- Sun-Tzu, The Art of War, pp 74
As I stand now my back is pressed against a wall and before me a panorama opens before my eyes: I see soldiers, American, Canadian, British, French, German – all the countries of the NATO alliance backed by Israelis, Ethiopians, Colombians, Mexicans, Filipinos, soldiers and security forces from every continent and behind them all I see their leaders – Bush, Cheney, Olmert, Netanyahu, Karzai, Zardari, Singh, Brown, Sarkozy, McCain, Obama, looking out I think I see even Donald Rumsfeld chuckling away off in a corner.
Surrounding them I see the legions of bureaucrats, corporate CEOs, think-tank academics, lawyers, preachers, celebrities, royalty, NGO activists, rock stars and all of the conservative hockey-moms, arm-chair warrior dads, libertarian gun nuts, cynical naysayers, and die-hard liberal and conservative voters – anyone who has ever celebrated the lie of the “free-world” and benefited from that lie at the expense of others – all of them, all of them, turn to me and mock my cause: the soldiers and police menacing me with M16s and tear gas canisters as the others laugh and shake their heads at this “idealistic youth” – “when will he ever learn? Oh it must just be a phase he is going through – how quaint! An angry young man with revolutionary ambitions – are there any left, how cute is that?”
Naturally the police and army will content themselves with saying “back it up you son of a bitch!” or something to that effect. The CEO will claim that this is the land of opportunity and that revolution is “so yesterday”, the NGO activist will point to the developing world and remind me how lucky I am to be living in the “developed West” with all of its amenities at my fingertips and join in with all the politicians and hockey-moms in telling me what an ungrateful brat I am and that I should join the Peace Corps or do something practically constructive – or join the army and blow the heads off a few Taliban in Afghanistan while my officers tell me it is for the peace and prosperity of all or join the police and bash in the skulls of a few undisciplined and ungrateful protestors before detaining their friends. The celebrities and rock stars all tell me what a glamorous place the “free-world” is – just buy their album or watch their next movie: “look at all the excitement on screen, look at all the rebellious lyrics in that rock song and all those moshing youths at that concert, is that not the definition of freedom? Come on and party with us!” All the politicians say, “come on son, you want to be the change, just join our party – we are the future, you might even be prime minister/president someday, imagine that now – all that power! You could change the world, just do what these lobbyists and lawyers tell you!” The activists call out to me, “remember Gandhi, remember Martin Luther King, they were pacifists and look what they accomplished – you don’t want to break faith with them do you? And the Dalai Lama, don’t forget the Dalai Lama!” The presidents and prime ministers just sniff in disgust: “If he ever becomes a problem the special forces will kill him like the terrorist he is,” they say with confident sneers upon their faces just before their handlers tell them to drop it in the name of political correctness, “wouldn’t want to scare away all the sensitive voters” they say.
They go on and on with their abuse while in the shadows to either side of them I see the shadowy forms of the exploiters, the abusers, the killers, the rapists, the tormentors, the mass murderers and the tyrants waiting for their moment and rubbing their hands with twisted glee.
While all of this is going on I cautiously turn my head to the right and to the left and see all of the men and women, boys and girls of every city and every nation of the world standing with their heads facing the wall. Workers drowning in debt, farmers with no more land to farm, broken families, rape victims, youths who cut themselves in order to stay sane, little boys with no feelings, faceless toilers, forgotten veterans crippled in mind and body, the cynics who press their heads against the wall and try desperately to ignore what is going on behind them – all the while telling themselves that they can do nothing, abused children, abandoned elders, indigenous peoples for whom the whole world seems to be slipping away, the victims of war who appear only as statistics on a computer screen or television set, the suicidal ones who just cannot take it anymore, the neglected, the brutalized, the exploited, the hopeless, the hated and all of the peoples of the world gripped by alienation.
I turn to them, the oppressed, and then I turn to the equally alienated oppressors and two words leave my lips, just two words: “No more,” and with that my sword hisses from its sheath and I stand: a bastion, a citadel of flesh and blood, between the two sides that not even the heaviest artillery barrage could ever hope to shift – unbroken, undaunted I stand in the knowledge that the spirit of humanity stands with me.
It is inevitable, after bearing witness to a certain level of injustice, for the activist, the concerned citizen, and the sympathizer to take up the sword and become a soldier, a warrior, a knight. I have crossed a threshold that many others will subsequently cross in the coming years, decades, and centuries. I have crossed the threshold and am now a guardian and for the first time in my life I have seen and realized my purpose.
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