Archive for September, 2006

War & Peace, part 2

Thursday, September 7th, 2006

In part 1 of this three part series, we covered how world peace is possible, especially when we keep a positive frame of mind regarding the future of the world. This part deals with the nature of war in the hopes that by better understanding war, we will be better equipped for finding peace.

The first thing to recognize is that the biggest war of all is going on inside our own hearts and minds. Inside each of us is a battle between two sides; on one side is who we are at any given instant, and on the other, our genetically imposed perpetual dissatisfaction. We all have an instinctual force telling us that no matter how much we possess, no matter how much we accomplish, that we will always need more.

This instinct to want more is not necessarily a bad thing. It is what drives humanity forward, what drives each of us forward. It results in positive things, like hard work, resourcefulness and inventiveness, but it can also result in negative things, like stealing and killing.

One might infer that, in a world full of people all wanting more for themselves, that the only state for the people to be in is one of perpetual war, as everyone claws and fights their way to the top. But I would have to disagree. In fact, I feel that humanity’s desire for more is the biggest reason why peace is possible. We all want more, and a world of peace will give us more:

  • more resources, since we don’t have to waste them on warfare
  • more security, from living in a more secure world
  • a higher quality of life that comes with a world where nations get along

So, if a world of peace is better for most everyone, it seems natural that we would have attained it. Why, then, do we still have entire nations going to war?

The main reason our world is at war is because this instinctual drive for more is taking place inside the minds of our world’s most powerful and influential leaders… leaders who support immeasurable suffering so that they can profit.

War is waged by billionaires and multi-millionaires who, like most people, are not happy with what they already have, so they want more. When one is at the top, the only way to get more is to take from others, and that is exactly what war between nations is about… redistributing wealth and power from one place to another. Sometimes it’s from a less powerful country to a more powerful country, other times it’s from a country’s population to the military and the government. But modern warfare is about what war has always been about – wealth and power.

War is about powerful people using their power to manipulate entire populations into fighting for them to make them more powerful.

Our leaders need us to pay for and fight in their wars, so they do what they need to do to keep us willing to fight. We are indoctrinated to believe that war is about things like bravery, patriotism, liberty, freedom & democracy, but it isn’t. Soldiers who fight and die may very well be brave and patriotic, but war isn’t about those things. Nor is it God’s will or Allah’s will or any other deity’s will that people should hate and fight and die. War only serves the interests of those who profit from war – mainly wealthy people who seek to be wealthier.

Not only is it our leaders who wage war, the very nature of war is such that it actually perpetuates itself. War makes more war in several ways, including:

  • For one, war is very expensive. It costs tax payers a lot of money for their country to have a military, and more for it to go to war. The resources that are used for destruction could be used for construction, like building infrastructure and investing in social capital like health care and education. Warfare uses up surplus resources, keeping enough of the population poor, uneducated, and living with a heightened level of insecurity so that they will continue supporting the war with their taxes and their lives.
  • Second, these resources – the wealth that people abandon to their war-making governments – empower those who profit from war. The trillion dollar industry that is the military complex means a lot of power and wealth tied up in ensuring that war continues. Large corporations receive billion dollar contracts to create weapons and advance war. Politicians and the media can be significantly influenced with that kind of money, and it results in a system that pushes war forward… and even encourages war to expand.
  • Third, war has been part of human civilization for so long that it has become institutionalized… war is part of the status quo. The status quo of any hierarchy is perpetuated by every member of the hierarchy who fears losing power. This means, the more power someone has, the more likely they will want things to continue as is. Those with power are in positions of power because of the way the world is, war included, and they will naturally fear change because change is a potential threat to their power.
  • Finally, war creates more war by creating more enemies. Modern warfare, short of nuclear annihilation, is about dropping bombs and shooting enemies, in the hopes of destroying those who would do the same. But the action of destroying one’s enemies only serves to create more enemies… the families and friends of those who are killed will seek revenge. War creates a vicious cycle… the demand for bloodshed increasing as hatred grows with every new generation.

We all have a war waging inside of us, and when nations going to war it is the result of our leaders wanting more, and using their power to convince us that war will get us more.

How can we hope to achieve peace, given that there is a war waging inside of all of us, including our leaders who have the power to wage war? How can we hope for change given that anyone who has power owes it in part to the way things are? Answers to these questions, and more, in the next article – War and Peace, part 3.

War & Peace, part 1

Tuesday, September 5th, 2006

A few days ago, someone left a comment regarding a movie I made about the war on terror. The person who left the comment, identified only as an American, wondered how our generation can achieve world peace given that we live amongst dangerous people in a world that has never known peace.

After deliberating for a few days, I’ve come up with what I feel is an adequate response to the question: “How can our generation hope to find peace?” While I don’t profess to have all the answers, this is the best that I can do right now. Because of the length, the answer will be split over three parts (this article being the first part). Also, please note that the underlined sections are links to previously written articles that are related to the text containing the link.

When it comes to discussing world peace, it is very easy to shoot peace down. In fact, world peace can be nay-sayed to death – literally! This is why, when it comes to achieving world peace, it is a necessity to think positively about the future of the world. The belief that improvement is possible – hope for a brighter future – is essential for making world peace a reality. Without hope, without belief, there is no will, no effort. If we never look for world peace, we can rest assured that we will never find it.

Still, faith alone is not enough. We also need rational thought and reasonable ideas to guide us. Arguments like “survival of the fittest” and “it’s human nature” are often cited to support the immutability of war, and while they make some sense, so too do ideas about humanity’s ability to co-exist; ideas about our compassion, our empathy, and our capacity for love.

As for the notion of “survival of the fittest”, life will always be struggle, but, as the dominant species of the planet, we have the power to decide where the line is drawn. We can choose to allow suffering to continue, or to at least try to alleviate it whenever possible.

When it comes to “human nature”, we are born tabula rasa, which is a fancy way of saying we are born with a clean slate, able to adapt to whatever environment we are exposed to. Sure, we have violent tendencies, but so too do we have cooperative tendencies. Just as a violent world nurtures our violent instincts, a world of peace nurtures our peaceful instincts.

The majority of humans today – humans who’ve been raised in a world of war – have the ability to co-exist without resorting to violence. If we had a world where the children were raised in a world of peace, where they see themselves as part of the global village, peace would come just as naturally as war does today. There is nothing in human nature that would prevent us from maintaining a world of peace when we achieve it.

So, once we achieve peace, we can rest assured that we will be able to maintain peace. Therefore, all we need for to do is make the transition from a world at war to a world of peace.

To find a way to make this transition, it will help to understand why our world is at war. Why our world is at war, and the nature of warfare in general, will be covered in the next section: War & Peace, pt. 2.