2 thoughts on “INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM: “Another Mass Attack in Paris” ☮”

1. Horrific, abomination, act of barbarism… all words used, rightly, by the French President, Hollande to the describe the Paris butchery. I felt it, like he and other westerners, viscerally. Imagine–right in the heart of Paris! All those nice European people going about their Friday night revelries and suddenly terror, murder, lunacy arises seemingly out of nowhere.

   But, of course, it did not arise from nowhere. After thinking about it, I also had to question why this particular act of butchery impacted me so viscerally, just as 9/11 had. Why did this instance of human slaughter affect me so profoundly when people in the Middle East and other non-European lands live in a slaughterhouse every day? Is it because they look and seem to act like me while the others dress differently, often have a different pigmentation, talk differently, are perhaps are of a religion, whose foundational principles, I disagree with? Does my moral universe extend only as far as people who seem to be like me? Regrettably, the answer is, on the instinctual level, yes; on the intellectual level, no, but it takes me a few moments to get there. However, at least I get there.

   Is religion at fault here? Well, partially of course. But the difficulty in blaming religion alone is reflected in Bill Maher’s comment that he suspected “the Amish were not to blame.” There are peaceful tenets in religion just as there are hateful, war mongering tenets and often in the same religion. You can always reach into your religious scripture file to find justification for any action.

   More at fault, I submit, is social structure, especially social structures that are intrinsically economically and socially oppressive, exploitative, and focused on profit and money, not people. An exploitive social structure is always about keeping the lid on an always dangerous brew and religion, especially Abrahamic religion, is a major player in keeping the lid on with its emphasis on obedience, order, hierarchy, and next-world reward. ISIS is the fruit of a global capitalism structure run amok, not necessarily the product of a particular religion although certain religious systems smooth the path to violence.

   Another reason for the West’s deeply felt reaction to the Paris attacks is that in today’s warfare we are not used to our actions producing reactions in our own backyards–I mean, the outrage that someone should actually hit us back! We are seeing clearly the moral hazard involved in conducting warfare from our computers, with insufficient emotional investment in the havoc we are wreaking somewhere else. If you hit someone in their homes and streets and churches and hospitals, they’re just supposed to keep on taking it?

   ISIS is a con game, tapping into oppressed people exploited by their own and foreign governments. But make no mistake, the West is also a player in this long-con. The difference is that while ISIS brays about its violence, the West is more adept at disguising its role in this butchery.

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   • Predictably, the “good guys” have hauled out their oversized American flags, stuck them on their pickup trucks, and are parading around the streets and byways of American. Never mind that most of the year they virtually hate anything French.

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