(Host) Commentator Nick Boke sees preparation for war with Iraq as a failure to learn one of the lessons of September 11.
(Boke) Last year, right after the September 11 terrorist attacks, I was among those convinced that the tragedy would fundamentally alter many things in our lives. But one change I hoped for has not occurred, by any stretch of the imagination.
I was hoping that the fear and disorientation the attacks generated would heighten our empathy. I was hoping we might begin to share a vision articulated by the 17th century Puritan poet and theologian John Donne. You remember. He wrote, “Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind. And therefore, never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”
I had hoped our tragedy would deepen our understanding that for many people in many lands, tragedy is an on-going, daily occurrence. We grieve the pointless deaths of people whose only crime was to have gone to work on September 11.
But for many, tragic days are the norm, not the exception. It’s not just one event on one bright September day for shopkeepers and housewives in Kashmir and Sri Lanka, taxi drivers and janitors on the West Bank, or accountants, fashion models and students in Northern Ireland, Israel, Angola, Nepal and Colombia. It’s equally random and violent acts on, say, the 11th of September, then the 14th, and the 16th, and the 21st, 22nd, and on and on.
I had hoped that our tragedy might have attuned us to the suffering of others, reminding us, as Donne put it, that “no man is an island.” But instead of John Donne, it’s Rambo and John Wayne we seem to be quoting more than we did a year ago. From bumper stickers to the halls of Congress, we emphasize our national pain; we justify our righteous anger.
Not having learned this lesson, I’m afraid that we’re once again about to overstep ourselves, as we did in Southeast Asia beginning in the 1960s. We might do well to heed some prophetic words written just before ‘debacle’ and ‘Vietnam’ became synonymous. In 1966, J. William Fulbright, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, wrote in his book, “The Arrogance of Power” words somewhat reminiscent of John Donne’s:
“We fail to understand our enormous and disruptive impact on the world; we fail to understand that no matter how good our intentions – and they are, in most cases, decent enough – other nations are alarmed by the very existence of such great power. America is showing signs of the arrogance of power which has afflicted, weakened, and in some cases destroyed great nations of the past. In doing so, we are not living up to our capacity and promise as a civilized example for the world.”
Our promise as a civilized example for the world. A good standard to hold for America. John Donne, I think, would approve.
This is Nick Boke, in Weathersfield, Vermont.
Nick Boke is a reading consultant, minister and freelance writer.