Too much aggression

I really don't care how I get branded, at this point. There is too much aggression in the country and in the world, right now. Everyone trying to act tough and stare down the tough guy across the way. This cartoon from Kevin Kallaugher in the March 29, 2007 edition of The Economist captures the spirit of the times better than any I've seen and perhaps better than anything I've read. It crowds out discussion and debate and brainstorming and independent thought and genuine concern for people and resolving problems they face, all of the values that matter most in liberal democracies. And I don't care, anymore, if that makes me look soft or weak for saying so. It's just a fact. It is undermining important national and international policy discussions and many of the goals that we say we want to achieve. It is the pride of less thoughtful, more action-oriented folks taking action and failing to thoughtfully reflect on the consquences of those actions. But life tends to have consequences, whether we reflect on them and our mistakes or not. I am becoming clearer that so many of the most serious problems in the world are the consequence of us being less thoughtful and perpetually making the mistakes, first, no matter how tragic, rather than reflecting on our actions and how to be more thoughtful and, thus, effective. The claim on the need for more and more aggression is the perpetual rationalization for all of the ugliest events of human history. We are naturally aggressive animals, human beings. We are born predators. But our aggression and predation betrays us and blinds us to the intelligent thought, engagement, and discussion that is needed to resolve our most serious problems. And I don't care, anymore, how that makes me look. I just want us to face it, sooner rather than later, and to move forward in a more sensible and thoughtful direction.

Love,
Ben