Separation or ethnic cleansing? Israel’s encaging of Gaza aims to achieve both
By Jonathan Cook in Nazareth
The following is taken from a talk delivered at the Conference for the Right of Return and the Secular Democratic State, held in Haifa on June 21.
27/06/08 "ICH"' -- -- In 1895 Theodor Herzl, Zionism’s chief prophet, confided in his diary that he did not favour sharing Palestine with the natives. Better, he wrote, to “try to spirit the penniless [Palestinian] population across the border by denying it any employment in our own country … Both the process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly and circumspectly.”
He was proposing a programme of Palestinian emigration enforced through a policy of strict separation between Jewish immigrants and the indigenous population. In simple terms, he hoped that, once Zionist organisations had bought up large areas of Palestine and owned the main sectors of the economy, Palestinians could be made to leave by denying them rights to work the land or labour in the Jewish-run economy. His vision was one of transfer, or ethnic cleansing, through ethnic separation.
Herzl was suggesting that two possible Zionist solutions to the problem of a Palestinian majority living in Palestine -- separation and transfer -- were not necessarily alternatives but rather could be mutually reinforcing. Not only that: he believed, if they were used together, the process of ethnic cleansing could be made to appear voluntary, the choice of the victims. It may be that this was both his most enduring legacy and his major innovation to settler colonialism.
In recent years, with the Palestinian population under Israeli rule about to reach parity with the Jewish population, the threat of a Palestinian majority has loomed large again for the Zionists. Not suprisingly, debates about which of these two Zionist solutions to pursue, separation or transfer, have resurfaced.
Today these solutions are ostensibly promoted by two ideological camps loosely associated with Israel’s centre-left (Labor and Kadima) and right (Likud and Yisrael Beiteinu). The modern political arguments between them turn on differing visions of the nature of a Jewish state orginally put forward by Labor and Revisionist Zionists.
To make sense of the current political debates, and the events taking place inside Israel and in the West Bank and Gaza, let us first examine the history of these two principles in Zionist thinking.
During the early waves of Jewish immigration to Palestine, the dominant Labor Zionist movement and its leader David Ben Gurion advanced policies much in line with Herzl’s goal. In particular, they promoted the twin principles of “Redemption of the Land” and “Hebrew Labor”, which took as their premise the idea that Jews needed to separate themselves from the native population in working the land and employing only other Jews. By being entirely self-reliant in Palestine, Jews could both “cure” themselves of their tainted Diaspora natures and deprive the Palestinians of the opportunity to subsist in their own homeland.
At the forefront of this drive was the Zionist trade union federation, the Histadrut, which denied membership to Palestinians -- and, for many years after the establishment of the Jewish state, even to the remants of the Palestinian population who became Israeli citizens.
But if separation was the official policy of Labor Zionism, behind the scenes Ben Gurion and his officials increasingly appreciated that it would not be enough in itself to achieve their goal of a pure ethnic state. Land sales remained low, at about 6 per cent of the territory, and the Jewish-owned parts of the economy relied on cheap Palestinian labour.
Instead, the Labor Zionists secretly began working on a programme of ethnic cleansing. After 1937 and Britain’s Peel Report proposing partition of Palestine, Ben Gurion was more open about transfer, recognising that a Jewish state would be impossible unless most of the indigenous population was cleared from within its borders.
Israel’s new historians have acknowledged Ben Gurion’s commitment to transfer. As Benny Morris notes, for example, Ben Gurion “understood that there could be no Jewish state with a large and hostile Arab minority in its midst.” The Israeli leadership therefore developed a plan for ethnic cleansing under cover of war, compiling detailed dossiers on the communities that needed to be driven out and then passing on the order, in Plan Dalet, to commanders in the field. During the 1948 war the new state of Israel was emptied of at least 80 per cent of its indigenous population.
In physically expelling the Palestinian population, Ben Gurion responded to the political opportunities of the day and recalibrated the Labor Zionism of Herzl. In particular he achieved the goal of displacement desired by Herzl while also largely persuading the world through a campaign of propaganda that the exodus of the refugees was mostly voluntary. In one of the most enduring Zionist myths, convincingly rebutted by modern historians, we are still told that the refugees left because they were told to do so by the Arab leadership.
The other camp, the Revisionists, had a far more ambivalent attitude to the native Palestinian population. Paradoxically, given their uncompromising claim to a Greater Israel embracing both banks of the Jordan River (thereby including not only Palestine but also the modern state of Jordan), they were more prepared than the Labor Zionists to allow the natives to remain where they were.
Vladimir Jabotinsky, the leader of Revisionism, observed in 1938 -- possibly in a rebuff to Ben Gurion’s espousal of transfer -- that “it must be hateful for any Jew to think that the rebirth of a Jewish state should ever be linked with such an odious suggestion as the removal of non-Jewish citizens”. The Revisionists, it seems, were resigned to the fact that the enlarged territory they desired would inevitably include a majority of Arabs. They were therefore less concerned with removing the natives than finding a way to make them accept Jewish rule.
In 1923, Jabotinsky formulated his answer, one that implicitly included the notion of separation but not necessarily transfer: an “iron wall” of unremitting force to cow the natives into submission. In his words, the agreement of the Palestinians to their subjugation could be reached only “through the iron wall, that is to say, the establishment in Palestine of a force that will in no way be influenced by Arab pressure”.
An enthusiast of British imperial rule, Jabotinsky envisioned the future Jewish state in simple colonial terms, as a European elite ruling over the native population.
Inside Revisionism, however, there was a shift from the idea of separation to transfer that mirrored developments inside Labor Zionism. This change was perhaps more opportunistic than ideological, and was particularly apparent as the Revisionists sensed Ben Gurion’s success in forging a Jewish state through transfer.
One of Jabotinsky disciples, Menachem Begin, who would later become a Likud prime minister, was leader in 1948 of the Irgun militia that committed one of the worst atrocities of the war. He led his fighters into the Palestinian village of Deir Yassin where they massacred over 100 inhabitants, including women and children.
Savage enough though these events were, Begin and his followers consciously inflated the death toll to more than 250 through the pages of the New York Times. Their goal was to spread terror among the wider Palestinian population and encourage them to flee. He later happily noted: “Arabs throughout the country, induced to believe wild tales of ‘Irgun butchery’, were seized with limitless panic and started to flee for their lives. This mass flight soon developed into a maddened, uncontrollable stampede.”
Subsequently, other prominent figures on the right openly espoused ethnic cleansing, including the late General Rehavam Ze’evi, whose Moledet party campaigned in elections under the symbol of the Hebrew character “tet”, for transfer. His successor, Benny Elon, a settler leader and rabbi, adopted a similar platform: “Only population transfer can bring peace”.
The intensity of the separation vs transfer debate subsided after 1948 and the ethnic cleansing campaign that removed most of the native Palestinian population from the Jewish state. The Palestinian minority left behind -- a fifth of the population but a group, it was widely assumed, that would soon be swamped by Jewish immigration -- was seen as an irritation but not yet as a threat. It was placed under a military government for nearly two decades, a system designed to enforce separation between Palestinians and Jews inside Israel. Such separation -- in education, employment and residence -- exists to this day, even if in a less extreme form.
The separation-transfer debate was chiefly revived by Israel’s conquest of the West Bank and Gaza in 1967. With Israel’s erasure of the Green Line, and the effective erosion of the distinction between Palestinians in Israel and the occupied territories, the problem of a Palestinian majority again loomed large for the Zionists.
Cabinet debates from 1967 show the quandary faced by the government. Almost alone, Moshe Dayan favoured annexation of both the newly captured territories and the Palestinian population there. Others believed that such a move would be seen as transparently colonialist and rapidly degenerate into an apartheid system of Jewish citizens and Palestinian non-citizens. In their minds, Jabotinsky’s solution of an iron wall was no longer viable.
But equally, in a more media-saturated era, which at least paid lip-service to human rights, the government could see no way to expel the Palestinian population on a large scale and annex the land, as Ben Gurion had done earlier. Also possibly, they could see no way of persuading the world that such expulsions should be characterised as voluntary.
Israel therefore declined to move decisively in either direction, neither fully carrying out a transfer programme nor enforcing strict separation. Instead it opted for an apartheid model that accommodated Dayan’s suggestion of a “creeping annexation” of the occupied territories that he rightly believed would go largely unnoticed by the West.
The separation embodied in South African apartheid differed from Herzl’s notion of separation in one important respect: in apartheid, the “other” population was a necessary, even if much abused, component of the political arrangement. As the exiled Palestinian thinker Azmi Bishara has noted, in South Africa “racial segregation was not absolute. It took place within a framework of political unity. The racist regime saw blacks as part of the system, an ingredient of the whole. The whites created a racist hierarchy within the unity.”
In other words, the self-reliance, or unilateralism, implicit in Herzl’s concept of separation was ignored for many years of Israel’s occupation. The Palestinian labour force was exploited by Israel just as black workers were by South Africa. This view of the Palestinians was formalised in the Oslo accords, which were predicated on the kind of separation needed to create a captive labour force.
However, Yitzhak Rabin’s version of apartheid embodied by the Oslo process, and Binyamin Netanyahu’s opposition in upholding Jabotinsky’s vision of Greater Israel, both deviated from Herzl’s model of transfer through separation. This is largely why each political current has been subsumed within the recent but more powerful trend towards “unilateral separation”.
Not surprisingly, the policy of “unilateral separation” emerged from among the Labor Zionists, advocated primarily by Ehud Barak. However, it was soon adopted by many members of Likud too. Ultimately its success derived from the conversion to its cause of Greater Israel’s arch-exponent, Ariel Sharon. He realised the chief manifestations of unilateral separation, the West Bank wall and the Gaza disengagement, as well breaking up Israel’s rightwing to create a new consensus party, Kadima.
In the new consensus, the transfer of Palestinians could be achieved through imposed and absolute separation -- just as Herzl had once hoped. After the Gaza disengagement, the next stage was promoted by Sharon’s successor, Ehud Olmert. His plan for convergence, limited withdrawals from the West Bank in which most settlers would remain in place, has been dropped, but its infrastructure -- the separation wall -- continues to be built.
How will modern Zionists convert unilateral separation into transfer? How will Herzl’s original vision of ethnic cleansing enforced through strict ethnic separation be realised in today’s world?
The current siege of Gaza offers the template. After disengagement, Israel has been able to cut off at will Gazans’ access to aid, food, fuel and humanitarian services. Normality has been further eroded by sonic booms, random Israeli air attacks, and repeated small-scale invasions that have inflicted a large toll of casualties, particularly among civilians.
Gaza’s imprisonment has stopped being a metaphor and become a daily reality. In fact, Gaza’s condition is far worse than imprisonment: prisoners, even of war, expect to have their humanity respected, and be properly sheltered, cared for, fed and clothed. Gazans can no longer rely on these staples of life.
The ultimate goal of this extreme form of separation is patently clear: transfer. By depriving Palestinians of the basic conditions of a normal life, it is assumed that they will eventually choose to leave -- in what can once again be sold to the world as a voluntary exodus. And if Palestinians choose to abandon their homeland, then in Zionist thinking they have forfeited their right to it -- just as earlier generations of Zionists believed the Palestinian refugees had done by supposedly fleeing during the 1948 and 1967 wars.
Is this process of transfer inevitable? I think not. The success of a modern policy of “transfer through separation” faces severe limitations.
First, it depends on continuing US global hegemony and blind support for Israel. Such support is likely to be undermined by the current American misadventures in the Middle East, and a gradual shift in the balance of power to China, Russia and India.
Second, it requires a Zionist worldview that departs starkly not only from international law but also from the values upheld by most societies and ideologies. The nature of Zionist ambitions is likely to be ever harder to conceal, as is evident from the tide of opinion polls showing that Western publics, if not their governments, believe Israel to be one of the biggest threats to world order.
And third, it assumes that the Palestinians will remain passive during their slow eradication. The historical evidence most certainly shows that they will not.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Christian Zionism: Dispensationalism And The Roots Of Sectarian Theology
A History of Dispensational Approaches
By Rev. Steven Sizer
12/20/2000 "ICH" Dispensationalism is one of the most influential theological systems within the universal church today. Largely unrecognised and subliminal, it has increasingly shaped the presuppositions of fundamentalist, evangelical, Pentecostal and charismatic thinking concerning Israel and Palestine over the past one hundred and fifty years.
John Nelson Darby is regarded as the father of dispensationalism and its prodigy, Christian Zionism. It was Cyrus. I. Scofield and D. L. Moody, however, who brought Darby’s sectarian theology into mainstream evangelical circles. R. C. Sproul concedes that dispensationalism is now ‘...a theological system that in all probability is the majority report among current American evangelicals.’
...Clarence Bass makes this assessment of dispensationalism:
No part of historic Christian doctrine supports this radical distinction between church and kingdom. To be sure they are not identical; but dispensationalism has added the idea that the kingdom was to be a restoration of Israel, not a consummation of the church... In the light of this principle, it is legitimate to ask whether dispensationalism is not orientated more from the Abrahamic Covenant than from the Cross. Is not its focus centred more on the Jewish kingdom than on the Body of Christ? Does it not interpret the New Testament in the light of Old Testament prophecies, instead of interpreting those prophecies in the light of the more complete revelation of the New Testament?
Whether intentionally or otherwise, dispensationalism is being used today to give theological justification to what the United Nations regards as racism and the denial of basic human rights; supporting the ethnic-cleansing of Palestinians from their historic lands; endorsing the building of Jewish settlements in the Occupied Territories; inciting religious fanaticism by supporting the rebuilding of a Jewish Temple on Mount Moriah; dismissing moderate Jewish opinion willing to negotiate land for peace; and advocating an apocalyptic eschatology likely to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
It is therefore not surprising that among the indigenous Christians of the Holy Land especially, dispensationalism is regarded as a dangerous heresy, an unwelcome and alien intrusion, advocating an exclusive Jewish political agenda and undermining the genuine ministry of justice, peace and reconciliation in the Middle East. MORE...
By Rev. Steven Sizer
12/20/2000 "ICH" Dispensationalism is one of the most influential theological systems within the universal church today. Largely unrecognised and subliminal, it has increasingly shaped the presuppositions of fundamentalist, evangelical, Pentecostal and charismatic thinking concerning Israel and Palestine over the past one hundred and fifty years.
John Nelson Darby is regarded as the father of dispensationalism and its prodigy, Christian Zionism. It was Cyrus. I. Scofield and D. L. Moody, however, who brought Darby’s sectarian theology into mainstream evangelical circles. R. C. Sproul concedes that dispensationalism is now ‘...a theological system that in all probability is the majority report among current American evangelicals.’
...Clarence Bass makes this assessment of dispensationalism:
No part of historic Christian doctrine supports this radical distinction between church and kingdom. To be sure they are not identical; but dispensationalism has added the idea that the kingdom was to be a restoration of Israel, not a consummation of the church... In the light of this principle, it is legitimate to ask whether dispensationalism is not orientated more from the Abrahamic Covenant than from the Cross. Is not its focus centred more on the Jewish kingdom than on the Body of Christ? Does it not interpret the New Testament in the light of Old Testament prophecies, instead of interpreting those prophecies in the light of the more complete revelation of the New Testament?
Whether intentionally or otherwise, dispensationalism is being used today to give theological justification to what the United Nations regards as racism and the denial of basic human rights; supporting the ethnic-cleansing of Palestinians from their historic lands; endorsing the building of Jewish settlements in the Occupied Territories; inciting religious fanaticism by supporting the rebuilding of a Jewish Temple on Mount Moriah; dismissing moderate Jewish opinion willing to negotiate land for peace; and advocating an apocalyptic eschatology likely to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
It is therefore not surprising that among the indigenous Christians of the Holy Land especially, dispensationalism is regarded as a dangerous heresy, an unwelcome and alien intrusion, advocating an exclusive Jewish political agenda and undermining the genuine ministry of justice, peace and reconciliation in the Middle East. MORE...
Sunday, June 22, 2008
A Totally Lawless Regime
No One in America is Safe--From the Government
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
Counterpunch.org
June 21 / 22, 2008, original HERE...
Think about this question: In the 21st century what regime is more lawless than the Bush Regime?
Everyone is entitled to his own answer. The only answer I can come up with is the Zimbabwe regime of Robert Mugabe. Voted out of power in the last election, the great man hasn’t left. Zimbabweans are going to have to vote again, and the great man has said that any vote that is not for him will be cancelled by a bullet.
Does anyone remember how determined the British and the Americans and everyone else was to turn Rhodesia over to Mugabe in order to save Rhodesia from the evil Ian Smith? What a fool everyone was.
But before we laugh at those fools, we had best laugh at ourselves, or cry.
It is now an incontrovertible fact, known all over the world, that George W. Bush and his regime lied through their teeth in order to launch wars of aggression against Afghanistan and Iraq, and that the Bush regime is doing the same thing again in hopes of launching an attack on Iran.
There have been a number of memoirs from high ranking Bush appointees who cannot stand all the lies. Bush’s first Secretary of the Treasury, Paul O’Neill, told us that an invasion of Iraq was on the agenda prior to 9/11. There is the leaked Downing Street Memo in which the head of British Intelligence told the British Prime Minister and his cabinet that the Americans have decided to attack Iraq and are creating the “intelligence” to justify the attack.
And now we have the White House’s own spokesman from 2003-2006, Scot McClellen, ratifying what we all already knew, that President Bush deceived us and led us into war based entirely on lies and fabrications, and that he, Scott McClellen, was deceived into issuing a false public denial that top Cheney aide Scooter Libby and White House operative Karl Rove were involved in committing a felony under US law by revealing the identity of a covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame.
As a consequence of Bush’s lies, there are a million dead Iraqis, mostly women and children, and four million displaced Iraqis, 4,100 dead American soldiers and tens of thousands of seriously wounded. No one knows how many dead in Afghanistan. And there is the ongoing Israeli slaughter of Palestinians and Lebanese that has fallen under the rubric of the “war on terror.”
The only ones pleased with these wars are the American neoconservatives, the Israeli right-wing, the US corporate military-security complex, and Osama bin Laden.
The Bush regime has created enormous hatred and disrespect for the United States. A recent world wide poll found that George W. Bush ranks at the bottom of world leaders as one of the least trusted along with US Pakistani puppet Musharraf and the Iranian president, Ahmadinejad, who has the disadvantage of being the victim of demonization by the US and European corporate-controlled media, which serves as ministries of propaganda for the governments that control their broadcast licenses. The American and European media lie for their living.
The two leaders with the highest approval rating are UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
So, the old adversary, Russia, now has a more respected leader than the “leader” of the Great Free Nation, a Great Free Nation that has sat on its hands while its “leader” destroyed America’s civil liberties, America’s reputation, the jobs of Americans, and committed the US to a course of war crimes punishable by the International Criminal Court at the Hague.
A number of readers took issue with my recent column, “Elect Obama or Fall Into Tyranny.” Echoing former Alabama Governor George Wallace, readers said Obama would make no difference. But that is what I wrote.
My point was not that Obama would make any difference, as he has put himself and his administration into the hands of Wall Street and the Israel Lobby. I said that the American people could make a difference by rejecting the Republicans, as it was the only accountability that the Republicans were likely to suffer.
If Americans return a Republican regime, Americans will validate the right of the president to violate with impunity US and international law. Americans will validate the use by the president of the United States of deception and lies in order to initiate wars of aggression, aggression that is a war crime under the Nuremburg standard established by the US. Americans will validate the infringement of US civil liberties in the name of “safety” and “national security.” Americans will disembowel the US Constitution and leave themselves at the total mercy of the government.
Reelecting Republicans means the end of the United States as a land of liberty.
I am sympathetic to the argument that we, as a country of liberty, are near our end regardless. Look at the Democrats. Today, June 20, the House of Representatives, which the voters gave to the Democrats in the 2006 congressional elections in order to end the pointless barbarity that the US has brought to Iraq, voted the largest war-spending bill ever. The “antiwar” Democrats completely collapsed, giving the warmonger Brownshirt Republican regime everything it wanted.
The House Democrats, led by “impeachment-is-off-the-table” Nancy Pelosi, added to the Democratic Party’s shame by passing today, June 20, a bill that shields from punishment the criminal Bush regime and the telecommunications corporations that the Bush regime coerced into committing felonies under US law by cooperating in Bush’s illegal spying on American citizens.
The great hope of the Founding Fathers, the people’s house, the House of Representatives, has passed an illegal and unconstitutional retroactive law making acts legal which were illegal when they were committed.
If a Democratic House of Representatives will pass a retroactive law in order to legalize the criminal violations of a Republican regime, the same House will pass a retroactive law making illegal what you did legally yesterday. No one is any longer safe in America. By abandoning the US Constitution, Republicans and Democrats have made America as potentially unsafe as Zimbabwe for anyone who takes exception to the government.
The total collapse of the Democratic Party and the House of Representatives signals the end of liberty and democracy in America. Henceforth, led by the Republican Federalist Society, we will gravitate toward the beautiful regime of “energy in the executive” that has been achieved in Zimbabwe by Robert Mugabe.
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
Counterpunch.org
June 21 / 22, 2008, original HERE...
Think about this question: In the 21st century what regime is more lawless than the Bush Regime?
Everyone is entitled to his own answer. The only answer I can come up with is the Zimbabwe regime of Robert Mugabe. Voted out of power in the last election, the great man hasn’t left. Zimbabweans are going to have to vote again, and the great man has said that any vote that is not for him will be cancelled by a bullet.
Does anyone remember how determined the British and the Americans and everyone else was to turn Rhodesia over to Mugabe in order to save Rhodesia from the evil Ian Smith? What a fool everyone was.
But before we laugh at those fools, we had best laugh at ourselves, or cry.
It is now an incontrovertible fact, known all over the world, that George W. Bush and his regime lied through their teeth in order to launch wars of aggression against Afghanistan and Iraq, and that the Bush regime is doing the same thing again in hopes of launching an attack on Iran.
There have been a number of memoirs from high ranking Bush appointees who cannot stand all the lies. Bush’s first Secretary of the Treasury, Paul O’Neill, told us that an invasion of Iraq was on the agenda prior to 9/11. There is the leaked Downing Street Memo in which the head of British Intelligence told the British Prime Minister and his cabinet that the Americans have decided to attack Iraq and are creating the “intelligence” to justify the attack.
And now we have the White House’s own spokesman from 2003-2006, Scot McClellen, ratifying what we all already knew, that President Bush deceived us and led us into war based entirely on lies and fabrications, and that he, Scott McClellen, was deceived into issuing a false public denial that top Cheney aide Scooter Libby and White House operative Karl Rove were involved in committing a felony under US law by revealing the identity of a covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame.
As a consequence of Bush’s lies, there are a million dead Iraqis, mostly women and children, and four million displaced Iraqis, 4,100 dead American soldiers and tens of thousands of seriously wounded. No one knows how many dead in Afghanistan. And there is the ongoing Israeli slaughter of Palestinians and Lebanese that has fallen under the rubric of the “war on terror.”
The only ones pleased with these wars are the American neoconservatives, the Israeli right-wing, the US corporate military-security complex, and Osama bin Laden.
The Bush regime has created enormous hatred and disrespect for the United States. A recent world wide poll found that George W. Bush ranks at the bottom of world leaders as one of the least trusted along with US Pakistani puppet Musharraf and the Iranian president, Ahmadinejad, who has the disadvantage of being the victim of demonization by the US and European corporate-controlled media, which serves as ministries of propaganda for the governments that control their broadcast licenses. The American and European media lie for their living.
The two leaders with the highest approval rating are UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
So, the old adversary, Russia, now has a more respected leader than the “leader” of the Great Free Nation, a Great Free Nation that has sat on its hands while its “leader” destroyed America’s civil liberties, America’s reputation, the jobs of Americans, and committed the US to a course of war crimes punishable by the International Criminal Court at the Hague.
A number of readers took issue with my recent column, “Elect Obama or Fall Into Tyranny.” Echoing former Alabama Governor George Wallace, readers said Obama would make no difference. But that is what I wrote.
My point was not that Obama would make any difference, as he has put himself and his administration into the hands of Wall Street and the Israel Lobby. I said that the American people could make a difference by rejecting the Republicans, as it was the only accountability that the Republicans were likely to suffer.
If Americans return a Republican regime, Americans will validate the right of the president to violate with impunity US and international law. Americans will validate the use by the president of the United States of deception and lies in order to initiate wars of aggression, aggression that is a war crime under the Nuremburg standard established by the US. Americans will validate the infringement of US civil liberties in the name of “safety” and “national security.” Americans will disembowel the US Constitution and leave themselves at the total mercy of the government.
Reelecting Republicans means the end of the United States as a land of liberty.
I am sympathetic to the argument that we, as a country of liberty, are near our end regardless. Look at the Democrats. Today, June 20, the House of Representatives, which the voters gave to the Democrats in the 2006 congressional elections in order to end the pointless barbarity that the US has brought to Iraq, voted the largest war-spending bill ever. The “antiwar” Democrats completely collapsed, giving the warmonger Brownshirt Republican regime everything it wanted.
The House Democrats, led by “impeachment-is-off-the-table” Nancy Pelosi, added to the Democratic Party’s shame by passing today, June 20, a bill that shields from punishment the criminal Bush regime and the telecommunications corporations that the Bush regime coerced into committing felonies under US law by cooperating in Bush’s illegal spying on American citizens.
The great hope of the Founding Fathers, the people’s house, the House of Representatives, has passed an illegal and unconstitutional retroactive law making acts legal which were illegal when they were committed.
If a Democratic House of Representatives will pass a retroactive law in order to legalize the criminal violations of a Republican regime, the same House will pass a retroactive law making illegal what you did legally yesterday. No one is any longer safe in America. By abandoning the US Constitution, Republicans and Democrats have made America as potentially unsafe as Zimbabwe for anyone who takes exception to the government.
The total collapse of the Democratic Party and the House of Representatives signals the end of liberty and democracy in America. Henceforth, led by the Republican Federalist Society, we will gravitate toward the beautiful regime of “energy in the executive” that has been achieved in Zimbabwe by Robert Mugabe.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
The Intrinsic Evil of Nuclear Weapons
By: Stephen Hand, original HERE...
I am often shocked at how many will defend the dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan on the grounds that it saved the lives of so many American soldiers towards the end of the Second World War. The argument, which I heard again not long ago, is as neat and simple as it is horrific.
But surely using the same logic we could prevent all of our losses in every war by simply preemptively nuking any nation that is deemed an enemy presenting a clear and immanent danger.
The elderly, the sick, women, children...kill them all...to win and cut losses.
But does human life mean so little that the end here justifies the means? What then becomes of Just War teaching? It is replaced by the easy logic of nihilism. Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen wrote,
"When, I wonder, did we in America ever get into this idea that freedom means having no boundaries and no limits? I think it began on the 6th of August 1945 at 8:15 am when we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima. Somehow or other, from that day on in our American life, we say we want no limits and no boundaries."
Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, the late head of the Holy Office(1) under Pius XII and John XXIII, likewise in 1947:
"The extent of the damage done to national assets by aerial warfare, and the dreadful weapons that have been introduced of late, is so great that it leaves both vanquished and victor the poorer for years after. Innocent people, too, are liable to great injury from the weapons in current use: hatred is on that account excited above measure; extremely harsh reprisals are provoked; wars result which flaunt every provision of the jus gentium, and are marked by a savagery greater than ever. And what of the period immediately after a war? Does not it also provide an obvious pointer to the enormous and irreparable damage which war, the breeding place of hate and hurt, must do to the morals and manners of nations? These considerations, and many others which might be adduced besides, show that modern wars can never fulfil those conditions which (as we stated earlier on in this essay) govern - theoretically - a just and lawful war. Moreover, no conceivable cause could ever be sufficient justification for the evils, the slaughter, the destruction, the moral and religious upheavals which war today entails".
God is love. Creation belongs to Him, not us. There are always too many "reasons" and pretexts to think the unthinkable, commit genocide, kill the innocent... Evidently there is a something of a Stalin and Hitler in all of us that must be exorcised.
If we have any humanity left inside of us, we must work now with all of our hearts and wills to eliminate nuclear weapons from the earth, just as we want an end to all death camps and other genocidal ends--- otherwise those nations which refuse become as evil as the weapons themselves.
The world is not safer since 1945 but immeasurably more dangerous.
___
(1) Today called the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
I am often shocked at how many will defend the dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan on the grounds that it saved the lives of so many American soldiers towards the end of the Second World War. The argument, which I heard again not long ago, is as neat and simple as it is horrific.
But surely using the same logic we could prevent all of our losses in every war by simply preemptively nuking any nation that is deemed an enemy presenting a clear and immanent danger.
The elderly, the sick, women, children...kill them all...to win and cut losses.
But does human life mean so little that the end here justifies the means? What then becomes of Just War teaching? It is replaced by the easy logic of nihilism. Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen wrote,
"When, I wonder, did we in America ever get into this idea that freedom means having no boundaries and no limits? I think it began on the 6th of August 1945 at 8:15 am when we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima. Somehow or other, from that day on in our American life, we say we want no limits and no boundaries."
Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, the late head of the Holy Office(1) under Pius XII and John XXIII, likewise in 1947:
"The extent of the damage done to national assets by aerial warfare, and the dreadful weapons that have been introduced of late, is so great that it leaves both vanquished and victor the poorer for years after. Innocent people, too, are liable to great injury from the weapons in current use: hatred is on that account excited above measure; extremely harsh reprisals are provoked; wars result which flaunt every provision of the jus gentium, and are marked by a savagery greater than ever. And what of the period immediately after a war? Does not it also provide an obvious pointer to the enormous and irreparable damage which war, the breeding place of hate and hurt, must do to the morals and manners of nations? These considerations, and many others which might be adduced besides, show that modern wars can never fulfil those conditions which (as we stated earlier on in this essay) govern - theoretically - a just and lawful war. Moreover, no conceivable cause could ever be sufficient justification for the evils, the slaughter, the destruction, the moral and religious upheavals which war today entails".
God is love. Creation belongs to Him, not us. There are always too many "reasons" and pretexts to think the unthinkable, commit genocide, kill the innocent... Evidently there is a something of a Stalin and Hitler in all of us that must be exorcised.
If we have any humanity left inside of us, we must work now with all of our hearts and wills to eliminate nuclear weapons from the earth, just as we want an end to all death camps and other genocidal ends--- otherwise those nations which refuse become as evil as the weapons themselves.
The world is not safer since 1945 but immeasurably more dangerous.
___
(1) Today called the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
Thursday, May 22, 2008
What of non-Traditional Marriage?
By: Dr. J. P. Hubert
Over the past several years marked interest has grown in what must for the sake of intellectual honesty be termed non-traditional “marriage.” By this is usually meant civil unions or arrangements in which same-sex couples formalize their relationship and in so doing derive the benefits usually reserved for married heterosexual couples. To date, little organized interest has been expressed for other kinds of non-traditional “marriages” such as polygamous ones or those involving animals and humans (bestiality). In any case it has now become necessary to flesh-out the philosophical implications of marriage including the nature of what it means to be a human person and what is meant by “tradition.”
As mathematician/physicist and philosopher Wolfgang Smith has taught, “traditional” when used as an adjective before anything connotes the transcendent not simply ancient or of historical significance. To say that marriage for example is traditionally a life-long commitment between one man and one woman is to say in part that it is based in the transcendent “other” which theists understand as God (being personified from a philosophical perspective); that it “embodies an element of revelation.” According to Smith, a “doctrine is traditional by virtue of the fact that it partakes somewhat of eternity.” In this sense traditional marriage is not only a horizontal but a vertical relationship (metaphysical reality) with God as one of the “partners.”
To develop this concept a bit further, traditional marriage (TM) is a microcosm/reflection of penultimate being that is, non-derivative being in much the same way that man was created in the imago Dei (image of God, Gen. 1:26). Orthodox Catholics understand it as a recapitulation of the tri-unity (“3” who’s in one what) that is the Blessed Trinity—wherein the “two (male and female possessing complementarity) become one flesh” (Gen. 2: 24) in the sense of giving life to a child (the third member of the human triad/family). From the perspective of human anthropology marriage in a traditional sense can join only one man and one woman in a permanent (covenant in religious terms) or exclusive relationship if it is to retain any semblance of meaning. As such the Traditional marriage union is a metaphysical (outside of space and time) reality as well as a physical one which is unbreakable by human means. It is this facet of traditional marriage which has been expunged in large part from post-modernity by the way.
The notion that individuals of the same sex or that multiple partners (in the sense of the pleural marriages practiced by polygamists) could “marry” is to rob the term traditional marriage of any real meaning. These and other “unions” such as between humans and animals are non-traditional in the extreme. Not only do they fail to mirror in microcosm the transcendent other (GOD) as understood in Christianity, they for the most part lack complementarity (anatomically at least) as well. While pleural marriage on an anatomic basis may possess complementarity , it clearly lacks exclusivity. Traditional marriage then for Christians must contain the elements of complementarity and exclusivity. This is true because of the essence of what it means to be human and because traditional marriage has both a vertical and a horizontal dimension, one in space and time; one outside of or beyond it. Unfortunately, the Enlightenment, much of modern philosophy (particularly the Utilitarianism of J. S. Mill) including Cartesian Dualism followed on by Baconian notions of science including Darwinist philosophy (philosophical naturalism) have emptied traditional marriage of its true meaning. As a result human nature is no longer considered “fixed.” It is simply assumed that one can create their own nature and for that matter reality itself. This reduces marriage to a completely horizontal “arrangement” of our own making that can be undone at will--resembling something more akin to a business transaction.
Admittedly, the idea that marriage is a recapitulation of the Blessed Trinity is unique to Christianity as it is predicated on a unique and divinely revealed understanding of the nature of God. Both Judaism and Islam which either tacitly or explicitly reject the Blessed Trinity; have historically allowed pleural marriage between human beings, (multiple wives with one husband) usually on economic, or other utilitarian grounds including custom. Nevertheless, over time, each has moved away from the practice of polygamy. It is safe to say that no monotheistic religion has endorsed non-traditional marriage between adult human beings of the same sex or between humans and animals presumably because of the issue of lack of complementarity and the recognition that traditional marriage in order to be legitimate/genuine must contain no impediment to the natural generation of children which would ensue from a lack of complementarity. This is another way of saying that marriage arrangements must not be incompatible with the natural law. Procreation--and with it the education and rearing of children--has traditionally been seen as either the primary/only or dual reason for marriage (along with the obvious positive unitive benefit for the spouses). Clearly this is an impossibility in the natural for same-sex and human/animal “unions.” Moreover, incest (parent/child) in recorded history has universally been sanctioned in all of the “3” monotheistic religions at least in part for reasons having to do with complications arising as a direct result of copulation and procreation (genetic disorders for example among other severe psychological problems). While heterosexual incest is correctly ordered anatomically, it is clearly disordered from the perspective of lacking exclusivity (parents already have or should have a monogamous and exclusive relationship), genetic complications and behavioral problems. Since traditional morality holds that sexual intercourse is proper only within the bounds of marriage, it is apparent that incest could never be morally acceptable.
Some would argue that while same-sex human or opposite-sex human/animal “unions” are not marriage in the Traditional sense, pleural marriage between for example one man and multiple women should be afforded the designation “traditional marriage.” There is a certain logic to this contention in that complementarity is preserved and with it the ability to procreate. The difficulty comes in that there is no exclusivity of the partners or of their offspring for the biological parents, thus not as organically related families in these arrangements. Such “unions” fail to recapitulate the divine pattern in microcosm and are inherently horizontal in nature; important criteria by which marriage is ultimately to be judged traditional where Christians and most monotheists are concerned. Atheists and agnostics or other nominal or fallen-away theists who embrace traditional marriage presumably do so in a more limited sense, one in which the historical, economic and conventional aspects of heterosexual marriage (in the horizontal sense only) are desired.
There is of course a certain collective wisdom of the ages which supports so-called traditional marriage. It has not been by chance that this kind of marriage has existed as the most frequent marital arrangement in virtually all cultures and time periods. TM has many obvious advantages and arguably the fewest negatives. Pleural marriage is associated with many hardships particularly where it is illegal. Even where polygamy is legal the natural tendency toward conjugal fidelity/exclusivity which is a natural part of human anthropology is difficult if not impossible to suppress and can lead to disastrous problems associated with jealousy of one or more of the spouses for each other. Attempting to preserve an equitable relationship with multiple marriage partners would seem to be an impossible undertaking. It is truly difficult to imagine how one could honor the biblical imperative to treat their neighbor fairly under such a circumstance.
Same-sex “marriages” are perhaps the most difficult to justify philosophically. Not only is there no complementarity of the sexes, statistically there is a high incidence of non-exclusivity of homosexual partners (particularly among men) which exceeds those of heterosexuals in which the marriage is considered a civil contract only and where they are not bound by the notion of indissolubility which comes with traditional marriage through verticality (covenant). If civil contract marriages between heterosexuals are removed from divorce statistics, overall divorce rates are much lower indicating that the problem in heterosexual marriage dissolution lies in the concept of a breakable civil contract. Therefore, in the interest of the common good it would be better to limit marriage to those who intend to form a traditional marriage rather than some other “arrangement” especially same-sex ones. Heterosexual couples considering marriage would be best served by exposure to traditional marriage and all of its obvious benefits since civil contract marriages fair so poorly over the long run.
Not to be underestimated are the potential medical complications predominately among male same-sex couples due to their incompatibility anatomically. For example since anal intercourse is usually involved in male/male same sex “unions”, the columnar lined rectal epithelial mucosa which is not suitable for intercourse (the vaginal mucosa is composed of squamous epithelium and designed for intercourse) is frequently damaged predisposing it to disease including anal warts, HIV/Aids, anal gonorrhea, fissures, fistulae and incontinence etc. Corresponding pathologies are invariably seen in the male partners of those who are frequently sodomized. This should alert us to the fact that something is inherently wrong with anal intercourse (heterosexual or homosexual) even if we had no other way of knowing it—fortunately, a careful study of human anatomy and physiology coupled with an adequate grounding in Aristotelian/Thomistic moral philosophy assures that other ways of knowing do exist.
As the reader may have deduced, from the moral perspective, traditional marriage follows the general construct that the “ought” should follow the “is” meaning that the proper moral formulation should flow from the reality of being in this case the human anthropology (including anatomical complementarity and the deep desire of human beings for exclusivity) of the partners. Only if one assumes that human nature is an accident, evolving or otherwise irrelevant would the nature of human being not be of critical consideration. According to the Aristotelian/Thomistic synthesis human nature is fixed not evolving, meaning it is unchangeable by man. As a result only traditional marriage as described herein can be judged morally licit. All other so-called “arrangements” would lack one or more necessary key elements in order to be considered marriages at all, or traditional marriages in particular--including polygamist ones which are closer to traditional marriages than are those between individuals of the same sex. Despite this reality, it is noteworthy that public (political) pressure in the West is increasingly in favor of same sex “marriage” rather than polygamous ones, a fact which given the realities of human anthropology is difficult to comprehend. While neither should be legalized in the interest of the common good, polygamist “marriages” are less deranged from the perspective of the natural law than are those of a homosexual nature.
The most commonly proffered justification for same-sex “marriage” is that each human person should have the right (a claim advanced on society; the result of a personal choice) based on Western notions of freedom, equality and autonomy to marry anyone they wish. Given the necessary elements of traditional marriage as herein defined, it is clear that same-sex “marriage” could never be considered marriage in any meaningful sense without doing damage to the English language and thousands of years of history including that which is common to all “3” monotheistic religions presently encompassing the vast majority of global inhabitants.
In helping to focus the morality involved in non-traditional marriage some critical questions might be waged as follows; to what extent should individuals be allowed freedom to act if those actions debase the common good and transgress established moral norms?
Only if no harm (direct or indirect) is done to other individuals and or the common good.
Do we as individuals have a moral responsibility to act personally in ways which are compatible with and enhancing of the common good? YES.
Does personal freedom include the ability to act in ways which while not directly or immediately harmful to others are nonetheless indirectly so and eventually very injurious to the common good? NO.
It is clearly in the common good for healthy life-long marriages between one man and one woman to be strongly encouraged if not codified in law. Moreover, it is beyond doubt in the best interest of our children to be reared in stable, two parent biological families. The sociological data strongly establish that this is the case irrespective of protestations to the contrary by those who advocate for non-traditional marriage.
Moreover, certain behaviors are not only immoral but have been made illegal as well. This is to protect individuals from injury and to insure the common good. Murder is both immoral and illegal as is rape for good reason. While homosexual activity and sexual activity with multiple sex partners is not illegal throughout the United States, it is currently illegal (in most states but this is rapidly changing) for multiple partners to marry (polygamy), for animals and humans to marry and in all but one state for same-sex partners to marry (Massachusetts). The latter reality is extremely regrettable. Since homosexual behavior and sex with multiple partners is immoral and destructive of the common good, non-traditional marriage in these circumstances should remain illegal. Massachusetts should repeal its current same-sex marriage law on the grounds that it represents poor social planning where a commitment to the common good is concerned. The wishes of some individuals especially when they are violative of the natural law should not be allowed to eclipse the interest of the common good. Unfortunately, that is exactly what has transpired in the case of US laws allowing abortion on demand and destructive embryo research.
From a traditional (scholastic) moral philosophical perspective, sex with multiple partners, between humans and animals (bestiality) and between individuals of the same sex are all morally illicit. This is true because of the nature of what it means to be human (unique and fixed human anthropology) and because of the principles of the natural law (they cannot be expunged in the same way that the 4 fundamental forces of physics cannot be denied) which includes complementarity of the sexes. The record of the last half century in the United States stands as a testament to the fact that the natural moral law cannot be revoked—it is immutable. Nothing but misery comes from denying or breaking it particularly on a massive scale e.g. at the level of nation states. Those who are familiar with the so-called perennial philosophy are well aware of this reality. Obviously, those who are steeped in Modern and post-Modern philosophy find this exceedingly difficult to accept.
Therefore, a key question remains; Are non-traditional “marriage” arrangements morally licit?
No, because; they are contrary to the common good and established moral norms including those between heterosexual couples who arrange civil contract marriages. The answer is simple but not easy given post-modern confusion with respect to what constitutes truth, reality and morality. In a pluralistic secular society such as ours, it would be impossible to make heterosexual non-traditional marriages illegal (although they should be discouraged) given the nature of current civil and human rights laws. On the basis of these, proponents of same-sex marriage have made similar appeals the results of which are in flux. From the perspective of the common good of society it would clearly be best if all marriages were “traditional” in the sense utilized herein that is, both vertical and horizontal and understood as a life-long commitment between one man and one woman. The fact that this is not possible in the developed West is a testament to the disadvantageous nature of living in a pluralistic society. This negative development which can be traced to the Enlightenment is extremely regrettable.
Finally, should non-traditional marriage be legalized?
No, it is unwise public policy to legally allow behavior which is; destructive of the common good and contrary to well established moral norms. The balance between individual desires on the part of individuals and the common good is too tipped in favor of the individual to the detriment of society.
Over the past several years marked interest has grown in what must for the sake of intellectual honesty be termed non-traditional “marriage.” By this is usually meant civil unions or arrangements in which same-sex couples formalize their relationship and in so doing derive the benefits usually reserved for married heterosexual couples. To date, little organized interest has been expressed for other kinds of non-traditional “marriages” such as polygamous ones or those involving animals and humans (bestiality). In any case it has now become necessary to flesh-out the philosophical implications of marriage including the nature of what it means to be a human person and what is meant by “tradition.”
As mathematician/physicist and philosopher Wolfgang Smith has taught, “traditional” when used as an adjective before anything connotes the transcendent not simply ancient or of historical significance. To say that marriage for example is traditionally a life-long commitment between one man and one woman is to say in part that it is based in the transcendent “other” which theists understand as God (being personified from a philosophical perspective); that it “embodies an element of revelation.” According to Smith, a “doctrine is traditional by virtue of the fact that it partakes somewhat of eternity.” In this sense traditional marriage is not only a horizontal but a vertical relationship (metaphysical reality) with God as one of the “partners.”
To develop this concept a bit further, traditional marriage (TM) is a microcosm/reflection of penultimate being that is, non-derivative being in much the same way that man was created in the imago Dei (image of God, Gen. 1:26). Orthodox Catholics understand it as a recapitulation of the tri-unity (“3” who’s in one what) that is the Blessed Trinity—wherein the “two (male and female possessing complementarity) become one flesh” (Gen. 2: 24) in the sense of giving life to a child (the third member of the human triad/family). From the perspective of human anthropology marriage in a traditional sense can join only one man and one woman in a permanent (covenant in religious terms) or exclusive relationship if it is to retain any semblance of meaning. As such the Traditional marriage union is a metaphysical (outside of space and time) reality as well as a physical one which is unbreakable by human means. It is this facet of traditional marriage which has been expunged in large part from post-modernity by the way.
The notion that individuals of the same sex or that multiple partners (in the sense of the pleural marriages practiced by polygamists) could “marry” is to rob the term traditional marriage of any real meaning. These and other “unions” such as between humans and animals are non-traditional in the extreme. Not only do they fail to mirror in microcosm the transcendent other (GOD) as understood in Christianity, they for the most part lack complementarity (anatomically at least) as well. While pleural marriage on an anatomic basis may possess complementarity , it clearly lacks exclusivity. Traditional marriage then for Christians must contain the elements of complementarity and exclusivity. This is true because of the essence of what it means to be human and because traditional marriage has both a vertical and a horizontal dimension, one in space and time; one outside of or beyond it. Unfortunately, the Enlightenment, much of modern philosophy (particularly the Utilitarianism of J. S. Mill) including Cartesian Dualism followed on by Baconian notions of science including Darwinist philosophy (philosophical naturalism) have emptied traditional marriage of its true meaning. As a result human nature is no longer considered “fixed.” It is simply assumed that one can create their own nature and for that matter reality itself. This reduces marriage to a completely horizontal “arrangement” of our own making that can be undone at will--resembling something more akin to a business transaction.
Admittedly, the idea that marriage is a recapitulation of the Blessed Trinity is unique to Christianity as it is predicated on a unique and divinely revealed understanding of the nature of God. Both Judaism and Islam which either tacitly or explicitly reject the Blessed Trinity; have historically allowed pleural marriage between human beings, (multiple wives with one husband) usually on economic, or other utilitarian grounds including custom. Nevertheless, over time, each has moved away from the practice of polygamy. It is safe to say that no monotheistic religion has endorsed non-traditional marriage between adult human beings of the same sex or between humans and animals presumably because of the issue of lack of complementarity and the recognition that traditional marriage in order to be legitimate/genuine must contain no impediment to the natural generation of children which would ensue from a lack of complementarity. This is another way of saying that marriage arrangements must not be incompatible with the natural law. Procreation--and with it the education and rearing of children--has traditionally been seen as either the primary/only or dual reason for marriage (along with the obvious positive unitive benefit for the spouses). Clearly this is an impossibility in the natural for same-sex and human/animal “unions.” Moreover, incest (parent/child) in recorded history has universally been sanctioned in all of the “3” monotheistic religions at least in part for reasons having to do with complications arising as a direct result of copulation and procreation (genetic disorders for example among other severe psychological problems). While heterosexual incest is correctly ordered anatomically, it is clearly disordered from the perspective of lacking exclusivity (parents already have or should have a monogamous and exclusive relationship), genetic complications and behavioral problems. Since traditional morality holds that sexual intercourse is proper only within the bounds of marriage, it is apparent that incest could never be morally acceptable.
Some would argue that while same-sex human or opposite-sex human/animal “unions” are not marriage in the Traditional sense, pleural marriage between for example one man and multiple women should be afforded the designation “traditional marriage.” There is a certain logic to this contention in that complementarity is preserved and with it the ability to procreate. The difficulty comes in that there is no exclusivity of the partners or of their offspring for the biological parents, thus not as organically related families in these arrangements. Such “unions” fail to recapitulate the divine pattern in microcosm and are inherently horizontal in nature; important criteria by which marriage is ultimately to be judged traditional where Christians and most monotheists are concerned. Atheists and agnostics or other nominal or fallen-away theists who embrace traditional marriage presumably do so in a more limited sense, one in which the historical, economic and conventional aspects of heterosexual marriage (in the horizontal sense only) are desired.
There is of course a certain collective wisdom of the ages which supports so-called traditional marriage. It has not been by chance that this kind of marriage has existed as the most frequent marital arrangement in virtually all cultures and time periods. TM has many obvious advantages and arguably the fewest negatives. Pleural marriage is associated with many hardships particularly where it is illegal. Even where polygamy is legal the natural tendency toward conjugal fidelity/exclusivity which is a natural part of human anthropology is difficult if not impossible to suppress and can lead to disastrous problems associated with jealousy of one or more of the spouses for each other. Attempting to preserve an equitable relationship with multiple marriage partners would seem to be an impossible undertaking. It is truly difficult to imagine how one could honor the biblical imperative to treat their neighbor fairly under such a circumstance.
Same-sex “marriages” are perhaps the most difficult to justify philosophically. Not only is there no complementarity of the sexes, statistically there is a high incidence of non-exclusivity of homosexual partners (particularly among men) which exceeds those of heterosexuals in which the marriage is considered a civil contract only and where they are not bound by the notion of indissolubility which comes with traditional marriage through verticality (covenant). If civil contract marriages between heterosexuals are removed from divorce statistics, overall divorce rates are much lower indicating that the problem in heterosexual marriage dissolution lies in the concept of a breakable civil contract. Therefore, in the interest of the common good it would be better to limit marriage to those who intend to form a traditional marriage rather than some other “arrangement” especially same-sex ones. Heterosexual couples considering marriage would be best served by exposure to traditional marriage and all of its obvious benefits since civil contract marriages fair so poorly over the long run.
Not to be underestimated are the potential medical complications predominately among male same-sex couples due to their incompatibility anatomically. For example since anal intercourse is usually involved in male/male same sex “unions”, the columnar lined rectal epithelial mucosa which is not suitable for intercourse (the vaginal mucosa is composed of squamous epithelium and designed for intercourse) is frequently damaged predisposing it to disease including anal warts, HIV/Aids, anal gonorrhea, fissures, fistulae and incontinence etc. Corresponding pathologies are invariably seen in the male partners of those who are frequently sodomized. This should alert us to the fact that something is inherently wrong with anal intercourse (heterosexual or homosexual) even if we had no other way of knowing it—fortunately, a careful study of human anatomy and physiology coupled with an adequate grounding in Aristotelian/Thomistic moral philosophy assures that other ways of knowing do exist.
As the reader may have deduced, from the moral perspective, traditional marriage follows the general construct that the “ought” should follow the “is” meaning that the proper moral formulation should flow from the reality of being in this case the human anthropology (including anatomical complementarity and the deep desire of human beings for exclusivity) of the partners. Only if one assumes that human nature is an accident, evolving or otherwise irrelevant would the nature of human being not be of critical consideration. According to the Aristotelian/Thomistic synthesis human nature is fixed not evolving, meaning it is unchangeable by man. As a result only traditional marriage as described herein can be judged morally licit. All other so-called “arrangements” would lack one or more necessary key elements in order to be considered marriages at all, or traditional marriages in particular--including polygamist ones which are closer to traditional marriages than are those between individuals of the same sex. Despite this reality, it is noteworthy that public (political) pressure in the West is increasingly in favor of same sex “marriage” rather than polygamous ones, a fact which given the realities of human anthropology is difficult to comprehend. While neither should be legalized in the interest of the common good, polygamist “marriages” are less deranged from the perspective of the natural law than are those of a homosexual nature.
The most commonly proffered justification for same-sex “marriage” is that each human person should have the right (a claim advanced on society; the result of a personal choice) based on Western notions of freedom, equality and autonomy to marry anyone they wish. Given the necessary elements of traditional marriage as herein defined, it is clear that same-sex “marriage” could never be considered marriage in any meaningful sense without doing damage to the English language and thousands of years of history including that which is common to all “3” monotheistic religions presently encompassing the vast majority of global inhabitants.
In helping to focus the morality involved in non-traditional marriage some critical questions might be waged as follows; to what extent should individuals be allowed freedom to act if those actions debase the common good and transgress established moral norms?
Only if no harm (direct or indirect) is done to other individuals and or the common good.
Do we as individuals have a moral responsibility to act personally in ways which are compatible with and enhancing of the common good? YES.
Does personal freedom include the ability to act in ways which while not directly or immediately harmful to others are nonetheless indirectly so and eventually very injurious to the common good? NO.
It is clearly in the common good for healthy life-long marriages between one man and one woman to be strongly encouraged if not codified in law. Moreover, it is beyond doubt in the best interest of our children to be reared in stable, two parent biological families. The sociological data strongly establish that this is the case irrespective of protestations to the contrary by those who advocate for non-traditional marriage.
Moreover, certain behaviors are not only immoral but have been made illegal as well. This is to protect individuals from injury and to insure the common good. Murder is both immoral and illegal as is rape for good reason. While homosexual activity and sexual activity with multiple sex partners is not illegal throughout the United States, it is currently illegal (in most states but this is rapidly changing) for multiple partners to marry (polygamy), for animals and humans to marry and in all but one state for same-sex partners to marry (Massachusetts). The latter reality is extremely regrettable. Since homosexual behavior and sex with multiple partners is immoral and destructive of the common good, non-traditional marriage in these circumstances should remain illegal. Massachusetts should repeal its current same-sex marriage law on the grounds that it represents poor social planning where a commitment to the common good is concerned. The wishes of some individuals especially when they are violative of the natural law should not be allowed to eclipse the interest of the common good. Unfortunately, that is exactly what has transpired in the case of US laws allowing abortion on demand and destructive embryo research.
From a traditional (scholastic) moral philosophical perspective, sex with multiple partners, between humans and animals (bestiality) and between individuals of the same sex are all morally illicit. This is true because of the nature of what it means to be human (unique and fixed human anthropology) and because of the principles of the natural law (they cannot be expunged in the same way that the 4 fundamental forces of physics cannot be denied) which includes complementarity of the sexes. The record of the last half century in the United States stands as a testament to the fact that the natural moral law cannot be revoked—it is immutable. Nothing but misery comes from denying or breaking it particularly on a massive scale e.g. at the level of nation states. Those who are familiar with the so-called perennial philosophy are well aware of this reality. Obviously, those who are steeped in Modern and post-Modern philosophy find this exceedingly difficult to accept.
Therefore, a key question remains; Are non-traditional “marriage” arrangements morally licit?
No, because; they are contrary to the common good and established moral norms including those between heterosexual couples who arrange civil contract marriages. The answer is simple but not easy given post-modern confusion with respect to what constitutes truth, reality and morality. In a pluralistic secular society such as ours, it would be impossible to make heterosexual non-traditional marriages illegal (although they should be discouraged) given the nature of current civil and human rights laws. On the basis of these, proponents of same-sex marriage have made similar appeals the results of which are in flux. From the perspective of the common good of society it would clearly be best if all marriages were “traditional” in the sense utilized herein that is, both vertical and horizontal and understood as a life-long commitment between one man and one woman. The fact that this is not possible in the developed West is a testament to the disadvantageous nature of living in a pluralistic society. This negative development which can be traced to the Enlightenment is extremely regrettable.
Finally, should non-traditional marriage be legalized?
No, it is unwise public policy to legally allow behavior which is; destructive of the common good and contrary to well established moral norms. The balance between individual desires on the part of individuals and the common good is too tipped in favor of the individual to the detriment of society.
Monday, May 19, 2008
Israel Must Be Held To Same Nuclear Scrutiny as Iran
By JOE PARKO
18/05/08 "The Tennessean", oritiginal HERE... -- - First, we went after nonexistent nuclear weapons in Iraq, and now we are consumed with the possibility that Iran might develop nuclear weapons sometime in the future.
Hillary Clinton has declared that she would obliterate Iran if it ever attacked Israel with a nuclear weapon. But what nobody wants to talk about is the fact that Israel has had a secret nuclear weapons program for more than 30 years that has produced well over 200 nuclear bombs.
Ever since Mordechai Vanunu, the Israeli nuclear technician, confirmed the existence of Israel's nuclear weapons program with his photographs of the secret underground bomb facility that were published in the London Sunday Times in 1986, the world has known that Israel has been making nuclear bombs but has pretended that they do not exist. Israel continues to publicly deny that it possesses nuclear weapons.
I talked with Vanunu in Jerusalem in 2005, and here are my notes from that interview:
"I worked from 1976 to 1985 at the Israeli secret underground nuclear weapons production facility at the Dimona nuclear plant in the Negev desert. During my time there, I was involved in processing plutonium for 10 nuclear bombs per year. I realized that my country had already processed enough plutonium for 200 nuclear weapons. I became really afraid when we started processing lithium 6, which is only used for the hydrogen bomb.
"I felt that I had to prevent a nuclear holocaust in the Middle East, so I took 60 pictures of the underground nuclear weapons processing plant, some 75 meters under the Dimona plant. I resigned my post and left Israel in 1986. I first went to Australia and then made a connection with the Times in London. After a group of nuclear scientists verified my photos as proving Israeli nuclear weapons production, my story was published in England. A few months later, I was kidnapped by the Israelis in Rome and sent secretly by ship to Israel, where I was subjected to a closed military trial without counsel. I was sentenced to 18 years in prison. I spent 12 years in solitary confinement.
"Now I am trapped inside Israel, and I'm being threatened with more prison time for speaking to people like you. I want to leave Israel and come to America where I can live as a free human being."
(Vanunu was released from prison in April 2004 but was prohibited from leaving Israel. The Israeli government continues to keep him in Israel against his will. Criminal action is pending against him for speaking to journalists and foreigners.)
The fact of the matter is that Israel is using nuclear blackmail against the U.S. Essentially, Israel is saying that if we don't agree to use our nuclear weapons against Iran, then they will use theirs. Israel is determined to keep its monopoly on nuclear weapons in the Middle East and is using its nuclear arsenal to force the U.S. to support its demand. It's time for our politicians to refuse to be blackmailed into a policy that is detrimental to achieving our goal of a nuclear-free Middle East. Most importantly, the U.S. must resist being pushed into attacking Iran to preserve Israel's nuclear monopoly.
It is time to deal openly with Israel's nuclear weapons. We need to recognize that the epicenter of the nuclear arms race in the Middle East is Israel's secret bomb factory, 250 feet underground in the Negev desert. The U.S. must join with the international community in opening Israel's nuclear weapons program to inspection and monitoring.
The only way to secure a nuclear-free Middle East is to have every nation in the region play by the same book of rules, and this must include Israel.
18/05/08 "The Tennessean", oritiginal HERE... -- - First, we went after nonexistent nuclear weapons in Iraq, and now we are consumed with the possibility that Iran might develop nuclear weapons sometime in the future.
Hillary Clinton has declared that she would obliterate Iran if it ever attacked Israel with a nuclear weapon. But what nobody wants to talk about is the fact that Israel has had a secret nuclear weapons program for more than 30 years that has produced well over 200 nuclear bombs.
Ever since Mordechai Vanunu, the Israeli nuclear technician, confirmed the existence of Israel's nuclear weapons program with his photographs of the secret underground bomb facility that were published in the London Sunday Times in 1986, the world has known that Israel has been making nuclear bombs but has pretended that they do not exist. Israel continues to publicly deny that it possesses nuclear weapons.
I talked with Vanunu in Jerusalem in 2005, and here are my notes from that interview:
"I worked from 1976 to 1985 at the Israeli secret underground nuclear weapons production facility at the Dimona nuclear plant in the Negev desert. During my time there, I was involved in processing plutonium for 10 nuclear bombs per year. I realized that my country had already processed enough plutonium for 200 nuclear weapons. I became really afraid when we started processing lithium 6, which is only used for the hydrogen bomb.
"I felt that I had to prevent a nuclear holocaust in the Middle East, so I took 60 pictures of the underground nuclear weapons processing plant, some 75 meters under the Dimona plant. I resigned my post and left Israel in 1986. I first went to Australia and then made a connection with the Times in London. After a group of nuclear scientists verified my photos as proving Israeli nuclear weapons production, my story was published in England. A few months later, I was kidnapped by the Israelis in Rome and sent secretly by ship to Israel, where I was subjected to a closed military trial without counsel. I was sentenced to 18 years in prison. I spent 12 years in solitary confinement.
"Now I am trapped inside Israel, and I'm being threatened with more prison time for speaking to people like you. I want to leave Israel and come to America where I can live as a free human being."
(Vanunu was released from prison in April 2004 but was prohibited from leaving Israel. The Israeli government continues to keep him in Israel against his will. Criminal action is pending against him for speaking to journalists and foreigners.)
The fact of the matter is that Israel is using nuclear blackmail against the U.S. Essentially, Israel is saying that if we don't agree to use our nuclear weapons against Iran, then they will use theirs. Israel is determined to keep its monopoly on nuclear weapons in the Middle East and is using its nuclear arsenal to force the U.S. to support its demand. It's time for our politicians to refuse to be blackmailed into a policy that is detrimental to achieving our goal of a nuclear-free Middle East. Most importantly, the U.S. must resist being pushed into attacking Iran to preserve Israel's nuclear monopoly.
It is time to deal openly with Israel's nuclear weapons. We need to recognize that the epicenter of the nuclear arms race in the Middle East is Israel's secret bomb factory, 250 feet underground in the Negev desert. The U.S. must join with the international community in opening Israel's nuclear weapons program to inspection and monitoring.
The only way to secure a nuclear-free Middle East is to have every nation in the region play by the same book of rules, and this must include Israel.
Friday, May 16, 2008
Roman Catholic Church Bears Responsibility for Growing Immorality
Yesterday's California Supreme Court ruling which overturned the ban there on gay "marriage" represents the next step of an ever deepening downward spiral in which traditional morality has been all but extinguished in the United States.
Over the course of the last four decades--which interestingly coincides perfectly with the end of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council that ended in 1965, the "golden rule" ethic as perennially taught in the Aristotelian/Thomistic synthesis has been effectively replaced by rank utilitarianism where virtually anything in the realm of human behavior can be justified. There no longer exist any moral absolutes (immutable moral norms) only temporary "values" reflected in choices which can be exercised by making use of sheer political/judicial power.
Regrettably it is now accurate to say that there is virtually no limit to what our society could eventually codify into law. In the past decade we have legitimized aggressive (preventive) war (a war crime by international agreement), torture of prisoners (another war crime), arbitrarily altered the time-honored definition of marriage in a way which is totally incompatible with the natural law and human anthropology and rendered increasingly larger segments of our population "expendable" because they are thought to possess lives which are unworthy of living.
In many respects it is the failure of the Catholic Church universal but particularly in the United States which is to blame for the despicable state we now find ourselves in. Had the Traditional faith and morals of the Catholic Church not been so radically altered in the wake of Vatican II, it would no doubt have been much more difficult for the entire moral fabric to have unwoven so readily in the US.
For example, no-fault divorce laws would have been much harder to pass and no doubt far fewer divorces would have been requested. Heterosexual pre and extra-marital sexual relations would likely have been much less frequent as well. Prior to Vatican II, homosexuality was greatly frowned upon among Catholics as being gravely sinful and incompatible with the natural law. It was considered a perverse disorder which was inherently anti-life; to be avoided in the interest of complying with God's will and the common good of society.
Pre-Vatican II, the Catholic Church openly and proudly taught that artificial contraception by a married man and woman was immoral because it separated the generative from the unitive parts of human sexuality--of course, non-married persons were not to be sexually active at all. The generative and unitive functions of marriage according to Catholic teaching were never to be artificially disjoined/separated meaning; that the couple was not to purposely impede the possibility of generating a child in the process of having sexual intercourse. Since there can never be any anatomic, physiologic or behavioral complimentarity between two individuals of the same sex, it is readily apparent that sexual activity of any kind between such persons cannot result naturally in the generation of a child. Therefore, according to Catholic teaching, it is morally wrong and always will be to engage in homosexual relations. While this may seem completely unbelievable to some, it is morally and rationally sound upon deeper reflection. This is in fact what well catechized Roman Catholics were taught and believed prior to Vatican II.
Prior to 1965 it would have been inconceivable for a Roman Catholic to imagine two persons of the same sex "marrying." It would have been recognized immediately as a non-starter. Their sexual incompatibility would have made such a thing preposterous--by definition. The fact that so many so-called "Catholics" now have no problem with same sex "marriage" is a testament to just how radically altered the post Vatican II Roman Catholic Church really is.
While the teaching against artificial contraception-- which was affirmed in Humani vitae as recently as 1968 has never been formally rescinded it is completely ignored by the vast majority of Catholics (practising and lapsed). This is the truth and has been well documented by multiple sociological studies. As a result it is very difficult to object to homosexuality. Once the need to keep sexual intercourse (which should involve marriage partners only) open to the generation of life is abandoned, there is no logical basis on which to limit marriage to one man and one woman. Virtually any other combination of persons or even cross-species relations/"marriages" then become tenable and are simply a matter of taste!
The fact that over 50% of Roman Catholic priests among those less than 60 years of age in the US are reported to be homosexual is of great interest given the views of many "Catholics" on sexuality and same-sex "marriage" and the greater public at-large. If and until this horrendous problem is resolved in the Catholic priesthood, it is unlikely that the constant movement toward more and more bizarre sexual practices and living arrangements in this country will be halted or reversed. Since Traditional Roman Catholicism is essentially dead in the United States, that eventuality appears highly improbable.
--Dr. J. P. Hubert
Over the course of the last four decades--which interestingly coincides perfectly with the end of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council that ended in 1965, the "golden rule" ethic as perennially taught in the Aristotelian/Thomistic synthesis has been effectively replaced by rank utilitarianism where virtually anything in the realm of human behavior can be justified. There no longer exist any moral absolutes (immutable moral norms) only temporary "values" reflected in choices which can be exercised by making use of sheer political/judicial power.
Regrettably it is now accurate to say that there is virtually no limit to what our society could eventually codify into law. In the past decade we have legitimized aggressive (preventive) war (a war crime by international agreement), torture of prisoners (another war crime), arbitrarily altered the time-honored definition of marriage in a way which is totally incompatible with the natural law and human anthropology and rendered increasingly larger segments of our population "expendable" because they are thought to possess lives which are unworthy of living.
In many respects it is the failure of the Catholic Church universal but particularly in the United States which is to blame for the despicable state we now find ourselves in. Had the Traditional faith and morals of the Catholic Church not been so radically altered in the wake of Vatican II, it would no doubt have been much more difficult for the entire moral fabric to have unwoven so readily in the US.
For example, no-fault divorce laws would have been much harder to pass and no doubt far fewer divorces would have been requested. Heterosexual pre and extra-marital sexual relations would likely have been much less frequent as well. Prior to Vatican II, homosexuality was greatly frowned upon among Catholics as being gravely sinful and incompatible with the natural law. It was considered a perverse disorder which was inherently anti-life; to be avoided in the interest of complying with God's will and the common good of society.
Pre-Vatican II, the Catholic Church openly and proudly taught that artificial contraception by a married man and woman was immoral because it separated the generative from the unitive parts of human sexuality--of course, non-married persons were not to be sexually active at all. The generative and unitive functions of marriage according to Catholic teaching were never to be artificially disjoined/separated meaning; that the couple was not to purposely impede the possibility of generating a child in the process of having sexual intercourse. Since there can never be any anatomic, physiologic or behavioral complimentarity between two individuals of the same sex, it is readily apparent that sexual activity of any kind between such persons cannot result naturally in the generation of a child. Therefore, according to Catholic teaching, it is morally wrong and always will be to engage in homosexual relations. While this may seem completely unbelievable to some, it is morally and rationally sound upon deeper reflection. This is in fact what well catechized Roman Catholics were taught and believed prior to Vatican II.
Prior to 1965 it would have been inconceivable for a Roman Catholic to imagine two persons of the same sex "marrying." It would have been recognized immediately as a non-starter. Their sexual incompatibility would have made such a thing preposterous--by definition. The fact that so many so-called "Catholics" now have no problem with same sex "marriage" is a testament to just how radically altered the post Vatican II Roman Catholic Church really is.
While the teaching against artificial contraception-- which was affirmed in Humani vitae as recently as 1968 has never been formally rescinded it is completely ignored by the vast majority of Catholics (practising and lapsed). This is the truth and has been well documented by multiple sociological studies. As a result it is very difficult to object to homosexuality. Once the need to keep sexual intercourse (which should involve marriage partners only) open to the generation of life is abandoned, there is no logical basis on which to limit marriage to one man and one woman. Virtually any other combination of persons or even cross-species relations/"marriages" then become tenable and are simply a matter of taste!
The fact that over 50% of Roman Catholic priests among those less than 60 years of age in the US are reported to be homosexual is of great interest given the views of many "Catholics" on sexuality and same-sex "marriage" and the greater public at-large. If and until this horrendous problem is resolved in the Catholic priesthood, it is unlikely that the constant movement toward more and more bizarre sexual practices and living arrangements in this country will be halted or reversed. Since Traditional Roman Catholicism is essentially dead in the United States, that eventuality appears highly improbable.
--Dr. J. P. Hubert
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