As so often the case, I agree and affirm the point of the essay . . . but query how much the author understands reality of life in the USA. Take "I highly expect anti-Asian sentiment in the US to increase." The only anti-Asian sentiment in the USA is in elite university admissions departments and among low-status black communities. Take for example my small community of 15,000 in rural SW Missouri. We have a Vietnamese Catholic seminary founded by refugees from the war . . . and this week as every week since the founding my city's population will swell by at least 40,000 as Vietnamese families from all over the USA arrive for religious, cultural, and family events. And the local population welcomes and supports the whole event--it's an interracial party. Everybody has a swell time. But then we are not an elite university nor do we have a different sort of racial composition.
It’s been six years since I’ve lived in the US, and I mostly lived in Seattle where very little white animosity toward Asians existed. My year in Vancouver BC was a completely different experience with even leftists complaining about the “Asian problem,” and it’s super important to remember “BIPOC” originated from that milieu as a way of excluding Asians from discussions about racist oppression.
I do think it is precisely from both of those groups you mention from which that increased animosity will come.
Especially if the Democrats can get lower class black communities to stop protesting US inequality and turn their anger towards Asians instead (remember that Chinese-owned shops were one of the primary targets of the Rodney King riots, rather than banks or white residential areas) they can rechannel that anger into votes for Democrats and diffuse black critique of the DNC.
They were Korean shops that were targeted and it was due to decades scapegoating by powerful black leaders. Read about the Red Apple boycott which only ended when Korean grocery association promised to "donate" 1% of their gross earnings to "the black community".
You are right that the boycott was NYC. The shooting of a black teenager by a Korean store clerk was used as an excuse for the targeting of Koreans during the LA riots. It should be noted that targeting Korean businesses has been really frequent during riots, including recent ones. And the targeting of their businesses during the LA riots took place in many parts of the country. The scapegoating by black leaders of Asians (Koreans in particular) has also been pretty ubiquitous and not confined to just LA and NYC.
You remember how statues were being tumbled because the person said something racist 109 years ago? During that time this statue was erected, 6 years after his comment, which he never apologized for. https://dc.curbed.com/2018/3/5/17080338/marion-barry-statue-mayor
I'm curious about this origination of "BIPOC". I had always assumed it was born from Black women in academia, but this idea that it was born from wanting to exclude Asians is way more interesting.
Did you write about this somewhere? How can I learn more?
It was something discussed a lot by Canadian activists when I lived in Canada.
I’ve tried to find records online about its creation to no avail, but if you look at the prevalent early uses on sites like everyday feminism and older tumblr posts you’ll find a lot of discussion about the “unique” oppression that Asians “do not face.” You’ll also see evidence of its exclusionary purpose in discussions where Asians are said to be “actually white” or to benefit from white supremacy rather than to suffer from it.
The Canadian situation is particularly fascinating since in Vancouver especially there are two classes of Asian immigrants: the older group of mainland Chinese who were imported for labor and who were discriminated against as farmers (they were often not allowed to sell their vegetables to whites). In their group is also the large influx of southeast Asian communities migrants working low wage jobs.
Then the second group is the capitalists from Hong Kong who sunk their money into BC real estate to hide it from the government. They actually do cause problems or social unrest through their capital.
The problem is that everyone hates the first group and discriminates against them because they’re easier to reach. And any actual oppressions they face are erased by the switch the BIPOC analysis.
Definitely not limited to "elite university admissions departments and among low status black communities" as it has occurred where I live in Philly in the China town neighborhood.
I am not sure this proves what you think it does. Unless you mean it is the Chinese residents in Philly China Town who are committing the Asian hate crimes, just saying where the hate crimes take place does not prove who committed the crimes. Maybe it is the chairpersons of the elite university admissions programs who are sneaking into Philly China town to bash Asians. More likely the perps are members of the lower status communities of some other mysterious race (maybe that ubiquitous race always vaguely identified as "teens" or "youngsters" or "juveniles").
The FBI statistics track the offenders and offense type. The most frequent offender in anti-asian crime is white non-hispanic and the offense type is aggravated assault. Maybe I am misinterpreting your statement but I just want to make clear that while things may be good in your community the nation as a whole has seen an increase in violence towards the asian community.
Hmm. I think on the contrary it might actually be forest logic that is responsible for them still being alive at all, rather than completely annihilated from North America.
Forest logic certainly kept them alive in most of Latin America. It isn't the natives' fault that the US was especially aggressive and brutal in their "conquest of the West", or that they were driven by that idiocy called Manifest Destiny.
Or that the epidemics were particularly bad on them...
Then of course, there's Chile and Argentina (also Uruguay, in fact), which were so influenced by imperialistic liberalism and the massive immigration of mostly Protestant communities that, after their independence from Spain, they started a process of mass annihilation of any indigenous community from the remaining territories that hadn't been incorporated yet. These new settlers (mostly German and British) would, with official sanction from the respective governments, utterly wipe out any indigenous peoples without any previous confrontation in order to clear lands for shepherding and increase the export in wool.
Thank you for drawing attention to the Amnesty report. They are taking a lot of flak for it, which suggests they're right over the correct target.
A point you didn't make but could have is the Ukrainian forces are not just hiding in civilian areas but bombarding them too, in particular the city of Donetsk. Anti-personnel ordnance, called Petals I think, are being used to maim civilians.
Likewise the HIMARS systems given as "military aid" (an obscene contradiction in terms) give Ukraine the capacity to shell enemies and civilians alike, not forgetting their own combatants taken as Prisoners Of War, from further away. Inevitably this entices DPR, LPR, and RF forces northward and westward in order to push the NATO/Ukrainian artilleries further away from the Donetsk Basin.
This is a point. This is scarcely a guerilla war, it has been pepared for during probably more than a a decade as Ukraine inceasingly was integrated into NATO. War is evil and atrocities on both sides the norm. Europe lives with this aftermath of WWII. Here in Britain the outraged sympathy is with Ukraine (i.e. with civilian 'normal' life), with no regard for history. The long term decisions and decision-takers are heavily veiled.
I'm in the UK and that sounds like a very accurate precis to me Philip. The prospect of the empty-headed Elizabeth Truss taking over from Johnson is almost as frightening as the near certainty that Kier Starmer will be next in to bat.
Just guessing! Doesn't provide much reassurance but I guess Truss (or Starmer) will not have much say in the critical decisions. I assume they must ok theirs with US policy.
Great and courageous writing about a very interesting topic. I myself scratched the surface of Imagined Communities in my last newsletter titled 'How Anyone Can Be A World Citizen'. Highly simplified and mainly meant to inspire rather than tackling the important question you asked: At what point do we just live? The answer probably varies greatly for different people. It may be depended on the level of consciousness as well as are their basic needs met? But, I believe that with a little reflection anyone should be able to answer this question for themselves. So, thanks for asking, Rhyd!
This reminds me of Leopold Kohr’s book “The Breakdown of Nations” where he argues “Little states produce greater wisdom” and speaks of the “crisis of bigness”. Paul Kingsnorth introduced me to Kohr.
I believe that this is a key question of this interregnum period we now seem to be going through.
As an actual political activist for about 15 years and then in my head for another 30 ( with all sorts of imagined communities in both phases!), my initial reaction to the choice of whether to nurture, shelter and actually try to grow the life around me, was experienced on a personal psychological level as a defeat--I failed, I'm a loser etc.
But on second, third, and fourth thought such an effort to nurture and shelter now strikes me as necessary, profound and extremely worthwhile and full of enough struggles of a surprisingly different nature to last 10 lifetimes.
Great writing all around, by you, The Guardian, and Amnesty International.
Many thoughts here, some conflicting, mainly because of the nuance of the situation that like most things in life keep us away from a hard, fast A or B solution.
War is one of those human things that boils existence of the people involved in it to very simple things. Stay alive and kill the enemy. All things start with that premise. Ethics and morals should (wish I could use italics for emphasis) be taken into account but are often lost in war throughout history because the fear of death puts everything else aside. There are many things that can affect that for the better, such as training, command structure, accountability. Those things don't exist in most militaries as much as they should. We could say that those soldiers should not be in the house in the neighborhood because it risks the civilians. The soldiers likely say if we are in the woods we don't have shelter or food or warmth. Our ethics and morals say too damn bad it is your duty to not put those civilians at risk, those soldiers may say you have never experienced what we have experienced. My personal ethics and morals say that as a solider I should never put civilians at risk however I have experienced enough unique situations in emergency services where I know one should not judge until directly placed into that position in the first place. Until you have had your life directly threatened by violence you do not know how that affects your way of thinking. A lot of things you believe in disappear completely in that moment.
A note on pacifism. I love the idea of it. It is the ideal we should strive for. The danger with pacifism is that there are those that will take advantage of it. Even in the fantasy I love of the Star Trek Next Generation universe the Federation and Star Fleet with it's premise of science and exploration still had to throw down. Sometimes in defense of others who could not defend themselves, sometimes in defense of itself. The question boils down to what is worse, not fighting and living under whatever conditions arise or death. I think the question is not so much should we or should we not fight but what is worse, death or a miserable existence.
Now one could easily argue that if Zelensky surrendered to Putin and Russia annexed Ukraine not much would change for the average person. To analyse that one would have to look at what occurred in Crimea after the 2014 annexation. That is difficult because it has been under an information and democratic lockdown since then. That is part of the challenge of assessing whether the Russian people support the war, many are afraid to even take part in a survey for fear of being jailed for what has been made illegal, criticism of the so called special military operation.
Here is what it boils down to for me. And this is just me, I judge not those who have a different point of view, I am not saying I am right or wrong in this. If the choice for me is risk of death by fighting in the defense of family, friends, others who can not protect themselves or living in an existence in which I am constantly abused or fearful of death or torture or even just living a miserable day to day existence where all I am doing is trying to stay alive to get to the next day I believe I would choose the risk of death in the fight. Now I have never been in that situation so that may change the moment the first bomb drops. I can not choose pacifism if it led to a situation in which I did not want to live. You could argue that my choice affects others who may not want to fight, puts their lives in danger. I would counter-argue that they will be at risk anyways, no invading army ever handed out cake and toys when they conquered a land. Russia's history when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union speaks to that.
Diplomacy, compromise, negotiation, mutual understanding, all these among others should be our priorities. However until we live in a world where abusive and exploitative people don't exist a situation may arise in which fighting is the only option. When that occurs morals and ethics should come into place. Not bombing civilian buildings but also not housing uninjured soldiers in civilian buildings should occur. But see then where we get nuance here? If a city is surrounded by a military force where are the military forces supposed to go? We could then return to the basic premise of Russia never should have attacked in the first place. Doesn't mean that it absolves Ukraine military from their actions but it certainly is a factor.
I suppose I will leave with this. Yes, the person at the protest who throws the rock at the police is at fault if they do so in full understanding that the police will respond with tear gas which will affect the other peaceful protestors in the crowd. But what if the police were not there at all? Then what would the protestor throw a rock at? What if we lived in a society where that protest never had to occur at all?
At the end of the day I will not blame a warrior for being a warrior. Sure not all people should be a warrior but most are just trying to stay alive. It is the people who put them in that situation in the first place, either as the aggressor or senior leadership who did not provide them with the food, equipment, training to not put civilians at risk, that should be held accountable.
"I guess this question reveals me to be one of those really awful humans called “pacifists,” but so be it."
Finally! Someone else "brave" enough to say it out loud, like it's some sort of sinful confession among leftism. If only more people would acknowledge what that originally meant and not take it for being a "wussy coward who doesn't want to get his or her hands dirty with lobbing off heads or burning churches".
I personally started to have enough from certain activist environments (especially those frequented by Stalinists and Maoists, but also anarchists) when I almost felt like some sort of "counterrevolutionary" scum for being a self-declared pacifist. I'll never forget their faces, their plainly baffled expressions. Apparently abhorring the shedding of human blood no longer means a profound rejection of pointless violence, war and crime.
As many, I do believe in defending your closest people and self-defence in the case of aggression, but that's pretty much it.
Much of these attitudes of fantasizing with a big war front or some sort of mass popular army fall into the realm of collective fantasies, what one of you guys actually pointed out in the last post among the comments. And like that guy, I'm also quite pessimistic about mass collective societies and groups. Pretty much the same point of this piece.
I tend to think there are pacifists and there are pacifists. I have little patience for upper middle class liberals who hand-wring about pacifism because they really don’t want any of the people who were exploited to provide their creature comforts to come take back what they built or even to stop building more consumables for them. And I think much of the left, myself included, has a knee-jerk reaction to pacifism based on the knowledge that it is usually pushed as a philosophical stance (rather than a useful tactic) by people I might say are wolves in sheep’s clothing.
But there are other pacifists. My father is a brilliant engineer. His father was instrumental in making the atomic weapons a reality. I have little doubt that if he were willing to use violence, he would have changed the face of the world in major ways. And perhaps, given his moral convictions, it would be a better world. However, he is a sworn pacifist who refused to work on any technology with military applications. I don’t think refusing to use his brilliance to exert power over others is cowardice or lack of commitment to a better world. I think it is having principles and truly believing in the rights of others to make their own decisions and mistakes. As an anarchist (and I consider myself one, though my anarchism is very far from black bloc) I can only respect his stance of refusing to become a power. To me, that is the heart of anarchism- to renounce power.
Power is the key. And if somebody is claiming their use of violence is for a greater good while, in the end, we all know what they would do if they had the power over the exertion of violence (Leninist repression of anarchist strikers, ahem...), then I'm out from the start.
I do know where I would be if, say, Romans came knocking on my door burning down forests and enslaving my nearest community.
Great article! I wish I had answers, too. In fact, I would say Ukraine is but an example of a problem that is close to home for many Americans. I live a mile from gas wells. They continually fail to light their stack off so methane just diffuses into the atmosphere. They also make the likelihood of radon percolating up through the soil or my well far higher. In other areas, such natural gas wells have caused earthquakes in states that never had earthquakes, such as Oklahoma. And that’s ignoring the purpose for which the gas is extracted- to power a fossil fuel driven economy which is ruining the planet. There is little doubt that a war is being waged and one of the battlefields is right up the road. And yet I do nothing. I have children, and to take the risk of fighting for their future would likely be to destroy their present. Is this the right choice? Similarly, given the undemocratic nature of recent SCOTUS decisions, it seems that violence would be the only effective means to restore female human rights or to maintain those left. Yet again, there seems little point. I guess a good bit of what turns the tide for me on pacifism vs rebellion is the probability of success. I know a lot of leftists condemn such a stance in theory as cowardice or point out that someone has to take the first step but I think pragmatically assessing the realistic projected results of an action is necessary. Is this a war that can be won, or is it meaningless sacrifices of lives for some abstract goal? And when it comes to Ukraine, I really don’t see the point. Independent Ukraine was still awful. The Russians may be more awful, but is the war worth it to get that little bit less awful? And from here in the US, how can my country justify propping up a war where we just don’t have a dog in the fight?
I don’t think asking these questions makes you a pacifist. At least, I’ve asked these questions and don’t consider myself a pacifist. I think the fight to create and defend Rojava was worth it. To radically change the position of women in society, to carve out the space for a tree-based agriculture to replace the annual grain-based agriculture forced on the region by conquerors, those were things worth fighting for. I could visualize thousands of people who would benefit from the defense of Rojava. When I try to visualize who benefits from the defense of Ukraine, what comes to mind is a few people in business suits. There are shades of grey between pacifism, which I generally take to mean a stance that violence is never the answer, and immature rebellion that attempts to add violence to situations where it is neither necessary or desirable. The old saying “better a live fox than a dead lion” seems like one the left ought to take to heart. But of course, I doubt our influencer masters who may or may not be on the payroll of some three-letter agency are likely to teach strategies or tactics that would actually help the left.
As so often the case, I agree and affirm the point of the essay . . . but query how much the author understands reality of life in the USA. Take "I highly expect anti-Asian sentiment in the US to increase." The only anti-Asian sentiment in the USA is in elite university admissions departments and among low-status black communities. Take for example my small community of 15,000 in rural SW Missouri. We have a Vietnamese Catholic seminary founded by refugees from the war . . . and this week as every week since the founding my city's population will swell by at least 40,000 as Vietnamese families from all over the USA arrive for religious, cultural, and family events. And the local population welcomes and supports the whole event--it's an interracial party. Everybody has a swell time. But then we are not an elite university nor do we have a different sort of racial composition.
It’s been six years since I’ve lived in the US, and I mostly lived in Seattle where very little white animosity toward Asians existed. My year in Vancouver BC was a completely different experience with even leftists complaining about the “Asian problem,” and it’s super important to remember “BIPOC” originated from that milieu as a way of excluding Asians from discussions about racist oppression.
I do think it is precisely from both of those groups you mention from which that increased animosity will come.
Especially if the Democrats can get lower class black communities to stop protesting US inequality and turn their anger towards Asians instead (remember that Chinese-owned shops were one of the primary targets of the Rodney King riots, rather than banks or white residential areas) they can rechannel that anger into votes for Democrats and diffuse black critique of the DNC.
They were Korean shops that were targeted and it was due to decades scapegoating by powerful black leaders. Read about the Red Apple boycott which only ended when Korean grocery association promised to "donate" 1% of their gross earnings to "the black community".
Wasn’t that the New York situation? I thought the Primary owners in LA were Chinese but maybe I am wrong. Will do some looking in to this thanks!
You are right that the boycott was NYC. The shooting of a black teenager by a Korean store clerk was used as an excuse for the targeting of Koreans during the LA riots. It should be noted that targeting Korean businesses has been really frequent during riots, including recent ones. And the targeting of their businesses during the LA riots took place in many parts of the country. The scapegoating by black leaders of Asians (Koreans in particular) has also been pretty ubiquitous and not confined to just LA and NYC.
“We’ve got to do something about these Asians coming in, opening up businesses, those dirty shops,” he said in the course of laying out his vision for the ward. “They ought to go. I’ll just say that right now, you know. But we need African American businesspeople to be able to take their places, too.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-politics/dcs-marion-barry-widely-rebuked-for-comments-about-asian-business-owners/2012/04/05/gIQA27SVyS_story.html
You remember how statues were being tumbled because the person said something racist 109 years ago? During that time this statue was erected, 6 years after his comment, which he never apologized for. https://dc.curbed.com/2018/3/5/17080338/marion-barry-statue-mayor
I'm curious about this origination of "BIPOC". I had always assumed it was born from Black women in academia, but this idea that it was born from wanting to exclude Asians is way more interesting.
Did you write about this somewhere? How can I learn more?
It was something discussed a lot by Canadian activists when I lived in Canada.
I’ve tried to find records online about its creation to no avail, but if you look at the prevalent early uses on sites like everyday feminism and older tumblr posts you’ll find a lot of discussion about the “unique” oppression that Asians “do not face.” You’ll also see evidence of its exclusionary purpose in discussions where Asians are said to be “actually white” or to benefit from white supremacy rather than to suffer from it.
The Canadian situation is particularly fascinating since in Vancouver especially there are two classes of Asian immigrants: the older group of mainland Chinese who were imported for labor and who were discriminated against as farmers (they were often not allowed to sell their vegetables to whites). In their group is also the large influx of southeast Asian communities migrants working low wage jobs.
Then the second group is the capitalists from Hong Kong who sunk their money into BC real estate to hide it from the government. They actually do cause problems or social unrest through their capital.
The problem is that everyone hates the first group and discriminates against them because they’re easier to reach. And any actual oppressions they face are erased by the switch the BIPOC analysis.
Just an effort to assist with info, in October 2021 Anti Asian hate crimes rose 73%. That is far more than the general broad hate crime rise of 13% - https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/anti-asian-hate-crimes-rose-73-last-year-updated-fbi-data-says-rcna3741
FBI reporting stats are here: https://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/ucr/hate-crime
Definitely not limited to "elite university admissions departments and among low status black communities" as it has occurred where I live in Philly in the China town neighborhood.
I am not sure this proves what you think it does. Unless you mean it is the Chinese residents in Philly China Town who are committing the Asian hate crimes, just saying where the hate crimes take place does not prove who committed the crimes. Maybe it is the chairpersons of the elite university admissions programs who are sneaking into Philly China town to bash Asians. More likely the perps are members of the lower status communities of some other mysterious race (maybe that ubiquitous race always vaguely identified as "teens" or "youngsters" or "juveniles").
(maybe that ubiquitous race always vaguely identified as "teens" or "youngsters" or "juveniles").
"at risk youth"
The FBI statistics track the offenders and offense type. The most frequent offender in anti-asian crime is white non-hispanic and the offense type is aggravated assault. Maybe I am misinterpreting your statement but I just want to make clear that while things may be good in your community the nation as a whole has seen an increase in violence towards the asian community.
The most frequent offender in anti-asian crime is white non-hispanic
You realize that's 70% of the population. So it's not a huge shock.
Forest logic did not help Native Americans even one little bit though.
Hmm. I think on the contrary it might actually be forest logic that is responsible for them still being alive at all, rather than completely annihilated from North America.
Forest logic certainly kept them alive in most of Latin America. It isn't the natives' fault that the US was especially aggressive and brutal in their "conquest of the West", or that they were driven by that idiocy called Manifest Destiny.
Or that the epidemics were particularly bad on them...
Then of course, there's Chile and Argentina (also Uruguay, in fact), which were so influenced by imperialistic liberalism and the massive immigration of mostly Protestant communities that, after their independence from Spain, they started a process of mass annihilation of any indigenous community from the remaining territories that hadn't been incorporated yet. These new settlers (mostly German and British) would, with official sanction from the respective governments, utterly wipe out any indigenous peoples without any previous confrontation in order to clear lands for shepherding and increase the export in wool.
Thank you for drawing attention to the Amnesty report. They are taking a lot of flak for it, which suggests they're right over the correct target.
A point you didn't make but could have is the Ukrainian forces are not just hiding in civilian areas but bombarding them too, in particular the city of Donetsk. Anti-personnel ordnance, called Petals I think, are being used to maim civilians.
Likewise the HIMARS systems given as "military aid" (an obscene contradiction in terms) give Ukraine the capacity to shell enemies and civilians alike, not forgetting their own combatants taken as Prisoners Of War, from further away. Inevitably this entices DPR, LPR, and RF forces northward and westward in order to push the NATO/Ukrainian artilleries further away from the Donetsk Basin.
This is a point. This is scarcely a guerilla war, it has been pepared for during probably more than a a decade as Ukraine inceasingly was integrated into NATO. War is evil and atrocities on both sides the norm. Europe lives with this aftermath of WWII. Here in Britain the outraged sympathy is with Ukraine (i.e. with civilian 'normal' life), with no regard for history. The long term decisions and decision-takers are heavily veiled.
I'm in the UK and that sounds like a very accurate precis to me Philip. The prospect of the empty-headed Elizabeth Truss taking over from Johnson is almost as frightening as the near certainty that Kier Starmer will be next in to bat.
Just guessing! Doesn't provide much reassurance but I guess Truss (or Starmer) will not have much say in the critical decisions. I assume they must ok theirs with US policy.
Thanks.
Great and courageous writing about a very interesting topic. I myself scratched the surface of Imagined Communities in my last newsletter titled 'How Anyone Can Be A World Citizen'. Highly simplified and mainly meant to inspire rather than tackling the important question you asked: At what point do we just live? The answer probably varies greatly for different people. It may be depended on the level of consciousness as well as are their basic needs met? But, I believe that with a little reflection anyone should be able to answer this question for themselves. So, thanks for asking, Rhyd!
This reminds me of Leopold Kohr’s book “The Breakdown of Nations” where he argues “Little states produce greater wisdom” and speaks of the “crisis of bigness”. Paul Kingsnorth introduced me to Kohr.
"At what point do you just live?"
I believe that this is a key question of this interregnum period we now seem to be going through.
As an actual political activist for about 15 years and then in my head for another 30 ( with all sorts of imagined communities in both phases!), my initial reaction to the choice of whether to nurture, shelter and actually try to grow the life around me, was experienced on a personal psychological level as a defeat--I failed, I'm a loser etc.
But on second, third, and fourth thought such an effort to nurture and shelter now strikes me as necessary, profound and extremely worthwhile and full of enough struggles of a surprisingly different nature to last 10 lifetimes.
Great writing all around, by you, The Guardian, and Amnesty International.
Many thoughts here, some conflicting, mainly because of the nuance of the situation that like most things in life keep us away from a hard, fast A or B solution.
War is one of those human things that boils existence of the people involved in it to very simple things. Stay alive and kill the enemy. All things start with that premise. Ethics and morals should (wish I could use italics for emphasis) be taken into account but are often lost in war throughout history because the fear of death puts everything else aside. There are many things that can affect that for the better, such as training, command structure, accountability. Those things don't exist in most militaries as much as they should. We could say that those soldiers should not be in the house in the neighborhood because it risks the civilians. The soldiers likely say if we are in the woods we don't have shelter or food or warmth. Our ethics and morals say too damn bad it is your duty to not put those civilians at risk, those soldiers may say you have never experienced what we have experienced. My personal ethics and morals say that as a solider I should never put civilians at risk however I have experienced enough unique situations in emergency services where I know one should not judge until directly placed into that position in the first place. Until you have had your life directly threatened by violence you do not know how that affects your way of thinking. A lot of things you believe in disappear completely in that moment.
A note on pacifism. I love the idea of it. It is the ideal we should strive for. The danger with pacifism is that there are those that will take advantage of it. Even in the fantasy I love of the Star Trek Next Generation universe the Federation and Star Fleet with it's premise of science and exploration still had to throw down. Sometimes in defense of others who could not defend themselves, sometimes in defense of itself. The question boils down to what is worse, not fighting and living under whatever conditions arise or death. I think the question is not so much should we or should we not fight but what is worse, death or a miserable existence.
Now one could easily argue that if Zelensky surrendered to Putin and Russia annexed Ukraine not much would change for the average person. To analyse that one would have to look at what occurred in Crimea after the 2014 annexation. That is difficult because it has been under an information and democratic lockdown since then. That is part of the challenge of assessing whether the Russian people support the war, many are afraid to even take part in a survey for fear of being jailed for what has been made illegal, criticism of the so called special military operation.
Here is what it boils down to for me. And this is just me, I judge not those who have a different point of view, I am not saying I am right or wrong in this. If the choice for me is risk of death by fighting in the defense of family, friends, others who can not protect themselves or living in an existence in which I am constantly abused or fearful of death or torture or even just living a miserable day to day existence where all I am doing is trying to stay alive to get to the next day I believe I would choose the risk of death in the fight. Now I have never been in that situation so that may change the moment the first bomb drops. I can not choose pacifism if it led to a situation in which I did not want to live. You could argue that my choice affects others who may not want to fight, puts their lives in danger. I would counter-argue that they will be at risk anyways, no invading army ever handed out cake and toys when they conquered a land. Russia's history when Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union speaks to that.
Diplomacy, compromise, negotiation, mutual understanding, all these among others should be our priorities. However until we live in a world where abusive and exploitative people don't exist a situation may arise in which fighting is the only option. When that occurs morals and ethics should come into place. Not bombing civilian buildings but also not housing uninjured soldiers in civilian buildings should occur. But see then where we get nuance here? If a city is surrounded by a military force where are the military forces supposed to go? We could then return to the basic premise of Russia never should have attacked in the first place. Doesn't mean that it absolves Ukraine military from their actions but it certainly is a factor.
I suppose I will leave with this. Yes, the person at the protest who throws the rock at the police is at fault if they do so in full understanding that the police will respond with tear gas which will affect the other peaceful protestors in the crowd. But what if the police were not there at all? Then what would the protestor throw a rock at? What if we lived in a society where that protest never had to occur at all?
At the end of the day I will not blame a warrior for being a warrior. Sure not all people should be a warrior but most are just trying to stay alive. It is the people who put them in that situation in the first place, either as the aggressor or senior leadership who did not provide them with the food, equipment, training to not put civilians at risk, that should be held accountable.
I don't know how to answer it, either, but you're absolutely right to ask it. Excellent, heart-rending piece. Thank you.
"I guess this question reveals me to be one of those really awful humans called “pacifists,” but so be it."
Finally! Someone else "brave" enough to say it out loud, like it's some sort of sinful confession among leftism. If only more people would acknowledge what that originally meant and not take it for being a "wussy coward who doesn't want to get his or her hands dirty with lobbing off heads or burning churches".
I personally started to have enough from certain activist environments (especially those frequented by Stalinists and Maoists, but also anarchists) when I almost felt like some sort of "counterrevolutionary" scum for being a self-declared pacifist. I'll never forget their faces, their plainly baffled expressions. Apparently abhorring the shedding of human blood no longer means a profound rejection of pointless violence, war and crime.
As many, I do believe in defending your closest people and self-defence in the case of aggression, but that's pretty much it.
Much of these attitudes of fantasizing with a big war front or some sort of mass popular army fall into the realm of collective fantasies, what one of you guys actually pointed out in the last post among the comments. And like that guy, I'm also quite pessimistic about mass collective societies and groups. Pretty much the same point of this piece.
I tend to think there are pacifists and there are pacifists. I have little patience for upper middle class liberals who hand-wring about pacifism because they really don’t want any of the people who were exploited to provide their creature comforts to come take back what they built or even to stop building more consumables for them. And I think much of the left, myself included, has a knee-jerk reaction to pacifism based on the knowledge that it is usually pushed as a philosophical stance (rather than a useful tactic) by people I might say are wolves in sheep’s clothing.
But there are other pacifists. My father is a brilliant engineer. His father was instrumental in making the atomic weapons a reality. I have little doubt that if he were willing to use violence, he would have changed the face of the world in major ways. And perhaps, given his moral convictions, it would be a better world. However, he is a sworn pacifist who refused to work on any technology with military applications. I don’t think refusing to use his brilliance to exert power over others is cowardice or lack of commitment to a better world. I think it is having principles and truly believing in the rights of others to make their own decisions and mistakes. As an anarchist (and I consider myself one, though my anarchism is very far from black bloc) I can only respect his stance of refusing to become a power. To me, that is the heart of anarchism- to renounce power.
Of course it is!
Power is the key. And if somebody is claiming their use of violence is for a greater good while, in the end, we all know what they would do if they had the power over the exertion of violence (Leninist repression of anarchist strikers, ahem...), then I'm out from the start.
I do know where I would be if, say, Romans came knocking on my door burning down forests and enslaving my nearest community.
Great article! I wish I had answers, too. In fact, I would say Ukraine is but an example of a problem that is close to home for many Americans. I live a mile from gas wells. They continually fail to light their stack off so methane just diffuses into the atmosphere. They also make the likelihood of radon percolating up through the soil or my well far higher. In other areas, such natural gas wells have caused earthquakes in states that never had earthquakes, such as Oklahoma. And that’s ignoring the purpose for which the gas is extracted- to power a fossil fuel driven economy which is ruining the planet. There is little doubt that a war is being waged and one of the battlefields is right up the road. And yet I do nothing. I have children, and to take the risk of fighting for their future would likely be to destroy their present. Is this the right choice? Similarly, given the undemocratic nature of recent SCOTUS decisions, it seems that violence would be the only effective means to restore female human rights or to maintain those left. Yet again, there seems little point. I guess a good bit of what turns the tide for me on pacifism vs rebellion is the probability of success. I know a lot of leftists condemn such a stance in theory as cowardice or point out that someone has to take the first step but I think pragmatically assessing the realistic projected results of an action is necessary. Is this a war that can be won, or is it meaningless sacrifices of lives for some abstract goal? And when it comes to Ukraine, I really don’t see the point. Independent Ukraine was still awful. The Russians may be more awful, but is the war worth it to get that little bit less awful? And from here in the US, how can my country justify propping up a war where we just don’t have a dog in the fight?
I don’t think asking these questions makes you a pacifist. At least, I’ve asked these questions and don’t consider myself a pacifist. I think the fight to create and defend Rojava was worth it. To radically change the position of women in society, to carve out the space for a tree-based agriculture to replace the annual grain-based agriculture forced on the region by conquerors, those were things worth fighting for. I could visualize thousands of people who would benefit from the defense of Rojava. When I try to visualize who benefits from the defense of Ukraine, what comes to mind is a few people in business suits. There are shades of grey between pacifism, which I generally take to mean a stance that violence is never the answer, and immature rebellion that attempts to add violence to situations where it is neither necessary or desirable. The old saying “better a live fox than a dead lion” seems like one the left ought to take to heart. But of course, I doubt our influencer masters who may or may not be on the payroll of some three-letter agency are likely to teach strategies or tactics that would actually help the left.