks out there creating new ways of living – and calling the rest of us to join them.
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By Clinton Callahan
Einstein’s bomb worked, remember, so he may also be right when he said, No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it. How much longer will you continue believing that the same system that created global warming and financial collapse has the ability to fix it? Here are actions to take:
It seems to me that we are at the go/no-go moment in terms of preventing the methane tipping point from avalanching into unstoppable global warming.
It could be the moment for scientists around the world who trust their own global warming evidence to withdraw from the system that propagates the global warming.
Withdrawal from the system is neither symbolic nor philosophical. Withdrawal is swift, total and drastic. The intention is to proactively collapse the carbon economy to give humanity a chance to change direction.
This would require great personal efforts and sacrifice on the part of the scientists. It would impact our families, teams, companies and organizations with a radical change of plans. It would also require you to take your own work seriously. If you do not trust your evidence enough to take direct personal action, why should someone else?
If our withdrawal could critically disable the carbon economy, its rapid demise would avoid even greater suffering from flood, draught, worldwide famine, and continued resource wars.
Abandoning modern culture proactively as a result of trusting scientific evidence would prove that human intelligence exists. It would be like steering a careening brakeless automobile into the hillside to stop it rather than doing nothing. By intentionally crashing the car someone might survive. Flying off the cliff is suicide for all.
The choice is not actually up to political authorities. The choice is up to the creative powerhouse behind the industrial machine: you, the scientists, engineers, programmers, designers, technicians and researchers keeping things going.
To continue a carbon-hungry consumer lifestyle in the face of recent climate-change knowledge makes us no more intelligent than bacteria, consuming beyond the carrying capacity of our resources and dieing in our own wastes.
Withdrawal is simple and effective. It is nonviolent noncooperation with whatever is nonsustainable. This would include:
If you already see the perfect storm about to hit humanity and trust your own findings, then immediately and completely extricating yourself from the system that generates the problems is appropriate. Let the system fail. It was not well thought out. Our combined population growth and harmful technological waste products grew so quickly we did not have time to make other plans. By redirecting your incredible creative capacity towards generating sustainable culture then we Homo sapiens could be true to our name.
What do you actually think about this? Does it make sense?
What are you willing to say and do along these lines?
What can you stop now? Next week? Next month?
What do the people you know say and do about this?
Many people criticize the idea of proactively collapsing the carbon economy.
Are you ready to take action even if others won’t?
How much longer will you wait before you replace talk with personal action?
For creative collaboration and support in your choices assemble a Just Stop Team www.just-stop.org.
Thank you for considering this.
Clinton Callahan, originator of Possibility Management and Phoenix Process, author of Radiant Joy Brilliant Love, founder of Callahan Academy, empowers responsible creative leadership through authentic personal development. He has traveled, lived or worked in 36 different countries, and is co-creating a sustainable-culture research ecovillage in Southern Germany called Possibilica.
– My friend, Kael, turned me onto the idea, several months ago, that all of us with green leanings can be further subdivided according to how we think it is all going to turn out. Â
– We determined that I would be a ‘Dark Green’ in this ranking system. A Dark Green is defined as follows:
Dark greens, tend to emphasize the need to pull back from consumerism (sometimes even from industrialization itself) and emphasize local solutions, short supply chains and direct connection to the land. They strongly advocate change at the community level. In its best incarnations, dark green thinking offers a lot of insight about bioregionalism, reinhabitation, and taking direct control over one’s life and surroundings (for example through transition towns): it is a vision of collective action. In a less useful way, dark greens can tend to be doomers, warning of (sometimes even seeming to advocate) impending collapse. Some thinkers, of course, (for instance, Bill McKibben and Paul Glover) blend a belief in the rural relocalization efforts of dark greens with the more design- and technology-focused urban solutions of bright greens. (Some of my own thinking can be found in these pieces Deep Economy: Localism, Innovation and Knowing What’s What, Resilient Community and The Outquisition.)
– That’s a slightly modified excerpt from an piece I found on the Worldchanging Blog – which I link to, below.
– If you want to know where you are on the Pollyanna to Apocalypse scale, give it a read. Â
– And remember, your life might depend on making the right choice here – unless you just want to pretend it is all unimportant.
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Alex Steffen
February 27, 2009 4:04 PM
People ask me with increasing frequency to explain what I mean by “bright green,” and what the differences are between bright green, light green, dark green and so on.
I can understand the confusion. The term is being used more and more widely, but the available explanations aren’t very helpful: the Wikipedia entry on the topic is far from clear, and with a handful of exceptions (like Ross Robertson’s excellent article), most of the media coverage so far has tended to muddy the water in one way or another.
What is bright green? In its simplest form, bright green environmentalism is a belief that sustainable innovation is the best path to lasting prosperity, and that any vision of sustainability which does not offer prosperity and well-being will not succeed. In short, it’s the belief that for the future to be green, it must also be bright. Bright green environmentalism is a call to use innovation, design, urban revitalization and entrepreneurial zeal to transform the systems that support our lives.
It’s been pretty amazing to watch “bright green” take off. Since I first coined the term, thousands of organizations — businesses, NGOs, blogs, student groups, even churches — have adopted the label. For this year’s COP-15 climate summit in Copenhagen, both the parallel expo and the lead-in youth summit are calling themselves Bright Green. I’ve even started to see the term bubbling up in pop culture, used by people who clearly get it.
Of course, not everyone talking about sustainability is bright green. I contrast bright green thinking with three other prominent schools of thought: light greens, dark greens and grays. All have some overlap, and in reality, even dedicated sustainability advocates tend to adopt different approaches on different questions. But here’s a brief run-down:
More… ➡
– I’ve been blessed during most of my adult life in having gay friends. Their strong presence in my life has helped to desensitize me to that nascent homophobia that was an inevitable part of my growing up in a blue-collar neighborhood in the 50’s and 60’s.
– Their attractions towards members of their own sex and their practices in the bedroom may be different than mine, but I simply don’t care. They respect my practices and feelings just as I do theirs. How else in an enlightened world should it be?
– Some of us (both gays and straights) have discussed this topic a lot in recent weeks with a special emphasis on California’s recent vote on Proposition 8.
– Undeniably, prejudices still run deep here in our American society. But, progress is being made – albeit, over decades. Women’s rights have improved much as has racial equality though there is still a ways to go on both. But, thus far, gay rights have been trailing behind.
– These situations are generally deplored in polite civic conversations and essays but silently condoned in far too many private hearts. I, for one, think we should each speak our minds on these things publicly and let those who are timid and on the fence, as to what they believe, see that there are many of us willing to speak up.
– As a white heterosexual male, I don’t, as they say, have a dog in this fight. But that’s all the more reason to speak up. We should not, in good conscious, leave the work of struggling for social improvement to those who are oppressed.
– So, dear readers, be clear then. I support full equality for women, all racial groups and for gays. It may not be the world we live in today, God help us, but it is what the better world of the future should look like.
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– from Newsweek Magazine – Dec 6, 2008
Let’s try for a minute to take the religious conservatives at their word and define marriage as the Bible does. Shall we look to Abraham, the great patriarch, who slept with his servant when he discovered his beloved wife Sarah was infertile? Or to Jacob, who fathered children with four different women (two sisters and their servants)? Abraham, Jacob, David, Solomon and the kings of Judah and Israel—all these fathers and heroes were polygamists. The New Testament model of marriage is hardly better. Jesus himself was single and preached an indifference to earthly attachments—especially family. The apostle Paul (also single) regarded marriage as an act of last resort for those unable to contain their animal lust. “It is better to marry than to burn with passion,” says the apostle, in one of the most lukewarm endorsements of a treasured institution ever uttered. Would any contemporary heterosexual married couple—who likely woke up on their wedding day harboring some optimistic and newfangled ideas about gender equality and romantic love—turn to the Bible as a how-to script?
Of course not, yet the religious opponents of gay marriage would have it be so.
The battle over gay marriage has been waged for more than a decade, but within the last six months—since California legalized gay marriage and then, with a ballot initiative in November, amended its Constitution to prohibit it—the debate has grown into a full-scale war, with religious-rhetoric slinging to match. Not since 1860, when the country’s pulpits were full of preachers pronouncing on slavery, pro and con, has one of our basic social (and economic) institutions been so subject to biblical scrutiny. But whereas in the Civil War the traditionalists had their James Henley Thornwell—and the advocates for change, their Henry Ward Beecher—this time the sides are unevenly matched. All the religious rhetoric, it seems, has been on the side of the gay-marriage opponents, who use Scripture as the foundation for their objections.
The argument goes something like this statement, which the Rev. Richard A. Hunter, a United Methodist minister, gave to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in June: “The Bible and Jesus define marriage as between one man and one woman. The church cannot condone or bless same-sex marriages because this stands in opposition to Scripture and our tradition.”
To which there are two obvious responses: First, while the Bible and Jesus say many important things about love and family, neither explicitly defines marriage as between one man and one woman. And second, as the examples above illustrate, no sensible modern person wants marriage—theirs or anyone else’s —to look in its particulars anything like what the Bible describes. “Marriage” in America refers to two separate things, a religious institution and a civil one, though it is most often enacted as a messy conflation of the two. As a civil institution, marriage offers practical benefits to both partners: contractual rights having to do with taxes; insurance; the care and custody of children; visitation rights; and inheritance. As a religious institution, marriage offers something else: a commitment of both partners before God to love, honor and cherish each other—in sickness and in health, for richer and poorer—in accordance with God’s will. In a religious marriage, two people promise to take care of each other, profoundly, the way they believe God cares for them. Biblical literalists will disagree, but the Bible is a living document, powerful for more than 2,000 years because its truths speak to us even as we change through history. In that light, Scripture gives us no good reason why gays and lesbians should not be (civilly and religiously) married—and a number of excellent reasons why they should.
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– Research thanks to John P.
We get told to work hard for future happiness. When does this future happiness arrive? People work hard their whole lives, saving, so that they can have a good retirement. When we retire is when we’re meant to be relaxed and happy. This is the wool being pulled over our eyes. I feel that as a society, we’ve been brain washed to work, instead of enjoying our lives.
When we’re old enough to retire, often we’re too old to enjoy ourselves. We’ve spent the prime of our lives suffering away, waiting for this magical day, and when it arrives we can’t fully enjoy it. Who wants to be too old to enjoy their life? Why should we wait until we’re past our peak to enjoy ourselves?Don’t put off your happiness. Live it. The only way to get to the future is through the present. It’s your actions now, your happiness now that dictates your future happiness. Even if we can justify short term hardwork, we have to be careful. By putting off happiness we increase suffering, as well as moving karma (habits) into a pattern of accepted suffering. People who work hard for a few months, when they get to the ‘other side’ often find themselves either bored/lacking or lonely. When they stop suffering, they often chose it again. It makes them feeling important.
More… ➡
– Ha, this is an excerpt from the October 26th, 2008, piece by The Salt Lake Tribune’s columnist, Robert Kirby.Â
– Funny stuff indeed, since he’s writing from the heart of Mormon country and they, in their Christian purity, have declared gay marriage to be anathema. Â
– Go Kirby!   Maybe you’ll wake them up (though I doubt it).
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A couple of years ago, I wrote a column in which I announced my official position on gay marriage. Basically, I don’t care.
Not only do I not care if gays get married, it is none of my business. As a flaming heterosexual, it’s a full-time job for me just to keep my thoughts clean in church. I don’t have the energy to fret about somebody else’s libido.
The column must have resurfaced on the Internet. I’m getting mail again telling me what a failure I am as a Mormon because I’m not solidly behind Proposition 8. As I understand it, the California ballot item would prevent the domestication of homosexuals. Or something like that.
[snip – here were a number of appeals for him to change his mind]
Hard as it is to counter such brilliant logic, my position hasn’t changed. The only serious concern I have about gays getting married is that they’ll register someplace pricey.
The church is serious about the sanctity of marriage. I get that. But aren’t more potentially “dangerous” marriages already being performed out there?
For example, I hear in church all the time about marriage being ordained of God. But I also hear about how the glory of God is intelligence.
Shouldn’t it be against the law for stupid people to get married? What’s more harmful to society – two well-dressed men getting married and settling down, or two idiots tying the knot and cranking out any number of additional idiots?
You should have to pass a harder test to get married than the one we currently have. Essentially, there are but two questions: “How old are you?” and “Is that your sister?” Hell, you could pass this test just by guessing.Â
More… ➡
– research thanks to PHK
I was reflecting last night on conversations I’d had with two different people recently. The subjects had been the environment, the state of the world, and the likely directions history will take in the near future.
Both my friends clearly understand the situation that we (humanity) are in. They are not denialists in any sense of the word- they really get what’s going on.
But, I noted, they were both emotionally distressed about it. And that their distress was causing them to waffle back and forth between seeing the situation we’re in clearly and then switching around to trying to ameliorate it by saying something like, “Well, humanity has tremendous powers of creativity – surely we’ll think of a way to avoid these problems.”
Watching them squirm got me to thinking about what it was that was making them squirm.
One of my friends has older parents who live in a major metropolitan area and she’s made a commitment to them and to herself to live near them in their closing years. She’s also dependent upon them financially as well. Later, when they’ve passed on, she will be able to live where she wants and how she wants – but for now, she’s made commitments that tie her to this city.
My other friend had been thinking very seriously about immigration to New Zealand as a result of his analysis of the world’s situation. But, after a lot of agonizing and thinking about his extended family here on the U.S., he decided that he couldn’t simply abandon them and go off to save himself. So, he’s decided, out of love of family, to stay here with all of them and face the hard times together.
To me, it looks like both of these folks have the same problem. They’ve both made emotional decisions to stay but at the same time, they are both confronted with convincing reasons why they should go. Cognitive dissonance is the result. And the way that the mind tries to reduce cognitive dissonance in a situation like this is to try to reinterpret the data that suggests they should leave into something less convincing.
It seems to me that their rational mental processes are being distorted by the presence of emotional non-negotiables in the mix.
When this first occurred to me, it seemed like a bit of an epiphany and I spent several hours over the next day or two noodling it over. In the end, I saw that it was no epiphany at all but just something I’ve known about and acknowledged forever. It’s just that I hadn’t quite looked at it from this angle before – especially as it relates to how people see the world’s current situation.
On the web site Al Gore’s put up about his movie, “An Inconvenient Truth“, he has a quote that I’ve admired since I first saw it.
It’s difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.
– Upton Sinclair
This captures a lot of what I thought was my epiphany.
When, in the past, I’ve asked myself why people seem so obtuse about seeing the state of the world right in front of their eyes, I’ve assigned the cause to a variety of things like ‘He’s a Republican.‘ or ‘He’s a Libertarian.‘ or ‘He’s a right-wing Christian.‘ or “He has no understanding of science.‘. Or any of a long list of other reasons.
But, amazingly, I’d never seen that all of these folks, just like you and me and everyone else, are encumbered by any number of emotional non-negotiable factors that limit their ability to process the data before them solely on its own merits. We are all twisted by our emotional attachments.
Men who run corporations and have their identities and all of their finances tied up in those endeavors cannot think objectively about the good or ill that corporations do in the world.
People who cannot move away from an area of danger (like my two friends), cannot see the data indicating the danger they are in clearly without cognitive dissonance. And that cognitive dissonance generates stress which the mind will try to lessen how ever it can.
Religious conservatives have staked their faith on the fact that God has everything well under control so how can they objectively view information that shows things are getting badly out of control around them?
Libertarians believe that free markets will find appropriate solutions for all conceivable problems so how can they assimilate the fact that the financial sieves that are multinational corporations and Globalization are steadily increasing the wealth of the very few at the expense of the many.
I’ve had to smile privately at Republican friends of mine as they held forth on the merits of less government and free markets. And then I watched them stress as they tried to explain why all these ‘free’ corporations and ‘free’ markets, which only care about next quarter’s numbers, are sending all of our jobs and manufacturing overseas to the benefit of their bottom lines but to the ultimate degradation of the country and the lives of those who live here.
I recall reading a Buddhist tract a long time ago. It said something like,
“One can only see what one is looking at clearly when one doesn’t care what one sees.“
Yep, that about sums it up. And we, all of us, are emotional creatures who are emotionally bound to certain ideas, creeds, places, points-of-view and whatever. And all of us, therefore, are not clear and rational thinkers to the extent that these emotional non-negotiables warp our rationality.
I don’t think any of this changes my prognosis for the world. I still think it is bleak. Perhaps, even more so given that I now see that many (most, all) of us are incapable of rational perceptions due to our emotional attachments. But, it does, perhaps, make the problem a bit clearer.
Recently, in New Zealand, there were reports ➡ and ➡ that Asian people in Auckland were considering banding together and forming vigilante groups to combat crime in their area. Their complaint was that the police were ineffective and that they, the Asian folks, were being targeted by criminal groups.
The fellow, Mr. Peter Low, who was at the center of the effort to organize vigilante defenses, in my opinion, went too far and created a media firestorm when he suggested that Asians could hire Chinese Triads to protect them. Chinese Triads, if you didn’t know, are similar to the Japanese Yakusa or, perhaps, the Italian Mafia. Secret societies with more than a little involvement in criminal activities.
Soon after, many of the people he was trying to defend were disowning him and the entire thing went nuclear in the press and basically melted down.
I found all of this interesting, to a point. I think Mr. Low may have been justified in organizing local people to defend themselves but I think he was clearly over the top to suggest bringing in outside Triad enforcers to defend Asian interests. He might as well have suggested importing the La Cosa Nostra.
So why am I blogging about this? Because it made me reflect on the fact that I, personally, only believe in the law … to a point.
The law is suppose to be a common set of rules we have all basically agreed upon to keep order in our societies. Of course, we could quibble for hours that that’s not how it often works, but that is the basic idea and intent. And that’s good – it benefits us all, when it works well.
But, I’ve often reflected that if the law breaks down and fails to protect my interests, I am not going to passively watch myself or those I love be abused. I have limits and beyond those, I will look out for myself.
Some would have us believe that this sort of thinking is anti-social and that we should always passively rely on society’s systems to look after us – even when they are failing us. They would have us believe that no matter what the justification, taking things into one’s own hands is bad. Personally, I don’t feel that way.
There will always be those who think they are above the law and that they can act with impunity against us because of their age, their associations, their money or their political clout.
Have you never encountered the 16 year old with an attitude? He’s been breaking the laws and causing mayhem since he was 11 and he knows the juvenile courts won’t do anything to him more than a slap on the wrist. His parents either think he’s a saint, no matter what he does, or they are utterly disinterested. In any case, he has no fear, no limits, no self control and no respect for anyone who’s not prepared to do him more violence than he can do them.
Would you think me anti-social and very un-liberal, if I said I think a two by four on a dark night in an alley might help sort him out?
My wife tells me about what it was like in the 50’s and 60’s to grow up in small town Kansas in the American Midwest. Everyone carried guns there. Every pickup truck sported a rifle rack with a rifle in the back window. And folks left their doors unlocked and there was very little serious crime of any sort.
I long ago read most of Ayn Rand‘s books and then outgrew them. But, Rand said one thing that has always stuck with me. She said (paraphrased), “They cannot oppress you unless you consent to it.”
I judge myself as quite liberal in most of my feelings and beliefs but there are definitely some exceptions to this pattern.
Your comments, as always will be appreciated.
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