> -----Original Message-----
> From: John Dunlop [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
>
> How can it ever be stopped? Surely it is not weakness to show
> restraint? Violence breeds violence. We need LESS killing in the
> world, not more.

Along those lines, here is another perspective:

the following is an essay by Professor James Garbarino entitled "Our
Response to the Attack on America: What It Can Teach Children About
Understanding and Revenge"  if you'd like to know more about Professor
Garbarino, you can go to http://esp-nat.tamu.edu/jgarbar.htm

 The September 11 attack on America means many things to America's children
and youth.  Much of the initial response by parents, educators, and mental
health professionals has focused on coping with the trauma and the fear.
But as the days pass and issues of retaliation become the focus of attention
a whole new set of issues emerges.  What will our response teach children
about revenge and compassion?

 Tibet's Dali Lama is a world leader in teaching about compassion.  One of
his most important lessons is that "true compassion is not just an emotional
response, but a firm commitment founded on reason."  It is easy to feel
sympathy of the victims of violence-- human decency demands it. But it is
much more difficult to feel true compassion for our enemies-- unshakeable
understanding of how violence and rage arise in human beings, understanding
that endures the bad actions of those human beings.

 I learned this anew in the case of Nathanial Brazil, the 13 year old boy
who shot and killed his teacher in Lake Worth, Florida, May 26, 2000. Before
he committed the murder, most of us would have found it easy to feel
sympathy for him because of the difficult circumstances of his life.  But
after his deadly act many people changed their emotional response from
sympathy to rage-- and many wished he be executed, or at least imprisoned
for life. One friend of the murdered teacher even said in public that he
hoped the boy would be raped and tortured every day while he was in prison.
This response reveals that the feeling people had for this boy was
sentimentality not true compassion as the Dali Lama defines it.

 This is an important lesson to consider as our nation responds to the
terrorist assault of September 11.  It is quite one thing to talk in public
about "bringing the perpetrators to justice" and quite another to speak of
exacting our revenge.  It is one thing to understand the origins of
terrorism and quite another to portray the struggle as simply one of "evil
versus good."

 Terrorists typically are caught up in their own scenarios of revenge and
retaliation. Often they have experienced personal suffering or family loss,
or historical victimization, and are seeking a way to give meaning to that
suffering through acts of violent revenge.  Mostly, they are individuals who
are offered a political or ideological interpretation for their situation by
their leaders. Sometimes these leaders are pathologically calculating and
cold in their exploitation of their followers. Sometimes these leaders
themselves are plotting revenge for what they have experienced as victims of
political oppression. For them, the terrorist acts they commit are not
"unprovoked assaults," but rather are their own, sometimes warped version of
"bringing the perpetrators to justice."

 All this is not to excuse the terrorist. No one of good faith or sensitive
heart could or would do so. But if we are to do more than continue to
escalate the cycle of violence we must do more than feel outrage and
practice more than retaliation. We must seek a deeper understanding-- of
individual terrorists and of the causes they represent.  We must not fear
this understanding. We must not reject those who ask for understanding.  We
must remember the wisdom that teaches, "if you want peace work for justice."
And remember what Ghandi taught when he said, "you must be the change you
wish to see in the world."

 The coming days and weeks will teach children and youth a great deal about
justice, compassion, and revenge.  They will learn lessons from what our
government does on our behalf.  Our goal should be to teach them at least
three lessons:  First, compassion and understanding are founded in strength
not weakness.  Let us celebrate the helpers and those who speak and act for
justice and due process rather than for blood revenge. Second, protecting
the stigmatized from scape goating and "guilt by association" is an
important goal of public institutions in a time of national crisis. In the
wake of the first Pearl Harbor at the start of World War II we rounded up
Japanese-Americans and detained them as suspected enemies of the state.  We
must guard against that mentality if it is indeed Arabs and Muslims who are
to blame for the catastrophe of September 11.  Third, understanding and
compassion in the face of hate and fanaticism are virtues, not something to
be afraid of. It is more than a matter of our good and their evil.
Dehumanization is the enemy. Each individual has a story to tell, a human
story. Even as we oppose, hunt for, and bring to justice the terrorists we
should remember this. Perhaps we can even understand something about the
conditions abroad that give rise to this fanatical hatred of America.

 Our kids are watching and listening.

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