Posted by some guy from SDAC on April 27, 1997 at 02:44:32:
In Reply to: nonviolence posted by just me on April 27, 1997 at 02:37:42:
If you have war then you have war. If you
have war then you do not have peace. Violence is
violence, and it will cause more violence. To
disagree would be to contradict yourself.
Today, the US will be happy to sell any
third world country all the weapons that it needs
to destroy anything that the country has left.
Our country likes revolution in the third world
because the imperialists make even more money
from the weapons that they sell to both sid
es
than from the other types of trade which would go
on in peace times.
Let us suppose that you are successful. You still
have to deal with a country full of trained
killers and others who have been through all
sorts of trauma. Ther
e is no way to be sure that the
new rulers of your nation will be any better than the
old ones or any less willing to sell out their
fellow countrymen. Even if you get one ruler who
is good, there is a good chance that he will be
overthro
wn because there is already a spirit of violence
in your country.
As examples you mentioned Vietnam, Nicaragua,
and Cuba. None of these three countries are in particularly
good shape today. I doubt that you can argue that
the US and oth
er imperialists nations have stopped
exploiting any of the three that you mentioned.
Frantz Fanon does advocate violence as a way
to make your country undesirable for the
imperialist powers to business with.Gandhi too said
that it is be
tter to stand up for your rights
using violence than to not stand up at all. However,
violence is not the only option. There are
even more effective strategies. These strategies
are effective when you have the truth
on your side. You can
stand up to violence and be
willing to die, but not willing to kill. This takes
much more courage than violence, and much more
dedication to your cause. If you truly believe
that you are working for what is right, then
you must believe t
hat others will be able to see
that this is true. Every time that the oppressor hits
you, and you don't hit back, the oppressor looks
worse and worse to the outside world.
Nonviolence is only effective if you
can get some sort of attentio
n from the outside
world. It is an effective when the
opressors violence helps you illistrate the
extent of the injustice. Nonviolence is effective
when your goal is to raise a support base for your
cause.
There are two views of Non
violence. Many people
would see nonviolence as a life style. These people
would say " I think that we should use non violence
as a lifestyle. It is wrong to hurt anything, so I have
no choice but to practice nonviolence." However, you
do n
ot have to believe that in order to agree
with nonviolence as a strategy! Some who endorse
nonviolent tactics would say "I believe that nonviolence
is the most effective strategy given the
circumstances." This type of person would practice no
nviolent
direct action because, as the situation exists
today, violence would be counter productive. You
don't have to believe that all violence is morally
wrong in order to see that violence is not the type
of action that is most effect
ive in the current
situation.
In fact, association with violent tactics
can be detrimental to a social change movement. If
you were to officially embrace violence then you
are going to have a hard time growing as a movement.
You woul
d also discredit yourself if you think that
you stand for justice. The soldier of the oppressor
is often not the one benefiting most from the situation
either. To kill the soldier is to enlarge the amount
of injustice, because he is being ex
ploited at least
half as much as you are. He has a family too. A better
bet is to convert as many people to your cause as is
possible. Especially now, you must agree, we need more
people working for social change. The most effective
way
to get people involved is to practice
non-violent direct action.
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