How Do We Respond to Unconscionable Evil?
Frozen_Paratrooper
Veteran
Unless one has been living under a rock the past two months, you know that the group formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria has declared itself a Caliphate now called the Islamic State. Spanning Syria and much of northern Iraq, the group first made headlines in June by routing the Iraqi Army and killing any not fortunate enough to escape. So successful have they been that many fighters from rival groups have dropped Al-Qaeda to throw in their chips with the burgeoning IS.
This week, the group shocked the world by surrounding the most heavily Christian areas of Iraq and committing some of the worst atrocities in decades. Women buried alive or gentially mutilated, men crucified, and _children_beheaded. I will not post links to the savagery out of respect for readers, but the images are readily available for those with the stomach to view them online. Added to the the brutality is embedded reporting and videos showing Sunni children proudly proclaiming their desire to either kill and die as martyrs or become suicide bombers.
This begs the question, for those of us who champion secular human rights, what is to be done in the face of such implacable evil? These are not some run-of-the mill insurgents like in Ukraine or Chechnya. These are actors with a country sized piece of real estate, millions of dollars, thousands of weapons and armored vehicles pilfered off the defeated Iraqi Army, and an insatiable appetite for blood.
Further more, what are adherents to Buddhism to make of this? After all, while Buddhists as of now remain blessedly far away from the bloodshed, the Caliphate makes no distinction between anyone they view as an infidel. A Buddhist minority in Ebril would suffer the same fate as the Yazidis under different circumstances.
So ignoring the blame game of who, if anyone, outside of Iraq is responsible for what we see occurring, the fact is that ISIS is a real and potent threat to anyone in their path. What are we to make of them?
Comments
The problem here, as I see it, is do we forever mire ourselves in Iraq and Afghanistan, add in Syria, etc., etc.? Let's face it, we've been at it for more than half a century, and we have failed miserably at bringing peace to that region. Guess we have a totally failed perspective. Do we spend more and more American lives and $$$$$ in the pit which is the Middle East? Several "experts" within the past 10 days, when asked when will peace come to the Middle East, finally answered honestly -- never.
We get condemned for being the world's policeman...and condemned for not being the world's policeman.
Indeed. It reminds me of the old joke that people always complain when the police overstep and always complain when the police aren't there in time. In any case, we all dial 911 when something bad happens.
As to your point about when peace will reign, the answer is gloomily probably never. That will only happen when there is a massive shift in culture about what is acceptable in the modern world. Slavery and Nazism as organized forms were forever banished to history, and the descendents of their perpetrators are wholly uninterested in resurrecting them. But the fact that no one today seriously wishes to reimpose them came st a heavy price.
@Frozen_Paratrooper
I get that you are emotionally wrought over the suffering of others but your posting has me mostly sending questions back at you.
Why are you asking what we (as Buddhists) are supposed to make of ISIS?
Are you afraid that we will join ISIS's victims because we will be more willing to be doormats than those currently being slaughtered?
Do you see Buddhism as another tribe to mobilize one way or another?
Is it just another army ready to war again to end all wars?
Each Buddhist individual needs to address what ever cause of ignorance comes there way as a matter of basic practice, not just the ones which are currently getting the most press. Just as every Buddhist can find the causes of ignorance in their own footfalls, it is also ignorance to think that ISIS was created in a vacuum away from each of our karmic contributions.
What part of the "life is suffering", isn't believable as a Buddhist teaching?
What part of the Buddha's path towards suffering's cessation do you agree with?
I do agree with the thrust of the Buddha's teaching that life tends towards suffering and much (I would not argue all) of life's suffering is rooted in our desires and cravings. But this does not seem to take into account suffering deliberately inflicted by others.
I am asking because many modern Buddhists speak of bringing the Dharma into the West and discussing how we can be "engaged" and relevant.
As a matter of fact, I do fear that many more groups will become ISIs's unwitting victims, Buddhists included depending how far the cancer spreads.
To answer your last question with a question, how can the Buddha's path to suffering's cessation help those who face terrible people wishing them great harm?
@How, I wish I understood your post better than I do. There is a lot of energy and pressure in your post (the multiple question marks). I keep trying to figure out how to say this but screw it. What in the heck are you talking about? Honest question!
Gosh. What part of @how post is unclear? What are you finding questionable?
All too often we want to sort out and deal with others suffering, ignorance and situation. The Buddhist solution is to start with ourself rather than elsewhere.
Yes, I think the question is fairly clear.
The way I translated it was how should Buddhists face this spreading cancer? And I think it's an appropriate question because Buddhists vote in America, and things are lining up on two sides here -- strong intervention or very limited intervention.
I irritates me when I see discussions of this ilk concentrating on how America will be affected by all this, when there are also other countries represented here.
What the heck makes America so damned special that makes folk believe it is unique?
This is a global problem, and to confine it to one nation is typically insular. Buddhists also live elsewhere, you see....
Because they actually do something. Often while others are still talking about it.
But this is not a Buddhist problem it is a political one.
America is not the only country that 'does' something. And History seems to show that whenever and wherever they have stepped in to police, pacify or govern the state of play, war has ensued, and aggression has escalated. Why don't people talk any more? This is going to turn into a bloody, aggressive conflict resulting in countless innocent lives lost - and i guarantee you, as with every other situation that has hitherto arisen, the resolution will be found through negotiation. Either that or a conscious effort towards annihilation.
When assailed by a dog it is pretty useless to talk to it first. First I subdue it so it understands who it is dealing with and then I speak to it.
The other way around and you risk loosing fingers.
I really do not mind if someone can stop this by talking to them but it needs to be done now before more people get killed.
I am the first to recognize that US intervention have not been successful in many occurrences but sometimes they do do the right thing.
And there has been a mighty lot of talking going on in the middle east and Pakistan and other places and I do not see anything good coming out of that either?
I am not saying I have any answer to this but. Saying that talking can solve conflicts is probably true in some cases. Just as violence can in some.
/Victor
Be very careful in your speech, Victorious. Comparing your fellow human beings to dogs is not compassionate or skilful.
I'm old enough to have learned there are many sides to every issue, things are never as black and white as they may appear. People are people, and no one group has a monopoly on evil. The only place to tackle evil is in your own heart.
I wasn't comparing dogs to humans. I was giving an example of when talking does not work.
In this case I would not compare them on account of it being an insult to dogs.
I do not think dogs are capable of genocide.
/Victor
It still dehumanises people to compare them to dogs. You are saying they are beyond reason, which I don't believe. People always have a reason, even if you don't know or understand what it is. It's a dangerous and inflammatory way to speak, because it affects how you think of them, and that affects how you act towards them.
Yes it is totally incomprehensible to me why anyone would want to kill another only on account of them holding another view than your own. That is true.
And I am bloody upset on behalf of those affected. That is also true. And I am perfectly aware that this whole situation can at least in part be blamed on the US. But the situation being what it is...instead of bombing their carriers, how would you have stopped them from killing 50 thousand people?
If there is a peaceful way to resolve this then why isn't anybody acting on it? The US is acting to save lives and as usual getting their pants chewed of by those who stand by doing nothing.
If there is a peaceful way then what is it?
/Victor
EDIT: I am fairly certain dogs cannot act like this. But wolf tearing sheep for fun is known to happen. the worst case in sweden was just this spring when 35 or so sheep were found slaughtered in a pen...so maybe. Still I think genocide is out of the question for both wolfs and dogs.
What adherents to Buddhism should make I think you could say is debatable. But what they shouldn't make I think is clear. What they shouldn't make is their mind being filled with ill-will or hate.
Agreed. And isn't it weird how so many members of the public can come up with reasonable ideas and suggestions on how best to deal with things, but so many politicians make the wrong decisions? ON our behalf? This is why I NEVER vote.
Shame. Let's at least be unified on here when we all hopefully can agree that -
>
I have had so many opportunities in my life to put this to the test, and it has never failed as sound, solid and true advice.
They don't tear sheep up for fun. They go into a frenzy, because the smell of blood activates and triggers certain pack behavioural traits. It's what humans refer to as 'mob mentality'. 'Fun' doesn't come into it. That's a human attribution, and it's inaccurate.
I suppose military intervention is the answer. Except every time we invade and bomb a country and rid them of a 'brutal regime' (that we often previously supported) we fuck it up even more and along comes a different, and usually worse one to replace it. Maybe we need a different solution?
Considering how Buddhists handle hate. I think a similar approach might do it. But it is a long term approach and not a fast one just like with cultivation.
A behaviour is best stopped by replacing it with another. So the hate must be replaced by something else. But what?
In SL I see hate for other people mostly from people who have had limited access to each other. And from them that do not have control over their situation. I.e. people living in uncertain conditions and poverty.
Seldom is it kindled in people that went to school together, what ever the station in life. So I think you need to start early with mixed schools. Brewing a social arena where people understands one another's needs and beliefs.
The hatred that is growing there now is fuelled by extremist powers and it is often people that are not in the best of situations that let their anger and frustration take the form of the hatred spoken by these extreme parties. Much like in Sweden. Comparing the two it is also evident that dissatisfaction stems from the perceived difference between neighbours and not the actual one. Since those in Sweden with extreme views are in general much better able to control their lifes than those in SL.
So empowering people to stear their own lifes and fates and educating people is another thing that needs doing.
I think the desire that needs to replace Hate is the desire to be able to lead successful and happy lifes without need of conflict. And the satisfaction there of.
But again how?
/Victor
In my view, Victorious was making an analogy of two types of violent situations, not an analogy of two different types of animals. And, in terms of that analogy, I think it was a valid one.
We would all like love and peace and sitting down and chatting to be the resolution to the situation of which we are talking. Would you like to personally go over there and try that face to face? I mean you, specifically.
ISIS has stated and already operated by instant conversion to Islam or instant death. To quote them on Christians: "there is nothing to give them but the sword". And guess what, you're not Muslim, so the same goes for you. Convert or die.
Agreed because what the world has been doing hasn't been working.
Okay, that was easy.
Now, what is the solution? That's the hard part.
Very relevant and interesting text. Even the Buddha could not stop any war.
http://www.academia.edu/196626/Norms_of_War_in_Theravada_Buddhism
But there is hope:
The reason the US is invoked so much is that it is the only major power capable of potentially intervening on a large scale to something like this.
I don't think Victorious' analogy is unkind. My Great Dane would never behead puppies because he thought he was divinely commanded to do so. If anything, it's insulting to dogs to compare child killers to them.
I get the the whole thing about not responding to hate with hate. But is any sort of response to ISIS necessarily rooted in hate? If a man swings an axe in a public place, there is not hate in the hearts of those who subdue him. It is compassion for the innocent around him.
That was my original point. Compassion and diplomacy is lovely when you are dealing with other Westphalian, liberal nations with a respect for the rule of law. But how do you...you as an individual and not just a government...respond to someone literally swinging a sword and demanding to worship his god or die? Easy to "not meet hate with hate" when it's someone else's child being beheaded.
@Frozen_Paratrooper
I am sure every empire explained it's decisions to try to control the world around it with "who else will do it then." I think it was, is, and will probably alway be more about the bottom line than anything else..
Money or power, is like fashion, it must move many folks in one direction or another or it falters..
This has been the historical root of all wars. We just dress it up in religious or ideological clothing to convince others of the worth of dying for it.
Young folks are not voting, not because they are stupid but because they are actually looking at the results and saying that the offered clothing to continue with the status quo is just another shell game.
Do you not wonder about the incredible genocide occurring elsewhere in the world that continually misses the evening news (in North America)?
There will always be new boogymen like (ISIS) thrown around to justify the next war
but personally I think that the boogymen I know of and can actually address in some way, live a lot closer to my home.
As a member of the armed forces though, it is understandable to wonder what a Buddhist thinks about meeting a sword with another sword. Hopefully that will only be done with equanimity when all other means have been exhausted, and not simply to keep someone elses investors happy with the bottom line.
@How, I think what you say is often true. I think it's so easy for us to say what, for example, Putin is planning in Ukraine.
But in this situation in Iraq, it's not us saying what ISIS might do. It's ISIS saying what it is going to do. It's ISIS already doing what it says it is going to do. In in reality, I think President Obama (whom I usually support) has rather consistently understated the consequences of what is happening there now. We're not putting the words in ISIS' mouth. Why would we not believe their intentions, when they are stating the intentions themselves quite publicly?
@vinln
Sorry if I was unclear. I can not get what in my post would give you the idea that I don't think ISIS is doing what it's claiming to be trying to do.
I was focusing more on the fact that our concerns for one expression of ethnic or religious cleansing when we have ignored so many others, elsewhere in the world, makes Samsara suspiciously look like it's throws of another hostile take over by business interests.
History seems like an endless expression of mankind being led into another war where the seeds of this war have simply been germinated by the last war. Somewhere, people will have to do something differently for this pattern to unfold differently.
Samsara is a dangerous, violent place. You can respond to that by running around trying to police it but as has already been said the results are usually a worse mess.
As for the Middle East, I don't indulge in idle barroom speculation about who should do what because I recognise the limitations of my own knowledge and I don't trust the politically motivated news bulletins to tell me the truth. Such idle chatter does nothing to alleviate the misery of those dying out there.
Okay. From your first few paragraphs, I thought you were implying that countries usually make judgements about what another entity is going to do, not always based on facts.
I agree with your point/question about consistency about ethnic/religious clensing in other places. Of course, that brings up again the question of should be the world's policeman, and if so, when.
And we are certainly in agreement that we need to start doing something differently. I think difficult part is that we can't figure out what that is. Or even if there is some significantly different approach that would work.
Sometimes I look at these issues in the ME and see no good options.
I just wish we could step up against the manifestations of evil within our own tribe as easily as we do against "others".
To examine where I am still an unthinking solder in samsaras battle with itself is part of the reason why I continue to slog away at my practice.
I haven't read all the posts yet, but for me, any time I think through situations like this, or others, the only solution I reach again and again is "with peace and compassion in my own mind and body, and then maybe I can reach out to others in my community." That is as far, at this point in my life, as my influence can reach. And based on the amount of work it is, that is quite enough for me right now.
I do know that the answer is not more violence. It only perpetuates the hate and the violence and the goals of small children to label others as enemies and to seek to annihilate them. But how to deal with someone who only understands violence and hate? I don't know. We cannot answer with violence and yet (or should not) yet they are blind to true peace and compassion. It is a path they have to go along themselves, just like the rest of us. But my heart cannot handle simply leaving so many poor people to suffer when we can do something, either. Not an easy thing.
We all suffer, some of us in unmentionable and horrific ways. But most of the time when we try to alleviate the suffering of some, we cause more suffering for others. It doesn't seem acceptable to me.
I haven't followed the news. Is the UN doing anything about this?
All very true.
So ought we to remain uninvolved or check our concern because we have inappropriately assigned it in the past? That is ridiculous, but I am having a hard time getting you. I want to get you.
As to your final paragraph, YES.
I don't know what that 'is' to do differently. By differently, are you pointing back to involving or uninvolving ourselves differently?
Hey @Hamsaka
Whether you can or do act to internationally help others or not.....
"To get me" is to
ask why the North American news compared to most of the rest of the world organizations are so divergent in their views at this time?
call into question our nationalism so that the help we offer others is just not another thinly veiled business acquisition.
address the boogie man in the mirror with no** less** ardor than the ones wearing other tribal colors.
accept that samsara should first be shown that it can be addressed at home before expecting anyone else to believe that you can do anything useful for them.
think that unless you can truely offer another country a viable & stable economic and safety improvement over what they currently have, the change of one despot's hat over to another, is just another war in the making.
I suppose I think that to the degree that people can actually bring some resolution to their own demons, is the same degree to which they might be able to help other people do the same.
Nothing I know of. Anybody else?
Swedish media is covering Ukraine crisis mostly.
I just read that the UK and France has promised help to the Kurdish fighters.
Military intervention can at best achieve limited objectives. But the larger question is how seriously do we take the idea of establishing a Caliphate. What it will mean to our future and security. I would not take it lightly. Checking ISIS is a small part of fighting a larger ideal.
Is it necessary for everyone to get involved with stopping evil or is it alright if some of us spend our lives working on our mental suffering and developing great love and compassion and thus effecting the world that way. Or as long as there is evil in the world should everyone one of us steel ourselves so we can directly confront it?
@How; I gotcha
I'm running a fever today . . . maybe it slowed down my uptake process.
"What indeed to we do about unconscionable evil? (finger jabbing at 'them over there' while 'us over here' have either planted or played into the evil so we can line up clutching business contracts to 'save them over there').
Amen brotha.
@Hamsaka
Get well soon!
What can you or I conceivably DO, say we 'chose' to 'get involved stopping evil'? I can mentally hear the arguments "What, you don't CARE about those poor Christian babies over there???" which is a logical fallacy but it won't stop it from being blasted in your face.
I can't even VOTE for a decent, moral candidate. I guess I could go over there and put bandages on people and nurse them until my head is cut off or blown off. That would be something to DO. I could protest out in the street but I've never been convinced of that working at all, for anything. Does anyone else think differently about protests or letter writing? I think those days have been over for a long ass time.
Maybe the worst thing we can do is keep jabbing our finger at the unconscionable evil of ISIS while the powers that be repeat history over and over again
Just noticed that after over 40 posts in this thread, no one has offered any solutions to the problem, just criticized what has been done in the past.
Just sayin'.
If/when the Islamofacists get the bomb they will use it. Then head chopping will seem like a quaint gesture. There exists forms of evil that are only restrained by the barriers to its mad furies, as a seawall contains a stormy sea from overwhelming a coastline.
I can't even VOTE for a decent, moral candidate. I guess I could go over there and put bandages on people and nurse them until my head is cut off or blown off. That would be something to DO. I could protest out in the street but I've never been convinced of that working at all, for anything. Does anyone else think differently about protests or letter writing? I think those days have been over for a long ass time.
Maybe the worst thing we can do is keep jabbing our finger at the unconscionable evil of ISIS while the powers that be repeat history over and over again
Exactly, unless we're all to become soldiers or join some kind of international aid organization what effect will any of us really be able to have on "unconscionable evil".
I feel that by working on our own personal "evils" we make our sphere of influence more peaceful. I think that is a noble and honorable way to live ones life and make the world a better place.
After all its not even possible for everyone to directly oppose such forces and what kind of world would it be if everyone was just devoted to aggressively stopping evil? One the world needs people who work for others well being, it isn't enough to just stop the bad, we need to promote the good too.
Second, who defines the evil, maybe the Iraqi kid who's parents are killed by an American bomb decides he wants to grow up and stop THAT kind of evil. Where does that ever end?
I don't think there are any short-solutions at this point. There's going to be a lot more fighting and a lot more people dying, as there has been for the last two years. Bombing one faction isn't going to stop that, or do anything to help prevent future violence. One thing that I think would help, but will never happen, is a coalition of countries going in to help evacuate civilians and accepting Syrian refugees to help them escape the violence rather than militarily engaging one side or the other. I mean, wasn't everyone condemning Assad just last year for possibly using chemical weapons and killing shittons of civilians in his fight to stay in power? And now we're talking about going after his opposition? And if we somehow manage to take out both, will we be happy with whomever emerges out of the power vacuum left behind? I sincerely doubt it.
I'm not disagreeing with you, Jason, but I don't see a solution in what you say (and I realize you concede that). But I have an issue with the concept of seemingly permanently removing civilians from their homelands, whatever the reason. It seems like just surrendering the nation(s) to a radical group who has refused to work within any accepted international concepts, and who has refused to negotiate anything with anyone.
OK, so what do you suggest?
Well, @Jason, part of my overall point in this thread is that there seems to be no good solution. And I can't say that my solution will be any better, but the lack of good alternatives tempers my criticism of various leaders and nations who have acted in the past (it's all to easy to criticize what has been done, as long as some group doesn't have to come up with good alternative solutions).
Iraq seems to me to be a slapped together country. Perhaps have the Arab League (?) in conjunction with the United Nations lead a partition of Iraq into 3 autonomous regions -- Shiites, Sunnis, and Kurds -- could address at least some of the problems since those 3 groups do not seem to be able to live together as one country. Isn't that somewhat similar to what was ultimately done in the 1990s with the Serbs, Croats, and Muslims (I'm no expert on that at all...just what I have read). Then develop governments for each of those 3 new "states", with decisions made by the people who naturally reside in the boundaries of each "state" (and not allow a group such as ISIS to force their will on the populace through murder and mayhem). If 2 or all of those separate states wanted to form a loose coalition, fine...their decision.
Probably there is something wrong with that idea, but at least it's a different approach than what has been done in the past.