Posted on 02/06/2005 5:26:49 PM PST by ken21
[An Phoblacht/Republican News]
The limits of pacificism
Pacifism as Pathology By Ward Churchill Published by Arbeiter Ring (e mail: arbeiter@tao.ca)
I would recommend to republicans a new book entitled ``Pacifism as Pathology: Reflections on the Role of Armed Struggle in North America.'' It is a re-introduction of an essay written by Ward Churchill in 1984. This version includes a supplementary essay by Canadian anti-imperialist Mike Ryan, and an introduction by recently-released American anti-imperialist POW Ed Mead. I think it could be a valuable resource for republicans and their allies.
Ward Churchill, who is of American Indian descent, served for a short time as an Army Ranger in Vietnam. After a short time he realised that he was doing to the Vietnamese what had been done to his people by the US government. He refused to go out anymore, and was soon sent back home.
Immediately after his plane landed in Chicago, he called Students for a Democratic Society, and became an organiser with them. He lived in Peoria, Illinois and had a room-mate who was a Black Panther, named Mark Clark.
In December 1969, when Chicago Police killed Black Panther Fred Hampton in a shoot-to-kill operation, they also killed Clark.
Churchill also became a member of the American Indian Movement at the time that it was engaged in armed conflict with the Federal government in Pine Ridge, South Dakota. He spent some time as a national spokesperson for the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee. Despite not having a PhD, Ward's incredible intellect and writing ability has earned him a top place in the Ethnic Studies Department at the University of Colorado in Boulder. I can hardly think of an issue he hasn't written about, but along with his work in American Indian Studies, he has also co-authored the standard works on the FBI's ``internal security'' campaigns (such as against the Black Panthers, labour, etc).
The book's main thrust is to analyze and tear apart the ideology of pacifism, explaining how it is, in many ways (as it is usually but not always practiced), a counter-revolutionary ideology. How in many cases pacifism allows people to pose as revolutionaries while ensuring that they are not in harm's way. Churchill argues that pacifism leads to liberalism and limits the ability of popular movements to create real change.
It is also argued that European-American pacifists, intentionally or not, ensure that the burden of violence is on non-European-American and Third World communities who are the most vulnerable to state violence and often have no real choice other than to use physical force in defence and in altering their situation.
Ward concentrates extensively on the Jewish Holocaust, pointing out that the overwhelming response of Jews was non-violence, but that when they did use violence they succeeded in destroying one entire camp, and one of the furnaces at Auschwitz.
Churchill does not advocate a shift from pacifism (especially if practiced in the purest form) to some kind of ``culture of violence.'' He is merely suggesting that left-wing and/or anti-imperialist movements should feel free to keep all options open, from rallies and petitions to armed self-defence to armed struggle and that this should be accepted by those who are not directly involved but who support the oppressed.
Mike Ryan quotes Martin Luther King, Jr. as saying: ``Whether they read Ghandi or Frantz Fanon, all radicals understand the need for action - direct, self-transforming and structure-transforming action.'' The point is that opposing repression and poverty and dismantling the structures which perpetuate them is more important than keeping ourselves out of harm's way.
As Ed Mead puts it, ``the question is not whether to use violence in the global class struggle to end the rule of international imperialism, but only when to use it.''
By Tom Shelley
Appeasement is a bad "people/idea" how much, how far, I think it tends to put one/family on the Darwin Award trac.
These people have trained armed guys to protect them and to hurt their enemies. They are called Dog Soldiers or DogMen.
Punching Ward Churchill would be a really dumb thing to do.
And GOPers can learn exactly WHAT from this lying fraud wannabe Indian,when he had,even at the time of this book's publication,espoused violence ANGAINST AMERICA?
The person who wrote this article is either too stupid to breathe on his own,or was paid to write this,or both. I'm betting on both.
Stop spamming this ridiculous,uneducated message to every thread posted about this man.The more facts the world knows about WSC,the better! We've explained the why of this,many times to you;stop ignoring it.
Or,are YOU a troll?
bttt
Many thanks for the links and info!
You are either a troll/shill for this man,or incapable of understanding this situation;maybe both.
Burying heads in sand has never made any problems go away.
Immediately after his plane landed in Chicago, he called Students for a Democratic Society, and became an organiser with them. He lived in Peoria, Illinois and had a room-mate who was a Black Panther, named Mark Clark.
How VERY interesting!!!
Agree. . .Margaret Thatcher had it right. . .'I think I smell the stench of appeasement'. . .
So many offended by 'war'; people dying . .as if war was the worst of the 'killers'. . .
. . .ignoring the fact, that more innocent people have died at the hands of their evil, totalitarian inspired/motivated, governments. What a bloody history, they choose to ignore.
There ARE Just wars. . .for sure.
ping for later
You are remarkably rude and shrill, and apparently incapable of reasoned thought. Please stop spamming ME with your insulting garbage. Don't you dare tell me what I can and can't post.
we're aware of that.
we've been on this for years.
thanks for you emotionalism.
Every single word of this sentence is a lie, including 'a' and 'of'.
Kinda surprised he didn't 'become black' too.
You know, to offset his Heap Big Injun-ness.
we're aware of that.
i've been on this for almost 30 years.
Ward Churchill is a great propaganda coup, he needs to be bloodied, pulverized and then thrown back to the liberal mob as their hero/martyr. If he did not exist I would want to have created him.
That's nice, but I'm still going to comment on it.
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