pragmatism vs. theory

(degrees of hypocrisy[1])_1979

Subtitle: will the real Christians please stand up?

More keywords: self-serving; fallacy[2], disingenuous[3], crusade[5], passion[6].

-=*=-

At the risk of appearing to dance on the head of a pin, and recognising that almost no matter what one says, it seems that there's always someone in here who will find something to carp[4] about it, I pose the following question.

Q: Just exactly what is it that is too hard to understand about "Thou shalt not kill!"

Tip: examine the word murder[0].

Then note the word 'unlawful.'

Consider two examples of killing,

a) in self-defence of you or yours, when under some direct mortal threat. Not too hard, that one - but not too often either. Then,

b) judicial killing, like that planned for the Bali-9. Not too popular, that one; and considering our AFP's role, not too savoury either.

Then ask yourself, just how lawful may it be, to be responsible for the pink-mist deaths of perhaps a million Iraqis since "Shock'n whore'03®" - this hideous, continuing slaughter thought to be predicated on impending and massive oil-theft. (The oil so stolen destined for a lot'a super-size SUVs and fat 4WDs.)

-=*=-

Intermezzo: It's not just what you say, it's how you say it.

a) JWBush: "crusade[5]." And not just the once, either[B1].

b) Blair: "I passionately[6] believe"[B2].

c) Howard: "Judaeo-Christian ethic"[H].

Now, I pose another question.

Q: Just exactly how separate is Church from State?

(And note: religion was similarly embedded in pre-WW2 Germany.)

A final feature, one of the most vicious claims in the pro-pushed paradigm propaganda is the one alleging concrete attempts at creating/restoring some sort'a (Islamic) caliphate[C1,C2].

-=*=-

Morality: I have tried to formalise my own, see the chezPhil morality in which the basic crimes are lying, cheating, theft and murder. The whole thing has nothing to do with any 'g*d construct,' but is driven only by reflexive altruism (i.e. I don't wish to be murdered, therefore I agree not to murder some other); and a key tenet is "Fair go, ya mug!"

Actually, here I'm (metaphorically) standing on the shoulders of giants, see Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics[A].

-=*=-

Discussion: All the elements are now present. Killing human beings, except in extremely exceptional circumstances, is both morally wrong (morality being a field claimed by religion - but not necessarily; see my own, say) and legally wrong (law being a field claimed by the state.)

The 'usual exception' for killing, as war, is 'self-defence.'

The other side of the coin from 'self-defensive' war is invasive war, not 'just' criminal, but Nuremberg: "To initiate a war of aggression ... contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole".

There is another point to be made about the war on Iraq, and that is this: we do know that they lied us into it, and that yes, Saddam was a tyrant. Although it's arguable about the form of bringing about regime-change (what Howard himself said was not a valid casus belli), the (illegal) invasion was deliberately morphed into occupation. This (brutal) occupation endures, as do the efforts to persuade the (puppet) Iraqi government to sign away the Iraqi birthright by passing the oil law. Those who doubt that 'murder for oil' is not a perfectly adequate and accurate description of what is occurring in Iraq are possibly fooling themselves (but not me).

The final element here is religion; each of B, B & H claim personally to have it, and further, that it is integral to the US/UK/Aus societies, see Howard[H], say.

-=*=-

Performance: We can now examine the actions/inactions of individual Christians and Churches. There is no doubt that some, many individual Christians expressed shock, horror etc at the prospect of "Shock'n whore" and demonstrated against it, along with many other non-religious people (like me). No argument. Similarly, many churches protested.

But: the war went ahead anyway, we saw (obscene! - IMHO) pictures of US 'grunts' praying before going into battle, planning to 'pink-mist' Iraqis - who are referred to often by those same grunts as "Hajjs[7]."

Pragmatism: WYSIWYG, and Q: what do we see?

a) we see a notional Christian society demonstrating against Howard then re-electing him - illustrating that the war was not the highest priority. But not to make it the highest priority is to extend Howard 'cover.' Q: Is this not hypocrisy?

b) we see notionally Christian Churches protesting against war but some declaring the war 'just,' IMHO a truly filthy cop-out. Q: Is this not hypocrisy?

c) it has been suggested, that the reason for this apparent hypocrisy is that the so-called Christians involved are somehow 'not real Christians.' But we're dealing with the real world and again: WYSIWYG. It is a fallacious[2] form of reasoning called 'the definitional retreat' (more detail available), to redefine a term in the face of a failing argument (example: when the topic is 250% house-price inflation, to jeer that the ABS figures for consumer inflation are 2-3%. Haw! (Bad tactics, fellas.))

-=*=-

Conclusion: people, be they sheople® or whatever, may say what they like. (That's freedom, ain't it?) The facts of the matter are, that no matter how some theoretically correct Christian may think or what s/he says; ditto for Churches (whether Christian or not and who cares), we have an invasive war on our hands, an (illegal) invasion turned brutal occupation, both equally murderous and predicated on eventual and massive oil-theft. Our so-called leaders claim religion for themselves, and assert that the nations they lead are based on religious morals - and yet this total travesty continues.

Penultimate: this ghastly murder for oil war is only the latest war, perhaps one of the filthiest ever, but it's got a looong history behind it. War and religion have existed alongside each other for as good as forever - the 'just war' cop-out being indicative of just how close.

Q: What good, then, is this religion?

A: Not much, that I can see.

-=*=-

Epilogue: people, be they sheople or not, religious or not, could stop this war and the crimes that infest our society, IF ONLY enough wanted to, decided to, and did something about it.

For example, by voting warmongers (and liars, cheats) everywhere out.

-=*end*=-

PS - a slightly different loop: governments, and especially this government go to sometimes great lengths to ensure our honesty, and by this I mean collecting data on us (snooping in bank accounts, say), sharing such data around among departments, then bugging our communications, etc. Yet this same government has lied us into an illegal war with subsequent brutal invasion, both horrendously murdering, and all that predicated on eventual oil-theft from the hapless Iraqis. We only get one chance per three years, say, to 'discipline' our government. Wha'da 'bout it? How will you use your vote, next time?

Ref(s):

[0] murder —n. 1 intentional unlawful killing of a human being by another. [POD]

[1] hypocrisy n. (pl. -ies) 1 false claim to virtue; insincerity, pretence. 2 instance of this. [Greek, = acting, feigning] [ibid.]

[2] fallacy n. (pl. -ies) 1 mistaken belief. 2 faulty reasoning; misleading argument.  fallacious adj. [Latin fallo deceive] [ibid.]

[3] disingenuous adj. insincere, not candid.  disingenuously adv. [ibid.]

[4] carp2 v. find fault; complain pettily.  carper n. [Old Norse, = brag] [ibid.]

[5] crusade —n. 1 hist. any of several medieval military expeditions made by Europeans to recover the Holy Land from the Muslims. 2 vigorous campaign for a cause. —v. (-ding) engage in a crusade.  crusader n. [French: related to *cross] [ibid.]

[6] passion n. 1 strong emotion. 2 outburst of anger (flew into a passion). 3 intense sexual love. 4 a strong enthusiasm (passion for football). b object arousing this. 5 (the Passion) a suffering of Christ during his last days. b Gospel account of this. c musical setting of this.  passionless adj. [Latin patior pass- suffer] [ibid.]

[7] hajj n. (also hadj) Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca. [Arabic] [ibid.]

[A] Asimov:

«..., the Three Laws of Robotics are a set of three rules written by Isaac Asimov, which almost all positronic robots appearing in his fiction must obey. Introduced in his 1942 short story "Runaround", although foreshadowed in a few earlier stories, the Laws state the following:

1. A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.


2. A robot must obey orders given to it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.


3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Later, Asimov added the Zeroth Law: "A robot may not harm humanity, or, by inaction, allow humanity to come to harm"; the rest of the laws are modified sequentially to acknowledge this.»

[Asimov/Three Laws of Robotics]

[B1] JWBush:

«We need to go back to work tomorrow and we will. But we need to be alert to the fact that these evil-doers still exist. We haven't seen this kind of barbarism in a long period of time. No one could have conceivably imagined suicide bombers burrowing into our society and then emerging all in the same day to fly their aircraft - fly U.S. aircraft into buildings full of innocent people - and show no remorse. This is a new kind of -- a new kind of evil. And we understand. And the American people are beginning to understand. This crusade, this war on terrorism is going to take a while. And the American people must be patient. I'm going to be patient.»

[September 16, 2001/Remarks by the President Upon Arrival]

«I want to tell you something, we've got no better friends than Canada. (Applause.) They stand with us in this incredibly important crusade to defend freedom, this campaign to do what is right for our children and our grandchildren.»

[February 16, 2002/President Rallies the Troops in Alaska]

[B2] Blair:

«The threat seems to some people to be remote, but I passionately believe that we must disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, we must uphold the authority of the United Nations, we must show rogue states and terrorist organisations that when we say we intend to deal with the issue of weapons of mass destruction we mean it.»

[PM: 'Saddam should take the peaceful route and disarm']

[C1] Calphate:

«The terrorist Zawahiri, number two man in the al Qaeda team -- al Qaeda network, he said, we'll proceed with several incremental goals. The first stage is to expel the Americans from Iraq; the second stage is to establish an Islamic authority, then develop it and support it until it achieves the level of caliphate; the third stage, extend the jihad wave to secular countries neighboring Iraq; and the fourth stage, the clash with Israel.»

[September 28, 2006/Remarks by the President at Bob Riley for Governor Luncheon]

[C2] Calphate:

«CIA Director Gen. Michael Hayden: "… I strongly believe [U.S. failure in Iraq] would lead to al Qaeda with what it is they said is their goal there, which is the foundations of the caliphate, and in operational terms for us, a safe haven from which then to plan and conduct attacks against the West." (Committee On Intelligence, U.S. House Of Representatives, Hearing, 1/18/07)»

[May 3, 2007/Setting the Record Straight: Iraq Is The Central Front Of Al Qaeda's Global Campaign]

[H] Howard:

«MITCHELL:

Well what are Australian values? This is the point. What are the Australian values we expect people to embrace or get out?

PRIME MINISTER:

Well we expect them to embrace democracy, we expect them to recognise this is a society made up of both men and women and that each should be accorded proper respect and an equal place. That doesn't mean that we should try and make them the same in their outlook and their attitude, but simply they should be treated fairly and equally. It's a society that recognises and respects freedom of religion but it's a society that does not have an established religion. Christianity, although it is the Judaeo-Christian ethic is the great moral shaping force, has been and continues to be in different ways, the great shaping moral force of Australia it is not entrenched in any way and the Christian church is not entrenched in any way as a state religion. We respect all religions and we respect people who don't have religions and in that sense, we are very different from a country such as Iran, a country such as, in many respects, even a country such as Pakistan or Indonesia, where there is a far greater, how shall I put it, far greater central role for Islam as a religion.»

[Interview Transcript 24 February 2006]