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Is it ok for a pacifist to accept free entertainment from the military-industrial complex?

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Since writing this post Anonymous may have helped people, but has not within the last four (4) days.
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free, accept, entertainment, military-industrial, complex
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CarolineFCY
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Kind of depends on how the pacifist feels about it. If they're inwardly asking that question, there's a seed of doubt.

Myself, I see it two ways. One, they can feel good that they're having the bad guy waste money and resources on someone who doesn't support them. Or two... it's kind of like a school or politician accepting funding from the NRA. How does that look/feel? Just a thought to mull over.

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There's a little bit of education involved too.

It's science. It's free. It's science.

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CarolineFCY
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Hm, I hear you. Science rules.

My ideas?
1) Pros and cons list.
2) If you get in on it and your conscience gnaws at you, you can get out whenever.
3) If possible, just make sure you sway them before they sway you.

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SerenelyBlue
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Don't over think it. Enjoy the facilities.

Helpcomanimatedyetiwithdot256
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I'm not much of a pacifist, yet was uncomfortable with the notion of being conscripted, assisting an organisation whose purpose is at least discouraging violence through intimidation if not violence.
Felt better about it after being assigned to the payroll unit, with the intention that I could mayhap do a bit of good for the sake of people, in a tiny way.

Help me with:

[quote]Test.[/quote]

Sherlock by olga tereshenko d9qdidc
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Never think soldiers just want to go out and kill people. Soldiers are the biggest pacifists. They know what death and carnage looks like.

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Anonymous
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My six year old artist had her mind blown at an air force optics display. She stood and argued with the man about primary colors. He said red and green make yellow. She said "I paint a lot and I know: red and green make brown and yellow is a primary color." He tried to explain absorption vs reflection, but it only confused her more. Finally, when she was near tears in frustration, I cut in "there's different primary colors for light". She was relieved.

Sherlock by olga tereshenko d9qdidc
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smiley wrote:
My six year old artist had her mind blown at an air force optics display. She stood and argued with the man about primary colors. He said red and blue make yellow. She said "I paint a lot and I know: red and green make brown and yellow is a primary color." He tried to explain absorption vs reflection, but it only confused her more. Finally, when she was near tears in frustration, I cut in "there's different primary colors for light". She was relieved.

Military people too often tend to make things too complicated.

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Anonymous
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Edit: never mind. Darn it, I blew my anonymous cover.

Yeah it was fun and I was already going long before I considered whether it would be implicit support of military manufacturers.

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Anonymous
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We went to the USA Science and Engineering Festival in Washington DC. It's always a good time, but crazy crowded. My favorite moment was mentioned above, my daughter having her mind blown, but my favorite souvenir is the green screen Riding With Starman in the Martian Roadster photos we got at the SpaceX booth. I'm going to frame them and hang them on our wall.

I'm a huge SpaceX fan. Actually, I'm interested in all of Elon Musk's companies. He genuinely seems to be trying to make the world a better place. But their booth at the festival was more fun than informative. I guess that's ok.

Sherlock by olga tereshenko d9qdidc
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Glad you had fun.

I was in the military for 22 years and have been serving as an advisor after retirement.

I can tell you that we need a military, and we need those military manufacturers, because the world is a dangerous place--and there are people who want to take YOUR place and your daughter's. I know. I have met these people. They do not think like you or I. They believe that God has conferred some extra-special status upon them and that God has given them a license to kill. I have seen, first hand, what these people are capable of doing. They snatch children to use as child soldiers or prostitutes; they force people to live under a set of primitive and harsh rules and kill people for violating them; they use terror as a means of controlling the population; they strip women of their human rights and force them into sexual slavery; they sell and buy people as slaves; and they kill aid workers who come to help the population.

And then you have the Russians and the Chinese, who are teaming up for joint military exercises as I write this. North Korea gets 99% of its food and fuel from China, and virtually all of its military hardware. China controls North Korea. Kim Jong Un will not so much as burp before getting permission from his Chinese handlers.

I think we have finally decided we cannot be the world's policeman--that must be a joint effort of all the free countries of the world.

But the day we become a second- or third-rate military power is the day that our freedoms will be taken from us, and the day the conqueror's boot is felt upon our necks.

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Anonymous
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@Sherlock yes, we need a military and we need companies that manufacture military technology, but there is a balance that must be found.

The Second Amendment guarantees our right to a well regulated (and presumably also well supplied and trained) militia, but it shouldn't be a major factor in our economy. People shouldn't profit from war.

I'm not fully pacifist. I just don't want my tax money to go to warmongering for profit around the world.

And those psychopaths that kidnap, enslave, and murder women and children were created as a result of cia cold war anti-soviet policy. I don't know if there is a cure, but if there is, it's education not more violence.

Sherlock by olga tereshenko d9qdidc
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I agree with you about profits from war--to an extent. Defense contractors have to make a profit or go out of business.

Also, those "psychopaths" were not creations of the CIA, but the Wahhabist school of Islam that began some 200 years ago in Saudi Arabia--but which gained control of Sunni Islam in Saudi Arabia with the sudden explosion of oil wealth. After the "Muslim Crusades", including the assaults on Europe had petered out, and until the rise of Wahhabism, all of Islam was indeed a peaceful religion.

Today there is a civil war raging within Islam--and the rest of us are caught in the middle of it.

And, I might add, the Arab slave trade in Africa, the Near East and the Middle East has been going on for centuries--long before the CIA or even the United States existed.

The "cure" does involve education--and, of course, the fanatics are doing their best to kill the teachers and the aid workers.

Security must be established before war torn nations can be rebuilt. When you are dealing with fanatical elements with whom negotiations are impossible, the only answer to the problem is annihilating those who are trying to destroy civilization. It's sad--and I hate it--but it's true.

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@Sherlock

I won't deny that the wahabbi movement started around 1890 or so in Saudi Arabia and was embraced by the rich and powerful due to its emphasis on following leaders whether they are right or wrong (might is right). However, it was a fringe cult until the CIA in Afghanistan propped them up to fight the Soviet Union.

I also won't deny that slave trade predates even Islam and is deeply rooted in African and Middle Eastern culture. That's why Islam has rules regulating the treatment of slaves and encouraging but not mandating their being freed.

However, fanatics don't start out fanatical. I disagree that they need to be killed en masse. They need to be shown that Islam teaches that if a person isn't your brother in religion he is your brother in humanity, and anyone who murders one, it is as if he has murdered all humanity. The only ones that maybe need to be killed are the leaders, just evil politicians manipulating the ignorant for their own financial gain. Maybe they need to be killed, but I think a better punishment would be for them to live like the people they "lead".

Sherlock by olga tereshenko d9qdidc
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Well, the Wahhabism seed was always there, just waiting for conditions that would allow it to germinate. Oil wealth was one of those factors--perhaps the principal factor.

It's true that the mujahadeen in Afghanistan were supported by the CIA. I have talked to many of them. When I advised the Afghan Ministry of Defense, there were generals I advised who had been on opposite sides during the civil wars there. Now they had to work together to defeat a common enemy, the Taliban.

The Taliban--believe me when I tell you this--was the creation not of the CIA, but the ISI in Pakistan. It is the ISI that supports the Taliban even now.

When I visited Pakistan years ago, an ISI agent trailed me to Paris. He tried to engage me in conversation to find out the reason for my mission. I "busted" him when he couldn't answer a question about Brussels that everyone living in Belgium--as he claimed he did--would know.

The rockets, explosives and heavy weapons used by the Taliban come from Pakistan. The Taliban are also assisted with battlefield intelligence by the ISI.

Years and years ago, the slaves owned by Arabs found out that Muslims were not supposed to keep Muslims as slaves. So they "converted" to Islam. Their owners prevented their escape, however, by "adopting" them as sons and daughters, and using their new "paternal authority" to keep them from leaving.

When you have a fanatical movement that comes into power, it brings the psychopaths out of the woodwork--like Himmler in Germany, and the many fanatical leaders we see of radical Islam today. In normal times such people would have had careers as serial killers or would have simply been dormant psychopaths. But when you get a movement that lets you kill and torture and be rewarded for it, then you will have an unending supply of murderers and torturers.

I think we will have to kill the leaders and their followers en masse, although it is morally distasteful to me, for the simple fact that one more psychopath always steps up when a leader is killed. We are going to have to go through several layers. It's kind of like dealing with fire ants--you don't want to just try to kill the queen, as others will take her place--you want to wipe them out to the last ant.

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