In his most recent hauntingly gorgeous article, journalist Chris Hedges describes the kind of trauma that afflicts the perpetrators of violence as they bury, deny, rationalize, and eventually face the truth of what they have done.
You served honorably for what seemed to you good reasons at the time, and you are not to blame. Reserve your contempt for the creeps in Washington who risked your life and millions of others to serve their bottom line and further the agenda of their corporate masters.
Thank you Charles. Your return to these matters in the last 4 essays have been deeply important to me. What you are saying is not being said. I know you know that I just want to reinforce its vitality.
I believe it was Thomas Keating who offered me the thought that forgiveness is the divine technology for all forward movement. Nothing meaningful happens without it. It is the starting place for all shifts in thinking. I have a long ago memory of a certain day in time when the front page news on all our newspapers in Toronto screamed of human atrocities. And I looked around and wondered how it was all of us were still standing, why we had not fallen to our knees in collective repentance, crippled under the weight of our disregard for the miraculous.
I follow Chris's work, as I do yours - both writers of intelligence and compassion. And these voices need hearing.
I don't know why, but Simone Weil wailing away in the thirties, comes to my mind. Perhaps because the image of a beautiful young girl's face seen through a snipper's instrument of viewing stays with me. I keep this little quote close to my own work always. It is from Waiting for God. "In the legend of the Grail, the keeper of this miraculous vessel is a king paralyzed by a most painful wound. And there is said that the Grail shall belong to the first who asks this king the question, "What are you going through?" The love of our neighbour, in all its fullness, simply means being able to say to him, "What are you going through?" It is a recognition that the sufferer exists, not only as a unit in a collection or a specimen from the social category labeled "unfortunate" but also as a man, exactly like us, who was one day stamped with a special mark of affliction. For this recognition to occur, it is enough, but it is indispensable, to know how to look at him in a certain way. This way of looking is, first of all, attentive. The soul empties itself of all its own contents in order to receive into itself the being it is looking at, just as he is, in all his truth."
Emmanuel Levinas' work too, speaks of the sacred in the face of the other. When we look into the face of the other, really look, we cannot kill. We have stopped looking, I think, both collectively and individually and this allows the killing to go on, government sanctioned, church sanctioned, culturally sanctioned. Even on this beautiful day, surrounded by the purple gold glory of the Canadian autumn countryside where I live, there is a malaise of sorrow filtering through the sunlight. In a world with pileated woodpeckers and polar bears, how can our contribution to the astonishments be to find new ways to kill? And worse, think ourselves clever in their inventions?
Thank you, as always, Charles, for your thoughtful renderings. Every blessing. Candice
Thank you for sharing your thoughts in this comment, to know what someone else is going through is an intimacy that seems of less importance these days and a question rarely asked. Thank you for bringing it up because of it’s life necessity and the core of humanity at least it should be ❤️🙏🏻
Thank you for this dear Charles. I was born and grew up in Israel and was a devout zionist for the first half of my life, before waking up. I later left that depraved terrorist state and that deeply-ill ethno-fascist perpetrator society. If i may respectfully point this out, it seems to me that you as well as Chris Hedges might be missing the ROOT CAUSE of what drives the neo-Nazi supremacist Israeli billionaire ruling class (who not only butcher, torture, abuse, disposses, steal lands, brutalize, traumatize, DEHUMANIZE and genocide the local people of the land, but also economically oppress ordinary israelis), it seems like you're missing the root cause that drives them to constantly commit their vicious genocidal atrocities nonstop (for many decades now) against the local people and implement their supremacist nationalist-religious ideology on a monstrous scale (like i said, i was born and grew up in israel and was a devout zionist for the first half of my life, so i am intimately familiar with how these Zionist Nazis think, their PROFOUNDLY SUPREMACIST, INTOLERANT, VIOLENT AND EXCLUCIVIST religious ideology, and with the "we're the victims" mythology that israelis are fed nonstop from birth to provide an excuse for the murderous criminality of the zionist billionaires' project in west Asia). The ROOT CAUSE that makes them commit these crimes is described in this profound essay https://www.pdrboston.org/israel-s-government-attacks-jews-to, which IMHO is a must read for anyone who wishes to understand what is actually happening in this piece of land. I can confirm that the very insightful researcher who wrote this is spot on in his description of life in israel and of the treatment of ordinary israelis by the zionist billionaire ruling class (who are the driving force behind the century-long nonstop zionist mass-butchering abuse dispossesion and dehumanization of the local people which is ongoing and relentless (and of which you gave just one small tiny example in this post. By the time you posted this, many others have already been murdered). The supremacist israeli billionaire ruling class who thrive on nationalist-religious division, intolerance, fear and hatred, and do EVERYTHING in their power to make sure it never stops. And by the way, that's also why these nazi zionist billionaires are so heavily backing and financing trump. Trump is an integral part of their strategy to ensure never ending religious-nationalist hatred, division and war, the very thing that the supremacist zionist billionaires thrive on and that keeps them in power and allows them to oppress and get rich off of ordinary israelis. Not that the right-wing zionist DNC are much better, but trump is clearly the preferred choice of the neo-nazi billionaire mass murderers because it's absolutely guaranteed thst he'll fully support, arm and fund (use american taxpayers money to fund) their mass-butchering and l dispossesion of the local people, in order to generate as much religious-nationalist hatred and violence as possible, which is the key to trump's and the supremacist israeli billionaires' division of the have-nots along nationalist-religious lines, and their pitting of the have-nots against each other, to cement their domination over the people.
And by the way, in order to understsnd EXACTLY how this process works, exactly why the billionaire ruling class must always keep us in a state of division and hostility along religious-nationalist lines, must constantly keep us in a state of tribalist war and insecurity (or threat of such war), in order to understand EXACTLY how this religuous-nationalist division, war and insecurity ensures that the billionaire ruling class stay in power over us and get richer and richer off of us, to understand this at depth, I highly recommend this profoundly important essay which in my view is absolute essential reading for every human on the planet, to understand what is actually going on and how the billionaire ruling class oppressors are playing us https://www.pdrboston.org/oppressors-need-bogeyman-enemies
And if i may continue, the same brilliant researcher also writes very insightfully on why there is no chance in the world to ever stop the century-long neo-nazi zionist project to disposses, dehumanize, brutalize, abuse, traumatize and annihilate the local people, if the TRUE NATURE of what drives the ruling class' violence against the local people (as well as their oppression of ordinary israelis) isn't exposed, the true CLASS DOMINATION nature of the billionaire's zionist project. Here https://johnspritzler.substack.com/p/pro-palestine-activists-make-themselves is one example of his wise criticism of the anti-genocide movement for its failure to bring to the public's attention the ROOT CAUSE of why the supremacist israeli billionaires are committing the ongoing atrocities. And the failure to point this out leaves the field right open for zionist propagandist to deceptively claim that they regretably must use violence in order to ensure the safety and security of jews, which is a BLATANT LIE, if one understands the class nature of the zionist billionaires' project in west Asia and how they actually opress ordinary jews and don't give a damn about jews. For example, besides their ongoing economic oppression against ordinary israelis (see details in the link shared above), right-wing zionists have also severely attacked and starved jewish holocaust survivors in the refugee camps after the second world war who didn't wish to come to their colonial project in palestine. Zionists also actively prevented the rescue of jews from nazi occupied areas in europe in order to use their death as bargaining chips to ensure world sympathy and support for their colonial project in palestine (the fact that most jews in germany were socialist and communist made it all the more easier for right-wing zionists to sacrifice them by giving them away to be slaughtered by right-wing german nazis who shared the supremacist essence of the zionists' nationalist-religious supremacist ideology (the nazi zionists and german nazis disagree on who is the superior group, but they fully agree on the principle that one group is superior over others and of higher value than others); In addition, zionist also routinely sacrifice jews (as well as others) in their global terror attacks that they conduct across the globe under the false flag of 'islamic terrorism' (they use these false flag operations for two reasons. One is in order to dehumanize muslims and present them as violent savages so that you'll cheer for the zionists' stealing of their land and dispossesing them. And the second reason for the zionists' global terror network under the false flag of 'islamic terrorism' is to again, ensure eternal religious division, hatred and violence, the key that keeps them in power. This is also the reason, by the way, why the zionist billionaires have been funding hamas (and ISIS) for decades now. To ensure that there's a always a scary boogeyman to maximally frighten ordinary israelis into keeping the right-wing billionaores in power (becasue it is the billionaores' representitives who cynically paint themselves as the ones who will protect "the people" from "that evil monstrous scary enemy who is coming to get you") AND in order to ensure that they can point to the scary boogyman as an existential threat and say that that's the reason they cannot stop attacking and dispossesing the local people.
The space for a comment is finished here, but if anyone wants sources for the claims in the last paragraph, I'll happily give them in a separate reply.
If you are not familiar with Avigail Abarbanel's substack, then you might find a kindred soul whose last post is deeply personal and moving, about her growing up and leaving Israel, which brought her not just travel but truth. https://avigail.substack.com
Joy, I just read this article and found it quite informative. Thank you for posting the link. I experienced many aha's and easily recognized the cult behavior you described in Israel. After all, I grew up in my father's WASP upperclass, antisemitic, anti anything but WASP cult. Once you've been in one, you recognize others. I was aware of the victim culture among Jews for sure, but I missed the sickness of the big picture you drew. We live in one big victim culture here in the US and victimhood goes part and parcel with cult life. So while I can see through her words that the Cult/Victim/Perpetrator culture is quite intense and blatantly violent in Israel, I also see it everywhere these days, in every country, every town, every neighborhood. What is truly unbelievable to me is how this picture is worldwide. But I guess when I think about how long humans have been doing their thing in the world (what a pathetic euphemism) then really the earth is pretty small. Perhaps it is not just a handful of evil puppeteers pulling our strings, but rather it is all of our creation..... every single one of us from the beginning. Which is kinda what Charles was saying. I love reading stories about courageous people who left the cult, who blew the whistle, who stood up and told their truth. It gives me courage.❤️
No matter where you look in the world you can find tragedy, violence, despair and greed. The food we eat on our plates is at the cost of life, even if it was just by stealing an animals habitat for farming monocrops like soy, or by killing the insects eating the crops, that other species eat to survive. The shelter we use to keep our families safe at night could be shelter for refugees, but we choose our family’s safety instead. Even the trees choke out the plants vying for sunshine and water.
It is our job to try to make peace where we can, but sometimes there is no peace to be had. Some marriages are irretrievably broken, some family divisions will never heal, some cultures will never be able to reconcile the past, and some people can choose to heal, but some cannot. In those cases, we need to find the beauty, grace, and love even in the midst of the darkness.
Take a little heart - trees in nature’s biome do actually share nutrients and information with each other and other species of trees. Read The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wholleben, it speaks to a way of being here on earth that we don’t often get a sense of.
Thank you, always and again for your insightful words.
We live in a black/white; good/evil perceiving culture that seems to believe that the “victim” is always worse off than the “perpetrator.”
My daughter was on campus at Virginia Tech during the 2007 massacre where Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people and himself. By the next day, the traumatized but deeply wise students had created thirty-three makeshift shrines on the grounds. Thirty-three.
They understood that Cho was also a victim, he had to be, in order to do what he did. Later it was revealed that Cho had been mercilessly bullied nonstop since kindergarten, and finally snapped. But no one person has to take the blame for that bullying, it is like a stoning. The blame is so desaturated that it becomes imperceptible. Nevertheless, all the tiny pieces of bullying violence, when added together, has a result.
When the parents of students finally got to Virginia Tech the next day, they dismantled the 33rd shrine. Shameful, imo.
I think it is the same for living in toxic patriarchy. Every day, the stones of toxic patriarchs are thrown at women and “others” by stone-throwers, many of whom don’t even realize they are toxic patriarchs throwing stones. It is like a fish who doesn’t have the consciousness that it lives in water, it is just the accepted state of affairs which surrounds it.
But the abuse continues, and the blame for the abuse is still dissipated enough to allow the abusers to remain incognito, even from themselves.
So the state of generalized abuse continues, and sets the stage for other more focused abuses, like the murder of Ayşenur Eygi.
Upon inspection, I think that we will find that the trail of abuse always ends at the foot of toxic patriarchy, so that’s probably a good place to start.
Yes, the Patriarchal Death Cult reigns supreme, for the moment. I fear we are in a place where either we learn how to rein it in, or it destroys us. What are the steps? Each of us has some part of the answer.
Yes, Joy, I think you are right on, that each one of us has a part of the answer. And I think it starts with the individual, being thoughtful about the invisible ways we give power to the patriarchy, and this is often in language. For example, history is “His-story”…but what about “HER story”? There is subtle but massive power in the words we choose, getting “woke” about that, and reflecting that understanding in daily language, is a start …
You realize that Charles has some pretty backward ideas about women. Like that they basically exist as a receptical for his seed to bring forth his "love gifts". When they stop being fertile he tosses them aside. Wonder how long it will be before Stella gets the heave ho. Or maybe that's what NAAS is for: a steady supply of women to impregnate.
I came into adulthood in the 90’s, training and working for an organization focused on transformation and being in service to the collective.
In the model we taught, calling oneself out for making others ‘wrong’ and other transgressions was a cornerstone of the work.
‘Looking good’ was a function of how quickly one was willing to own their subversive beliefs and behaviors. The second piece was cleaning up the mess we made.
While I had plenty of issues with the organization itself, their working model of taking responsibility for one’s impact is still one I have yet to see taught elsewhere.
I’ve spent decades practicing owning my shit only to have my own vulnerability and willingness used against me.
I used to assume that my willingness to tell the truth and own my perpetrations would create a space for others to do the same.
That’s often not been the case. More often than not others have used my generosity to further hunker down in their righteousness.
I am personally sick of the cult of white guilt. Every goddamn Progressive organization opens a meeting with a so-called land acknowledgment now, in addition to your pronouns, disabilities and victim status. Like any of us had anything to do with anything.
It is a symptom of the times of course. But YOU know where your heart and soul lie and why are you doing and being what you do. It is so important for us to hold on to that in the face of disdain
Thank you for this poignant and convicting reflection on the complicity of what Christopher Browning calls “desk murderers” in “Ordinary Men”:
“This approach emphasizes the degree to which modern bureaucratic life fosters a functional and physical distancing in the same way that war and negative racial stereotyping promote a psychological distancing between perpetrator and victim. Indeed, many of the perpetrators of the Holocaust were so-called desk murderers whose role in the mass extermination was greatly facilitated by the bureaucratic nature of their participation. Their jobs frequently consisted of tiny steps in the overall killing process, and they performed them in a routine manner, never seeing the victims their actions affected. Segmented, routinized, and depersonalized, the job of the bureaucrat or specialist—whether it involved confiscating property, scheduling trains, drafting legislation, sending telegrams, or compiling lists—could be performed without confronting the reality of mass murder. Such a luxury, of course, was not enjoyed by the men of Reserve Police Battalion 101, who were quite literally saturated in the blood of victims shot at point-blank range.”
I explored the cowardice and culpability of such individuals in “Letter to a Colluder” three years ago:
And I can’t help but think of Derrick Jensen after reading your point about civilization being a killing machine as he details in his “Endgame” lecture:
Though I haven't agreed with Charles' last 2-3 articles in his dismissing the horrors and deceit perpetuated by Trump and his ilk, I heartily agree here: "The nation must face the truth of what it has done. It must discard its justifications, rationalizations, and false histories. It must gaze with grief and horror at its works, and resolve to be as strong an agent of peace and healing as it had been of war and destruction. That last step follows inevitably from the first. That is the key—honesty. A nation must be honest with itself about its history and its present." The lies and coverups on all sides must end...so that we may grieve and forgive. https://medium.com/@lindajoystone/december-23-2019-by-lindajoy-7fafe56c45c9
Thank you. This is profound and necessary, imho. It's also a very generous look at someone else's work, for those who might not quite be ready or aware that it's there. On that note, I'm still mind-boggled by how Chris Hedges went from journalistic hero to villain in the eyes of many, so I'm particularly grateful for your clear-eyed view of how and why his perspective matters ever more right now. 🙏
So much understanding is needed to ease the collective shame---perhaps if our culture was less judgemental and so quick to condemn, fault, ridicule, neglect or ignore, fewer and fewer spikes of violence would occur in the first place. (I mean that is the question isn't it. Why?)
I recall the proverb:
A child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth.
Wow, Charles, what an incredibly powerful post. Thank you! This passage in particular resonated throughout my being as being true: “What is the real plea behind begging for forgiveness? It is, ‘Please see me. Please see that the crime is not my deepest nature. Please know me as someone who has turned from extinguishing life to nurturing it. I need you to see that in me, so that it may be true.’”
I attempt as each day unfolds, to ask forgiveness for my own despair as a USMC sniper during the Reagan secret wars.
Each day is a new attempt at forgiveness within my broken mind, left to compartalizing the finalization of destruction of human life.
Each day I say "I'm sorry".
I see you. Sending love for your peace.
You served honorably for what seemed to you good reasons at the time, and you are not to blame. Reserve your contempt for the creeps in Washington who risked your life and millions of others to serve their bottom line and further the agenda of their corporate masters.
Absolutely! Well said
May God bless you brother with the assurance of your complete forgiveness and redemption.
Thank you for your service. You have nothing to apologize for.
🥰
A Chinese fortune cookie I recently got said that the ax soon forgets the damage it's done; the tree never forgets. Very timely.
A chicken is involved in your breakfast. The provider of the bacon is committed.
The gorgeous Hawaiian ho’oponopono prayer to heal all wounds:
“I’m sorry, Please forgive me, Thank you, I love you.” 🙏💖🌷
Yes!! That is exactly what sprang to my mind as well. Thank you so much for posting this.
That’s also what sprang to my mind! Ho’oponopono: https://deephooponopono.com/hooponopono-a-deeper-dive-into-the-methods-of-spiritual-cleaning/
Amen brotherman, I can feel, and I deeply appreciate the place that you're writing from and communicating your heart.
Wise, you are, and compassionate.
Thank you Charles. Your return to these matters in the last 4 essays have been deeply important to me. What you are saying is not being said. I know you know that I just want to reinforce its vitality.
I believe it was Thomas Keating who offered me the thought that forgiveness is the divine technology for all forward movement. Nothing meaningful happens without it. It is the starting place for all shifts in thinking. I have a long ago memory of a certain day in time when the front page news on all our newspapers in Toronto screamed of human atrocities. And I looked around and wondered how it was all of us were still standing, why we had not fallen to our knees in collective repentance, crippled under the weight of our disregard for the miraculous.
I follow Chris's work, as I do yours - both writers of intelligence and compassion. And these voices need hearing.
I don't know why, but Simone Weil wailing away in the thirties, comes to my mind. Perhaps because the image of a beautiful young girl's face seen through a snipper's instrument of viewing stays with me. I keep this little quote close to my own work always. It is from Waiting for God. "In the legend of the Grail, the keeper of this miraculous vessel is a king paralyzed by a most painful wound. And there is said that the Grail shall belong to the first who asks this king the question, "What are you going through?" The love of our neighbour, in all its fullness, simply means being able to say to him, "What are you going through?" It is a recognition that the sufferer exists, not only as a unit in a collection or a specimen from the social category labeled "unfortunate" but also as a man, exactly like us, who was one day stamped with a special mark of affliction. For this recognition to occur, it is enough, but it is indispensable, to know how to look at him in a certain way. This way of looking is, first of all, attentive. The soul empties itself of all its own contents in order to receive into itself the being it is looking at, just as he is, in all his truth."
Emmanuel Levinas' work too, speaks of the sacred in the face of the other. When we look into the face of the other, really look, we cannot kill. We have stopped looking, I think, both collectively and individually and this allows the killing to go on, government sanctioned, church sanctioned, culturally sanctioned. Even on this beautiful day, surrounded by the purple gold glory of the Canadian autumn countryside where I live, there is a malaise of sorrow filtering through the sunlight. In a world with pileated woodpeckers and polar bears, how can our contribution to the astonishments be to find new ways to kill? And worse, think ourselves clever in their inventions?
Thank you, as always, Charles, for your thoughtful renderings. Every blessing. Candice
Thank you for sharing your thoughts in this comment, to know what someone else is going through is an intimacy that seems of less importance these days and a question rarely asked. Thank you for bringing it up because of it’s life necessity and the core of humanity at least it should be ❤️🙏🏻
Love Chris Hedges. Matt Taibbi, too.
🥰
Thank you, Charles. I appreciate you continuing to show up. Blessings to you.
Thank you for this dear Charles. I was born and grew up in Israel and was a devout zionist for the first half of my life, before waking up. I later left that depraved terrorist state and that deeply-ill ethno-fascist perpetrator society. If i may respectfully point this out, it seems to me that you as well as Chris Hedges might be missing the ROOT CAUSE of what drives the neo-Nazi supremacist Israeli billionaire ruling class (who not only butcher, torture, abuse, disposses, steal lands, brutalize, traumatize, DEHUMANIZE and genocide the local people of the land, but also economically oppress ordinary israelis), it seems like you're missing the root cause that drives them to constantly commit their vicious genocidal atrocities nonstop (for many decades now) against the local people and implement their supremacist nationalist-religious ideology on a monstrous scale (like i said, i was born and grew up in israel and was a devout zionist for the first half of my life, so i am intimately familiar with how these Zionist Nazis think, their PROFOUNDLY SUPREMACIST, INTOLERANT, VIOLENT AND EXCLUCIVIST religious ideology, and with the "we're the victims" mythology that israelis are fed nonstop from birth to provide an excuse for the murderous criminality of the zionist billionaires' project in west Asia). The ROOT CAUSE that makes them commit these crimes is described in this profound essay https://www.pdrboston.org/israel-s-government-attacks-jews-to, which IMHO is a must read for anyone who wishes to understand what is actually happening in this piece of land. I can confirm that the very insightful researcher who wrote this is spot on in his description of life in israel and of the treatment of ordinary israelis by the zionist billionaire ruling class (who are the driving force behind the century-long nonstop zionist mass-butchering abuse dispossesion and dehumanization of the local people which is ongoing and relentless (and of which you gave just one small tiny example in this post. By the time you posted this, many others have already been murdered). The supremacist israeli billionaire ruling class who thrive on nationalist-religious division, intolerance, fear and hatred, and do EVERYTHING in their power to make sure it never stops. And by the way, that's also why these nazi zionist billionaires are so heavily backing and financing trump. Trump is an integral part of their strategy to ensure never ending religious-nationalist hatred, division and war, the very thing that the supremacist zionist billionaires thrive on and that keeps them in power and allows them to oppress and get rich off of ordinary israelis. Not that the right-wing zionist DNC are much better, but trump is clearly the preferred choice of the neo-nazi billionaire mass murderers because it's absolutely guaranteed thst he'll fully support, arm and fund (use american taxpayers money to fund) their mass-butchering and l dispossesion of the local people, in order to generate as much religious-nationalist hatred and violence as possible, which is the key to trump's and the supremacist israeli billionaires' division of the have-nots along nationalist-religious lines, and their pitting of the have-nots against each other, to cement their domination over the people.
And by the way, in order to understsnd EXACTLY how this process works, exactly why the billionaire ruling class must always keep us in a state of division and hostility along religious-nationalist lines, must constantly keep us in a state of tribalist war and insecurity (or threat of such war), in order to understand EXACTLY how this religuous-nationalist division, war and insecurity ensures that the billionaire ruling class stay in power over us and get richer and richer off of us, to understand this at depth, I highly recommend this profoundly important essay which in my view is absolute essential reading for every human on the planet, to understand what is actually going on and how the billionaire ruling class oppressors are playing us https://www.pdrboston.org/oppressors-need-bogeyman-enemies
And if i may continue, the same brilliant researcher also writes very insightfully on why there is no chance in the world to ever stop the century-long neo-nazi zionist project to disposses, dehumanize, brutalize, abuse, traumatize and annihilate the local people, if the TRUE NATURE of what drives the ruling class' violence against the local people (as well as their oppression of ordinary israelis) isn't exposed, the true CLASS DOMINATION nature of the billionaire's zionist project. Here https://johnspritzler.substack.com/p/pro-palestine-activists-make-themselves is one example of his wise criticism of the anti-genocide movement for its failure to bring to the public's attention the ROOT CAUSE of why the supremacist israeli billionaires are committing the ongoing atrocities. And the failure to point this out leaves the field right open for zionist propagandist to deceptively claim that they regretably must use violence in order to ensure the safety and security of jews, which is a BLATANT LIE, if one understands the class nature of the zionist billionaires' project in west Asia and how they actually opress ordinary jews and don't give a damn about jews. For example, besides their ongoing economic oppression against ordinary israelis (see details in the link shared above), right-wing zionists have also severely attacked and starved jewish holocaust survivors in the refugee camps after the second world war who didn't wish to come to their colonial project in palestine. Zionists also actively prevented the rescue of jews from nazi occupied areas in europe in order to use their death as bargaining chips to ensure world sympathy and support for their colonial project in palestine (the fact that most jews in germany were socialist and communist made it all the more easier for right-wing zionists to sacrifice them by giving them away to be slaughtered by right-wing german nazis who shared the supremacist essence of the zionists' nationalist-religious supremacist ideology (the nazi zionists and german nazis disagree on who is the superior group, but they fully agree on the principle that one group is superior over others and of higher value than others); In addition, zionist also routinely sacrifice jews (as well as others) in their global terror attacks that they conduct across the globe under the false flag of 'islamic terrorism' (they use these false flag operations for two reasons. One is in order to dehumanize muslims and present them as violent savages so that you'll cheer for the zionists' stealing of their land and dispossesing them. And the second reason for the zionists' global terror network under the false flag of 'islamic terrorism' is to again, ensure eternal religious division, hatred and violence, the key that keeps them in power. This is also the reason, by the way, why the zionist billionaires have been funding hamas (and ISIS) for decades now. To ensure that there's a always a scary boogeyman to maximally frighten ordinary israelis into keeping the right-wing billionaores in power (becasue it is the billionaores' representitives who cynically paint themselves as the ones who will protect "the people" from "that evil monstrous scary enemy who is coming to get you") AND in order to ensure that they can point to the scary boogyman as an existential threat and say that that's the reason they cannot stop attacking and dispossesing the local people.
The space for a comment is finished here, but if anyone wants sources for the claims in the last paragraph, I'll happily give them in a separate reply.
If you are not familiar with Avigail Abarbanel's substack, then you might find a kindred soul whose last post is deeply personal and moving, about her growing up and leaving Israel, which brought her not just travel but truth. https://avigail.substack.com
Joy, I just read this article and found it quite informative. Thank you for posting the link. I experienced many aha's and easily recognized the cult behavior you described in Israel. After all, I grew up in my father's WASP upperclass, antisemitic, anti anything but WASP cult. Once you've been in one, you recognize others. I was aware of the victim culture among Jews for sure, but I missed the sickness of the big picture you drew. We live in one big victim culture here in the US and victimhood goes part and parcel with cult life. So while I can see through her words that the Cult/Victim/Perpetrator culture is quite intense and blatantly violent in Israel, I also see it everywhere these days, in every country, every town, every neighborhood. What is truly unbelievable to me is how this picture is worldwide. But I guess when I think about how long humans have been doing their thing in the world (what a pathetic euphemism) then really the earth is pretty small. Perhaps it is not just a handful of evil puppeteers pulling our strings, but rather it is all of our creation..... every single one of us from the beginning. Which is kinda what Charles was saying. I love reading stories about courageous people who left the cult, who blew the whistle, who stood up and told their truth. It gives me courage.❤️
Thank you very much. I will look at her substack. Thank you 🙏
Thank you for your perspective, i will read those pieces recommended.
What I want to live under a broadly liberal democracy in Israel, or some Muslim psychostate?
No matter where you look in the world you can find tragedy, violence, despair and greed. The food we eat on our plates is at the cost of life, even if it was just by stealing an animals habitat for farming monocrops like soy, or by killing the insects eating the crops, that other species eat to survive. The shelter we use to keep our families safe at night could be shelter for refugees, but we choose our family’s safety instead. Even the trees choke out the plants vying for sunshine and water.
It is our job to try to make peace where we can, but sometimes there is no peace to be had. Some marriages are irretrievably broken, some family divisions will never heal, some cultures will never be able to reconcile the past, and some people can choose to heal, but some cannot. In those cases, we need to find the beauty, grace, and love even in the midst of the darkness.
Take a little heart - trees in nature’s biome do actually share nutrients and information with each other and other species of trees. Read The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wholleben, it speaks to a way of being here on earth that we don’t often get a sense of.
Thank you, always and again for your insightful words.
We live in a black/white; good/evil perceiving culture that seems to believe that the “victim” is always worse off than the “perpetrator.”
My daughter was on campus at Virginia Tech during the 2007 massacre where Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people and himself. By the next day, the traumatized but deeply wise students had created thirty-three makeshift shrines on the grounds. Thirty-three.
They understood that Cho was also a victim, he had to be, in order to do what he did. Later it was revealed that Cho had been mercilessly bullied nonstop since kindergarten, and finally snapped. But no one person has to take the blame for that bullying, it is like a stoning. The blame is so desaturated that it becomes imperceptible. Nevertheless, all the tiny pieces of bullying violence, when added together, has a result.
When the parents of students finally got to Virginia Tech the next day, they dismantled the 33rd shrine. Shameful, imo.
I think it is the same for living in toxic patriarchy. Every day, the stones of toxic patriarchs are thrown at women and “others” by stone-throwers, many of whom don’t even realize they are toxic patriarchs throwing stones. It is like a fish who doesn’t have the consciousness that it lives in water, it is just the accepted state of affairs which surrounds it.
But the abuse continues, and the blame for the abuse is still dissipated enough to allow the abusers to remain incognito, even from themselves.
So the state of generalized abuse continues, and sets the stage for other more focused abuses, like the murder of Ayşenur Eygi.
Upon inspection, I think that we will find that the trail of abuse always ends at the foot of toxic patriarchy, so that’s probably a good place to start.
Yes, the Patriarchal Death Cult reigns supreme, for the moment. I fear we are in a place where either we learn how to rein it in, or it destroys us. What are the steps? Each of us has some part of the answer.
Sadly Charles is now part of the Patriarchal Death Cult. He's supporting Trump.
Yes, Joy, I think you are right on, that each one of us has a part of the answer. And I think it starts with the individual, being thoughtful about the invisible ways we give power to the patriarchy, and this is often in language. For example, history is “His-story”…but what about “HER story”? There is subtle but massive power in the words we choose, getting “woke” about that, and reflecting that understanding in daily language, is a start …
You realize that Charles has some pretty backward ideas about women. Like that they basically exist as a receptical for his seed to bring forth his "love gifts". When they stop being fertile he tosses them aside. Wonder how long it will be before Stella gets the heave ho. Or maybe that's what NAAS is for: a steady supply of women to impregnate.
Wow. 33. 🙏🏽✨
Your words ring as True.
I came into adulthood in the 90’s, training and working for an organization focused on transformation and being in service to the collective.
In the model we taught, calling oneself out for making others ‘wrong’ and other transgressions was a cornerstone of the work.
‘Looking good’ was a function of how quickly one was willing to own their subversive beliefs and behaviors. The second piece was cleaning up the mess we made.
While I had plenty of issues with the organization itself, their working model of taking responsibility for one’s impact is still one I have yet to see taught elsewhere.
I’ve spent decades practicing owning my shit only to have my own vulnerability and willingness used against me.
I used to assume that my willingness to tell the truth and own my perpetrations would create a space for others to do the same.
That’s often not been the case. More often than not others have used my generosity to further hunker down in their righteousness.
I am personally sick of the cult of white guilt. Every goddamn Progressive organization opens a meeting with a so-called land acknowledgment now, in addition to your pronouns, disabilities and victim status. Like any of us had anything to do with anything.
It is a symptom of the times of course. But YOU know where your heart and soul lie and why are you doing and being what you do. It is so important for us to hold on to that in the face of disdain
Thank you for this poignant and convicting reflection on the complicity of what Christopher Browning calls “desk murderers” in “Ordinary Men”:
“This approach emphasizes the degree to which modern bureaucratic life fosters a functional and physical distancing in the same way that war and negative racial stereotyping promote a psychological distancing between perpetrator and victim. Indeed, many of the perpetrators of the Holocaust were so-called desk murderers whose role in the mass extermination was greatly facilitated by the bureaucratic nature of their participation. Their jobs frequently consisted of tiny steps in the overall killing process, and they performed them in a routine manner, never seeing the victims their actions affected. Segmented, routinized, and depersonalized, the job of the bureaucrat or specialist—whether it involved confiscating property, scheduling trains, drafting legislation, sending telegrams, or compiling lists—could be performed without confronting the reality of mass murder. Such a luxury, of course, was not enjoyed by the men of Reserve Police Battalion 101, who were quite literally saturated in the blood of victims shot at point-blank range.”
I explored the cowardice and culpability of such individuals in “Letter to a Colluder” three years ago:
• https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/letter-to-a-colluder-stop-enabling
And I can’t help but think of Derrick Jensen after reading your point about civilization being a killing machine as he details in his “Endgame” lecture:
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtuxHVD4Srw
Though I haven't agreed with Charles' last 2-3 articles in his dismissing the horrors and deceit perpetuated by Trump and his ilk, I heartily agree here: "The nation must face the truth of what it has done. It must discard its justifications, rationalizations, and false histories. It must gaze with grief and horror at its works, and resolve to be as strong an agent of peace and healing as it had been of war and destruction. That last step follows inevitably from the first. That is the key—honesty. A nation must be honest with itself about its history and its present." The lies and coverups on all sides must end...so that we may grieve and forgive. https://medium.com/@lindajoystone/december-23-2019-by-lindajoy-7fafe56c45c9
Thank you. This is profound and necessary, imho. It's also a very generous look at someone else's work, for those who might not quite be ready or aware that it's there. On that note, I'm still mind-boggled by how Chris Hedges went from journalistic hero to villain in the eyes of many, so I'm particularly grateful for your clear-eyed view of how and why his perspective matters ever more right now. 🙏
So much understanding is needed to ease the collective shame---perhaps if our culture was less judgemental and so quick to condemn, fault, ridicule, neglect or ignore, fewer and fewer spikes of violence would occur in the first place. (I mean that is the question isn't it. Why?)
I recall the proverb:
A child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth.
Thanks for shining a light on this.
Wow, Charles, what an incredibly powerful post. Thank you! This passage in particular resonated throughout my being as being true: “What is the real plea behind begging for forgiveness? It is, ‘Please see me. Please see that the crime is not my deepest nature. Please know me as someone who has turned from extinguishing life to nurturing it. I need you to see that in me, so that it may be true.’”