Human Rights, Democracy and Liberalism
There are inconsistencies in all world views, although when we see them in our own philosophy we usually turn a blind eye. Saddham's execution reminded me of one of the problems with liberalism's belief in human rights. And as long as I am on the subject I thought I would take this opportunity to discuss the motherload of Liberal quandries, which is the support of Democracy around the World.
One of the revisionist justifications for overthrowing Saddham was his crimes against humanity, including the massacre of 148 Sunni Muslims for which he was ultimately sentenced to death. Ignoring the much larger loss in civilian lives and lower standard of living resulting from the invasion itself, most people I have spoken with do not recognize the irony of using political executions as a justification for invasion, only to turn around and execute the very person you claim was committing a crime. Some liberals will argue that Saddham received a trial and that his execution is therefore justifiable, whereas he killed people without such transparency. I don't buy it.
It is not difficult to run a counterfactual as to whether Saddham could have devised a trial for killing the 148 Sunnis after they tried to assassinate him, or that there could have been a trial for his massacre of the Kurds after Gulf War I. Beauty and murder are in the eye of the beholder. This is a paradox which most people ignore. We try and cloud our actions in righteousness, but our actions are inconsistent with our philosophy. Realists have a much easier time executing Saddham; he was a political threat, and now he isn't.
My concern is that our actions are obviously hypocritical to most people outside of this country. There is little wonder that people in the Middle East question our motives in the region, given that there is no coherent reason. The administration originally claims that it is for WMD, then it fails to admit it made a mistake and seamlessly creates the justification of emancipation and hypothetical security. People would respect us more if we remained consistent. In the long run, it would also be more effective.
The same is true of Democracy: we claim to support it until we don't like the results of the elections. The Bush administration has created a dichotomy between Democracies and Everyone-Else. Democracies Good. Everyone-Else Bad. We lose credibility when we push for elections in Palestine and we suddenly claim that Palestine is a bad Democracy when a political group associated with terrorist gets elected; it's inconsistent. It's time we stop claiming that Democracy is an end, in and of itself. The institutions themselves are not goals. We need to stop talking about bringing people Democracy, because when it fails to give people a better life, it actually undercuts the liberal agenda.
That's my first rant of 2007. Happy new year.
Posted by Peter
One of the revisionist justifications for overthrowing Saddham was his crimes against humanity, including the massacre of 148 Sunni Muslims for which he was ultimately sentenced to death. Ignoring the much larger loss in civilian lives and lower standard of living resulting from the invasion itself, most people I have spoken with do not recognize the irony of using political executions as a justification for invasion, only to turn around and execute the very person you claim was committing a crime. Some liberals will argue that Saddham received a trial and that his execution is therefore justifiable, whereas he killed people without such transparency. I don't buy it.
It is not difficult to run a counterfactual as to whether Saddham could have devised a trial for killing the 148 Sunnis after they tried to assassinate him, or that there could have been a trial for his massacre of the Kurds after Gulf War I. Beauty and murder are in the eye of the beholder. This is a paradox which most people ignore. We try and cloud our actions in righteousness, but our actions are inconsistent with our philosophy. Realists have a much easier time executing Saddham; he was a political threat, and now he isn't.
My concern is that our actions are obviously hypocritical to most people outside of this country. There is little wonder that people in the Middle East question our motives in the region, given that there is no coherent reason. The administration originally claims that it is for WMD, then it fails to admit it made a mistake and seamlessly creates the justification of emancipation and hypothetical security. People would respect us more if we remained consistent. In the long run, it would also be more effective.
The same is true of Democracy: we claim to support it until we don't like the results of the elections. The Bush administration has created a dichotomy between Democracies and Everyone-Else. Democracies Good. Everyone-Else Bad. We lose credibility when we push for elections in Palestine and we suddenly claim that Palestine is a bad Democracy when a political group associated with terrorist gets elected; it's inconsistent. It's time we stop claiming that Democracy is an end, in and of itself. The institutions themselves are not goals. We need to stop talking about bringing people Democracy, because when it fails to give people a better life, it actually undercuts the liberal agenda.
That's my first rant of 2007. Happy new year.
Posted by Peter
posted by PWN at 4:12 AM
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