Wrong Direction
The bloodiest century in all of human history, a century that marked the near-annihilation of the Armenian people, witnessed two world wars, holocausts, ethnic cleansing campaigns and left millions of humans in inhumane conditions, displaced and traumatized for generations to come, is being allowed by the great thinkers of our time to reinvent itself into traditions that continue into the 21st century.
No sooner than imperialism was thought to have retired into legendary tales in history books, globalization became the rallying cry for the post-industrial quest to fuel the new world economic order. In this new century when mankind is amassing more information and advancing knowledge and science that in any other period in the history of civilization, humans are left questioning and contemplating why their loved ones are being butchered, abducted, held captive and their human rights violated not just in Iraq and Guantanamo, but in Yerevan, the Sudan and in Europe and the United States.
Tens of thousand of Iraqis, not only insurgents and terrorists, but civilians, father, mothers, students and children, have been killed since the start of military operations in Iraq. Tonight, young Americans who should be home celebrating the holidays with their families, are metaphorically stranded near the oil fields of Arabia, while the world collectively debates how long they should remain there, if it was necessary for them to be dispatched to destroy and rebuild a country and whether oil or the teaching of democracy were either of the many reasons given for the unnecessary violence playing out on CNN every day.
What do we know about Iraq and military operations there? What did we learn from the endless history of violence in the 20th century? Was there a more civilized way to deal with Saddam Hussein? Does the war in Iraq set another precedence as did the invasion of Afghanistan? Does a global economy and capitalism justify treating humans anywhere as extras on a movie set, to control them and do away with them as needed to reach a more lucrative bottom line? Can government treat citizens elsewhere the way corporations are allowed to treat unnecessary employees during their massive restructuring of businesses to justify corporate management bonuses? Have these corporations gone above and beyond layoffs into creating wars for profit? And if yes, who in the global democratic process will stand up and say 'no more?'
How the US will leave Iraq, how much profits US contractors like Halliburton will take away from the war, and how many more lives, American or Iraqi, will be taken is unknown. What is known is apathy by SUV-driving, McDonald's eating, debt-ridden, mortgage-owing citizen has to stop. Not only human beings should have the right to question what is the news, but they should take responsibility for what their governments are doing to ensure their lifestyles. Young Americans shouldn't be overseas this holiday season fighting an unjustifiable war. Young Iraqis should have been traumatized and left mourning the dead. War was never the answer, and the lessons learned in the 20th century should have not allowed history to repeat itself.
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No sooner than imperialism was thought to have retired into legendary tales in history books, globalization became the rallying cry for the post-industrial quest to fuel the new world economic order. In this new century when mankind is amassing more information and advancing knowledge and science that in any other period in the history of civilization, humans are left questioning and contemplating why their loved ones are being butchered, abducted, held captive and their human rights violated not just in Iraq and Guantanamo, but in Yerevan, the Sudan and in Europe and the United States.
Tens of thousand of Iraqis, not only insurgents and terrorists, but civilians, father, mothers, students and children, have been killed since the start of military operations in Iraq. Tonight, young Americans who should be home celebrating the holidays with their families, are metaphorically stranded near the oil fields of Arabia, while the world collectively debates how long they should remain there, if it was necessary for them to be dispatched to destroy and rebuild a country and whether oil or the teaching of democracy were either of the many reasons given for the unnecessary violence playing out on CNN every day.
What do we know about Iraq and military operations there? What did we learn from the endless history of violence in the 20th century? Was there a more civilized way to deal with Saddam Hussein? Does the war in Iraq set another precedence as did the invasion of Afghanistan? Does a global economy and capitalism justify treating humans anywhere as extras on a movie set, to control them and do away with them as needed to reach a more lucrative bottom line? Can government treat citizens elsewhere the way corporations are allowed to treat unnecessary employees during their massive restructuring of businesses to justify corporate management bonuses? Have these corporations gone above and beyond layoffs into creating wars for profit? And if yes, who in the global democratic process will stand up and say 'no more?'
How the US will leave Iraq, how much profits US contractors like Halliburton will take away from the war, and how many more lives, American or Iraqi, will be taken is unknown. What is known is apathy by SUV-driving, McDonald's eating, debt-ridden, mortgage-owing citizen has to stop. Not only human beings should have the right to question what is the news, but they should take responsibility for what their governments are doing to ensure their lifestyles. Young Americans shouldn't be overseas this holiday season fighting an unjustifiable war. Young Iraqis should have been traumatized and left mourning the dead. War was never the answer, and the lessons learned in the 20th century should have not allowed history to repeat itself.
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