Is the monster you spawn — a whole lot worse than mine?

30 November 2018

Another bit — from the American asylum

Have you noticed how critics of American foreign policy, nevertheless and obligatorily, have to condemn our equivalently acting "enemies"?

Here is an example

(US Army) Major Danny Sjursen always writes with uncommon common sense.

But even he occasionally feels compelled to stoop to labeling monstership in others — even though their evil parallels our own:

Osama bin Laden had a point.

No, his grievances, as well as those of his followers and sympathizers, didn’t excuse the mass murder of 9/11—not by a long shot.

After all, I am a native New Yorker whose family and neighborhood were directly touched by the horror of those inexcusable attacks.

Still, more than 17 years after the attacks on the Pentagon and twin towers, it’s worth reflecting on bin Laden’s motives and discussing the stark fact that the United States government has made no moves to address his gripes.

The U.S. military remains mired in wars across the Greater Middle East that have now entered their 18th year.

The cost: $5.9 trillion, 7,000 dead American soldiers, at least 480,000 locals killed and 21 million refugees created. The outcome: more instability, more violence, more global terror attacks and a U.S. reputation ruined for at least a generation in the Islamic world.

Bin Laden was a monster, but that doesn’t mean he was wrong on all fronts.

Is this name-calling of too small a reach?

Bin Laden struck us in exactly the same callous way that US power-mongering perennially asserts itself abroad.

How did he alone become Hell's creature?

Let's do a quick calculation — using Utilitarian philosophical principles

Bin Laden killed about 3,000 Americans, predominantly in New York City, in retribution for continuing American imperialism in the Islamic world.

In supposedly world-calming revenge, the United States then exterminated 480,000 people (Sjursen's figures, which are probably low) in retaliation. Dispossessed another 21 million. And continues to fuel perpetual war and bleeding chaos.

In that inferno of evil, how does Bin Laden, by himself, implicitly remain as the Massively Malevolent One?

Sjursen's politically correct (pragmatically inspired) name-calling is similar to the United States' insistence that:

Palestinians are "terrorists" when they defend their lands —

but Israelis are victimized heroes,

even though they are illegally in Palestine — unnecessarily killing the locals — and eagerly stealing their homes.

No wonder that the Islamic world, or anyone with a fairness gene, hates us.

The moral? — This planet doesn't lack for monsters — its most power-wielding ones are ours

"My" (supposedly Christian) American ghoul is as bad as "your" Islamic one.

Writing convincingly about morality's overlap (or not) with Realpolitik requires an ability to use language with an objective regard for facts.

Political correctness — in this case, presumably used to placate the uber-patriotic nitwits, with which the United States is brimming — merely weakens the common sense message one is trying to preach.

Bin Laden, mass murderer though he was, was reacting to American deadliness abroad, using essentially American means (attack from the air).

In a Biblical parable sense, it does not become more poetically "righteous" than that.

And from a martial arts perspective, Bin Laden triggered the American Empire's collapse by pulling the grenade pin on our characteristically overreacting strength.

Rationally speaking, both of us are monsters. Or neither.

That is why I use the term "parable". It is what we do not see in ourselves that becomes the lesson. Usually for someone more insightful.

Jingoistic political correctness is a sop to the fools who create deadly chaos. We should not, too easily, cater to the twisted preferences of their damagingly ignorant souls.

PeteFree.com

Is the monster you spawn — a whole lot worse than mine?