We're supposed to think Iraqis took babies out of incubators in Kuwait, the people of Afghanistan were responsible for the crimes of September 11, 2001, Russia invaded Ukraine after a peaceful democratic election, China is a threat to the United States when it sails in the South China Sea, the Vietnamese attacked the United States in the Gulf on Tonkin, the United States brought civilization to the Philippines, Spain blew up the U.S.S. Maine, Wilson didn't know the Lusitania had troops and guns on it, Roosevelt had no idea Japan was about to attack, World War II was fought to save the Jews, no country has gained its independence or ended slavery without a war, Mexico attacked us, and the Native Americans started it.
We're supposed to think those and many other things. But I've never been a fan of blindly accepting what I'm supposed to think. I believe we should think what the evidence suggests to us, namely that U.S. wars generate more enemies and dangers rather than reducing them. Those enemies are usually armed with U.S. weapons. Militarism is an economic drain. Global starvation, unclean water, and numerous other problems could be completely solved for a tiny fraction of military spending. U.S. war victims are at least 95% on the other side and most of them civilian by any definition. The wars are fought in and from above people's homes. War has been sporadic in our human past, requires intense conditioning, and sees many participants never recover. Stopping the bombing of Syria in 2013 and the push for war on Iran in 2015 were successes typical of popular and largely untapped power, as was the nonviolent Tunisian overthrow of a dictator in 2011. War is a crime driven by irrational urges and marketed on the basis of lies.
WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE?
The consequences of coming to think in this -- what I take to be a fact-based -- manner include the unpleasantness of recognizing that so-called leaders, top officials and authorities are engaged in evil and atrocious actions. But did anyone really not know that? Many who avoid that reality when it comes to foreign relations are nonetheless, to one degree or another, aware of it in the areas of environmental destruction or trade or banking or domestic gun control or education or favors for dispensers of juicy bribes. There's some extra resistance to recognizing the painful truth when it comes to wars because fear and hatred come into play. Recognizing the lies of "your side" is equated with treasonously and dangerously taking the other side. This has to be overcome by recognizing the enemy to be war itself, not a group of people or a foreign leader.
The way to overcome the unpleasantness of facing reality, by transforming it into something enjoyable, is to work to change it. The work itself is quite fulfilling and rewarding. And that has nothing to do with its success or failure. It has, for me, everything to do with aiming as strategically as possible toward success and knowing that success is possible. But optimism and pessimism don't enter into it.
What I work for is cultural change. As corporations now boycott states that discriminate against LGBTQ people, we need to achieve a society in which it is acceptable to boycott profiteering from mass murder. The particular legislative and judicial steps to end war will follow, and they matter less in their details -- though we will have to work on them as strategically as possible.
Cultural change can be tricky. When you look at polling on support for wars and militarism, as on numerous other issues, people aged 18-30 often have significantly, sometimes dramatically, better opinions than their elders. The trouble is that they are not sufficiently active, not protesting, not lobbying, not organizing, not even voting in the necessary numbers. The other trouble is that they tend to age. And as they age, they have a tendency to form truly awful political opinions. With millions of exceptions, of course, the older people get the worse their politics becomes.
This, of course, bodes very ill for a peace movement made up disproportionately of old people who became peace activists in an earlier era when a great many young people were peace activists. Can we expect people who are young today and not engaged in opposing war to become active members of a peace movement when they get older? Or can we help facilitate a peace movement of young people today? The latter seems the more promising course. This is why I try to prioritize speaking at colleges and to groups of young people. This is why I think we need to work to expand movements where young people are somewhat active to include opposition to war. These include movements against the militarization of police, for the protection of the environment, and against the wars of Israel. And when there are moments of expansion in the peace movement, when partisan and personality and corporate media factors drive people to oppose a war, we need to support and encourage the youngest leaders of that wider movement.
WHAT SHOULD WE SAY TO PEOPLE?
I was invited to speak in Roanoke, Virginia, on June 24, 2016, the day after the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union (EU), and Prime Minister David Cameron announced his resignation. It was also just after a mass-shooting in Orlando, Florida, and not terribly long after a Roanoke television news reporter was shot to death live on the air. I began by trying to put the UK's vote in context. I didn't speak from a script but I said something like the following. I've filled it out here as I think it applies in any town one might speak in.
Raise your hands: How would you vote on leaving NAFTA?
How about on leaving NATO?
Yeah, me too.
Shout out what nation comes to mind first when I say this phrase? "Greatest democracy on earth."
The United States? If it's the United States, that must be because the United States wages wars in the name of democracy. Because we decide nothing by public vote here, and we have a majority opposed to the actions of our senators and misrepresentatives on many issues. We've had a recent academic study conclude that the United States is in fact an oligarchy.
What about if U.S. states could have more power in relation to the federal government, the sort of power that members of the EU have or provinces in Canada have -- would you vote for that? Many might not. We're taught to be afraid of democracy. Some U.S. states with more power would do bad things, but others would do wonderful things. I'm afraid that nobody in power in the U.S. thinks that allowing that to happen would be better than just sticking with Washington D.C. doing catastrophic things. Few even favor having Congress, rather than presidents, make the laws within the federal government. And, yes, it's hard to blame them if you've seen Congress lately. But these are antidemocratic tendencies.
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