From: Charles Hixson (charleshixsn@earthlink.net)
Date: Wed Mar 26 2003 - 15:29:42 MST
Noah Horton wrote:
>On Wed, 26 Mar 2003, Charles Hixson wrote:
>
>
>
>>Lee Corbin wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>>What is the emotional reaction of those protesting the war
>>>to American setbacks in the field?
>>>...
>>>Lee
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>That's basically irrelevant. This is a war of aggression, and is
>>therefore wrong. That it's being sold as something else basically
>>demonstrates the power of the press. It's not the first time. Hearst
>>organized the Spanish-American war to sell more newspapers.
>>
>>
>
>This sort of behavior is really inappropriate. Lee Corbin wrote a rather
>thoughtful email that was really an interesting question regarding
>the behavior of human beings with both logical and emotional stimuli that
>was rather interesting and rather relevent to Extropianism. Calling the
>question irrelevent and taking off once more on a tirade about why you
>think the war is wrong is unproductive to say the least. It is one thing
>to have a discussion about the merits of this war on this list, it is
>another to subvert other discussions on this list for your own ends.
>
>-Noah Horton
>
I'm sorry. I thought I was answering him. My answer was, that I don't
have any feeling of joy about the setbacks. Or, really, any sorrow. I
don't know any of the people involved, so my emotions don't flow at that
level, but are rather moved by more abstract criteria. I'm not claiming
to represent any large fraction of protestors, but merely myself. I
have protested, so I qualify as one of the people he was asking about.
I tend, in my eyes, to be basically an isolationist libertarian. I
don't believe in starting aggression, it seems wrong to me. But I also
don't rejoice when someone I disagree with meets with problems (and I
doubt that the resistance being encountered is sufficient to raise to
that level). I don't feel that we have some right to be the world's
policeman, and it seems to me that insisting that Iraq disarm when they
have many nearby enemies is ... bizarre. I will grant you that they
created their current enemies (except in the case of Turkey, where it
seems more motivated by desire to prevent an independant Kurdish
state). But still... to place it in a different context, I see it as if:
A man has been terrorizing a group in an alley with a knife. You walk
up to him, point a gun and say "Throw down your knife, and I'll walk
away". If he does what you say, how long will he live? Yes, he created
the mess, but still...
In a sense it could be argued that we have an obligation to remove
Hussein, because we saddled Iraq with him in the first place, so if we
had placed a price on his head I wouldn't have a qualm, but most of the
people being killed and maimed are essentially innocent. And the
justifications for starting the war seem very shallow. How many
countries do you suppose feel threatened that they US has weapons of
mass destruction? And of that number, are there not some few who might
feel that we could attack them? Are they then justified in attacking us?
We jail a larger fraction of our population than most countries, the
conditions under which we hold them are vile, and some of them are
killed. Most countries consider that an apalling mistreatment of our
citizens, and I wouldn't want to try to justify it. Would this make it
right for them to invade us?
Saying that other countries are no better is really faint praise, and
I'm not even sure it's true. It used to be, but that's not the same thing.
I hope that I have answered what you wanted answered. If not, then I
don't understant your question. (Also, I'm not really clear about the
connection between this question and extropianism. Other doctrines I
can see as applying, but if I missed answering that, it's because I
really don't understand.)
-- -- Charles Hixson Gnu software that is free, The best is yet to be.
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