Day 122 I Saw Something That Irritated Me.

I've seen this bumper sticker a few times that really drives me up a wall. I came across it again on someone's facebook and I've been thinking about it all day. It reads this way: "Except for ending slavery, Fascism, Nazism, and Communism, war never solved anything." I figure I'll take this one point by point, although I am sure you know where I'm going just already.

Slavery. HAHA. Let's define it, shall we? Because this quote hasn't, I'm gonna do it instead. What about the girls in India that are forced into sexual acts with men many years older than them? That's slavery. And war didn't end it because it's still going on. "But no," you say "we're obviously talking about slavery in America." Ok. Again, we're defining slavery. So if setting someone free means throwing them out into a capitalist society where they have essentially no rights anyway, what good does it do? I'm not suggesting that slaves weren't happy to be set free. I am saying that they remained oppressed by the Jim Crow laws and a poor public opinion until the flippin' 1960s and 70s, and that oppression continues today as well. This doesn't mention the idea slavery of the proletarians to the bourgouisie, because as good as I have it in this world, I'm still a slave to the system.

Fascism. The only country that's ever had this government in it's truest form is Mussolini's Italy, and it worked really well. Fascism, for those of you that don't know, or even care, is a totalitarian form of government in which all power is centralized in the hand of one individual. What was bad about it is that it was based on extreme nationalism. These ideas still persist today. This same train of thought goes into Nazism, which was basically nationalism (you all know this) with somewhat of a socialist twist (industrial army and so on.) There are Nazis and Fascists still out there in this world today. War didn't kill the ideas, because you can't kill an idea. And, by the way, the 1st Ammendment to the US Constitution protects people's right to believe these things. Anyone heard of Aryan Nation? The Church of Jesus Christ Christian? Wikipedia them and see what you find. Essentially Nazis claiming the divine right of white people to rule the earth.

War won't kill an idea.

Communism. Anyone heard of Cuba? Because it's a communist country. Actually, if you're heard of the Bay of Pigs, they actually beat US. Go figure. Vietnam? Yeah, they're communist too. And I am of the opinion that there's nothing inherently wrong with communism, it's dorks that rush it and don't know how it works.

So.

Let's not say what war did and didn't do. It has resulted in millions of lives lost, served as events used for political and economic gain, and reinforced cultural riffs that have led to even MORE wars.

Ok. Sorry, ya'll.

I just really hate war. I see it's use, I just don't like how it's used.