Artists and Writers Oppose Expanding War On Terrorism

by John Hawkins | October 15, 2002 10:09 pm

Artists and Writers Oppose Expanding War On Terrorism: Reader Harley Daugherty sent me a link to a web page called, “Artists and Writers Oppose Expanding War On Terrorism[1].” I decided to write about this online petition because it’s a perfect example of the type of thinking that permeates the entire anti-war movement. Here is the entire petition with my comments added

To: US Government, War on Terrorism coalition partners

Artists have both the ability and the moral obligation to combat deceit and distortion. It is the ability to illuminate even difficult truths that defines an artist.

The nearly meaningless opening paragraph is the sort of dreck you’d expect to hear in a book report written by a twelve year old who wants to be a rock star when he grows up.

Truth has been one of the casualties of the “War on Terrorism”. Assassinations, bombings, and chemical and biological attacks, whether perpetrated by individuals or states, are crimes. They should be dealt with by the rule of law, and not by the use of military force. With this in mind, we condemn the US “War on Terrorism” and call upon both the US government and the “anti-terrorist” coalition to end this war, which benefits no-one but those who are making money from it, and which is sowing the seeds of future terrorism and violence.

I hate to disillusion Doug Lain and Tim Jones (the clueless morons who wrote this petition), but the “rule of law” would not exist without the use of force, military or otherwise. As a whole, people and nations follow rules set down by others because there will be consequences if they don’t, not out of the goodness of their hearts.

The “War on Terrorism” is now being used to justify further US aggression against the people of Iraq. Such aggression would lead to a high civilian and military death toll and a further deterioration of the situation in the Middle East. [then bullet points:]

* We call upon the United States and the United Nations to lift all economic sanctions on Iraq.

Wait a second, weren’t these guys just calling for the “rule of law?” Are these sanctions not a punishment for Saddam’s refusal to comply with the terms he agreed to after the Gulf War? Yet, they want to drop them anyway. This is like telling a criminal that, “I demand that you turn yourself in to the nearest police station so you can be tried and sent to jail! Uh, you won’t go? In that case, we’ll just drop the charges.”

* We call upon the United States and its allies to abandon preparations for war against Iraq.

* We call upon the United States, Iraq, and all other countries to refrain from developing and deploying weapons of mass destruction.

No one but an idiot could ever believe that this would happen. Seriously, is there anyone who thinks this could possibly happen? Anyone? Oh you do? Then you are an idiot just like the people that wrote this.

* We call upon Iraq to allow the resumption of weapons inspections, and upon the United States to allow these weapons inspectors to operate independently rather than as a projection of US interests.

This statement shows the sort of tenuous grasp the authors have on reality. If Iraq isn’t willing to allow real and genuine weapons inspections despite the sanctions and with the threat of war hanging over their heads, why in the world would any sane person think they’d suddenly give in after we removed the sanctions and ceased threatening them?

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

Notice what these guys didn’t talk about? Since the authors are opposed to expanding the ‘war on terrorism’, what are we supposed to do about the terrorists who are blowing up skyscrapers, nightclubs, and pizza parlors? The authors had absolutely nothing to say about it. I guess we’re just supposed to sit on our hands and wait to die. That seems to be the attitude of most of the anti-war crowd which is why it’s difficult to take any of them seriously — especially these guys.