[lit-ideas] Re: Al Zarqawi

  • From: Paul Stone <pas@xxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Thu, 08 Jun 2006 14:21:31 -0400


AA: There's a skit by Abbott and Costello wherein I think Costello proves that he's not there by using logic. Since we're neither vegetables nor minerals, yes, we're animals who like to think we're superior to all the other life forms on this planet, even as we behave like monsters half the time, including rejoicing when fellow monsters are killed. When we're not behaving like monsters, we're wishing death and destruction, on a big scale or small, like monsters.

Man, I thought _I_ was a pessimist. You make my outlook like rosier than Ronald Reagan's cheeks. Do you ever see the good in people? I just don't think you are able. People are, in my experience generally good. Misguided, stupid, greedy, narcissistic, yes, it all goes with looking out for number one -- a very, if not, Darwinian, at least Dawkinsian concept -- but we're not monsters. We surely have the capacity to exhibit and perform behaviours that could be construed -- in non monstrous situations -- as being that of monsters.


But I'm not going to give up my faith in the goodness of humanity. We are strong, intelligent, superior, albeit evolving creatures with tremendous potential for that evolution into something fully good. There will always be 'bad' stuff and there will always be behaviours which someone else will deem 'monstrous' but we are better than animals and we are very, very overwhelmingly 'good'. We have to be... being monsters all the time would result in anarchy and then we'd kill each other... that's not conducive to fulfilling our potential. It's very hard to potentiate when we're dead.

But rejoicing in some evil fuck's end is not monstrous, it's normal behaviour. This guy beheaded people with a sword that required sawing through the person's neck as they cried in agony. He and anyone like him who would carry out such acts deserves a dirt nap. Regardless of the way he was hunted down and killed, the world is better off with him dead. You can't argue that. You can argue that we shouldn't have done x or y to get him and we shouldn't have expended innocent lives and started a war etc. etc. and I would tend to agree with all that, but people who are willing (not just able) to apparently callously carry out such barbarity should themselves be immediately dealt with in a vicious retaliation that result in their demise as swiftly as possible. That's not monstrous, that is human and humane justice. For the good of humanity we, as a people should not tolerate the likes of him. We can deal with monsters without turning into them ourselves.

sleighing,
paul


##########
Paul Stone
pas@xxxxxxxx
Kingsville, ON, Canada


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