Terrorism and Nonviolence
by Arun Gandhi
Understandably, after the tragedy in New York and Washington DC on
September 11 many have written or called the office to find out what
would be an appropriate nonviolent response to such an unbelievably
inhuman act of violence.
First, we must understand that nonviolence is not a strategy that
we can use in a moment of crisis and discarded in times of peace.
Nonviolence is about personal attitudes, about becoming the change we
wish to see in the world. Because, a nationıs collective attitude is
based on the attitude of the individual. Nonviolence is about building
positive relationships with all human beings relationships that are
based on love, compassion, respect, understanding and appreciation.
Nonviolence is also about not judging people as we perceive them to
be that is, a murderer is not born a murderer; a terrorist is not
born a terrorist. People become murderers, robbers and terrorists
because of circumstances and experiences in life. Killing or confining
murders, robbers, terrorists, or the like is not going to rid this
world of them. For every one we kill or confine we create another
hundred to take their place. What we need to do is to analyze
dispassionately what are those circumstances that create such monsters
and how can we help eliminate those circumstances, not the monsters.
Justice should mean reformation and not revenge.
We saw some people in Iraq and Palestine and I dare say many other
countries rejoice the blowing up of the World Trade Center and the
Pentagon. It horrified us, as it should. But, let us not forget that
we do the same thing. When Israel bombs the Palestinians we either
rejoice or show no compassion. Our attitude is they deserve what they
get. When the Palestinians bomb the Israelis we are indignant and
condemn them as vermin who need to be eliminated.
We reacted without compassion when we bombed the cities of Iraq. I
was among the millions in the United States who sat glued to the
television and watched the drama as though it was a made for
television film. The television had desensitized us. Thousands of
innocent men, women and children were being blown to bits and instead
of feeling sorry for them we marveled at the efficiency of our
military. For more than ten years we have continued to wreak havoc in
Iraq an estimated 50,000 children die every year because of
sanctions that we have imposed and it hasnıt moved us to compassion.
All this is done, we are told, because we want to get rid of the Satan
called Sadam Hussein.
Now we are getting ready to do this all over again to get rid of
another Satan called Osama Bin Laden. We will bomb the cities of
Afghanistan because they harbor the Satan and in the process we will
help create a thousand other bin Ladens.
Some might say we donıt care what the world thinks of us as long
as they respect our strength. After all we have the means to blow
this world to pieces since we are the only surviving super-power. Do
we want the world to respect us the way school children respect a
bully? Is that our role in the world?
If a bully is what we want to be then we must be prepared to face
the same consequences as a school-yard bully faces. On the other hand
we cannot tell the world ³leave us alone.² Isolationism is not what
this world is built for.
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