The great Illusion

Submitted by Lindsay
Melbourne Australia!

They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Benjamin Franklin

(12/2015) The horrific bombings in Paris on November fourteen are the continuation of a campaign to punish America and all who have sided with her. It has put the cause of civilization, freedom, community, and peace back decades, and the whole world will never be the same again. Terrorists have one aim – to induce terror into the hearts of others so that they will capitulate. They aim to disrupt any society that dares stand in its way, and have the ability to use every piece of modern technology and publicity with a sophistication that is dumbfounding.

Isis and related groups are not disaffected groups of citizens; they are not breakaway political parties, persecuted minorities, or gung ho militias. They are smart, informed and angry people who do not care for anything or anybody who disagrees with them. Their roots can be traced back over 1000 years, yet it is only in the past 30 years that the resentments, injustices and humiliations they have suffered over that millennium have boiled over into madness.

This anger has been presented as a rallying point for young Muslims who have either experienced similar injustices, or have graphically been told of them by relatives, teachers or mullahs. Their slogans have been based on distorted interpretations of the Koran, and their appeal has been sufficiently powerful that the inhumanity of their aims is overlooked and ignored. Self sacrifice has been embraced as the glorious price to be paid; attacks by their enemies are touted as proof of persecution, and every death a victory.

There are a multitude of factors behind this, but one – and only one – stands out as the primary source of their hatred: American interference into the affairs of other nations, especially those in the middle east. Their hatred is based not on just the overt interference, but the ethos on which it thrives. Contrary to what you at home may believe, America is centred on producing only one outcome: The furtherance of its own interests. Nothing stands in the way of that, and the means by which this is achieved are many, devious, and without regard for international law, codes of conduct, or the welfare of the citizens.

It’s tempting to give a summary of those means, but it is so painful to think about that the best I can do is to say that you are all in the grip of the greatest illusion ever staged. If I were to ask you which is the greatest country on earth, the one with greatest freedoms, success, power, resources and culture I have no doubt you would unanimously reply "Why, ours!"

And you would be telling the truth from your perspective, because you live in a world bounded by mirrors that reflect back your society. "Yes", you might add, "we know things are not perfect, there are too many poor, too much crime, too many struggling, but we are still the top nation, the only one worth that title." And who can blame you? It’s what you are told every day in every way, but the price of living in this paradise is that of your freedom. Freedom from the truth, freedom of being allowed to care for the fate and condition of foreigners, freedom from the ability to open the box of secrets that govern your lives, freedom from compassion.

Would you agree that the overall aim of America as a nation is to make the rest of the world indistinguishable from it? That everyone should be like Americans, like you, with a few minor differences to show they were once some other nation with different cultures, beliefs and ways? I would hope not, yet that is the aim..

Isis et al cannot see that individually you are great folk, caring, generous and kind. They can only see what your conception of supreme America has pushed their faces into: the mire of exploitation, the horror of uncaring attacks, the humiliation of religious denigration. And the real problem you all face is that you cannot see it either. Life is too cozy, your safety is constantly guaranteed, the major press is informed with truth and reality, your leaders of all kinds are so trustworthy, and you believe you live in the greatest nation on earth. What you also see is that the only way to deal with terrorism is to bomb it into oblivion, not that it is much too late to deal with it that way. That the way was lost when you embarked on hegemony and subjugation of those who stood in the path to world supremacy.

And most of the the rest of the world has been dragged into it. We all have, at best, a love-hate relationship with you. We have to kowtow or be put on your hit list. We do not want $9,000,000,000 worth of more useless aircraft, but are stuck with getting them. Many of us are sick of that, and wish to preserve our long and wonderful heritages, our ways of life, and to not surrender our freedoms for the pottage you offer. France is suffering, we have and will suffer, those you have raped still suffer, while your five billion dollars an hour keeps the bad guys at bay. I wonder how China views all this? What do you think?

Of course many of you have never fallen into the trap of megalomania, you cherish your civil liberties above all else, and are appalled at the way your governments behave. You will not give up one iota of freedom for the sake of security, for you know you finish up with neither.

Christmas will be with us soon, and the very name in that word has come to mean love and care for all. I would like to propose that we unite in the promotion of real freedom – to respect and value the people of other lands, to let them show us their culture and care for us, and to subvert the message of imperial America.

Time for a truly happy, forgiving Christmas, one full of civil liberty for all.

Lindsay, Melbourne