How can John Brown and Gandhi both be great men?

Back before the young radicals destroyed what we old folks used to call a sense of humor, someone might have started a joke with Thoreau, Tolstoy, King and Gandhi go into a bar.

Well, maybe they shouldn't go into a bar during the pandemic. But, let's say they did. Would they, speaking to one another, express pride in today's purported successors? The carnage with which of the BLM movement has left of some of the inner cities, the damage they've done to actual justice by demanding it be social (by which they mean according to skin color or other superficial characteristics and not according to actual justice), the numbers of dead, mostly minorities at other minority hands still going on over two months after George Floyd's death, the viciousness and illogic of their arguments, and also the a-religiosity of it, would have left them all cold (except for Thoreau, who would have cared only about the immorality of it). 

If the topic wasn't so serious and happening now, I'd write a short play in which Sartre came in at the end, deux ex machina style, and says not - as in the actual play - "Hell is other people," but, "Hell is white people." Or "Hell is white men." Well, isn't that the mantra we have been listening to?

King, Thoreau, Gandhi, Tolstoy were all unique and fascinating people.  I have read biographies, sometimes more than one (in Thoreau's case - many), on all of them. They were all unique individuals, but they had one thing in common. Non-violence. 

For Thoreau it was a matter of reason and morality to resist an unconscionable law (Fugitive Slave Act) by refusing to pay taxes he believed would pay for it. For Tolstoy it was mainly a Christian thing (though he quoted Thoreau in both his fiction and non-fiction), and it took him not just to non-violence as a way of life, but a rejection of government and modern civilization. For Gandhi, non-violence = Truth = God. He was inspired by Thoreau and Tolstoy (both of whom he would quote). For King, the religion and justice were intertwined, and he admittedly based it on Gandhi's Satyagraha, and that he read Thoreau in college and was inspired by the idea of refusing to cooperate with evil.

The historical chain is easy to see. Thoreau inspired Tolstoy. Tolstoy and Thoreau inspired Gandhi, who wrote about both of them; in fact, Tolstoy, shortly before he died, and Gandhi became correspondents. King based his movement on Gandhi's ([The Gandhian philosophy is] “the only morally and practically sound method open to oppressed people in their struggle for freedom.” He read and was inspired by Thoreau and I'm told Tolstoy, although I don't myself remember him quoting or referring to Tolstoy off the top of my head. But, if he read Gandhi, and we know he did, it would be hard to imagine he did not know Tolstoy. In any event, they are all philosophically linked. 

Thoreau started his plea for Captain John Brown with words I could use as a capstone for my own posts on the pandemic revolution -  

"I trust that you will pardon me for being here. I do not wish to force my thoughts upon you, but I feel forced myself. Little as I know of Captain Brown, I would fain do my part to correct the tone and the statements of the newspapers, and of my countrymen generally, respecting his character and actions. It costs us nothing to be just. We can at least express our sympathy with, and admiration of, him and his companions, and that is what I now propose to do."

So I feel in my efforts here, virtually unheard (a voice crying out in the wilderness), to call attention to the lies spread by the media in our own day and the absolutely fascist tactics that are succeeding in our own country.

I will not, again, babble on ad nauseum about what Thoreau said in his plea for John Browna pretty close to one hundred years before I was born. But, I will quote from it a few paragraphs I think particularly relevant - 

"'In his camp,'" as one has recently written, and as I have myself heard him state, 'he permitted no profanity; no man of loose morals was suffered to remain there, unless, indeed, as a prisoner of war. "I would rather," said he, "have the small-pox, yellow-fever, and cholera, all together in my camp, than a man without principle.... It is a mistake, sir, that our people make, when they think that bullies are the best fighters, or that they are the fit men to oppose these Southerners. Give me men of good principles,--God-fearing men,--men who respect themselves, and with a dozen of them I will oppose any hundred such men as these Buford ruffians.'" He said that if one offered himself to be a soldier under him, who was forward to tell what he could or would do, if he could only get sight of the enemy, he had but little confidence in him."

It's not my point at all here that we shouldn't curse (I curse a lot) or should be God-fearing (I'm still an atheist who thinks we should try to behave as if we believed in a benevolent God). I actually disagree with many things that even Gandhi and Tolstoy believed (I mean, Tolstoy was essentially an anarchist and an anti-modernist and Gandhi thought it was better to kill his daughter than that she be would be dishonored [raped?]). The important thing is that this is all about principles, and important principles, the most important ones being refusal to cooperate with evil, non-violent methods of political change, the improvement of ourselves and trying to inspire our enemies, not destroy them. They were not cooperating with their enemies, but they were not trying to destroy them either. Whether you agree or not, with that, it is what made them great men. It is fascism which must be destroyed. Some would say - hate the sin, love the sinner. 

Why then do I (and Thoreau) think Brown was a great man, when his means were violent? He took the war to the slave owners and the system that protected them. The reason is, because it matters who you are fighting and the reasons you are doing it. Gandhi recognized that beliefs were relative and subjective. And, indeed, he wrote that he preferred courageous violence in the face of oppression before cowardice and burying your head in the sand. We are faced in our country with an ignorance based on addiction to a very dishonest media (you know who I mean CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, Washington Post, the three networks, sometimes even FoxNews - such as when they referred to the violent takeover of several blocks in Seattle as mostly peaceful or supported BLM).

In our modern times, we must fight against those who would, using racism as a club, revive the same views as the slaveholders held - that skin color is what matters in judging someone and that justice should be based on that skin color rather than our individual deeds and intent. It is because of these outrageous beliefs, which took so long to defeat in America, but had been nearing death for decades, that they must continually lie and use the media to mount a false narrative, and the education system to proselytize the children into believing false things.

King famously said that he had a dream that one day his children would live in a world where they, that is, of course, all of us, would be judged by the "content of their characters" and not the "color of their skin." This the modern-day version of purported "civil rights," has turned on its head so that they and we shall all be judged by the color of our skins. What else does "black lives matter" mean, if skin color isn't the key?

Whose side do I think Gandhi and Brown would be on now? Of course, I think mine. But, you know, who cares? I'm sure those on the other side from me would either completely disagree or, probably more typical of the times, just brand them racists - as they have Gandhi. Maybe he was at one time, but clearly the mainsprings of his movement and life were a testament to anti-Racism, or MLK, Jr. would have hardly built his own movement around Gandhi's.

When do we decide that someone who uses violence or the threat of it is okay - that he or she is a good guy or gal as opposed to the opposite? I mean Hitler used and threatened violence against his neighbors, claiming he was simply protecting oppressed Germans. And Churchill used and threatened violence against Germany? And many times the forces I approve of, even hero-worship, lapse into the kind of behavior of which I can never approve. They might even agree, but say, we have to, for all of our sakes. You do your worst, and we will do our best (Churchill if you didn't know), even if it looks like the same thing from the point of view of the one being garroted, beaten, humiliated or shot with or without a blindfold. 

I'm not going to tell you that you can never use or threaten violence. Sometimes, many times, you have to. In a civil society, we hope people are so raised and successful in their view of their lives that they will not want to do so, and that it will not be a part of their daily or regular lives. We also hope that is true internationally, on a government level. And there is evidence it is more like this now than it has ever been in history in the last century, even with two horrible world wars (see, Steven Pinker's The Better Angels of our Nature). But, we also know that violence and oppression still has tremendous staying power, because it so often works. Unless we are blind, we see it all over our country and the world.  

I'm not giving away any terrible secret by telling you that this is utterly subjective. One man's this is another man's that, and all that stuff. Of course, it is. And that's why it is so important how we raise our children, so they learn what is important. In my view, if they aren't raised with certain "enlightenment" values, that character matters, that ethnicity does not, that freedoms of expression, conscience and association, among others are critical; that the rule of law and not men which promotes both order and freedom, that history and education are important, and so on, then we are pretty much screwed. You try and have faith that good people will do their best to make sure this will happen, but I'm not sure it is true if they don't see a financial advantage for themselves and those they care about. 

Of course, those on the "other side" will say that this is exactly what they are doing. I expect many or most of them believe it so. It is hard to believe, when you are passionate about these things, that the other side is evil and just wants power. 

So, all I can tell you is where I draw my lines and why I feel both John Brown and Gandhi are both heroic (yes, I know, others too - they are my examples). 

It's this simple - as the great 20th-century spy, Austin Powers, told us - "It's freedom, baby, yeah," and, "Freedom didn't fail. Right now we have freedom and responsibility. It's a very groovy time." 

Yes, the answer to these questions is your view of freedom. Because wrestling is often more like real life than politics, I turn there. It's the reason we root for Hacksaw Jim Duggan and not King Kong Bundy. It's the reason wrestling fans know the moment a "face" becomes a "heel" and visa versa without having to have a deep philosophical discussion with themselves. 

Unfortunately, life really isn't wrestling either. There, we get to be almost omniscient, whereas in real life, particularly in the modern age, we are subject to the power of the media. And, though they can be very good, they can be very bad too. It's a huge distraction, and more people I know who I consider to be on "my side" in this difficult time -- believe that the media is the most dangerous, and disgusting, part of our society right now. 

You know that I can go on forever, down every rabbit hole, and in each one, we will find subjectivism again, and then another paean to freedom. So I will leave it at this - John Brown, who used violent means to try to obtain freedom for blacks in America, and made the ultimate sacrifice, was a great hero. So, was Gandhi, who used peaceful means to obtain freedom for Indians. Because - it's about freedom, baby, yeah!