On Violence

Missing his father, Vermont
man digs up his remains
and takes them home.

I have abhorred violence for as long as I can remember. Perhaps this is because I was raised in a small mining town where violence was common, especially on week-ends, when the miners and lumberjacks came to town for their weekend entertainment. Fights occurred regularly, especially on Friday and Saturday nights, and they could be quite violent with heads being smashed on the concrete sidewalks and such (most fights were not this bad, but did result in a lot of blood and black eyes and such). This kind of behavior was also by no means uncommon among high-schoolers and teen-agers. During WWII, when a naval station was created at Farragut on Lake Pond Oreille, and the sailors would visit our town there were also many fights over the local girls, and there were most always fights after our football games. Having grown up in such a mileu, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that the natives in New Guinea where I spent some time, who were said to be violent, did not seem to me to be very violent at all (within their own groups, that is). I recall as a teen-ager asking my parents if I could please go away to school, but that did not happen. Hunting with my father I soon learned I did not really like killing things. I guess I was a “sissy,” although I never felt that way. Anyway, this is not really about me, only about my reaction to what I am hearing about what to do in Iran, Afghanistan, and elsewhere.
I cannot believe, for example, that John Bolton is urging us to use nuclear bombs on Iran. He was recently seconded in this by one of our Generals who said if Israel bombs Iran we should join them. There are many other “hawks” as well, including, I gather, even Hillary Clinton, our Secretary of State, and even President Obama has refused to take military action off the table. I am unable to understand this. First, there is no evidence that Iran is building a nuclear bomb. These warmongers apparently just refuse to believe it, even though our own intelligence has verified it. For the most part I guess these are pretty much the same people who thought we were right to illegally attack Iraq and now want us to continue the carnage in Afghanistan. Do people like this have no idea of what it is they are promoting? Are they brain dead when it comes to human misery and death? What do they think happens when we start dropping bombs on people? Are they not satisfied that we have already killed probably a million, mostly innocent civilians, and displaced four million from their homes? Perhaps this might be necessary if we were under attack by these countries, but we aren’t, weren’t, and aren’t going to be. So I don’t get it. Are they in it for the money or the black gold or what? Personally I am led to conclude these warmongers are mindless creatures who have no understanding or empathy when it comes to others, basically ghouls who take pleasure in torturing and destroying other people, monsters who are so enraptured with power they believe they can do anything (they have so far and have managed to escape responsibility for it). We are not in danger from any of these people, except for a tiny few who might legitimately be considered terrorists, but that hardly justifies attacking other countries or engaging in “war” rather than police action. Perhaps there are reasons for what we do that I am unaware of, in which case I would have to bow to their superior knowledge and understanding of our Foreign Policy, but at the moment I simply do not believe this is the case. I think they (and even we) are quite simply mad.

Are our banks suicidal? It seems they are all raising their interest rates on credit cards. I know my own rates are going up from 9.9% to 13.4% (or close to that) for no reason at all other than that they can apparently legally do it. I saw a report today that Citibank is raising their rates to 29.9%! Can you believe that! Apparently their short-term greed is such they cannot realize they are actually killing the goose that has been laying them the gold eggs for so long. Everyone should just refuse to pay, ending the credit card business once and for all. Unfortunately, credit cards and credit have become so integral to our lives we would probably go on with such a thieving situation no matter what they did (we really are not very bright, you know).

LKBIQ:
No society that feeds its children on tales of successful violence can expect them not to believe that violence in the end is rewarded.
Margaret Mead

TILT:
The Semai of Malaysia have two main values, avoiding violence and sharing food.