The Right Thing?
How do you
support one idea while deploring another in the midst of an event that
expresses both? That is the very
conundrum that I face when I think about the war in Iraq. On the one hand, I see a political power
play, an All-American Bully if you will, that is pushing forth a policy of
violence under the pretense of securing Americans from some ill-defined
boogeyman. On the other, I see a
vicious, ruthless and unrepentant despot who rules his people with terror,
systematic murder and the sort of iron fist that would cause Stalin himself to
cringe at it’s absolute tyranny.
To clarify, let me outline exactly my problem: Do I criticize Bush for his unilateral, cowboy politics, especially in light of my mistrust of him to do right by anyone but himself and his war-mongering cronies? Alternatively, do I call for the heads of Saddam and his genocidal sons on a plate, because it does not take a genius to recognize a serial killer in statesman’s clothing with his boot on the throat of his oppressed people?
Do I
protest a war that has yet to prove to be about anything other than oil for an
already insanely rich 1% of our population?
Do I pray that cluster bombs cause the fiery death of the government of
sadistic, serial rapists?
It is in
times like these that I find myself with an overwhelming feeling of emptiness
and apathy. After all, who cares what
happens half a world away when I cannot find a job to pay my rent? And yet, how can I not feel sick at my own
selfishness when there are people who have escaped a regime that has committed
wholesale slaughter of it’s own people in order to prove how big and bad it is?
Like many
of my Gen-X peers, I have attempted to educate myself on the subject (not bad
for a generation that is alleged to be more poorly educated than their
parent’s) in an effort to get to the root of the problem we now face as a
nation. Unfortunately, I find that the
more I learn, the more I am disgusted by the abject ignorance (both my own and
that of the American public at large) of the events that have lead us to this
impasse. As a result, I bounce
ineffectually from self-loathing (didn’t Iraq used to our friend?) to
demagoguery (our system may not be perfect but it’s still the best thing going
on in the world). My range of emotions,
while therapeutic in the sense that it is expressed, is ultimately useless when
faced with the decision of what to do about it.
How do I,
in good conscience, denounce Iraq for Geneva Convention violations when our own
government breaks those same accords? At
the same time, I realize there is a vast difference between holding prisoners
with no legal representation and executing them outright.
I submit
to you that this is not the Just World War II of our grandparents, nor is it
the Unjust Vietnam of our parents.
Rather, I would say that this is the bastard political hybrid child of
both. It was WWII that gave us our smug
sense of moral superiority but it was Vietnam that showed us what happens when
we attempted to impose our democratic values at gunpoint. By the way, wasn’t it Mao Tse-Tung that said
Political power comes from the barrel of a gun? That doesn’t sound very democratic to me.
It is at
this point that most essayists would offer their own version of what could be
done, but I am not one of those people.
In fact, I can offer no solution, nor even a direction in which to
look. So, I am still left with the
choice between the white elephant that represents Peace (leave Iraq alone and
maybe it’ll go away) or the “Bomb’em back to the Stone Age” view of the
so-called pro-liberation side.
So, tell
me, what is the right thing to do?