Pressure

Melissa and I saw the most horrific thing last night. It was a beheading of an American by Iraqi insurgents.

Warning: Extremely graphic and disturbing
Beheading of Eugene Armstrong

Terrorists and those from autocratic countries reason that liberal democratic countries just really don't have the balls to use pressure and blunt force like they do.

People from liberal democratic countries who aren't quite convinced of their liberal democratic values get scared that the terrorists are right.

And the truth is that far too many citizens from liberal democratic countries act as if the terrorists are right, so enamoured are they with the use of force or pressure - bullying is the common term for that strategy - to accomplish their ends.

I don't understand why free people can never quite embrace their freedom, and the learning that comes with it, from good choices and from bad choices.

And bad choices by average people in liberal and autocratic countries always rationalize bad choices by a government and by other average people to force themselves on one another.

That beheading video is what real pressure looks like. I wonder if liberal democratic citizens will either have the balls to apply real pressure like that beheading, or give up the practice, altogether, as much as possible, since it undermines development and exercise of conscience.

All I know is that while I may be forced to live with the awful choice that liberal democratic citizens have chosen for this political period, I will never recognize it as the right choice or the best choice. Because it clearly isn't, no matter how much pressure people apply.

Love,
Ben