The Best Reason Now To Be An Expat In Argentina...

[Jaredberryman]

You are exactly right of the Gandhi quote . However, "That said, 99.9% of the wars that are fought are fought for reasons of cowardice". I can not agree on this term. Greed is the real operative.

Ghost, that's a good point, but I think greed is also basically a form of cowardice. People are greedy because they are afraid they will not have enough or what they want or need in the future. In that sense, their cowardice lies in the fact that instead of being uncertain about their future, they would rather provide certainty and comfort for themselves at the price of other people's lives.

 

[ghost]

Ghost, that's a good point, but I think greed is also basically a form of cowardice. People are greedy because they are afraid they will not have enough or what they want or need in the future. In that sense, their cowardice lies in the fact that instead of being uncertain about their future, they would rather provide certainty and comfort for themselves at the price of other people's lives.

Not exactly , greed and cowardice are not always ...in fact, quite seldom, synonymous. There are only 2 motivators in the human motivational lexicon. They are Fear and Greed. You are either afraid you will lose something or there is something that you want. That's it. We are simple creatures.

 

[John.St]

You are implying that Iraqis, Libyans, Liberians, Rwandans, Yugoslavs, Syrians, North Koreans, Chinese, etc., are not civilized. I wonder what they would say about that?

I can't follow you.

What happened in Rwanda?
500,000–1,000,000 men, women and children slaughtered because they belonged to the Tutsi tribe. Civilized?

What happened in Libya?
A civil war with tens of thousands tortured and/or killed, sexual assaults, the combatants using human shields. Civilized?

What happened in (ex-)Jugoslavia?
Ethnic cleansing, genocide, displacement; some 130,000 killed, some 4,000,000 refugees. Civilized?

What is happening in North Korea?
Brutal dictatorships one after the other, government rejecting food help during serious famines, concentration camps for 150-200,000 political opponents, real or imagined, blessed by forced labour and risk of summary beatings, torture and execution. Civilized?

What is happening in Iraq?
De facto religious and tribe civil war, where private armies and suicide bombers kill indiscriminately, etc. Civilized?

Continue the list of civilized behaviour yourself.

Here is what I am thinking: if our military were trained with non-violent resistance tactics, and we deployed our military in Syria and they used those non-violent tactics, the war in Syria would be over by now possibly or very soon. Human beings are human beings, not matter where they are from. I am unaware that these kinds of tactics were used in any of those places. Pacifism does not mean "sit and do nothing". It means to resist injustice, but without violence. In many of those cases, the United States just did nothing at all. This kind of resistance also only works if it is organized and many people do it. But it works.

Do you really believe that turning the other cheek to murderous fanatics will achieve anything but your death?

I am sorry, but it is not a question of injustice, it is about blue murder to gain power.

Can you name one or two countries, where one side was prepared to kill all opponents and yet pacifism won (unassisted)?

As I wrote in a previous post: "It worked for Gandhi in India - but it would not have worked, had the British simply killed him immediately after he started his movement."

Only Britain's sensitivity to public opinion saved his life. How sensitive is e.g. North Korea to public opinion? did it stop the genocide in Rwanda, the civil wars in Libya, Liberia, Congo, ... mile long list.

 

[ajoknoblauch]

Not exactly , greed and cowardice are not always ...in fact, quite seldom, synonymous. There are only 2 motivators in the human motivational lexicon. They are Fear and Greed. You are either afraid you will lose something or there is something that you want. That's it. We are simple creatures.

How about altruism?

 

[ghost]

Nope. Everything derives from two. Pure altruism does not exist.

 

[khairyexpat]

Last time there was a hearty debate about peace and war was 1963, the era of "Ernest Hemingway" movie "A Farewell to Arms".
All you watch on TV nowadays is a bunch of air heads with nothing 2 say, non stop 7/24.
Not even in a Presidential debate.

 

[ajoknoblauch]

Nope. Everything derives from two. Pure altruism does not exist.

So people are altruistic out of fear and greed, then?

 

[ghost]

Fear or Greed. Yes. But that is not bad.

 

[ajoknoblauch]

Fear or Greed. Yes. But that is not bad.

Attributing people's motives to such narrow grounds amounts to almost total reductionism.

 

[Jaredberryman]

I can't follow you.

What happened in Rwanda?
500,000–1,000,000 men, women and children slaughtered because they belonged to the Tutsi tribe. Civilized?

What happened in Libya?
A civil war with tens of thousands tortured and/or killed, sexual assaults, the combatants using human shields. Civilized?

What happened in (ex-)Jugoslavia?
Ethnic cleansing, genocide, displacement; some 130,000 killed, some 4,000,000 refugees. Civilized?

What is happening in North Korea?
Brutal dictatorships one after the other, government rejecting food help during serious famines, concentration camps for 150-200,000 political opponents, real or imagined, blessed by forced labour and risk of summary beatings, torture and execution. Civilized?

What is happening in Iraq?
De facto religious and tribe civil war, where private armies and suicide bombers kill indiscriminately, etc. Civilized?

Continue the list of civilized behaviour yourself.

Do you really believe that turning the other cheek to murderous fanatics will achieve anything but your death?

I am sorry, but it is not a question of injustice, it is about blue murder to gain power.

Can you name one or two countries, where one side was prepared to kill all opponents and yet pacifism won (unassisted)?

As I wrote in a previous post: "It worked for Gandhi in India - but it would not have worked, had the British simply killed him immediately after he started his movement."

Only Britain's sensitivity to public opinion saved his life. How sensitive is e.g. North Korea to public opinion? did it stop the genocide in Rwanda, the civil wars in Libya, Liberia, Congo, ... mile long list.

It's just that your quote sort of implies that none of the people in these countries know that it is wrong to murder. It sounds as if you are saying that only Western culture knows what is right. We have our fair share of murder and immorality, though. Our own country has dropped quite a few bombs on quite a few people, a lot of them innocents. Our own people are killing each other constantly, too. And Western society has some of the greediest people that have ever lived. So I am somewhat skeptical of the claim that we are in a position of moral authority here.

People that pull the trigger are not the government or those in power. The government can give orders, and it may be despicable, but people must carry out those orders. Everyday people don't always have the stomach to do what they are told. Just look at the video of the protester in Tianmen square above.

Let's just think about for a moment the conflict in Rwanda. The U.S.A. did nothing about Rwanda (Madeleine Albright told the media that 'it was not in our interest', another words, we we would not get anything out of it). Let's say that our military had gone to Rwanda and done some of the following things:

1. Made shelters for the Tutsi and surrounded them with human body shields.
2. Had a major propaganda campaign. For instance, airdropped pamphlets and leaflets saying that to kill Tutsi for their race is murder. Put all sorts of visible propaganda on the houses of major leaders and known murderers of Tutsi that say 'you are a murderer, stop killing people', and so forth. Put that message over loud speakers, everywhere, that to kill a Tutsi is murder. Emit radio and even television messages explaining why it is murder and despicable.
3. Confiscated weapons or destroy them whenever or wherever possible.
4. Surround leader's houses with loudspeakers blaring 'Why do you murder and support murder! Stop murdering!

So forth and so on. If we would have done that, the genocide would likely have stopped.

Your argument, that you may be killed, has no weight. You may also be killed in war. What is the difference? Anyways, even if it does mean you will die, it is still morally superior. Sometimes doing what is right does not benefit at all. This is what is means to be a wise and fulfilled human being. I am much more interested in that than how long I live.

But, in fairness, you do have a point. I still disagree.