inclimate climes (wasRe: LOTR credit line)

In a message dated 2004:01:01 09:43:45 PM, andjo@FREE.FR writes:

>A possible interesting aspect of recent decades is that wars tend to take
>place in places that are climatologically challenging or poor or both.
>In short, in places where there isn't too much of (material) worth to be
fighting
>over.
    Yepyep, exactly. Hence the fighting tends to be over autonomy or over
ethnic issues.
    My uncle Kai taught me that when a people have nothing to lose and
everything to gain they will inevitable go to war (or at least on strike). Hence
many so-call ethnic wars are really about _identity_ - sometimes the "only" thing
a people possess (also called "dignity", etc.) Identity can be very much an
issue of autonomy, of freedom.
    Unckie Kai emailed me this:

>   On the individual personal level, we tend to be quite threaten if our
personhood, >our identity - is insulted or challenged.
>   Similarly we react much the same on a collective level as well.
>    Individuals in a threatened collective personally feel challenged... if
this threat >comes from a power over them, this most often leads individuals
becoming quite >readily, and willing, to totally commit themselves to extreme
forms of >insurgency,terrorism and >war because, when it comes to identity,
even implied >coercion, violence and tyranny is reason enough to declare a war
for "freedom" or >a people's struggle for independence- in essence, identity.
>   Every armed conflict in human history has been over some kind or form of
>identity. In the future, "wars of identity" will be more common than ones of
a purely >nationalistic kind.
> To aid in a historically justified war of identity on behalf of an
oppressed people is >the highest calling a professional soldier - a warrior - can
aspire to.

    I find what my uncle says is pretty dead-on-right & true bleu, though
somehow it strikes me as being a cynical, sweeping (self)justification of
gun-running, guerilla warfare, terrorism, mercenary-ism and other nasty acts of
"dirty war" - things like unchecked torture and whole-sale slaughter.
    In these small regional dirty wars - as well as larger ones, there are
definite tendencies to deliberately disregard or ignore all concepts of honour,
humanity and decent conduct in the supposed name of "freedom" or "patriotism"
or "homeland" ... that, somehow, the Ends justifies the Means...
    I, by no means, am above this myself... I just hope I am honest enough to
remain truly human, truly humane despite of any possible _situa en extremis_
and my reaction(s) in those situations- however minor or major - are
alwayssubject to the harshest forms of self-criticism, self-criticism and
self-discipline. To me _this_ is the highest calling of the everyday warrior as _I_ see it.


In a message dated 2004:01:01 06:53:25 PM, BooRad*** quotes:

>                    There are years that ask questions and years that answer.
>
 >                                                          Zora Neale Hurston

    Shit Happens.


--- º°`°º ø,¸¸,ø  º °   ° º ø    ¸ , ø  º        º     ø       ø     º

Hanuman Zhang, _Gomi no sensei_ [Master of junk]

    "To live is to scrounge, taking what you can in order to survive. So,
since living is scrounging, the result of our efforts is to amass a pile of
rubbish."
                - Chuang Tzu/Zhuangzi, China, 4th Century BCE

    "The most beautiful order is a heap of sweepings piled up at random."
                                    - Heraclitus, Greece, 5th Century BCE

    "...So what is life for? Life is for beauty and substance and sound and
colour; and even those are often forbidden by law [socio-cultural conventions].
. . . Why not be free and live your own life? Why follow other people's rules
and live to please others?..." ~Lieh-Tzu/Liezi, Taoist Sage (c. 450- c. 375
BCE)

    "Taoism in a nutshell: Shit Happens. Roll with the Punches. Hang 10 - Go
with the Flow!" - anonymous California surfer/Beatnik,circa late 1950's/early
1960's

Ars imitatur Naturam in sua operatione.
        [Latin > "Art is the imitation of Nature in her manner of operation."]

"...There is life feeding on this dead heap. ... life will complete its
cycle, teeming within this lump of death." - Bela Bartok

"jinsei to iu mono wa, kichou na geijyutsu to ieru deshou"
        [Japanese > "one can probably say that 'life' is a precious artform"]

    "Art is an antidote for violence. It gives the ecstasy, the
self-transcendence that could otherwise take the form of drug addiction, terrorism,
suicide, or warfare." - Rollo May

"There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats." -
Albert Schweitzer

"Life'n'art, art'n'life. There is _no_ separation. Each is a manifestation of
every aspect of the other. This is a difficult game... A difficult game to
play. It seems, to me, like the only game that needs playing at the moment." -
Warren Burt

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