Shouldn’t we change our negative opinions about war and killing civilians in general?
If we browse through the pages of history, the only dominant theme back from ancient times to now is killing other people. We do it on business days and on weekends and on holy-days, we love it so much. We don’t live to love and to give our kids good examples of decency. It’s all break time short stories. Once a kid is strong enough to hold a gun, we prepare them to take over our favorite sport. We even have changed our language to reflect this love of ours: hunters go out to kill game. Not a living being.
Maybe in early 20th century we were emotionally and psychologically underdeveloped - which is obvious from writings and movies of that time. Then came WW2 and we quickly proclaimed it the tragedy of all times. Until the time when backstage dealings were disclosed, a famous US citizen from a famous family of long presidential connections was sentenced and his bank was found guilty of laundering money for the Nazi throughout the war…
But we ended WW2 as highly sophisticated species, so well outspoken, so articulate about love, friendship, peace, one global community, sharing and coexistence… that we had to spring into Korea, Vietnam and all other smaller wars run in the meantime or in parallel, because why not. It’s good money, and the best of this money is unaccounted for, anyway. No love, no humane feelings, no recognition of suffering, because why not.
All art, music, painting, theatre, even cinema goes into the “additional activities” section. Killing other people is what we do best. We even give medals and honor those who kill best or get killed. In the latter instance, we honor only those events which will help to advertise more hatred and killing. The rest remains is not mentioned because why should they be.
Obviously, our love of killing is reserved for us. The other guys, the bad guys, when they kill other people in wars, like defending their countries, they are enemies, they should be killed because they can kill us one day. We have called it “pre-emptive” killing. Because why not, it’s easier (especially for kids flying drone games in containers in comfy backyards), cost-effective and practically no-risk. The other guys should not have any weapons because we say so. But we don’t do much about it because they have to have some weapons for us to justify why we want them killed first before they can kill us.
Talking? Negotiations? Agreements? Coexistence? Shared purposes? Future? Humanity? Don’t be childish. That’s not for real men.
Real men go out there and kill civilians. This is what wars are about. If you don’t believe it, think:
If wars were the game for soldiers only, both sides would make arrangements to meet on selected practice grounds, training grounds, military-only sites, away from cities, infrastructure and civilians. They never do - it has never happened in history.
It’s like with MMA or boxing events. The fighters do not go out to your neighborhood or market or park, they do their thing in an isolated space, designed specifically not to harm anyone, and the fighters are specifically taught and trained not to touch anyone except the “enemy”. Even the referee who prevents them from going full-scale and vent off is untouchable. Strange…
Shouldn’t we change our negative opinions about war and killing civilians in general?
If we browse through the pages of history, the only dominant theme back from ancient times to now is killing other people. We do it on business days and on weekends and on holy-days, we love it so much. We don’t live to love and to give our kids good examples of decency. It’s all break time short stories. Once a kid is strong enough to hold a gun, we prepare them to take over our favorite sport. We even have changed our language to reflect this love of ours: hunters go out to kill game. Not a living being.
Maybe in early 20th century we were emotionally and psychologically underdeveloped - which is obvious from writings and movies of that time. Then came WW2 and we quickly proclaimed it the tragedy of all times. Until the time when backstage dealings were disclosed, a famous US citizen from a famous family of long presidential connections was sentenced and his bank was found guilty of laundering money for the Nazi throughout the war…
But we ended WW2 as highly sophisticated species, so well outspoken, so articulate about love, friendship, peace, one global community, sharing and coexistence… that we had to spring into Korea, Vietnam and all other smaller wars run in the meantime or in parallel, because why not. It’s good money, and the best of this money is unaccounted for, anyway. No love, no humane feelings, no recognition of suffering, because why not.
All art, music, painting, theatre, even cinema goes into the “additional activities” section. Killing other people is what we do best. We even give medals and honor those who kill best or get killed. In the latter instance, we honor only those events which will help to advertise more hatred and killing. The rest remains is not mentioned because why should they be.
Obviously, our love of killing is reserved for us. The other guys, the bad guys, when they kill other people in wars, like defending their countries, they are enemies, they should be killed because they can kill us one day. We have called it “pre-emptive” killing. Because why not, it’s easier (especially for kids flying drone games in containers in comfy backyards), cost-effective and practically no-risk. The other guys should not have any weapons because we say so. But we don’t do much about it because they have to have some weapons for us to justify why we want them killed first before they can kill us.
Talking? Negotiations? Agreements? Coexistence? Shared purposes? Future? Humanity? Don’t be childish. That’s not for real men.
Real men go out there and kill civilians. This is what wars are about. If you don’t believe it, think:
If wars were the game for soldiers only, both sides would make arrangements to meet on selected practice grounds, training grounds, military-only sites, away from cities, infrastructure and civilians. They never do - it has never happened in history.
It’s like with MMA or boxing events. The fighters do not go out to your neighborhood or market or park, they do their thing in an isolated space, designed specifically not to harm anyone, and the fighters are specifically taught and trained not to touch anyone except the “enemy”. Even the referee who prevents them from going full-scale and vent off is untouchable. Strange…
We are all live Lusitanias.
Well put!
So often, I hope that I am wrong.