On Wed, 19 Sep 2001, Kelvin Bailey wrote:
> --- "Peter T. Chattaway" <petert at interchange_ubc.ca> wrote:
> > What, you think it's "cowardly" to train for months and capture a
> > plane and fly it into certain death, all in the service of a higher
> > cause?
>
> You tell me which is more cowardly: to use people and planes as weapons,
> pull off a huge hit and run mission, then hide in the bushes/sand and
> deny responsibilty
Well, the people who actually commandeered the planes are hardly hiding in
the bushes -- they're *dead*.
> or
>
> To say This is who I am. For these reasons we are about to hurt you,
> unless... And then after the fact say 'Yes, this is who we are, this is
> what we did, and this is why.'
>
> I think the first one is the coward.
But the second one is stupid. :) Remember that line in _Monty Python and
the Holy Grail_ about the "brave *but* dangerous" Sir Lancelot? The
so-called "brave" thing to do isn't always the smart thing to do.
When you take on a global power like the United States, you don't restrict
yourself by playing according to the United States' rules.
> > It sounds to me like the people who say this are speaking out of
> > wounded pride -- to assert their own bravery, they must put down their
> > enemy and try to shame their enemy -- but it just rings hollow to me.
>
> I think they shamed themselves. I'm sorry you don't see that.
I dunno, in their *own* eyes, I would guess they were *already* living in
shame, because their lives sucked and they felt powerless to do anything
about it. Finding someone to blame for their shame, and striking back,
was how they planned to *escape* their shameful status. And what better
way to strike back, once you have decided who your enemy is, than by
destroying a symbol of your enemy's pride? It's the same basic impulse
that prompted Klebold and Harris to attack their fellow students.
http://www.nationalpost.com/commentary/story.html?f=/stories/20010914/687246.html
[ snip ]
The analogy goes deeper than this, however. In the same New York Times
article, Dr. Weinberger also wrote of the psychological motivation
behind teenage rampage attacks: humiliation. "In the face of ridicule,"
he notes, "they may want revenge." Twelve years ago, in his book on
Middle Eastern history and sociology, The Closed Circle: An
Interpretation of the Arabs, David Pryce-Jones put things in similar
terms: "Acquisition of honor, pride, dignity, respect and the converse
avoidance of shame, disgrace and humiliation are keys to Arab
motivation." Thus do Arab mobs occasionally seek to "burn
[Western-style] buildings ... They are facades, imitating the West in
order to ward off the charge of being 'backward' and 'uncivilized' ...
What otherwise seems ... self-destructive in Arab societies is
explained by the anxiety to be honored and respected at all costs, and
by whatever means ... Shame is a living death."
It is this psychology that makes fighting terrorists so difficult. Most
belligerents seek to conquer land and resources -- a threat that can be
easily defended by Western armies. But Islamists are more concerned
with avenging their perceived humiliations -- the humiliations that
modernity implicitly imposes on technologically primitive, politically
backward Arab theocracies. Like bitter gun-toting teenagers bent on
going out in a blaze of suicidal fury, Islamists act under the evil and
tragically misguided view that the mere act of murder -- even the
murder of innocents -- feeds their dignity.
FWIW, I first began to realize the importance of honor-shame systems when
I read Robert Jewett's excellent book _Saint Paul Returns to the Movies:
Triumph over Shame_ -- which happened to come out right around the time
the Columbine thing happened. If we don't wrap our minds around the
notions of honour and shame, and how our opponents feel crushed by them,
we'll never get to the root causes of these conflicts.
> > > > Especially since Jesus trumped those cards in his teachings,
> > > > anyway. I don't hear much along the lines of "love those who hate
> > > > you" and "turn the other cheek" coming from my national leaders
> > > > right now.
> > >
> > > do you really think christ was talking about something of this
> > > mammoth proportion here?
> >
> > <Yoda> Size matters not. </Yoda> Christ *was* talking about politics
> > and revolution and occupying forces and imminent warfare between
> > nations.
>
> And where did you get this?
A number of places, but, perhaps most influentially, from N.T. Wright's
_Jesus and the Victory of God_ (published by Fortress in 1996).
> In my Bible it is part of the 'Sermon On the Mount'. Christ was
> speaking to his disciples about how to treat and deal with their
> enemies. It's smack dab in the middle of taking oaths and loving your
> enemies. It has nothing to do with warfare and governments. That would
> be a huge extrapolation.
But golly, who do you think their enemies *were* back then?
--- Peter T. Chattaway --------------------------- peter at chattaway_com ---
"I detected one misprint, but to torture you I will not tell you where."
Winston Churchill to T.E. Lawrence, re Seven Pillars of Wisdom
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