Re: Nuclear testing, the military and Humanty
Robert Levesque (rbtlev@INTERLINK.NET)
Wed, 19 Jul 1995 13:57:10 -0500
>Subject: On xenophobia and nuclear testing
>
>Chris Harris writes:
>
>- All French people have to make the choice to remove the
> criminal government they have elected.
>
>
>- If French Culture gives rise to this essentially nihilistic
> behaviour, Then every effort must be made to remove all French
> words, food, customs, etc from civilized culture.
>
>- One is reminded of past criminal actions and lies by French
> governments, therefore any assurance from the French must be
> taken with more than a grain of salt.
>
>- All the above arguments apply equally to Korea, Israel, Britain,
> U.S.A, China etc if they choose to develop and/or set off nuclear
> weapons.
Christine Mathieu replyed :
>How can 'All French people' be counted responsible for the 'criminal
>government they elected', when Chirac was elected with a percentage of
>votes? Would Chris Harris hold himself responsible for the actions of a
>government he did not vote to elect? Or even for a government he voted to
>elect but nonetheless acted in ways which he disapprove of? Or are we to
>believe that there is one French man out there called Jacques Chirac and
>55,000,000 clones?
>And how would the Chinese or the Koreans who don't even vote be held
>accountable for their governments?
>
>If we were to scrap from 'civilized culture' the languages of those who
>developed nuclear weapons or set them off, Chris Harris would not speak
>English.
>
>If we were to take with more than a grain of salt the words of those whose
>governments have committed crimes against humanity, Chris Harris as a
>national of a country (New Zealand, the same goes for Australia - my
>country of citizenship) built on the expropriation of indigenous people not
>to mention their genocide would only have lies to tell.
>
>Please make intelligent politics - if not, what is the point of wishing to
>save the planet and its people? Does the world really need more xenophobia?
>
________________________________________________________________________
-DOES THE WORLD REALY NEED.... MORE "HOT AIR" ?-
________________________________________________________________________
I do not usualy take to the keybord to answer this type of posting,
thingking that the world has too much "Hot Air" as it is, but I wold like
to make a point:
M. Chris Harris uses abusave language and arrogance and is puting it to
use in a campaing to stop the French govenment to have nuclear testing for
military use!!!!!
Mr Chris Harris, while I recognize the urgency of bannig nuclear
testing, weapons and all millatary hardware and also do not forget the
militarist "mind set", the push buton philosophy of :kill the ennemi. You
see French culture as a nihilistc culture. But you what to annihilate
=46rench fron civilisation!? I do not belive that you are making a very good
argument for your cause.
It is arrogant and narrow minded when you suggested that :
"=A8(...) every effort must be made to remove all French
> words, food, customs, etc from civilized culture."
How are you to make such a suggestion? A "civilized" member of some
moral elite? Are you not beeing your self "rude" being a savage to every
person who has french for its culture ! Tell me, how you can juge what is
or is not to be categorized as a civilisation in its hone rghit ? What is
your methodology that permits you a conclusion such as this one ? Are you
so full of your "civilised push-button" way of thinking that you advocate
the extinction of one culture from existence. I found that remark very,
very, very offensive, @#$%?&!!!!!!!!!!
On the moral side of this issue of nuclar testing by the French
government. I will say that globaly we must move towards a world were every
individual MUST HAVE adequate food, shelter, health care and eduction and
so consequently we must ban (this is my utopia) : the militarist mind sets
and its hardware !!!
Finally I would like to give All somme food for thought on this
subject, it may be chronologically to far ago for M. Chris Harris, but I
think is has a bering on this issue of science, the military "mind sets"
and hardware and humanity.
This exerpt is from Jacob Bronwski's (1908-1974): The Ascent of
Man, pp. 234-235:
<< The first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima in Japan on 6 August 1945
at 8.15 in the mornig. I had not been long back from from Hiroshima when I
heard someonesay,in Szilard's presence, that it was a tradgedy of
sceintists that their discoveries were used for destruction. Szilard
replied , as he more than anyone had the rghit to reply, that it was not
the tragedy of sceintists: "it is the tradedy of mankind."
There are two parts to the human dilemma. One is the belief that
the end justifies the means. That push-button philosophy, that delibarate
deafness to suffering, has become the monster in the war machine. The other
is the betrayal of the human spirit : the assertion of dogma that closes
minds, and turns a nation, a civilisation, into a regiment of ghost-
obedient ghost or tortuerd ghosts.
It is said that sceince will dehumanize pepole and turn them into
numbers. That is false, tragically false. Remember the concentration camp
and crmatorium at Auschwitz.This is where people were turned into numbers.
Into this pond were fulshed the ashes of some four million people. (In the
TV series Prof. Bronowski was in Aschwitz his two feet in a pond and
grasping with one hand the wet earth were some members of his family died)
And that was not done by gas. It was done by arrogance. It was done by
dogma. When people belive they have absolute knowledge, with'no test in
reality, this is how they behave.>>
Thank You, et excusez mon anglais! Je suis francophone !!!!
Robert L=E9vsque
D=E9partement d'anthropologie
Universit=E9 de Montr=E9al
=ABHistory is not a menu, you can not have it a la carte=BB
Cox, G.O., African Empiers and Civilisations
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