I read an interesting article in an older NY Times about ancient terrorism.
The author, Robert Harris is talking about the year 68 BC. He begins: “the world’s only military superpower was dealt a profound psychological blow by a daring terrorist attack on its very heart. Rome’s port at Ostia was set on fire, the consular war fleet destroyed, and two prominent senators, together with their bodyguards and staff, kidnapped.”
He continues: “ in the panicky aftermath of the attack, the Roman people made decisions that set them on the path to the destruction of their Constitution, their democracy and their liberty.”
Toward the end, Harris summarizes: “By the oldest trick in the political book — the whipping up of a panic, in which any dissenting voice could be dismissed as “soft” or even “traitorous” — powers had been ceded by the people that would never be returned.”
Sound familiar? There’s a lot of parallels in the original article, which you can read here : http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/30/opinion/30harris.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
a security blanket
This happens often, and yet we never change our reaction. And that’s why it happens again. It’s an easy plan with guaranteed results.
The way to stop terrorism seems to be to stop being afraid of things that probably won’t happen to most of us.
A way to make people do what you want is to scare them. (That’s really rather boring, wouldn’t you say, and unimaginative. We should demand more than just feeling frightened by something horrific before anyone gets to change the rules, right? We could demand… uh, evidence, or facts.)
Yet we never change our reaction
cgroke: “This happens often, and yet we never change our reaction.”
At the Nuremberg trials Reich-Marshall Hermann Goering testified:
“Naturally, the common people don’t want war, but after all it is the leaders of the country who determine policy and it is always a simple matter to drag people along…Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and for exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.”
yep
Until people realize that safety is an illusion and freedom isn’t, it’ll always be the way.