A Purpose-Driven War

A billboard on the street tells us who we are:
"God, guns, guts & glory" - and what man could want more?
On another street, the signs are just as clear:
Stake your lives for Allah in the mighty path of war.


It's war that gives men purpose.
War fulfills men's dreams.
Wars force the idle hands at play
to work life & death schemes.

War defends the women
against the warring men.
War kills for the children
so they'll be safe again.

Peace breeds easy living
that spoils our hearts and souls.
Peace brings corrupting happiness
in simple, low-life goals.

Peace welcomes in a garden
and fruit-trees and old women,
their stories' gentle wisdom,
philosophy of old men.

War is always in a rush
to burn its path much higher;
its words a fever-eloquence,
fodder for the fire.

There's men inside the planning rooms
and men who shed their blood
and women's blood dismissed as tears
and women plowing mud.

I'm sure the night is inside out
the moment sky turns day.
I'm sure the rabbit nibbles grass
until his heart's the prey.
I'm sure there is a purpose here
that we're all living for:
To live, to breed, to contemplate,
Then kill ourselves in war.

"Doing God's Work"

I was struck the other day by how Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein describes himself (h/t): "(...) He is, he says, just a banker "doing God’s work"".

Incidentally, this was in justification for the following position of his (emphasis added):

(...) For Blankfein, in the end, it all comes down to one thing: finding the best, fastest, and safest way to make money with money, then make some more money, with money on top. He’s not interested in a reality check, just a bumper pay cheque for his clients, for his firm, for his staff, for his shareholders and, eventually, he believes, for us (...) Is it possible to make too much money?

"Is it possible to have too much ambition? Is it possible to be too successful?" Blankfein shoots back. "I don’t want people in this firm to think that they have accomplished as much for themselves as they can and go on vacation. As the guardian of the interests of the shareholders and, by the way, for the purposes of society, I’d like them to continue to do what they are doing. I don’t want to put a cap on their ambition. It’s hard for me to argue for a cap on their compensation."

Ergo: unchecked, out-of-control greed - the very cause of the last financial collapse from which we are still trying to recover - constitutes "God's work".

After all - didn't you know that Jesus actually embraced greed and self-interest?

Indeed. Here are other recent shiny examples of what constitutes "doing God's work":

Demonize other religions (especially Muslims): (see also here) This past weekend, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano warned against allowing “anti-Muslim sentiment” to emanate from the shooting at Fort Hood by Major Nidal Malik Hasan. But that is exactly what some conservatives are doing. Dave Gaubatz, the controversial author of the controversial Muslim Mafia, called yesterday for “a professional and legal backlash against the Muslim community and their leaders.” On his 700 Club TV show yesterday, Pat Robertson claimed that Islam is “not a religion,” but “a violent political system bent on the overthrow of the governments of the world and world domination”:

ROBERTSON: That is the ultimate aim. And they talk about infidels and all this, but the truth is that’s what the game is. So you are dealing with not a religion. You’re dealing with a political system. And I think we should treat it as such and treat its adherences as such as we would members of the Communist Party or members of some fascist group. Well, it’s a tragedy. Our hearts go out to the families who suffered. But those in the Army should be held on account for the fact they let this man loose.

Of course, Christianism is such a sparkling paragon of peace, tolerance and love for others ... and therefore definitely not politically-oriented, right? [EXPAND FULL POST +/-]

Right. Got it good. Nothing to do with religious terrorism. At all. Which leads me to this:

Christian radicalization of the military: (emphasis added; h/t) When Barack Obama moved into the Oval Office in January, he inherited a military not just drained by a two-front war overseas but fighting a third battle on the home front, a subtle civil war over its own soul. On one side are the majority of military personnel, professionals who regardless of their faith or lack thereof simply want to get their jobs done; on the other is a small but powerful movement of Christian soldiers concentrated in the officer corps. There’s Major General Johnny A. Weida, who as commandant at the Air Force Academy made its National Day of Prayer services exclusively Christian, and also created a code for evangelical cadets: whenever Weida said, “Airpower,” they were to respond “Rock Sir!”—a reference to Matthew 7:25. (The general told them that when non-evangelical cadets asked about the mysterious call-and-response, they should share the gospel.) There’s Major General Robert Caslen—commander of the 25th Infantry Division, a.k.a. “Tropic Lightning”—who in 2007 was found by a Pentagon inspector general’s report to have violated military ethics by appearing in uniform, along with six other senior Pentagon officers, in a video for the Christian Embassy, a fundamentalist ministry to Washington elites. There’s Lieutenant General Robert Van Antwerp, the Army chief of engineers, who has also lent his uniform to the Christian cause, both in a Trinity Broadcasting Network tribute to Christian soldiers called Red, White, and Blue Spectacular and at a 2003 Billy Graham rally—televised around the world on the Armed Forces Network—at which he declared the baptisms of 700 soldiers under his command evidence of the Lord’s plan to “raise up a godly army.”

What men such as these have fomented is a quiet coup within the armed forces: not of generals encroaching on civilian rule but of religious authority displacing the military’s once staunchly secular code. Not a conspiracy but a cultural transformation, achieved gradually through promotions and prayer meetings, with personal faith replacing protocol according to the best intentions of commanders who conflate God with country. They see themselves not as subversives but as spiritual warriors—“ambassadors for Christ in uniform,” according to Officers’ Christian Fellowship; “government paid missionaries,” according to Campus Crusade’s Military Ministry.

Furthermore, there is also this, and that, and this, and that - as well as so many other examples of such radicalization that I could easily write a whole book just by enumerating them.

So, who ever dared claim that the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are crusades against muslims?

(What? It definitely looks like this is actually the case? Really? Oops - I stand corrected then)

Hence, the following should not be a surprise to anyone:

Beat an orthodox greek priest: (emphasis added; h/t) Marine reservist Jasen Bruce was getting clothes out of the trunk of his car Monday evening when a bearded man in a robe approached him. That man, a Greek Orthodox priest named Father Alexios Marakis, speaks little English and was lost, police said. He wanted directions.

What the priest got instead, police say, was a tire iron to the head. Then he was chased for three blocks and pinned to the ground — as the Marine kept a 911 operator on the phone, saying he had captured a terrorist. Police say Bruce offered several reasons to explain his actions:

The man tried to rob him.

The man grabbed Bruce's crotch and made an overt sexual advance in perfect English.

The man yelled "Allahu Akbar," Arabic for "God is great," the same words some witnesses said the Fort Hood shooting suspect uttered last week.

"That's what they tell you right before they blow you up," police say Bruce told them.

(...) The incident took place around 6:35 p.m. Monday, police said. The priest, Alexios Marakis, 29, is from Crete, Greece. He is visiting St. Nicholas Greek Cathedral at 17 E Tarpon Ave. but police said he was in the Westshore area to bless another retired Greek priest.

But Marakis apparently got lost and exited northbound Interstate 275 into downtown Tampa, police said. The priest followed several cars into the Seaport Channelside Apartments on Twiggs Street. He got out of his car and asked Bruce for help.

Instead of offering help, Bruce struck the priest on the head with a tire iron, police said. He then chased the priest for three blocks to the Madison Avenue and Meridian Avenue, police said, and even called 911 to say that an Arabic man tried to rob him.

Bruce said he was going to take the Arab into custody. When police arrived, Bruce told them the victim was a terrorist.

Oh yes - doing God's work indeed ... and then some. Got that too.

Here's a quicker run-down of further recent, shiny examples of doing God's work:

Vote to kill a proposal that would have ensured that insurance companies cannot use domestic violence as a pretext for denying coverage to women;

Shout down members of the Democratic Women’s Caucus on the House floor when they attempt to give a brief statement about how the House health care legislation would benefit women;

Keep on introducing bills and amendments to limit or stifle women’s reproductive rights;

Deny the reality of global warming;

Reject the fact of evolution;

Reject sex education and promotion of contraceptive usage for teenagers;

Promote abstinence as Teh Solution to AIDS, STDs and unwanted pregnancies;

Force people to pray;

Delay/derail/stop health care reform - but not faith healing;

Kill physicians and bomb abortion clinics.

It goes without saying that the preceding constitutes but a small sampling.

So, what is the point I am seeking to drive here?

Throughout recorded hsitory, and going back as far as into Antiquity, proclamations of "doing the will of the Gods" (or God - regardless of which one exactly), of "doing God's work", have ever been used to justify - and gain support for - just about anything and everything.

From despotism, monarchy, empire-building and theocracy, to war, persecution, genocide, mass murder (one obvious example here), torture, violence and even destruction of knowledge.

Plus ça change, plus c'est pareil.

Hence, doing God's work is nothing more than hypocritical, self-serving justification which not only serves to legitimize base, egotistical, greed- and power hunger-driven self-interest, but furthermore to dodge any responsibility - let alone accountability - for one's actions.

The problem here is that instead of a majority of us calling out such rank hypocrisy, we meekly allow - if not actually fervently embrace - this time-honored justification for doing anything and everything.

Being an atheist, I am by no means an expert on theology. However, were I happen to actually adhere to the catholic faith which keeps on prevailing where I've been living all my life, then I would be convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that causing such overwhelming evil while "doing God's work" simply means that, in truth, one is instead doing the Devil's work.

Too bad all those fundie Christians, Muslims and others have their primitive minds blinded to any and all reason to realize such an obvious, simple truism.

Too bad as well for the majority of the rest of us whom are equally guilty of such blatant hypocrisy, such repugnant self-delusion about our grandeur, of our goodness, of our so-called moral high ground.

I say here that any claim of doing God's work constitutes not only a confession, but an legal admission of guilt - of whatever criminal, illegal and/or amoral activity justified by such a claim.

Having stated this, I have little hope that we'll change for the better in this respect any time soon.

Sadly enough.


(Cross-posted from APOV)

Blood Poisoning

(This is about how one man changed after fighting a brutal war.)


When war got in your blood,
young & eager, you found the enemy,
and the world aligned its poles.
You trained your soul for slaughter,
eating snakes in the desert,
naked flesh and sand
and sun baking the universe -
men must avoid becoming leaves.

You trust your eyes and nose.
A woman soldier laughs
in her enemy tent with comrades.
The poles must align,
so you reverse that inner empathy,
disembowel her among them,

like a snake burned on a stick
so enemies will fear you
and people still fear you
long after the poles shifted
and new sand buried the old
and your fellow warriors slipped between
like fluids in a stiff backbone

that still holds the same war
high on a stick, terrifying
enemies in your eyes

© 2009 OMYMA

Somalia

Only a few years and archaeology set in.
Buildings, a lighthouse, a city turns reef,
all under the ocean,
worn and gutted like a Spanish galleon -
children wander in and out like new fish -
their city wreckage eaten by the sea
of blood and ghosts of blood,
blood-souls, blood-clouds, blood-thoughts

and the lurking plans for blood,
where guarded journalists study the ruins
in a mother's face, a young mans' ancient eyes
and new-burning forests
to sell charcoal to oil-rich, fat men
who never had a forest to burn.

Their sons rise up against women
because women deliver blood
but men spill it in the streets
and this is called religion.
They will rid the world of fertility
and sin, and eating in peace
and drinking, and lusting after life.
There is a market for blood-letting,
for the craft of explosives,
an art form recognized by God.
There is a market for soldiers.

The market for forests, grains, and fish is terrifyingly
spare, or may get you by just on the edge
of death, but not
in the dead-sure middle
where suicides have better salaries
and the end is a tearing apart
a devil's blood feast
washed away like everything else
leaving a mosque of rubble
where no one prays
and archaeologists comb
through the afterlife,
looking for a motive

© 2009 OMYMA

About the author: Omyma
Age: Probably older than you
Other online presence: thinkbridge
Personal: married, 5 children (mostly adults)
Interest in poetry: from childhood - then a period of 30 yrs a blank - and now...
Will contribute to this blog, thanks to the encouragement of the inimitable Poetryman
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ART IN A TIME OF WAR

(Ben Heine)

Thinking of my own responsibility as an artist in a time of war, I began to consider the obligations of artists and was struck with the sense that many artists do not feel compelled or obligated to craft something that attempts to shed light upon the often shady reasons for warfare or upon the propaganda that may foment it.

Why would an artist not try to weave immediate dissent into his or her works, be it painting, music, film, plays, etc? For me the need for art in the world is great, and during times of strife, upheaval or war, it is, in my opinion, most important, appropriate and even obligatory.

With the premise of responsibility one might explore the following questions:

1. Are artists obligated to create, pro or con, art that touches upon aspects of current wars?

2. If artists do not are they basically forgoing some unwritten rule of their particular craft?

To explore these questions one must, I suppose, first consider the definition of war and the feelings it may illicit.

Wikipedia, defines war as "...a reciprocated, armed conflict, between two or more non-congruous entities, aimed at reorganizing a subjectively designed, geo-politically desired result."

Merriam Webster defines war as "...a state of usually open and declared armed hostile conflict between states or nations."

In his book, On War, Prussian military theoretician Carl Von Clausewitz calls war the "...continuation of political intercourse, carried on with other means." He goes on to add that war is like a duel, but on “an extensive scale”.

Clausewitz’s description of war is certainly vivid and concise (if not somewhat flippant), but is it valid? Is war so easily defined and at the same time so difficult to bring to a close once it's waged? How can something so simply defined create such epic bloodshed and long lasting destruction? As a poet and playwright these questions swim beneath most, if not all, of my works.

From Stanford’s Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Michael Gelven writes, "...war is intrinsically vast, communal (or political) and violent. It is an actual, widespread and deliberate armed conflict between political communities, motivated by a sharp disagreement over governance."

Gelven's definition, and any other definition I could find, made no mention of an artist's obligation, as a matter of fact, the word art was nowhere to be found in any of them. Perhaps then, art is the antithesis of war, much like peace? And if that is the case, then artists, so it would seem, do have an obligation to resist or, at the very least, explore such thoughts during wartime.

I know this; my conclusion, may not necessarily balance out or prove that the artist indeed has an obligation, but, given the definition of art from the same Wikipedia source, I would conclude that it actually doesn’t matter… "Art is the process or product of deliberately arranging elements in a way that appeals to the senses or emotions. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations, and modes of expression, including music, literature, film, sculpture, and paintings. The meaning of art is explored in a branch of philosophy known as aesthetics.

The definition and evaluation of art has become especially problematic since the early 20th century. Richard Wollheim distinguishes three approaches: the Realist, whereby aesthetic quality is an absolute value independent of any human view; the Objectivist, whereby it is also an absolute value, but is dependent on general human experience; and the Relativist position, whereby it is not an absolute value, but depends on, and varies with, the human experience of different humans. An object may be characterized by the intentions, or lack thereof, of its creator, regardless of its apparent purpose. A cup, which ostensibly can be used as a container, may be considered art if intended solely as an ornament, while a painting may be deemed craft if mass-produced."

Perhaps this definition gets to the heart of art and responsibility. If art, by definition, appeals to the senses and emotions, surely this thing called "war" will and should elicit emotions regarding the state of humanity, which are or will ultimately be seen, in the artists work, intentional or otherwise. Art may well be the only avenue for expressing or releasing such feelings for both the artist and the viewer at large.

For me, artists do have an obligation to create something that delivers war in a form that is easier to digest than raw statistical data, corporate news or political spin, but, as I wrote earlier, it may not matter if an artist feels obliged, because the idea of obligation or duty for the artist during wartime might actually be unconscious and therefore the art rendered will naturally capture these emotions without being obligatory.

Many works of art throughout history have given us the strength, the compass, if you will, with which to direct ourselves away from the gloom and doom of war and into a realm of deeper thought. Yes. It has shown us heroes and valiant chivalry and, in some cases, been the only actual depictions or accounts of certain battles. But art has also shown us the evil, the torture, the grave human toll, the mass murder, and the wrongheadedness of many, if not most, wars throughout history. I would also proffer that art is history. It may not actually give us the "facts" of a particular war or battle, but it most assuredly leaves an emotional account of the mood of us humans before, during and after. In many instances art joins us in the our collective breath and with the same involuntary human response to war.

Let us then hope that peace might soon begin its own unconscious journey within us.

© 2009 mrp/thepoetryman