Freedom isn’t violent, violence is violent…
It’s not just war, bombs, hate crimes, murders, fist fights, assassinations, violence is so much more. I don’t think there’s a need for me to explain how beating your wife or war is bad. So, we will pass these things. As violence is every present everywhere you look. But people will not seem to face that fact because it feels like they like to relish in that type of violence. Be it because they take part in it, or they enjoy it as it is targeted towards people they do not like for any arbitrary reason that makes no real sense. But we need to unlearn this, violence is not just one that is seen.
A. Verbal Violence
Violence comes in so many forms. Verbal, is another popular form of violence. Whether it’s verbal abuse of a significant other, racist, xenophobic, hateful stuff, slurs and their use. There are so many ways of being violent through words. But, luckily, lately we being to understand that and fight back against such behavior or at least label it correctly, such that we can say “this is bad”. Which means we can do something about it. And if we can understand this, we might understand others as well. For example, it seems that a great subsection of abuse, which is political or systematical abuse is still a mystery for many.
B. Political Violence
Policy makes system, system makes policy, it’s a vicious corrupt circle. But we need to understand that these two things are tied together. One can not be without the other. If violence is present in one, then it is present in the other as well. Same goes for corruption and everything that is bad, not just violence. But let us start with strictly policy…
1. Strictly Policy
Contrary to popular belief these days, assassination attempts are not the only type of political violence. Policy and law can be violent as well. For example, the UK and France restricting the right to protest. That is a violent precedent that steps on the rights of these people. I don’t think I have to explain to you how apartheid is bad, how the Holocaust and genocide is bad, how the Jim Crow era was bad, how war is bad and that all this usually starts with policy and law. The Holocaust was legal, and you’ve probably read that multiple times. We’ve talked about this in the previous post about Historical Consequences. So, hopefully you understand how all that is violent. Because otherwise we’d be stuck here for eternity. But, if you understand those things, you understand the base level of political violence and how it can have many forms.
So, now that we get that out of the way, there are plenty of other ways policy and law can be violent. Basically anything that restricts your freedom and makes your life harder is violent. For example, if you have rights, and a certain group of people do not have the same rights you have, that is political and systematical violence. Why? Because they do not have access to certain rights. And anyone against that, is violent against said group of people. Red lining, a thing that happened in the US where if you were of a certain color, you were not able to buy a house there. That is also political violence. Here’s another example, let’s say you were born in a city. You went to school, you got your degree, you work hard, but by the time you started school to now, the price of housing has gone through the roof. That is political violence, as it is tied to directly to policy of your government and it affects you directly. The government could do something about it. Plenty have done so, there are studies on this which could bring a solution. But the people in charge have an inherent interest in not doing something, because they are systematically using the excuse of a free market to plump their pockets and those around them in order to profit. And it’s really difficult to think they are just incompetent when we have too many examples, studies, exposes of them doing these things on purpose. And not with just housing, food, water, and pretty much everything else that could make our lives better, which got harder and harder to attain. Just like creating a family, pollution, global warming, these are things policy could change and make our lives easier and better. But the violent system will not accept such a change for the loss of profits.
2. Strictly Systematical
So when everything is for profit, and profit comes at the expense of workers, what is this system if not violent against the cogs it uses to function? A corporation can bribe officials, to get a license to dry out a lake, put a fence around it and sell the water to the locals. Something Nestle is really good at. That is violence. And it is brought on by this system. A system in search of maximizing profits for the shareholders. It doesn’t matter if an African village is left to die or walk 1.5 km to the nearest water source, if Nestle can sell you that water for 1 dollar when the salary there is 2 dollars per hour, that’s all that matters. Now, I don’t think I have to explain to you that worker exploitation is bad. But while this is a real extreme example. Just like the children making your iPhones, picking your cocoa and coffee beans, you are also exploited. If a corporation makes 4 billion a year, pays out its CEO with 3 million dollars, yet you make 600 bucks a month, you are being exploited. And the governments allowing this, makes it legal. Thus this is a violent systematic problem, affecting us all. So every single thing an employee can do to profit and not pay you, is inherently violent. And when this is at the very core of the philosophy of everything we do, then everything is violent by its nature as this is its system. And you can’t change your jobs out of it, or bootstrap yourself out of it. You can only join in the violence and start your own business, if the entrance level is low and exploit others.
You can mask it as incompetence, corruption, the free market, freedom of expression, political freedom, religious freedom, whatever you want to call it, this system is one with violence at its core. Remove the violence, the system is suddenly called something else. Because this system needs profit, profit needs exploitation of workers, exploitation of any kind if violent. So if we want to change this system, we need to change. We need to stop making excuses for what is. In no fair world, no matter how responsible one is, one should have access to everything and have all their rights, if they do not impede the rights and freedoms of others. And no, there is no right to be a bigot.
I promise we will talk what you can actually do and solutions some other time. But this two parter was about violence and most its forms.
You can read post early on Nobody The Extra Blog with the tagline “I actually do love people very much, but…”
