Picking A Fight With Pacifism

CaliforniaRepublic ^ | 4/30/07 | Burt Prelutsky

[ParsifalCA]

The main problem with pacifism is that it doesn’t work in all situations. The main problem with pacifists is that they’re convinced it does.

Gandhi persevered for years and ultimately gained independence for India, but that was because, for all its faults, England was basically a civilized, Christian nation. It was possible to arouse the sympathy and good will of the British people. Had he tried it with Nazi Germany, he would have died in an oven.

There’s no getting around the fact that being a pacifist has a nicer ring to it than being, say, a warmonger. But when I hear people such as Alan Colmes say, as he did recently, that we rushed to war in Iraq and didn’t give negotiations a chance to work, I wonder what planet he and Mrs. Colmes call home. After all, for a dozen years, Saddam Hussein had violated his 1991 ceasefire agreement, and he cynically used the profits from his oil-for-food program to bribe Russia, Germany and France, into complicity. During that period, the U.N., the last great hope of the feeble-minded, passed 17 resolutions against Iraq. I guess the member nations figured they’d shame Hussein into compliance. They couldn’t even get him to allow the inspectors to search his palaces, leading one and all to believe he had WMD stashed in his wine cellars.

But in spite of British and American intelligence, and the leading lights in both political parties, agreeing that the Butcher of Baghdad had to be taken out, the pacifists disagreed. To them, anything beyond the equivalent of giving Hussein a good talking-to and a time-out, as if he were a three-year-old who’d been acting up, was unthinkable.

It’s hard to get a grip on the way their minds work.

[joeystoy]

There are no pacifists in America; only cowards who are willing to enjoy the comfort and security provided by others.

Then, for good measure, they pronounce their moral superiority to those who sacrifice their own safety in the defense of freedom.

They make me sick.

[ClearCase_guy]

It's certainly worth noting that Gandhi advised Britain to capitulate to the Nazis rather than fight WWII. Gandhi also criticized the Jews in Warsw for fighting the Nazis rather than peacefully marching off to Auschwitz.

Peace is good. We can have peace through Strength and Honor. But without strength and honor, there is simply capitulation to the forces of evil. That is no path to peace.

[Beckwith]

Remember the gas outpost in the “The Road Warrior” that was besieged by the Ayatollah of Rock and Rollah.”

The majority of the inhabitants were classic liberal losers who wanted to negotiate with the barbarians (yeah, right), who would have eaten them alive.

It took the Road Warrior to put some fight into them.

What this country needs is the equivalent of that character.

[joeystoy]

Remember the “pacifist” in The Road Warrior who shouted:

“Listen to them. They sound reasonable.”

Riiiiiiiiiight.

[syriacus]

I was a pacifist for years. Then I realized that if we think it is all right to use weapons to defend little kids who are being threatened with bodily harm, why shouldn’t nations be allowed to defend people the same way?

[RKV]

Yep, and the pacifist aggressives want you to be morally, legally and physically unable to defend yourself and your family, just like they are. They just cannot leave you alone, since they perceive themselves as morally superior - when in fact, they are the cowards you describe.

[pikachu]

a lot of people mistake ‘passive’ for ‘pacifist’. I know lost of pacifist through many years of martial arts practice and these people have chosen not to be violent (but they KNOW how). Someone passive does not know how to protect their hides or those of others. But boy do the passives know how to bitch.

[joeystoy]

Read my blog on liberal strategies to combat bullying at:

www.give-n-go.blogspot.com

The title is: The Bully’s Best Friend

[Badeye]

“Gandhi persevered for years and ultimately gained independence for India, but that was because, for all its faults, England was basically a civilized, Christian nation. It was possible to arouse the sympathy and good will of the British people. Had he tried it with Nazi Germany, he would have died in an oven. “

Exactly.

[The Great RJ]

I have always wondered how pacifists would have confronted Hitler. Perhaps they would have form straight lines and sung “kumbayas” on the way to the gas chambers.

[Noumenon]

“The pacifist is as surely a traitor to his country and to humanity as is the most brutal wrong doer.”

Theodore Roosevelt

[Noumenon]

Those of us who have received and understood good martial arts training don’t go looking for a fight. We’er simply prepared to decisively end a fight when our opponents offer us no other altrernative.

[archy]

There’s no getting around the fact that being a pacifist has a nicer ring to it than being, say, a warmonger. But when I hear people such as Alan Colmes say, as he did recently, that we rushed to war in Iraq and didn’t give negotiations a chance to work, I wonder what planet he and Mrs. Colmes call home. After all, for a dozen years, Saddam Hussein had violated his 1991 ceasefire agreement, and he cynically used the profits from his oil-for-food program to bribe Russia, Germany and France, into complicity.

The total military dead in the Iraq war between 2003 and this month [written Feb, 2007] stands at about 3,133. This is tragic, as are all deaths due to war, and we are facing a cowardly enemy unlike any other in our past that hides behind innocent citizens. Each death is blazoned in the headlines of newspapers and Internet sites. What is never compared is the number of military deaths during the Clinton administration: 1,245 in 1993; 1,109 in 1994; 1,055 in 1995; 1,008 in 1996. That's 4,417 deaths in peacetime but, of course, who's counting?