A thought experiment on the war on terror
There's no point, I've decided long ago, for me personally to belabor whether the war in Iraq is justified or not. It's happening, and it's not gonna stop from kids protesting. I've probably stated somewhere that I (honestly!) have a legitimate medical condition that prohibits me from joining the military. (Okay, I take Paxil for obsessive-compulsive disorder). Since I'm not fighting, and my friend Chris is, for me to criticize the war could disappoint him and would just make me look bad. However, since I'm not fighting, and my friend Chris is, there is no way I can stand on the sidelines like a college Republican chickenhawk and talk about the Iraq war being a noble cause. Personally, in my heart I wouldn't mind every Iraqi dying if my friend Chris were guaranteed to come home safe -- even though in my brain, I know that Iraqis are just human beings too and I wish them well. My personal feelings on that matter do not add to my internal debate on the war's overall justification. Therefore, no point in me weighing in either way.
As regards the larger U.S.-led war on Islamic terrorists (remember that), my feelings are similar but maybe a bit more chickenhawk. I don't want any other Americans to get blown up by terrorists, and if bombing Afghanistan is necessary to keep that from happening, my reptilian brain considers that acceptable. There is the question of whether bombing innocent civilians across the ocean actually will reduce terrorist attacks on Americans, but again, I'm just a hippie with a medical deferral, so whatever my opinion is is probably wrong.
Having no opinion on the war on terror or the war in Iraq, I nonetheless thought I'd do a little thought experiment. This thought experiment is specifically for supporters of the war, but will hopefully help clarify the thinking of the opponents of the war as well. The experiment I've come up with will probably seem most relevant to American conservatives who, like me, live in the "red states" (God bless Ohio!). The point of this experiment is to help pro-war fellow Americans see why anyone in their right mind might oppose the war on terror/Iraq war.
In this experiment, I'd like you to imagine that the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks happened during the presidency of Bill Clinton. Instead of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, let's say it was the United Nations building that was hit with airplanes, with thousands of people killed (I don't know off the top of my head if the UN building holds thousands, but I assume it does). Also -- and this is most important -- instead of Muslims from oversees, the attacks were orchestrated and performed by American members of the Christian Identity movement.
The Christian Identity movement was semi-big news in the '90s. They were a white-supremacist movement who considered themselves to be Christian. The basis of their beliefs was that the original Israelites had been white people, that Christianity is a religion meant only for white people, that modern Jews are basically just faking being Israelites so they can go about their liberal-elite-Jewish-banker-Communist-world-domination plot. They think nonwhites are bad, et cetera -- you've heard this before. They also hold what has come to be seen as basically conservative Christian positions on culture-war issues -- they oppose abortion as murder and they hate gays. They're some of the folks you heard who blew up the abortion clinics and gay bars in the '90s.
Anyway, when the Christian Identity people pilot planes into the New York UN building, killing thousands, everybody in the country is pretty upset. The victims included not only a bunch of foreign diplomats and Frenchies we don't normally care much about, but also regular Americans we do normally care about -- I don't know, maybe they were in the buildings next door. Okay, so all Americans (and foreign people) are upset by this, even conservative Americans -- they may have never liked the UN much, but hey, people are people, and they really didn't need to get killed -- plus real Americans died too. The segment of the American populace most pissed off, though, is the American liberals, who clamor for harsh measures to be taken against the so-called "redneck terrorists." Bill Clinton -- who just recently, let's say, won a very close election with a big 'ol hanging chad controversy -- comes on TV and announces to America and the world that the terrorists will be punished. "These terrorists tried to destroy the unity of nations," Clinton says, "but the world stands together as one, stronger than ever. Whoever is not with this united world is against us."
To this end, Clinton and the surviving delegates of the UN and represented countries form a military alliance. Bomber planes -- maybe U.S. planes under a UN mandate, whatever -- are sent to drop bombs on the hideouts of the Christian Identity movement remote wilderness areas of the Southern and Western United States. Of course, many people who are not in Christian Identity are killed and/or seriously injured by the bombings, but the people in the blues states figure that -- and I quote a New York editorial from this imaginary parallel universe -- "It's them or us. Besides, it is widely known that these rednecks are known to hold several ideas similar to those of Christian Identity -- they may not bomb abortion clinics or gay bars, but they do oppose abortion and gay rights. Plus, all those ignorant people want if they got what they want would be a theocracy that would oppress women." So goes the logic, and the bombing continues.
Soon Clinton moves troops -- UN, U.S., take your pick -- into the bombed areas to apprehend and neutralize those of the right-wing terrorists who remain from the bombing runs. Picture the whole shebang with curfews, mistaken shootings, maybe some prisoner mistreatment -- you get the idea. Then Clinton gets a big idea. There is another racist group, called the World Church of the Creator. The name is misleading, because unlike Christian Identity, the World Church of the Creator folks do not consider themselves Christian -- the Creator the name refers to is the white race. Clinton produces some evidence that World Church has been working with Christian Identity and may have even helped the UN attack. Some protests are heard, saying that World Church doesn't even like Christianity, while Christian Identity considers Hitler -- whom the World Churchers admire -- to be too pagan and socialistic. Some find it hard to believe these two groups, bad as they each are, would work together. Nonetheless, Clinton insists the two groups' shared hatred of nonwhites, of the United Nations, and of liberalism in general means that they would cooperate despite their differences. Thus, Clinton sends planes and troops in blue helmets to attack and occupy World Church of the Creator bases throughout the country, killing more innocents, largely in the red states, and taking troops and resources away even from Christian Identity areas. Through all this, people in the areas under military pressure are subjected to the whole curfew-shooting-thing, especially if they are known to be religiously conservative Christians. After all, New Yorkers and Angelenos do not know how many Christian Identity racists are hiding behind the facade of supposedly innocent non-racist Christianity. Conservative Christian leaders protest that not all born-again or evangelical Christians are racist -- in fact, the vast majority are not racist at all, listening to DC Talk and all that. But in vain. Meanwhile, non-Christian conservatives (lower-tax agnostic minarchists, Jews like David Horowitz, et cetera) begin to protest what is being done to their Christian political brethren. In response, several liberal pundits and citizens speculate that these secular conservatives may have more in common with those religious and/or racist terrorists than they let on. "If you're not with us of the united world against the redneck terrorists, you're against us," the liberals say. Furthermore, many liberals insist that Clinton is by far the greatest president ever, and applaud his faith in one world of love. Through all this, conservatives of all stripes -- both non-terrorist, non-racist Christians and secular-minded conservatives -- honestly feel nothing but contempt for those racist killers, but it is so obvious that the liberals and Clinton and the UN are out of control ...
I could go on with this imaginary description, I guess, but I don't think I need to. If you who are reading this are a conservative and/or support the current war on terror and/or war in Iraq, this description is not expected nor intended to change your mind. However, it just might help you see that liberals who oppose the war and criticize the administration of George W. Bush are not necessarily conspiring with bin Laden to destroy America. If you're an opponent of the war and of Bush, please do not think I am on your side, either. And finally -- yes, I am aware that the current real war does not have blue-states being bombed, so of course my thought experiment is not perfectly analogous. I did not intend to suggest that blue-staters under Bush have suffered at all like the foreigners killed in the war on terror (as well as our own American soldiers, of course). I just wanted you conservatives to see how a hippie like me -- not me, but like me -- could come to the conclusion that the war on terror could be wrong without being evil. That's all.
As regards the larger U.S.-led war on Islamic terrorists (remember that), my feelings are similar but maybe a bit more chickenhawk. I don't want any other Americans to get blown up by terrorists, and if bombing Afghanistan is necessary to keep that from happening, my reptilian brain considers that acceptable. There is the question of whether bombing innocent civilians across the ocean actually will reduce terrorist attacks on Americans, but again, I'm just a hippie with a medical deferral, so whatever my opinion is is probably wrong.
Having no opinion on the war on terror or the war in Iraq, I nonetheless thought I'd do a little thought experiment. This thought experiment is specifically for supporters of the war, but will hopefully help clarify the thinking of the opponents of the war as well. The experiment I've come up with will probably seem most relevant to American conservatives who, like me, live in the "red states" (God bless Ohio!). The point of this experiment is to help pro-war fellow Americans see why anyone in their right mind might oppose the war on terror/Iraq war.
In this experiment, I'd like you to imagine that the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks happened during the presidency of Bill Clinton. Instead of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, let's say it was the United Nations building that was hit with airplanes, with thousands of people killed (I don't know off the top of my head if the UN building holds thousands, but I assume it does). Also -- and this is most important -- instead of Muslims from oversees, the attacks were orchestrated and performed by American members of the Christian Identity movement.
The Christian Identity movement was semi-big news in the '90s. They were a white-supremacist movement who considered themselves to be Christian. The basis of their beliefs was that the original Israelites had been white people, that Christianity is a religion meant only for white people, that modern Jews are basically just faking being Israelites so they can go about their liberal-elite-Jewish-banker-Communist-world-domination plot. They think nonwhites are bad, et cetera -- you've heard this before. They also hold what has come to be seen as basically conservative Christian positions on culture-war issues -- they oppose abortion as murder and they hate gays. They're some of the folks you heard who blew up the abortion clinics and gay bars in the '90s.
Anyway, when the Christian Identity people pilot planes into the New York UN building, killing thousands, everybody in the country is pretty upset. The victims included not only a bunch of foreign diplomats and Frenchies we don't normally care much about, but also regular Americans we do normally care about -- I don't know, maybe they were in the buildings next door. Okay, so all Americans (and foreign people) are upset by this, even conservative Americans -- they may have never liked the UN much, but hey, people are people, and they really didn't need to get killed -- plus real Americans died too. The segment of the American populace most pissed off, though, is the American liberals, who clamor for harsh measures to be taken against the so-called "redneck terrorists." Bill Clinton -- who just recently, let's say, won a very close election with a big 'ol hanging chad controversy -- comes on TV and announces to America and the world that the terrorists will be punished. "These terrorists tried to destroy the unity of nations," Clinton says, "but the world stands together as one, stronger than ever. Whoever is not with this united world is against us."
To this end, Clinton and the surviving delegates of the UN and represented countries form a military alliance. Bomber planes -- maybe U.S. planes under a UN mandate, whatever -- are sent to drop bombs on the hideouts of the Christian Identity movement remote wilderness areas of the Southern and Western United States. Of course, many people who are not in Christian Identity are killed and/or seriously injured by the bombings, but the people in the blues states figure that -- and I quote a New York editorial from this imaginary parallel universe -- "It's them or us. Besides, it is widely known that these rednecks are known to hold several ideas similar to those of Christian Identity -- they may not bomb abortion clinics or gay bars, but they do oppose abortion and gay rights. Plus, all those ignorant people want if they got what they want would be a theocracy that would oppress women." So goes the logic, and the bombing continues.
Soon Clinton moves troops -- UN, U.S., take your pick -- into the bombed areas to apprehend and neutralize those of the right-wing terrorists who remain from the bombing runs. Picture the whole shebang with curfews, mistaken shootings, maybe some prisoner mistreatment -- you get the idea. Then Clinton gets a big idea. There is another racist group, called the World Church of the Creator. The name is misleading, because unlike Christian Identity, the World Church of the Creator folks do not consider themselves Christian -- the Creator the name refers to is the white race. Clinton produces some evidence that World Church has been working with Christian Identity and may have even helped the UN attack. Some protests are heard, saying that World Church doesn't even like Christianity, while Christian Identity considers Hitler -- whom the World Churchers admire -- to be too pagan and socialistic. Some find it hard to believe these two groups, bad as they each are, would work together. Nonetheless, Clinton insists the two groups' shared hatred of nonwhites, of the United Nations, and of liberalism in general means that they would cooperate despite their differences. Thus, Clinton sends planes and troops in blue helmets to attack and occupy World Church of the Creator bases throughout the country, killing more innocents, largely in the red states, and taking troops and resources away even from Christian Identity areas. Through all this, people in the areas under military pressure are subjected to the whole curfew-shooting-thing, especially if they are known to be religiously conservative Christians. After all, New Yorkers and Angelenos do not know how many Christian Identity racists are hiding behind the facade of supposedly innocent non-racist Christianity. Conservative Christian leaders protest that not all born-again or evangelical Christians are racist -- in fact, the vast majority are not racist at all, listening to DC Talk and all that. But in vain. Meanwhile, non-Christian conservatives (lower-tax agnostic minarchists, Jews like David Horowitz, et cetera) begin to protest what is being done to their Christian political brethren. In response, several liberal pundits and citizens speculate that these secular conservatives may have more in common with those religious and/or racist terrorists than they let on. "If you're not with us of the united world against the redneck terrorists, you're against us," the liberals say. Furthermore, many liberals insist that Clinton is by far the greatest president ever, and applaud his faith in one world of love. Through all this, conservatives of all stripes -- both non-terrorist, non-racist Christians and secular-minded conservatives -- honestly feel nothing but contempt for those racist killers, but it is so obvious that the liberals and Clinton and the UN are out of control ...
I could go on with this imaginary description, I guess, but I don't think I need to. If you who are reading this are a conservative and/or support the current war on terror and/or war in Iraq, this description is not expected nor intended to change your mind. However, it just might help you see that liberals who oppose the war and criticize the administration of George W. Bush are not necessarily conspiring with bin Laden to destroy America. If you're an opponent of the war and of Bush, please do not think I am on your side, either. And finally -- yes, I am aware that the current real war does not have blue-states being bombed, so of course my thought experiment is not perfectly analogous. I did not intend to suggest that blue-staters under Bush have suffered at all like the foreigners killed in the war on terror (as well as our own American soldiers, of course). I just wanted you conservatives to see how a hippie like me -- not me, but like me -- could come to the conclusion that the war on terror could be wrong without being evil. That's all.
posted by jlhart7 at 6:51 PM
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