tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17190292.post6169239071152496305..comments2023-10-07T05:35:14.064-04:00Comments on Bazungu Bucks: Red HandJohn Powershttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17126222842766191343noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17190292.post-53546705752455744802008-02-13T19:54:00.000-05:002008-02-13T19:54:00.000-05:00I agree with you that it seems fake for the strong...I agree with you that it seems fake for the strong to just say "sorry" and then imagine that's all. But forgiveness never comes from a once off "sorry" but rather requires dialog and engagement, a negotiation.<BR/><BR/>An emperor's decree can exert either happiness or grief, whereas to ask forgiveness means that acceptance cannot be assured. Forgiveness is something that has to be created together. Forgiveness as a process and product is in sense something that insists on equality of power.<BR/><BR/>The idea that the high shall be made low and the low shall be made high is an attractive notion for a world so unbalanced as ours. But I'm a small and I'm low. As attractive as the reversal of power may seem it also seems improbable. It also seems to insist on the idea of power over as the normal and appropriate distribution of power. <BR/><BR/>Empowerment, where people are creatively engaged in composing their lives seems a better way to envision power distributed.John Powershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17126222842766191343noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17190292.post-56489207579745446542008-02-13T17:43:00.000-05:002008-02-13T17:43:00.000-05:0027th comrade, preach it, dude!Hey John, I linked y...27th comrade, preach it, dude!<BR/><BR/>Hey John, I linked your blog, finally! Looks like a great day to do so, too. :) Excellent post.Daisy Deadheadhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17993200276152025235noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17190292.post-1448406011590790502008-02-13T06:19:00.000-05:002008-02-13T06:19:00.000-05:00Well, yeah. Sure, whatever. Ideals fail, John. Com...Well, yeah. Sure, whatever. Ideals fail, John. Communists, more than roughly anybody else in the world, know that too well.<BR/><BR/>This concept of forgiving, to stop the revenge loop, is not entirely hard to figure out. And we try, we try fuckin' hard. But the ideal - this forgiving - fails almost all the time. More-importantly, I think the time is here to tame you people, so that it will have to be you to forgive us for our excesses in revenge. :o)<BR/><BR/>I'm just from reading on the Australian Natives' plight from Gay Uganda's blog. And I'm enraged even further. And let me toll you one thing I know all the time but couldn't grasp until Mahatma Gandhi got words for it:<BR/>Forgiveness is an attribute of the strong. The weak cannot forgive.<BR/><BR/>So, we've got to have all of you rounded up and locked up in a camp awaiting your turns at breathing in the Gas, or, if we are feeling particularly French, at having your heads roll down the guillotine. And then we'll forgive.When we are strong. :o)The 27th Comradehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08490992094734826485noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17190292.post-9688149090755882672008-02-13T04:36:00.000-05:002008-02-13T04:36:00.000-05:00Here's Tumwijuke's piece. To annoy you about spe...Here's <A HREF="http://ugandaninsomniac.wordpress.com/2008/02/12/understanding-robert-mugabe/#comments" REL="nofollow">Tumwijuke's </A> piece. <BR/><BR/>To annoy you about speechs, but also to affirm what I think is true, I'll quote Martin Luther King, Jr.:<BR/><BR/>"Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction. So when Jesus says "Love your enemies," he is setting forth a profound and ultimately inescapable admonition. ... The chain reaction of evil — hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars — must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation."<BR/><BR/>"Extermination of Aggressors" won't do it. King wrote that above in Strength to Love." I'm not so sure of Jesus, but that admonition rings true.John Powershttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17126222842766191343noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17190292.post-82282593075548057902008-02-13T03:59:00.000-05:002008-02-13T03:59:00.000-05:00I can't help seeing how nearly Stalinist America i...I can't help seeing how nearly Stalinist America is. Kids wake up to recite old speeches, be told they live in the Greatest Country in the World, that their Freedom is better than anything, that they should be Lucky to be Americans ...<BR/>Do you spot any difference between that and George Orwell's <I>1984</I>? Any whatsoever?<BR/><BR/>Why wouldn't they go to give their lives for something that good? Except it isn't good. I didn't know I'd write on brain-washing in two comments back-to-back (one at Tumwijuke's). Anyway, so they are brain-washed, and they go fight. At 19. I know that many American soldiers in the last wars were very young. <I>Some had to lie about their ages and join the army.</I><BR/>It is really just like how Mao got the fire-brand late-teeners to power his Cultural Revolution. It is no different here. Young people can be very idealistic, and that is why you saw that totally blind comment by the YouTube commenter: I AM PROUD OF MY COUNTRY. It is blind loyalty, blind patriotism. It is the only thing the Nazis required, you know.<BR/><BR/>So, this brings me to my gist: I don't give a shit if we have child soldiers. I give a damn that me have war at all! I mean, Red Hand is about child soldier. What the fuck will Magenta Foot be for? Children whose mothers have been raped by soldiers? The victims of biological attacks? Children born with no parts, because someone used a Bomb? Children who have died of 100,000 pounds of explosives? Children whose fathers have been taken away to rot on some island?<BR/>No. Magenta Foot should be a drive to finance all groups that are sworn to the total extermination of the Aggressors. Whether or not they have Arab names. Kidding. :o)<BR/><BR/>Anyway, I am enraged, and I make no attempts to hide it. Meanwhile, the rest of you recite a document that yaps on about how all men are created equal, even though it was written by fuckin' slave drivers.<BR/><BR/>(You won't believe how much constraint it taxes me of to keep these from becoming personal attacks on whichever Americans may be on the other side.)The 27th Comradehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08490992094734826485noreply@blogger.com