Absolute Pacifism Essay

Just war can be traced back to the pagan teachings, which was later refined by Christian leaders to justify their followers into going to war (Cahill, 2005). St. Augustine was identified as the first to offer his view on war and justice, viewing war as a necessary evil if peace and justice were to come and labeling it as something practical when conflict arises. Later on, St. Thomas Aquinas revised Augustine’s version and added three more conditions: the war had to be waged by the proper authority, the cause had to be just, and the intentions had to be right. All of these additions and refinements lead to the same just war theory that we are familiar with today (Baer, 2006).

As Cierco(Source A) said to his son, “physical force… is characteristic of man.” Peace may last for some time, but differing views on complicated issues means fighting for what you believe is right. For example, the Cold War clearly supports this message because the US strongly believed in democratic values and they were fighting against the Soviet Union who desired to spread communism. The Cold War strengthened US politically because they maintained their democratic values and contained communism by helping out countries that were devastated after World War II. The US was strictly against communism because it harmed their democratic views and because this could not be solved through discussion, the Cold War was bound to happen. The US and USSR wanted to gain more allies through the spread of their own ideologies but, the Soviet Union clearly had a negative intent of spreading their power on the world. The US policy of containment weakened the Soviet Union because they were not able to spread communism and therefore led to the fall of their empire. This shows that war can either strengthen countries or weaken countries who abuse their use of power. Action must be taken against countries who have a negative purpose of spreading their power and if not resolved through discussion, this means going to

George Orwell states “if you hamper the war effort of one side you automatically help the other” (283). If we do not prepare for any war that comes toward our way because of pacifism we are automatically helping the enemy defeat us. If we just follow the pacifist believes many historical wars that were won would have resulted in defeat. War preparation is a key that helps win any war and defeats the enemy.

The damage of wars is way too much that it should never happen under any circumstance. No one should ever initiate a war and claim it justified. Let’s see why war should not be justified.

People believe war can help the development of mankind and country. Stated by Emile Zola in her book The Origin of the First World War, “It is only warlike nations which have prospered; a nation dies as soon as it disarms. War is the school of discipline, sacrifice and courage” (Document 1). Zola’s point is very true. After years of war, the winning country can always gain some sort of profit.

There are a number of other benefits the non-violence and pacifist policy has. They believe that wars only lead to

Pacifism is the broad belief that war and violence are unethical and that disputes should be settled with nonviolence. It is divided into three main sections: absolute pacifism, conditional pacifism, and selective pacifism. The different branches of pacifism support its effectiveness as a foreign policy because they provide different ways for nations to incorporate pacifism into their foreign policy. It gives nations the freedom to choose how they want to include peace without being restricted to one branch. For example, absolute pacifism is probably not an effective principle to dictate foreign policy, but the fact that there are other forms, such as selective and conditional, makes pacifism more effective as a foreign policy.

Almost every state on Earth desires peace, so why do countries go to war so

As explained by William Hawk in his essay “Pacifism: Reclaiming the Moral Presumption”, the pacifist is a person that refuses to participate in war for in any circumstance for two reasons; the grounding belief that war is wrong, and the belief that human life is sacred and invaluable. Many pacifist

War is controversial, unfortunate, and certainly misunderstood; it is a transforming agent, a catalyst for change. Nonetheless, many people focus on war's negative consequences, while positive effects are downplayed. War is a necessary evil in the sense that it stabilizes population, encourages technological advances, and has a very high economic value. Without war, the overpopulation of the human race is inevitable. It is this reason that war is a useful tool by not only Mother Nature, but also humans themselves to institute population control.

During the 20th century America has been involved in many conflicts that have led to war or the taking up of arms against other humans and nations. Although the vast majority of Americans have blindly accepted these actions throughout the century, more and more people are seeing war as morally wrong. Reasons for this epiphany are based off of a variety of things and encompass many other aspects related to war and killing examples include: due to moral and ethical principles, objection to war due to strong religious beliefs, the objection to violence due to the same ideals above, objection to the government's use of force, and the objection to the use of weapons of mass destruction. Being a conscientious objector is fairly uncommon in the United States military but there are those who have served have identified as one.

In World War 2 over 65 million people lost their lives. The emotional toll on the families of the lost soldiers soon followed. Throughout World War 2 we gained many allies, but because of all the destruction that the was caused, for example, peoples homes and all their precious materials being stolen or destroyed, we lost a vast majority of those them. The taking of so many lives and destroying of countries can cause a lot of hate on the nations that inflicted this destruction. This can cause young kids to grow up hating other nations and that is when conflict can start. The lives that are lost during wartime are undeniably one of the biggest causes of death. One thing that every country has in common is the death toll that they face in war. Conflict arises no matter what the cause. The way to grow as a world is to control these conflicts with verbal communication instead of using war as an option.

Sometimes the longest and toughest journeys are inside one’s mind; and although others cannot notice them instantly, they change personalities profoundly. Dan, the main character, is a gymnast-student for Berkley University, California. His life seems perfect, he has everything he wants: friends, girls, good grades, his talent and passion for gymnastics and the strive to go to the Olympics. Until he meets Socrates. Socrates is a gas station attendant who leaves a mark in Dan’s memory right from the beginning. When they start to get to know each other, Dan understands that he’s nothing but a fool, and that he needs Socrates’s guidance to wake up and reach a deeper state of knowledge, a state of enlightenment.

For my book project I read the book Way of the Peaceful Warrior, by Dan Millman. Set in Berkeley California, Dan Millman a college student struggles to find the part of himself that has always been missing. One night while out walking from his dorm, Dan comes across a gas station and a strange man that is soon to turn his life upside down. This man, known as Socrates, shows Dan a side of existence that only few people had ever seen. To become a warrior like Socrates and have the mind to not allow the regular struggles of life to control a single part of you. Socrates takes Dan in and tries to create a warrior from a young star athlete with the ignorance of every other human on this earth. Through his

2. There are different theories that seek to explain why humans still fight in war. Some of the individual, state and global level theories of conflict are based on: Human Nature or Individual Leaders, States’ Internal characteristics, and Global Level System (Turetzky lec 11). Human Nature arguments for the causes of war are based in Sigmund Freud idea that “aggression is simply part of human nature that stems from humans’ genetic programming and psychological makeup.” Realists also “argue that violence is a product of bad human nature” and that there is not anything to eliminate this bad human habit. I believe that it is true that humans’ nature is composed with an instinct of violence (War). However, society has a lot to do with the expansion of this bad habit. Today aggression is embedded in everything, which enforces our acceptance and practice of violence. Obviously, as realists argue, it is almost impossible to eliminate this bad habit from human nature. In contrast, the individual Leader arguments blame the state leaders for wars. However, we can’t blame a country’s leader for war. The author Stoessinger, stated in his book that a state head’s perceptions are decisive in war (Stoessinger 65). I believe that a leader’s