Friday, April 19, 2013

Reflections on the Boston Bombing

We're not a very reflective society. Immediately after the bombings in Boston people were calling for the heads of the perpetrators. Our instinctive response to violence is always more violence. In response to the attacks on 9/11 we've launched wars across the globe killing at least a million people, creating millions of refugees, and destroying entire nations in the process. Our leaders have codified torture and systemically rolled back our civil liberties. No doubt this attack will be used to roll back even more liberties. Here in New York City we have to show ID to purchase a utility knife. I imagine we will see similar efforts when one purchases a pressure cooker.

What's happening to us a society? It's not just Muslims from far off lands intent on killing us. Our own citizens have again and again went on killing sprees, intent on killing as many of us as possible. While we wage wars in dozens of countries across the globe the number one killer of our soldiers is suicide. And suicides are up across the board. Basically when someones not trying to kill us, we're killing ourselvesat unprecedented rates. Violence begets violence; and our systemic attack on the inherent value of life seems to come home to roost. We don't value life "over there" and we don't value it over here.

Much of the current focus is on regulating gun sales. Gun advocates point to the Boston Bombing as proof that curbing gun sales won't stop the crazies. All of this misses the much larger point that our collective actions at home and abroad are driving people to want to kill as many of us as possible. Calling it terrorism doesn't change this fact.

This isn't to justify any of this violence. But in a nation that routinely uses violence to settle disputes, is it any wonder that citizens and non-citizens choose that same route? When our President doesn't like what's going on in North Korea he doesn't reach out to discuss the issue, he flies nuclear capable bombers over the peninsula.

As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said so eloquently in 1967, "My government is the largest purvayor of violence in the world." We were then in the process of murdering millions in Indochina. Dr. King's sentiments are still true today in a world where the US nearly outspends the rest of the world on death and destruction. Over the last 30 years our police forces have become highly militirized, routinely murdering citizens with impunity, and acting more like an occupying army than a civilized police force.

Our problem is not Islam. It's not East vs West. It's not a problem of regulating gun sales or enhancing the security state. We can't regulate this problem. We cannot legislate it away. There are no easy fixes, but as Noam Chomsky has said again and again there's an easy way to stop terrorism: stop participating in it. Stop looking for violent means to address our problems.

 

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