WAR AND PEACE
The Quaker way vs. The Spirit of '76.
“Could the peaceable principle of the Quakers be universally established, arms and the art of war would be wholly extirpated: But we live not in a world of angels...I am thus far a Quaker, that I would gladly agree with all the world to lay aside the use of arms, and settle matters by negotiation: but unless the whole will, the matter ends, and I take up my musket and thank Heaven He has put it in my power.”
Thoughts on Defensive War (1775)
Unsigned, but published under Thomas Paine’s editorship & widely attributed to him.
When will demonstrators and opponents of the corporate war-machine finally understand the common-sense equation outlined in the above quotation?
Cards on the table: we view non-violent action as dependent on strategic and pragmatic questions; NOT as somehow fundamental or absolute. First principles never change. The right to self-defense, for example, is a first principle; non-violence is not. At one time, a bullet was nicknamed “the ten-cent solution.” A bullet costs more now, but does the USA not have any number of problems that might be addressed with a “ten-cent solution?” Certainly the ruling class has had no compunctions about using it against our own citizen leadership. Right-wing elements in the USA and elsewhere — and we include the police broadly considered in this formula — have trended to more and more violent positions. Police now arrive, for example, in full combat regalia and armament, sometimes in armored personnel carriers. Non-police Right wing militia elements have murdered obstetricians and demonstrators, feel free to train in secret and muster in public, actively promote separatism, Christian dominionism, and secessionist ideas, and have engaged in and sometimes been convicted of insurrectionist activity. And yet, opponents of corporate, institutional, and non-institutional oppression still put on the “nice face,” sometimes even advocating gun bans.
One more question: who defends constitutional and human rights? Who are the real patriots?
And when will opponents of the corporate war-machine finally understand the common-sense equation outlined in the quotation at the top of this post?
Although I gained the quote from the bandits of bygone lawless days, it is still reasonable to say, it’s better to have a gun and not need it, than to need a gun and not have it.
Or, to quote Bob Marley, “ …what’re you gonna do when they come for you’”