They do perform a service to their country even though their efforts are often belittled. And such a belief might serve every country well if it were widely followed. I imagine that many would think it naive or worse to think that such a thing could ever happen. Still there are examples of where individuals have refused to take part in war even at great personal cost. So the will to reject war as a solution is within the parameters of human potential. And what some people have been able to do others can do also if they make the choice to do so.
To me the total rejection of the use of war seems similar to the need for an addict to reject drugs in order to recover. I imagine that to most this seems extremely unrealistic. Still with the human capacity to rationalize there may be some truth in that total abstinence from war is the only solution.
I got to thinking about this yesterday on Veteran’s Day. It seems like for thousands of years we have been thanking and even glorifying warriors. And yet the things that their wars were meant to prevent keep happening and often one war plants the seeds for a more terrible war to follow. To me it seems like we have been in a pretty futile cycle for a long time. Maybe the example of the conscientious objector offers a way to break that cycle. And maybe if this world one day does become a much saner place to live we will have a day to thank the conscientious objector.
I have found that I like making a post better if I have an image to go with it. I made this one from a scan from an old newspaper and some photoshop work.
Halloween when I was growing up was a time when a child could go a little wild with pranks and mostly small acts of vandalism. For the most part this was tolerated by adults as long as what we did did not cause any lasting damage. In fact in a way we were encouraged in that adults often shared stories of their Halloween days. My grandmother especially had many of these stories that she told with relish. It seems like in her day it was seen as a lot of fun to tip over an outhouse. And it was even better if someone was in the outhouse when it was tipped.
Today it doesn’t seem like Halloween is the same as it once was as far a tricks go. I can’t remember the last time that I saw a car in October with its windows soaped. I would imagine that there is somewhere someone at this moment talking about “zero tolerance” for such behavior.
Now although I don’t know how conscious it was, however I think the idea of the Halloween season once was to let young people get some of their “devilishness” out of their systems within certain parameters. And I have not done a serious study of the issue, however I think this acceptance of the dark or at least less productive side of our nature was once the predominant view.
I think that in words this is captured by how we once had Peace Officers instead of Law Enforcement. At least to me there seems to be a profound difference between keeping the peace and enforcing the law. Looking back in time some it seems that most towns once had some kind of vice district where most anything went. The only real restriction was that none of this activity was allowed to spill over to the “respectable” parts of town. This allowance of vice seems to have come from the idea that it couldn’t be eliminated so it was best to contain it and thereby keep the peace in most parts of town.
Then it seems that at some point the idea that humankind was perfectible started to grow. Instead of containing vice we would now eliminate it. I suppose the temperance movement that ended in the prohibition of alcohol showed how this way of thinking had grown. Also in this same era once openly tolerated vice districts were shutdown and many previously legal drugs were made illegal. Now considering the increase in violence caused by prohibition and by today’s drug wars it is hard to say if this increased the peace. And you be the judge of if it bought humankind any closer to perfection. Still a lot of people seem to think that if you want people to behave better you make a rule and have “zero tolerance” for its violation.
So I do wonder if people before us were wiser than us in their acceptance and accommodation of our darker sides? Or maybe if not wiser then instinctively more realistic. I suppose I wondered about that more lately as I have been seeing some of the horrible violence in Mexico that is a result of our decades long failure of a drug war. During Halloween when we do still to some extent celebrate our darker sides it may be time to learn to live more peacefully with that side instead of fighting a war against it.
Once cemeteries were a popular spot for an outing. Families would often spend the day and have a picnic while visiting the graves. Cemeteries were often park like and graves were marked with various kinds of elaborate monuments. Demand for flowers for grave sites was enough that often there would be a florist shop located near the entrance to the cemetery. If you could go back to one of the large old cemeteries in the late 19th century on a weekend you would probably find it to be one of the busiest places in town. Traffic was great enough to the main cemeteries that most towns had a trolley line directly to the cemeteries.
Today most of us stay out of cemeteries unless we have to be there. I don’t remember ever seeing anyone having a picnic in a cemetery. Some people still occasionally visit and decorate graves, however that seems to be becoming more rare. From what I have seen the newer cemeteries seem to be designed so that they can be mowed more easily. Monuments are smaller and often are set at ground level so a mower can easily pass over. Cemeteries seem as if they are where we file away the dead.
I suppose the change came as advances in health care made contact with death a less frequent thing. When I read of people living in the 19th century I am struck by how they must have often been grieving. Today the death of a child is a rare thing. Back then it was common to lose half of your children before they became adults. Before vaccinations and antibiotics death came frequently as the result of infectious disease. Of course this had been the condition of people for a long time, however I wonder if it did not become even more painful during Victorian times. Many people in those times were beginning to enjoy a level of comfort and leisure like humanity had not often experienced on a large scale. Life had become less of a constant struggle for the material things needed to survive. Still the Victorians were just as vulnerable to disease as they were in less prosperous times. And considering that humans have a good capacity to make a bad thing even worse we in the US added in a Civil War to up the death rate even more.
So in the 19th century death was a frequent visitor. And it appears that part of the way they coped was to use some of their new wealth to make places of burial more pleasant. And the result today can be seen in the many old cemeteries with their mausoleums, monuments, and large trees. What got me to thinking along these lines is that I plan to visit one of these old cemeteries this weekend. Greenwood Cemetery in Decatur Illinois is one of the best of the great cemeteries of Illinois. While burials still occur there its glory days ended with the Great Depression. Still Greenwood is in pretty good shape. The Cemetery is on hilly ground with many large oak trees. Many of Decatur’s prominent families used Greenwood so there are some outstanding monuments. I have visited Greenwood in the past, however I didn’t have my camera with me. This time I hope that conditions will be such that I can make some worthwhile photos. I imagine that my friend and I will be the only people in the place. Although Greenwood is popular today with ghost hunters since it is said to be very haunted, it has been empty of people on my previous visits there. I imagine that if I see any picnickers this weekend they will be apparitions from another time.
To me it would seem that it would be a great benefit for most of us to have a health care system whose primary purpose was to serve the health needs of all our citizens. Instead we have one whose main purpose is to make large amounts of money for a few of us. Now the current system does provide adequate service to enough people that there is not open rebellion against it. Still I wouldn’t think that it would take much imagination to realize how vulnerable most of us are under the current health care system. Most of us are not so wealthy that we could afford health care if we were to lose access in one of the many ways that one can be shut out of the current system. So to me it would seem like it would make sense to come up with a system that would lessen or eliminate that vulnerability. And until someone comes up with a better mechanism to make such a change we will need to look to the government.
And it seems like it is this look to the government that gets many people agitated. I have heard many say that they do not want the government making decisions about their health care. Like somehow that would be worse than the current system where large insurance companies are the ones making the decisions. It seems like an odd situation where people have come to think they can trust people whose main goal is to make a profit off your illness over our government. And when i say “our government” I think I am pointing out something that many of us seem to have forgotten. And that is that our government is not some alien object that has attached itself to our society to do us harm. Instead from the start of this country we have formed various units of government to do collectively things that we couldn’t do as individuals. And such collective actions did bring many improvements to our lives. Sticking to the area of health care the government funded research in the field of infectious disease probably has done more to improve health and lifespan then any other advancement in treating illness. Yet today many never hear about the many benefits that we enjoy today because of the collective action that those before us took through their government. Instead it seems to have become a reflex in many to see government involvement as bad.
I wonder who benefits from this negative view of our government? If our government is the means where we come together to decide how to accomplish goals that benefit most of us, then who would see that as a negative thing? In the area of health care I think it is clear that the ones who benefit are those few who are making a lot of money off of our need for health care. They know that they would lose this source of easy wealth if Americans ever were to wise up. So they have been spending large amounts of money to scare people about change. And it seems the easiest button to push is the fear of having government involved in health care. And I think how easy it is to trigger this fear is the result of one of the most successful marketing campaigns in history by those who benefit by blinding most Americans to their real interests. I don’t suppose that is surprising since it is those who have the most money who can most often make the best propaganda. And the idea that the government will always be ineffective is an idea that they have done well at getting many to believe. And so while it would help most of us to come together to create a health care system that we all can rely on many are convinced that this is the road to ruin.
