One man's freedom fighter is another man's child killer
Ah. In the wake of a terrorist act which can be argued as even more horrific than 9/11, leave it to Reuters to invoke "cycle of violence" rhetoric:
Here's the old story: A bus blows up in Jerusalem. The IDF kills two Hamas militants in retaliation. The "cycle" continues. Innocents are killed. Law enforcement lashes out against likely perpetrators. It's all morally equivalent. (There are many Frenchmen still alive today who could tell stories about how to end "cycles of violence". Ask them what happened to the ordinary citizens of French villages when revolutionaries attacked Nazi soldiers or sabotaged Nazi equipment. Israel's restraint, and Western ideas of decency are what keeps the "cycle" alive).
Despite the breathtaking horror of the events in Russia, Reuters apparently decides to phone in this same old backstory, exposing the fallacy in both journalism and world opinion. In this terrorist act, the mantra that "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter" has proven morally bankrupt.
More than 225 years ago, true Minutemen (as opposed to those radical Islamists called such by Michael Moore) stood on a green in Lexington, Massachusetts to oppose British troops who were trying to seize American weapons stores. The "shot heard round the world" was fired in a revolutionary engagement, by armed men against other armed men. It was not fired into a school. The Minutemen did not, upon hearing that the British were coming, round up children and threaten to kill them if the British did not leave Massachusetts.
Reuters and their ilk will do their best to highlight the repression of Chechens by Russian forces. This is a legitimate grievance which should be discussed, but for purposes of the school catastrophe, is completely irrelevant. There are no excuses for this act. If a decent man lived in the most brutal regime the world had ever seen, he may be justified in rising up against his government, and killing agents of that government. But the decent man would never take children as his hostages. The decent, God-fearing man would certainly never kill them, no matter what vicious acts his government has committed against him.
No man, or woman for that matter, who could be considered a human being would ever commit such an atrocity. And yet a group of people, in the name of a cause, has done just that. What, by God, does this tell you about their cause?
But there have been pointed calls from countries like France for Russia to explain its get-tough policy in Chechnya, which human rights groups say has led to an escalation in atrocities by both Russian forces and rebels.
Here's the old story: A bus blows up in Jerusalem. The IDF kills two Hamas militants in retaliation. The "cycle" continues. Innocents are killed. Law enforcement lashes out against likely perpetrators. It's all morally equivalent. (There are many Frenchmen still alive today who could tell stories about how to end "cycles of violence". Ask them what happened to the ordinary citizens of French villages when revolutionaries attacked Nazi soldiers or sabotaged Nazi equipment. Israel's restraint, and Western ideas of decency are what keeps the "cycle" alive).
Despite the breathtaking horror of the events in Russia, Reuters apparently decides to phone in this same old backstory, exposing the fallacy in both journalism and world opinion. In this terrorist act, the mantra that "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter" has proven morally bankrupt.
More than 225 years ago, true Minutemen (as opposed to those radical Islamists called such by Michael Moore) stood on a green in Lexington, Massachusetts to oppose British troops who were trying to seize American weapons stores. The "shot heard round the world" was fired in a revolutionary engagement, by armed men against other armed men. It was not fired into a school. The Minutemen did not, upon hearing that the British were coming, round up children and threaten to kill them if the British did not leave Massachusetts.
Reuters and their ilk will do their best to highlight the repression of Chechens by Russian forces. This is a legitimate grievance which should be discussed, but for purposes of the school catastrophe, is completely irrelevant. There are no excuses for this act. If a decent man lived in the most brutal regime the world had ever seen, he may be justified in rising up against his government, and killing agents of that government. But the decent man would never take children as his hostages. The decent, God-fearing man would certainly never kill them, no matter what vicious acts his government has committed against him.
No man, or woman for that matter, who could be considered a human being would ever commit such an atrocity. And yet a group of people, in the name of a cause, has done just that. What, by God, does this tell you about their cause?