Pacifism… Not sticking one’s head in the sand

One of my friends was in a debate tonight regarding war, specifically the current war. The opening question was whether or not America should pull out of Iraq and into Afganistan. There were a number of good points raised by the five students, some more than others, and I have to say that my friend did a remarkable job as an informed individual that answered the question comprehensively.

There was one student who, in his opening statement, made extremely clear that he is a pacifist. I am a pacifist too, as one would know from my previous entries, so at first I was interested in how he might relate that to the current situation. But that was the problem… he didn’t. He “answered” the question, saying that America should not move out of Iraq, and should not go into Afganistan. Then he went into what might have been a good argument for pacifism in another context… however, it had no bearing whatsoever on the actual topic being discussed. He was the only one of the five to bring his Bible up to the debate table (although he didn’t open it; maybe it was just there as moral support), and he argued that murder and killing and violence are unnatural. Very true. But what does that look like for this situation?

A lot of the other students had obviously been well informed about specific cultural and political tensions between not just the three countries mentioned, but Iran as well. They addressed each others’ concerns well, and then the need for clarification about the pacifist’s position arose. When the moderator asked for clarification of what it looked like to stay in Iraq but not be at war, the pacifist opened a whole other can of worms: he said that our government is a Christian nation, and as such we should be “pushing” Christianity, although not in a military sense.

I’m sure that shocked a lot of us. He went on to say other things that are clearly fallible, or at least need a lot more clarification, like the Roman empire fell because of the pacifism of early Christians, and that the Christian force he’s promoting will not disrupt any current cultural tendencies, essentially taking out the “Christian” aspect of Christianity, since a “secular” group could promote justice and peace just as much as Christians.

All that to say…. I really wish he hadn’t given pacifism such a bad rap. Pacifism isn’t a denial of all reality. It is ascribing to a higher reality. There are governmental issues that need to be discussed pragmatically as well, and if as a pacifist who thinks that those ultimately will fail, and want to abstain from that, like me, that’s fine. But if you go as far to say we are a Christian nation, and ignore the specific issues that are making this a complicated topic, just trying to promote pacifism in the process, I wish you wouldn’t. Really. Be a closet pacifist or something.