Posted by finelinebob on August 22, 2006, at 23:43:03
In reply to Re: Doing nothing » finelinebob, posted by laima on August 22, 2006, at 20:47:50
> >Since there are people unwilling to live in peace, taking the "first step" means inevitably facing loss and suffering. Taking the "second step" would mean not retaliating, not seeking vengeance.
>
> This makes a lot of sense, but seems frustratingly hard to put into practice. A lot of strength and "compromise"...I can't remember the film "Gandhi" that well, but I remember this one scene where he was leading some protest march -- I can't remember if they were trying to get into some compound or just down a road, past an intersection. What I do remember was something like all his followers lined up in ranks of four being opposed by British troops with their Indian counterparts in front (of course) carrying long bamboo canes. Gandhi's people kept slowly walking towards the guards. The Indian guards would knock the front rank out of the way, beating them over the head with these poles. As the people in the front rank fell off the side of the road and were escorted by companions away for treatment of their wounds, the next rank would continue and force the Indian guards to keep hitting more and more people.
I can't remember the exact outcome ... much of anything! ... but I recall how dehumanizing it seemed to me to be one of the guards
Then again, if the only way violent people are going to stop killing one another on this planet is to fall back on "The enemy of my enemy is my friend", Us vs Them sort of thing ... maybe what we need is a good alien invasion.
poster:finelinebob
thread:678623
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/poli/20060809/msgs/679222.html