[Buddha-l] Re: Texas liberals (death penalty)

[curt]

There is no need to create hypothetical situations. One need only
study the case of Dietrich Bonhoeffer - a Christian pacifist who
decided to kill Hitler AFTER it was clear that Hitler was an evil
man doing evil things. The important thing about Bonhoeffer's
story is that it shows that these kinds of questions are not just
parlor games - and that when confronted with such situations
there are few easy answers.

Also, it did not require a great deal of psychism to presage what
the Nazis were up to before they came to power. It would have
been relatively easy for the German trade-unions and leftist
groups to effectively deal with the Nazis in the late 20's or
even the early 30's - but they did not wish to "be as bad as
the Nazis", so they mostly restricted themselves to legal, peaceful
methods of struggle. The Nazis themselves crowed about how
easy it would have been to suppress them had anyone actually
tried. This was a good example of mistaking squeamishness for
ethics. If there had been a few more Che Guevara types in Germany
at the time then there would have been no Holocaust (ironically, perhaps,
it was the right-wing "socialists" who played the worst role by
killing Rosa Luxemboug, Karl Liebknecht and the rest of the
nascent leadership of a truly revolutionary German left during the
Sparticist uprising.)

- Curt

Bshmr at aol.com wrote:

>>Stefan Detrez <stefan.detrez at gmail.com>: To kill a whole ... As I stated, if 
>>    
>>
>someone would have killed Hitler in his early years, or Stalin or Pol Pot, I 
>think the killer would do the world a favor and would, in consequence, create 
>favorable conditions for social cohesion and development. Such ... if somebody 
>would have shot Rumsfeld before he decided to... Who knows?
>  
>
>
>Oft forgotten is that any killing has consequences, to the killer and killed. 
>The historical texts are very clear. 
>
>In the questionable example of one killing a tyrant earlier (so to speak) 
>before their crimes is to act on the chance that one's imagination is not 
>delusion.  Society doesn't support 'psychic revelation' as justifying violence -- 
>only criminal acts themselves are crimes. Fortunately, I might add -- otherwise I 
>would have been raped, robbed, assaulted, punished, ... hundreds or thousands 
>of times. But, folks don't necessarily act out their fantasies or mine.
>
>Now back to your hypothetical, the 'psychic commando' most likely would have 
>been apprehended and punished (rather severely) for executing a leader 
>(potential Mess-I-Ah ...) or an innocent infant Hilter/Stalin/Pol Pot if prescient 
>enough. In any event, the 'psychic commando' would reap consequences for their 
>actions -- either a shortened one life or additional ups and downs, or births 
>and deaths if you prefer. 
>
>Note that the visions of the 'psychic commando', when not acted on, would be 
>interpreted as 'past lives', 'parallel dimensions', or 'seductive futures' -- 
>that is, one of the side-effects of meditation.
>
>rbb
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