By: Michelle Carr
Paris, France the city of love. The city that has always held a special place in my heart. The one place that I have repeatedly told myself, I would one day see. Now my heart aches for this magical city as it recovers from a horrific set of terrorist attacks. I am greatly saddened by all the lives that were lost and those that were injured and the loved ones affected. Upon hearing the news of these attacks, I was immediately taken back to that day in September, fourteen years ago. I remember the complete and utter devastation I felt then. I was in the same heartbroken place that I find myself in now. I was filled with fear and sadness as the world seemed so lost.
Quickly the cries for war began. The news feed began to fill with thoughts of “This was an attack of terror, we must retaliate”. This is War! Now, I’m sitting at dinner with friends fourteen years ago watching our President’s speech hearing him say the same words. We weren’t going to allow the attacks to make us live in fear. We were going to go about as normal and continue living. We were beginning the war on terror. I remember having such mixed feelings then. I have never been one who thought war was an answer but I also felt such anger inside at what had happened. I wanted retribution. I wanted to see those, who had hurt us so badly, be hurt in return. My anger then, was far stronger than my fear of what war would bring. And in the end, I agreed that we should go after those who had attacked us. That all those lives we had lost needed to be answered for, our attackers needed to pay. I didn’t want to start my own family in a world filled with fear. And it was so. Our country went to war.
Now, in the present I find myself in a hugely different place than I was then. I hear the people calling for war and I have no urge to join their cries. Not one part of me feels that this is the right answer to what has happened. This is not because these attacks didn’t happen on our home front, because as I said a part of my heart belongs to France. Also there were American lives that were lost as well as some who were injured in these attacks. So it is not because we haven’t been affected, we have been. It is more so due to the fact that for fourteen years, I’ve watched us fight. I’ve seen family members and loved ones go off to join in the fight against terror. I’ve said goodbye as they have gone off to keep the others safe from the fight. I have worried for and waited for their safe return. I have felt the helplessness and prayed that orders would be changed so those I care about won’t been sent off. It may be selfish. I know that we will always need people to protect us, they are all so very brave for doing so and I appreciate it completely. But I just don’t feel that war is the answer any longer. So now even if I’m of the few, my voice will cry for peace.
The genius part of having the ability to remember our history is so that we can learn from it. The key part of that, is to LEARN. History has a habit of repeating itself and it is our job to see that and change our behavior to in turn create a different outcome. With this in mind, one would think that that we would know where retaliation gets us from Pearl Harbor and 9/11. Did we really feel better once we got our eye for an eye? Did our vengeance seeking solve the problem? No it didn’t and as Ghandi said “An eye for an eye will leave the whole world blind.” Vengeance is not the answer.
Nor did the fighting stop after the vengeance was taken in both cases either. The fighting just continued on after, for far too long and is still, ongoing. Now we find ourselves at odds with an enemy that is a subsidiary of the Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda are those who were responsible for the 9/11 attacks.This subsidiary group seems overly anxious to take responsibility for any attack that is attributed to terrorism. Which in many cases, this makes me wonder if in our rush to end this group’s atrocities, are we overlooking the actual people that may be behind the these acts? This aggressive group called Isis, would like nothing more than to see our ground troops on their own territory so they can finally have a shot at them. Because as of now, they can’t organize their reach this far. This group wants us to live in fear and separate ourselves instead of uniting. They would love to see us pointing fingers and saying you did this, believe this and we believe this. They want us to fear each other and push our Muslim friends away. Are we really going to allow ourselves to jump back into a McCarthy like state where we allow fear to guide our actions? Are going to regress to a time where we quickly judge others by their covers instead of who they really are? And yes, I know this does happen even now, but I feel we have gotten somewhat better at understanding one another and accepting others differences. Are we going to let these people push all the efforts of others away and return to living in fear?
I, for one, refuse to take this leap backwards. I refuse to live in a world that we lump people together into groups and fail to see their individuality. I refuse to believe that just because they may share a religion (Which it is really questionable that they do since the religion in question is nonviolent in nature) that they are to be feared. Muslims are not the enemy. Syrians are not the enemy. Religion is not the enemy. Hate is our enemy and that is what we need to address.
I truly believe that the only way for us to end the fighting and these horrible acts is to review our past. Learn from it. See that this direction in which we are headed in can only lead to more fighting and horror. The loss of more lives is not a solution. It is the problem. All lives matter. We simply can’t keep doing the same things over and over hoping for a different result. If we want a new ending then we must start fresh, with a different approach. We can’t let our anger and fear dictate our actions. If we want the fighting to halt, then we can’t approach it from a fighting stance. This only shows that we are prepared to fight. Instead, we must approach it from a place of peace. We need to spread more love and understanding in this world and bring its people together. Isis wants us to divide and fight that is how they become more powerful. They use our words of hate towards one another to empower themselves. They draw numbers for their army by us disagreeing and pushing others away. They want us to turn on each other. The only way we can take away what little power they have is if we band together. We need to look at one another as humans, brothers and sisters, all sharing the same world. We can live together in peace and harmony if we stop looking at one another’s differences as problems and see the beauty in them instead. We are all have our own gifts that we have been given let’s use them toward fixing the things that are wrong instead of attacking each other. As a very wise man by the name of Martin Luther King Jr once said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” Isn’t it about time we listened?
Peace is possible. Let’s not let the louder voices win this time. Together we can be heard. I believe we can create peace for the world. I believe anything is possible if we really want it. Question is, do you want it too? Peace be with you my friends.
Image by Matt Collett found on http://tinyurl.com/nsv3fj2