"All it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to remain silent."
We have seen a week's worth of words of war, as if bombing a few terrorist
camps and killing a few hundred people will do anything but make us feel
food. But killing bin Laden and his supporters will at best slow down the
threat, and may make it grow in the future as they become martyrs to the
cause. In a western liberal society, with freedom to travel, own guns, buy
fertilizer, and so on, anyone who is willing to die for a better place in
heaven can kill dozens or more in his own suicide.
What we need to do, as a people and a civilization, is challenge and stop all
those who demonize and deny the humanity of others, and those who give
comfort and support to such people. For it is from such sources that suicide
bombers spring. Whether it is state supported mullahs in the Mideast who
teach children that Israel and Jews have no right to exist and that the
United States is the Great Satan, or racists here in the US who preach the
superiority of white Christians and the illegitimacy and evil of the
Government, or the Xenophobics in Africa who challenge the humanity of the
Chinese among them, those who support western liberal ideals must be vocal
and active in challenging hate mongers wherever they live.
The way to do this is not just to kill more people as feel good retribution
and stop at that, but to challenge individually such behavior and to support
an effort for all western civilizations to create political and economic
incentives for pluralism and freedom, and to put a stop to the hate that
spews forth from so many mouths.
This runs counter to our "live and let live" philosophy, but unless we want
to see unending generations of terrorists grow up to kill, we have to support
tolerance and those who preach it with words, acts and money at home and
abroad in every way we can.
Gary C
the red one
the black one
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