A revelation today. My son, nearly nine, has expressed a new life aspiration, to be a soldier! I'm shocked to the core.
"Because so many people are dying!" And he wants to help. Not for King and Country. Not in the killing, he wants to help. There's something noble in this. To Fight, to Protect, to Defend!
I hadnt thought through any desire to be in warfare or a battle with any sense of justice any sense at all of a positive putcome, surely there must be sometimes. Or is liberation usually just a transfer from one tyranny to another?
Can a combatant be a subversive peacemaker?
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I'm increasingly drawn to non-violence. I don't mean to sound like I've previously been drawn to violence exactly, but I did always kind of assume that there was occasionally a just war. Then I started reading about Just War Theory and realised how seldom a war would actually tick all the boxes to fall into that category. It's seldom enough, in my view, for non-violence to be by far the preferred default. I hope we've come far enough to recognise that effective non-violent protest takes a great deal of courage.
My terms here are a bit mixed-up. But then so am I.
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