~vidak :emacs: on Nostr: i feel like i am going to regret chiming in on the conversation i saw happening last ...
i feel like i am going to regret chiming in on the conversation i saw happening last night, but i wanted to point out something.
i hope i am not seen to be someone trying to have the last word, but something didn't seem quite right about the way a lot of people were talking, and i wanted to sleep on it.
there was a lot of emphatic words written here about the necessity for violence to restrain or destroy fascists/bigots.
i am usually one derided for being a pacifist. maybe i am a pacifist. perhaps pacifism and ruthlessness are just relative terms. i could be so only compared to others. there could be others more prone to non-violence than i.
anyway, what i think needs to be said is that death and destruction is just a tactic, it's something to be deployed in a particular instance, and is not a general principle of politics.
the same could be said about mercy and forgiveness. the overall goal is to make sure that there is justice for those who are oppressed.
this debate is a very old one. the earliest written words about it (in western thought, anyway) of which i am aware go all the way back to plato in the republic, between thrasymachus and socrates. that's around 300 BC.
my point is--the choice violence versus pacifism misses the point. it is a false dichotomy.
someone a lot braver than i once said that the revolution should, most importantly, be based on principles, and should not simply be a coup d'etat. he also said (at the risk of sounding silly/embarrassing) that revolutionaries are guided by feelings of great love.
i think i agree. an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.
i hope i am not seen to be someone trying to have the last word, but something didn't seem quite right about the way a lot of people were talking, and i wanted to sleep on it.
there was a lot of emphatic words written here about the necessity for violence to restrain or destroy fascists/bigots.
i am usually one derided for being a pacifist. maybe i am a pacifist. perhaps pacifism and ruthlessness are just relative terms. i could be so only compared to others. there could be others more prone to non-violence than i.
anyway, what i think needs to be said is that death and destruction is just a tactic, it's something to be deployed in a particular instance, and is not a general principle of politics.
the same could be said about mercy and forgiveness. the overall goal is to make sure that there is justice for those who are oppressed.
this debate is a very old one. the earliest written words about it (in western thought, anyway) of which i am aware go all the way back to plato in the republic, between thrasymachus and socrates. that's around 300 BC.
my point is--the choice violence versus pacifism misses the point. it is a false dichotomy.
someone a lot braver than i once said that the revolution should, most importantly, be based on principles, and should not simply be a coup d'etat. he also said (at the risk of sounding silly/embarrassing) that revolutionaries are guided by feelings of great love.
i think i agree. an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.