A question for protestors and others against the war

[Scylla]

Svin:

That?s why Blair?s speech to the British parliament was so effective, IMO. He didn?t shirk from the fact that there were good reasons for opposing the war, and expressed a profound (possibly rhetorical, but anyway) respect for those who did not share his point of view. He had to, of course, considering the fact that Robin Cook had resigned because of the government?s pro-war stance. But admitting that the opposing side has a point ? that its not simply a naive, unpatriotic, un-American stance ? and arguing for your own convictions in the face of those reservations is much more effective than simply ignoring the opposition while appealing to patriotic jingoism and religious conviction, if you ask me. So, at least in part, the rejection of the official line by the anti-war crowd was also simply a visceral response the rhetoric of the Bush administration (especially here in Europe).

That knife cuts both ways. War protestors rarely acknowledge that the other side has a point, too. I guess it’s natural to discount your opponents point of view while making your argument. I know that happens, and it’s understandable. What seems to be different this time is that those in favor of the war have (perhaps for the first time,) a strong humanitarian argument on their side. This war is effectively sound for the reasons that past wars like Vietnam were not from that perspective.

Well, I have, in several threads, over the last year or so. I?ve also consistently claimed that, from my perspective, the human rights argument is the strongest case for intervention. And I?ve stated several times that should the UN Security Council decide in favor of military intervention, I would probably support the decision.

I can?t answer as to why few war opponents have been unwilling to address this problem, if that?s the case. In a sense, it does pose a dilemma, and maybe people are just uncomfortable with the internal cognitive dissonance it causes. From my own experience, on the other hand, I haven?t seen too many anti-war folks shying away from the question, or merely paying ?lip-service? to the human rights perspective. Do you have any specific examples in mind?

You and I have not debated the issue. I see no reason not to take you at your word that you have been arguing from the humanitarian perspective.

As so often happens in cases like this, I find that the audience that I have directed this conundrum at, is for the most part conspicuously accident. You, and Spiritus are not ones that I have engaged before in war debates. Daniel seems to have done an admirable thing in forgetting our past differences and arguing in good faith, and I am doing my best to live up to his example.

In other words I find myself debating people who are taking a different view than the one I have directed it. However, the results are more than satisfactory. I’m happy and grateful for the level of debate here. My only regret is that I am getting so many good thoughtful responses that it is difficult to justice to them all without giving people (noteably Abe) short shrift.

(BTW Abe, I apologize for not entering into dialogue with you to date in this thread. Your posts deserve better than the neglect I’ve given them, but I hope I’ve hit on some of your points, I’ll try to go back and address you directly.)

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

*Originally posted by Scylla *
**The only reason such things happen is because they work, because we go along with them.
:
:
We do something a little less extreme, but fairly similar. We negotiate. We talk. But, from the beginning we know that we are not doing so in good faith. We’ll talk till we’re blue in the face, and negotiate as long as we gain something from it, but we don’t capitulate or give in. The problem with your stance is complex, but do you see that it actually encourages terorrism if you accept the equation they are handing you?
**

I think these two passages contradict each other. I agree with your second passage.

I’ve been watching since high school for some escaped prison dude to take a hostage on his escape, trying to buy time, and to actually get away with it.

There have been a lot of escaped prison dudes in the news since I left high school, and a lot of them have taken hostages.

And not a single one of them has found their hostage-taking strategy successful. Most of the hostage-takers end up dead; a rare few end up back in prison.

Escaped prison dudes don’t take hostages because it works. They take hostages because they’re desperate, stupid egomaniacs who think that they’re smarter than everyone else out there.

But that doesn’t just hold true for hostage takers. How effective, in your judgement, have Palestinian terrorists been at gaining rights for Palestinians? Do Hamas recruiters say, “Look at our long record of success in gaining rights for the Palestinians!” when recruiting disaffected Palestinian youths to strap bombs about their midsections?

No. They say, “Look at what those fuckers are doing to our people. Help us strike back at them the only way we can!”

You can kill individual terrorists, disrupt terrorist networks. But the more a population believes that they are oppressed by a militarily superior power, the more members of the population will be willing to engage in terrorist attacks against that power.

A guy who says, “Give me a dollar or I’ll shoot the kid” will, if he’s paid any attention to the media, know that this strategy never works. He’ll know that he’s going to end up in jail or dead. Even if he gets a dollar first, he’ll know that he’ll never get a chance to spend that dollar. If he uses this tactic, he’s stupid, desparate, egomaniacal, or all three.

So refusing to hand over the dollar doesn’t save future children. It just kills this one dead.

What saves future children? Ensuring that there are easier ways to get a dollar.

Daniel

[Spiritus_Mundi]

If you beleive that we’ve come to the point where we should simply agree to disagree, that’s ok. I was regarding our debate as constructive and interesting, and would not have minded hearing you extrapolate further on our points of disagreement beyond just simple disagreement.

Me too, I was just pointing out that from this point on we ar dicerging from the quesiton posed in your OP, since whateer agreement we might reach (or not) will be independent of both the ethical systems used by the protesters and the particular evaluations the protesters mught make.

(For the record, I’m not a consequentialist myself, though I do try to include a consequentialist element in my ethical models. I’m happy to go through this exercise, though. It’s never a bad thing to exercise one’s ethical understanding.)

With that said, I’m incredibly pressed for time. I hope to get a response to your detailed points done sometime this weekend, but you should have a nice lull (from me, at least) to catch up to the other 6 dialogues you are holding.