Quite. Bloodlust is a dangerous thing, but total pacifism is still a fairly radical idea that I don't think many people actually buy into when the rubber meets the road. Pacifism has claimed few victories, suggesting that historic incidents could have been better solved with pacifism is a good way to make yourself look very silly very quickly.
Pacifism is a tool, not a silver bullet. For revolutionaries and reformationists, there is no silver bullet.
Just to pile on here, you'll usually find that people who claim to be pacifists will say, "oh, well, yeah, of course we had to fight Hitler" when confronted. They don't actually even think of themselves that way, in other words.
During the war (to his credit, before the full extent of the atrocities committed by the Nazis were publicly known), Gandhi called on Britons to fight the Nazis without arms, suggesting that the only way to defeat the Nazis with violence was to become more horrible than the Nazis.
Today we have the benefit of hindsight so we can see that was a silly thing to assert, but that hindsight realization should drive us to realize that caution must be exercised when advocating non-violent resistance. It cannot be successfully applied to every situation.
[T]here is reason to think that Gandhi, who after all was born in 1869, did not understand the nature of totalitarianism and saw everything in terms of his own struggle against the British government. The important point here is not so much that the British treated him forbearingly as that he was always able to command publicity... he believed in ’arousing the world’, which is only possible if the world gets a chance to hear what you are doing. It is difficult to see how Gandhi’s methods could be applied in a country where opponents of the regime disappear in the middle of the night and are never heard of again. Without a free press and the right of assembly, it is impossible not merely to appeal to outside opinion, but to bring a mass movement into being, or even to make your intentions known to your adversary. Is there a Gandhi in Russia at this moment? And if there is, what is he accomplishing?
Gandhi also made statements after the war (and therefore without the possibility of being ignorant as to what happened) that people have raised very similar objections to:
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“Hitler,” Gandhi solemnly affirmed, “killed five million Jews. It is the greatest crime of our time. But the Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher’s knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from cliffs. I believe in hara-kiri. I do not believe in its militaristic connotations, but it is a heroic method.”
“You think,” I said, “that the Jews should have committed collective suicide?”
“Yes,” Gandhi agreed,” that would have been heroism. It would have aroused the world and the people of Germany to the evils of Hitler’s violence, especially in 1938, before the war. As it is they succumbed anyway in their millions.”
[snip]
Mahatma Gandhi has never lived under a thoroughly totalitarian regime; his generosity and humanity make it difficult for him to realize how very cruel a dictatorship can be. In India, and in Palestine, and other plces, violence or organized nonviolence is a form of “public relations.” …
Thus gandhian nonviolence as well as its ugly opposite — Zionist terror — implies the existence of a free democratic society in England (and in America). It is to this court of public opinion that the resisters in India and kidnappers in Palestine have appealed. But suppose there were no democracy in Western nations?
A British prime minister could not order a million people dragged out of their houses and off the streets to be melted down to soap in fiery furnaces. Hitler could — and did.
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That last section in particular strikes me as quite similar to George Orwell's objection.
Noting that Gandhi recommended that the Jews should have committed mass suicide to "arouse the world" to their plight, Sam Harris added the rejoinder, "So the world could do what, commit mass suicide in turn?"
That sounds like Game Theory, although much much more serious.
The problem in this case is that it's Game Theory without (Social) System Theory cannot give an answer to this question. To me such an act would be, as you stated, the "End of Faith".
A British prime minister could not order a million people dragged out of their houses and off the streets to be melted down to soap in fiery furnaces. Hitler could — and did.
You are correct, though I think the quote still has teeth. They may not have turned a million people into soap, but on the other hand they also killed way more than just a million people.
right. like the US president and UK prime ministers are not turning millions of middle eastern into soap as well.
yeah, i can totally see how that is impossible.
irony aside, the politics in play at those wars are exactly the same that allowed the nazists socialists to kill people in Europe as well (from the surrendering Jewish to the fighting french)
In the literal sense, currently nobody is turning millions of people into soap, and there is no evidence that this has ever happened. And to my knowledge, there are no boxcars full of humans speeding towards crematorium in the middle east right now.
I don't think that the foreign policy of the Five Eyes is really a relevant tangent at this point in the discussion, but suffice it to say that I am 'Not A Fan'(tm). If you're looking for someone to disagree with there, you'll have to find somebody else.
Gandhi gets misunderstood quite easily because of how well he understood how to defeat those that employ violence... By showing massive fortitude by acts of passive resistance, it both awes the bully and gains their respect instead of appearing as another target to be neutralized: whether demanding a harsher punishment in a court room or opposing an army without weapons, such uncommon acts of bravery demand intrigue. This is how to "be like Jesus," neither a wallflower nor a wimp, without creating more violence. (Yes, yes, leaders of movements rarely live to retirement... Often becoming martyrs thanks to assassins.)
I think Gandhi's critics understand this. The standard objection to the universal application of these techniques is that people like the Nazis would not have been awed by such a display of bravery and resolution. Had the Jews all committed mass organized suicide (the organization of which would have been almost certainly impossible... but that is a tangential objection...) the Nazis would have been pleased that the job had been done for them.
You might argue that even if Germany had been unswayed, the Americans and British would have been. That may be true, but then you are just pushing the task of using violence to stop Hitler onto another party. You haven't eliminated violence, you've just postponed it and had millions of people senselessly kill themselves instead of making the Nazis struggle with the task.
Most Germans didn't know about the atrocities until after the war. If Germany closed down the media so well, the people might not have known about mass suicides either.
The Nazi regime was fundamentally self-destructive. German citizens who witnessed the mass Jewish suicide and were swayed by into practicing non-violent resistance would have become targets of the Nazis themselves. Were they to kill themselves to make a point as well?
The only way that loosing the support of the uninformed German masses would have stopped the Nazis is if those previously uninformed German masses took up arms against their government. The Nazis were only going to stop killing once there was nobody left to kill, or once they were killed. They played by a different set of rules.
It looks like you've fallen into the trap of seeing "the Nazis" as the ultimate, perfect and monolithic evil. They were not. They were regular humans with quite disparate personalities and motivations.
And they needed active support from the "uninformed German masses" - why do you think Goebbels was their 3rd or 4th most important man? The support was gained through propaganda, and the core parts of that were the all-around (including moral) superiority of the Aryan race and in contrast the portrayal of Jews as its absolute enemy, both despicable and threatening.
If that propaganda had been revealed as a lie via large-scale non-violent protests, it would have caused serious and quite possibly unsurmountable problems for the Nazi government - they did not have nearly enough hardened ideologues to run the entire country.
"It looks like you've fallen into the trap of seeing "the Nazis" as the ultimate, perfect and monolithic evil."
No, I don't think that.
What I think is that are a fine example of people who could not be stopped with anything but violence. Killing or letting them have their way were the only options.
They likely could not have run the country without the support of the German people (I'd like to point out that it is not clear that they could have run the country _even with_ the support of the German people; they were still on a self-destructive trajectory even if they had not been at war with the Allied forces...) but they could have kept the slaughter going. While having an industrialized society does make genocide more efficient, it is by no means a prerequisite for genocide.
The Nazis required propaganda not because they were afraid of what would happen if the German public became peacefully non-cooperative. They needed propaganda to 1) prevent a violent rebellion in Germany and 2) remain strong in the face of violent opposition from the Allied forces.
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Succinctly put:
I do not believe that the Germans were pure monolithic ultimate evil.
I do not believe that this would have been a winning strategy:
"You will invite Herr Hitler and Signor Mussolini to take what they want of the countries you call your possessions. Let them take possession of your beautiful island, with your many beautiful buildings. You will give all these, but neither your souls, nor your minds. If these gentlemen choose to occupy your homes, you will vacate them. If they do not give you free passage out, you will allow yourself, man, woman and child, to be slaughtered, but you will refuse to owe allegiance to them."
Against the Nazis, I believe that is the strategy of a fool.
It is not certain that is a lie, though there is certainly more than a little evidence that it is.
What is clear is that the German people knew something was afoot. Perhaps they did not know that there were camps build for the express purpose of extermination, but the sure as hell knew there were mass deportations, families being disappeared, and concentration camps (a concept that is distinct from death/extermination camps).
I have personally talked to a few granddads who were alive at that time, many years ago. I wanted to hear from them, if and why they supported the nazi regime. That's because as a kid, when you hear these things, you're getting suspect of your own neighbors.
However, when I talked to those granddads, it became very clear that they knew what was going on. They not only had a sharp memory of what happened, but also tried to make their ideology and actions appear harmless. It's always the same story. "I had no idea what was going on. And what could I have done, even if I knew it?"
The stinky story falls apart, when they start explaining how it was back then. After an hour of talk you get the sense that they try to defend something that is simply illogical. Most Germans today, don't agree with any part of the NS-Period, but cannot get rid of their own hate against Jews, colored people or different people. You've recently read this story about the guy who got him self arrested, right? Try to suit up like a Jew, a Black, a Gay or any other enemy of the old regime and you will really understand how it is. On Halloween you can go out as one without looking weird, but even though the setup is artificial, I'm sure you will get reactions that you wouldn't expect and from people from whom you wouldn't expect it.
Once a disabled man knocked our door and asked for a signature. He tried to use sales tactics to get his signature, but when I found out what it was for, which he strongly tried to hide, I was shocked. He blatantly tried to get our votes for their nazi party. That's not a year ago. Of course, I told him to go the f* out of here and that he should read a book, which explains how his own party burned people like him alive, and then think about his political views.
> how well he understood how to defeat those that employ violence
How well did he? He was rotting away in prison when the most important aspects of India and Pakistans independence was negotiated by more pragmatic leaders.
The British decision to grant independence happened at a time when Congress had lost massive amounts of influence due to their stance on the war, and the other parts of the independence movement had used the opportunity to strengthen their positions.
Because he was out of the picture when the most important decisions was made, he lost his chance at preventing the partition, for example.
It's clear he was an important leader, but there were many others.
maybe not in britain but the Kenyan Mau Mau rebellion comes pretty close. It is no coindidence that Caroline Elkins' book title is "Britain's Gulag" which describes the end of empire in Kenya in the 1950s.
I can't help but think this is an east-vs-west thing. Ghandi calling on the Jews to resist the Holocaust through non-violence sounds "silly" to western ears. Orwell argues that non-violence only worked in India because the British weren't as ruthless as the Nazis.
There's something to that, but consider the case of Tibet. Ok, China isn't Nazi Germany, but they're pretty totalitarian, particularly in Tibet. They certainly don't allow "a free press and right of assembly." The Dalai Lama, as spiritual and political leader of Tibet, has insisted on Ghandi-style non-violent resistance for over 60 years now. Instead of jumping into the ocean, Tibetans protest the occupation by setting themselves on fire. It happens so often that gasoline is a controlled substance in Tibet.
We might note that non-violence hasn't been very effective against the Chinese, (at least so far) and if that's all Orwell was getting at, fine. On the other hand, I think it's safe to say that the Dalai Lama and his followers do understand the nature of totalitarianism, and it's not just naiveté that makes them continue with non-violence.
Non-violent resistance doesn't always mean simply protesting occupations. If a population is motivated enough, a non-violent resistance movement could look very much like a country which anybody could invade, but nobody could control.
To apply an example: If this resistance was trained into the British public, and the Germans marched into London and declared themselves conquerers, the population would ignore them. When they are ordered to build factories here, to report to detention centres there, they would simply refuse to. Threats and demonstrations of force aimed at extracting compliance by brutalising certain segments of the population would be disregarded by the rest of the population[1].
Supplies for the conquerors would go missing or never be produced. They would have to rely on their own manpower to oversee all operations at gunpoint. As soon as the men with guns are called away somewhere else, work stops, workers disappear.
Any population which could respond in this manner would be unconquerable not in terms of territory, but in terms of spirit, which I believe is the sort of thing Ghandi was after.
The degree to which you could ever implement this system is dubious. I'm not sure you could get large groups of people to act that way. But if you could, it would be very effective.
[1] This is the bit I find hardest to see in practise.
"We might note that non-violence hasn't been very effective against the Chinese, (at least so far) and if that's all Orwell was getting at, fine."
That is a very strong component of what Orwell was getting at. What Orwell was further getting at is that the Germans had extermination on their mind, the English in India and even the Chinese in Tibet did not.
Additionally Orwell is pointing out that non-violent resistance is made effective by the existence of free societies anywhere in the world that they might have influence. The Tibetans benefit from this, as you can infer from how much time the Dalai Lama spends courting the international community. Gandhi's suggestion to the British would have led to the eradication of free societies.
That's why I think this is an east-vs-west thing. Orwell focuses pretty narrowly on the problem of Nazi aggression. They're killing Jews and attacking other countries. So we go to war and 6 years later, the problem is solved. Except... decades later, Europe is still dealing with the after-effects of WWII. The current economic crisis can be traced pretty directly back to the war.
Ghandi and the Dalai Lama, on the other hand, have a much broader goal, which, yes, involves lifting oppression, but also includes more subtle aspects of the well-being of their followers once that goal has been achieved. I think that contra Orwell, practitioners of non-violence appeal not only to free societies elsewhere, but also to the humanity of their oppressors. And so they try to eliminate the conflict, rather than winning it. Except... decades later, Tibet is still oppressed by China.
My point is not that Orwell is wrong, but that he misunderstands Ghandi.
I don't remember how it came up, but I was asked something similar to this during my Eagle Scout interview, back when I believed in God and stuff. I said that I would be a conscientious objector, even during World War 2. It wasn't a popular answer, as the interviewers were veterans, but I just didn't think that Jesus wanted me to drop bombs on other people.
I agree. For instance, (and it's been a while, so perhaps my reading is bad), Arendt makes a distinction between the justified use of violence, in which we suppose that violence is wrong but can see no other course of action, and legitimate violence, where we understand violence simply as our right as people with power.
A justified violent action is future oriented, hoping that the future will vindicate what will be a past action but knowing that at the moment, the action is "wrong" until it becomes redeemed through historical context.
By contrast, a legitimate violent action is past oriented, and understood as simply "right", because the power carrying it out has been granted legitimate state power. Here, we can see how people in the US who favor military action often see military action as the "right" of the US to protect its interests, coupled with the legitimacy of US power as a force for the promotion of human rights (not a view I agree with, by the way).
This might sound like a strange and useless distinction, but consider the difference between a police officer shooting someone because there is no other action, and doing even though it may be wrong, and on the other hand, a police officer tasing a "non-compliant" suspect because he believes he legitimately has that power and won't be harmed even if, in the future, people decide it was a wrong action.
At that point, it seems useful, at least to me, to understand that we live in an imperfect world and may have to do violent things, but can be strong pacifists by asserting that there is never a "legitimate" violence.
This lines up pretty well with what I was trying to say, I think. Violence is always bad. Sometimes, it may be less bad than the alternative, but it's difficult and dangerous to judge exactly when; and even if you guess right, violence is still bad. It doesn't retroactively become glorious.
I liked the approach in Iain Banks' Culture series. The Culture believes that war is sometimes necessary but resolutely refuses to glorify it, so all their combat ships are named things like "Thug" and "Gangster" and "Torturer".
But then you're not a pacifist. By definition (at least my understanding / interpretation), a pacifist considers violence unjustifiable in any and all situations.
Like most things, it's a spectrum. There are pacifists who won't partake in violence. Either by their action or the action of someone on their behalf (i.e., they'd argue against their nation going to war). There are also pacifists who won't partake in violence in their own defense, but might to defend others. And others will resist throwing the first punch, but are willing to defend themselves and others with violence if forced to. And there are plenty of other variations on this theme.
And if you really want to go to the definition, wiktionary [1] has it as:
1.One who loves, supports, or favours peace;
one who is pro-peace.
2.One who avoids violence.
3.One who opposes violence and is anti-war.
Opposition to and avoidance of violence. Not necessarily an absolute rejection of it (though that is likely the ideal of all pacifists).
No! Pacifism has no spectrum, like anarchism. You can't have a little bit of government with anarchism any more than you can have a bit of violence with pacifism.
Read up on pacifism and its history and various philosophies. I use spectrum to indicate that there are a variety of pacifist philosophies and I'm not wrong, because there are a variety of pacifist philosophies. They all desire a world with zero violence. But some are willing to defend themselves or others against violence with violence, while others are not. Some won't even allow you to defend them, they'd rather fall on the sword than let another perform a violent act for their sake. To think that there's a singular philosophy on this issue is a totally ignorant position to take.
How can you claim pacifism if you resort to violence? Pacifism is the rejection of violence, full stop. The ambiguity lies in the definition of "violence." Tolstoy called voting, paying taxes, and engaging in commerce forms of violence, for instance. Regardless, only using physical violence in defense doesn't make you a pacifist, it just means you don't attack people.
I think you can reasonably claim to be a pacifist if you think that violence is unacceptable in broad categories that most people find it acceptable in, even if you still support it in some situations. For example, wanting to abolish the military but not the police.
I think it would depend on exactly what you mean by "abolish the military". Are we talking "abolish standing militaries, but leave ourselves open to the possibility of raising one in the future if Ganghis Khan rises from his forgotten grave"?
In my personal opinion, abolishing standing militaries while leaving ourselves open to raising an army if the (perhaps unlikely) need arises is, while probably not a common attitude, still just a standard non-pacifist position. I am more than open to abolishing standing armies, but I do not consider myself to be a pacifist.
Well, it's certainly a subject of lively debate among pacifists. Ghandi would probably have agreed with you. Personally I think there should be room for people who are committed to peace as an ideology but e.g. think you should defend yourself if attacked in the street. I don't think you'll find a definition that is universally agreed-upon.
Most people don't think that violence is always the solution, most people recognize that most problems have non-violent resolutions and that non-violent resolutions are preferable.
That's not so much "pacifism" as it is "being a bog-standard sensible person". Of course standard sensible people like to give themselves all sort of nice sounding labels that they can wear like badges (egalitarian, pacifist, etc); there isn't anything wrong with that.
I guess the take-away here is that people can certainly claim these sorts of things about themselves, evidence to the contrary, but we shouldn't necessarily take them seriously.
Regarding pacifism, an interesting take on it that might surprise people is C.S. Lewis's essay "Why I'm Not a Pacifist." In my opinion, he provides some clarity on the issue, especially on when it is appropriate to not be pacifist, and why.
Pacifism is a tool, not a silver bullet. For revolutionaries and reformationists, there is no silver bullet.