I know that there was a firestorm of attention paid to my most recent note where I expressed my moral outrage for the connotation of a recent Facebook status posted on Thursday by an Iraqi soldier.
Many have taken this in comments out of the actual context from which I wrote. Let me be clear and straightforward in three separate points:
1. The soldier in question has expressed remorse and regret to me and to others personally which gives me (personally) moral reason to put down my sword.
I do think, however, that there may be other effects (or not) and those effects, insofar as they are just and fair, will not haunt me as unjust. My good friend who is in active combat was busted down a rank for drinking at a base where alcohol is prohibited and if that constitutes an offense, then, this might qualify too.
As for me, I have no reason to pursue this any further. I have given him my word that I take his word to be true and will offer no more personal rebukes towards him in anyway. I have also deleted my the post and will do the same at Vox Nova.
Let me very explicit about what I mean here (using all caps for emphasis): This PARTICULAR case is forgiven in my own heart and mind, although the GENERAL case of war (even this particular war) and military violence in general remains a violation of my own principles of conscience.
2. Many seem to think that I went about this belligerently and with no regard for reason or prudence. I would beg to differ. Here is why:
A: I was the very first reply to this status–over 24 hours before I wrote the note–giving a basic, “WTF?!?!?!” to see if this was some sick joke or it would prompt him to change his tune. Only after a day passed and all the other comments indicated that this was being taken literally (including one person who recommended that this be done to adult, not children) did I act with prose.
B: In my reply I decried this immoral regardless of if it happened or not. Advertising a racist war crime as a joke when one is an active duty soldier is tantamount to advertising racist pedophilia when one is an active kindergarten teacher. Even the mere thought of such an action seems highly problematic especially from a person that is presumed to offer some kind of moral standard. If we grant the heroism of soldiery, then, we must also hold them to a heroic standard of behavior, I think.
So, even if I were certain that this were silly little “joke,” I would have acted the same way until the soldier in question had the goodwill to reply with his own regret, which I accept in full.
C: My note was a memoir, not a rant, and was intended not only to declare this as wrong and intolerable, but also to express my own insufficient and broken disposition to it. I was not trying (as some of the commenters on both sides have been doing) to assert my own moral superiority–this is a very tragic situation for many reasons.
None more tragic than the fact that this soldier could very well lose his life in combat and to many of you his memory will only be in this fallen moment. At the same time, the idea of children–of any race–being exploited in war, or peace, puts those persons–even if only potentially–in conflict with this soldier. I have pitted a soldier’s life against children. Morally speaking, who wins?
Many of your intuitions will vary, but in the imagery of my own boys, the children won, and would win again. But that does not trivialize or dehumanize the fact that there is another life and family at stake.
Those stakes should humble, not inflate, our moral intuitions, I think.
3. Let me end with this. To everyone outraged at: me; this situation; the war in general; those who oppose the war in general; conservatives; liberals; and more–so much more–hear this: Here we find ourselves at a crossroads I was just presented with today. How, then, will we reply to the other we have so disfugured in our mind with anger and rage when they reveal themselves to us as human, as a person–as a friend?
For me, as righteous as my anger was and may still be in some unknown recess of my heart, I must forgive and love. Otherwise, I have only taken something truly wrong and made it worse.
To all involved, especially to this soldier in question and his family, know that for me and myself (even as that “self” changes and grows) I have spent this exercise of writing to begin beat my sword into a plow and have yet to finish. I hope you will join me and exceed my poorly attempt thus far.
Peace and Good.
Sam Rocha
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