[thechat] West v. East (was: civilized vs. uncivilized)

[Erika Meyer]

Ron,

Hindsight is 20/20, and as I mentioned, I'm not an expert on WWII in 
the Pacific.  I appreciate your historical knowledge, but still am 
not convinced that things needed to happen as they did.  To me, it is 
still wrong to bomb civilians.

I'm sure that no WWII decision was easy.

When the whole world believes in war, you get war. You have to be in 
that situation regardless.  Then you have to decide how to respond. 
My response is to try to stop the world from believing in war.

Utopian?  I'd simply like the world to be a better place.

I understand that our government and economic systems largely are 
built on war,  and it's important to people that we hang on to "our 
way of life," and all the land that we took during previous wars.

So it's not just utopian to be against war, it's downright subversive.

But if we weren't thinking about war and greed, we could be thinking 
about education, population control, freedom, food, sustainable 
living, strengthening democracy...  there are a lot of places we 
could put our energy.

>In war, things are black and white: You live or you die, you win or you
>lose. War is sometimes necessary and before you respond with some lame reply
>that it's NEVER necessary, look at your daughter and tell her the Native
>Americans shouldn't have fought back against the white men stealing their
>land and way of life...

I believe very strongly in the cause of Indigenous peoples.  But in 
the US, most of their battles are fought in the courts and in the 
schools.  Important battles are also fought in the world's public 
opinion.

American Indians lost most of their land.  Those who survived the 
best were able to hole up in more rugged and/or less desirable areas, 
go into hiding as appropriate, compromise as necessary, etc.

Crazy Horse et al faced horrible situations and made choices... I 
don't know whether the people were ultimately better off for their 
choices.  Little Big Horn was a payback for broken treaties and 
Custer's massacres.  Wounded Knee was payback in return.  The Lakota 
killed US soldiers, and the US soldiers responded by killing Lakota 
women and children.

What good can come of it?

Erika
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