Week 13 Reflection

This reflection is on the question of if Montezuma really had a choice to make some sort of move against the Spaniards. When I first thought about and answered this question I realized my response was based on my bias. I am so used to thinking that a person always has a choice to do something or at least try to do something. Now when I look back at the question and try to put myself in Montezuma’s shoes, I realize that they believed so much that everything in their lives was predicted because they believed that everything that happens has happened before.

If Montezuma really did have a choice then I think he would have forced the Spaniards to leave. He had many chances but was so confused because the Spanish coming back never happened before and he started to think that it was the Toltec people. The thing is that “he knew” that there was a reason for the Spaniard arrival and was getting frustrated that no one foresaw it coming.

The way I tried to relate to Montezuma was thinking about how at one point everyone knew the Earth was flat and at the center of the universe. Then we knew the Earth was round, but still, the center of the universe. Then finally we found out and still believe today that the sun is the center of the solar system and we know this through scientific fact. Right now we know the universe goes on forever, what happens when we find an end?

Signs helped the Spanish conquest

Todorov asked a very interesting question regarding the Spanish victory over the natives. "Did the Spanish defeat the Indians by means of signs?" The Spanish did have superior firepower and armor being guns, cannons, metal body armor and horses. What they also had on their side (in their minds) was g-d and a feeling of superiority The Spanish knew they had the upper hand when it came to military technology but they also knew that they were severely out numbered, Montezuma had many opportunities to defeat the conquistadors but didn't. The Spanish used the fact that the Aztecs based decision making and their future off of what soothsayers had to say, along with their faith and/or loyalty to the Kingdom of Spain to do whatever possible to conquer the Indians.

Trying to communicate with the Indians had been a problem since Columbus first arrived in the Caribbean when the locals referred to themselves as the "Cariba" meaning people of the Caribbean, Columbus heard "Caniba" which means people of the Khan. This little misunderstanding made Columbus think he was in Asia rather than the new world. Cortes also experienced a misunderstanding with the Montezuma, leader of the Aztec people. When they met on the shore Montezuma refused to speak and showed this by putting his hand over his mouth and bowing his head. The Spaniards saw this as a gesture of surrender. The Spanish probably figured this isn't surprising we know we're better than them, even though on the inside they were really scared.

In conclusion, my answer to Todorovs question is "Yes, yes signs helped the Spanish defeat the Indians." What I think helped them the most was their advanced technology that the Indians had never seen and their overall more worldly knowledge. My favorite example of how the Spanish demonstrated the superiority over the Indians was when they threatened the Indians that they would take the moon.

Reflection Week 12:

This week when we were talking about global development and poverty, organizations like "worldfund" and "world vision" came up quite a bit. In my opinion they were receiving some unfair criticism for their advertising techniques and how much money really goes to what you think it’s going to.

We discussed how their advertisement techniques were to make you feel guilty if you didn't donate and better about yourself if you did. We also talked about how in every picture on these websites there was a happy child. Even though sending them a goat or school supplies won't change their life, it's a start. The ASPCA does the same thing, in every one of their commercials there are sad, abused, caged, homeless animals, how can you not want to give them a loving home. This technique worked for my family and now we have our awesome dog Sally. This technique is the best option they’ve got

I also heard that the best way to make a difference is to go to where this poverty and development is and help hands on. I agree this is the best way, but most people can't drop everything and go. People have families and jobs to worry about as well. For most people the only way to help is to send money and/or goods. When it comes to the question “how can I be sure my money goes to a useful cause?” You usually have to do your own research on that because each organization varies. For example I provided a link that says how much of your money World Vision donates. The percentage that doesn’t go is used to keep their organization running.

In conclusion these organizations are needed and do serve a purpose. What I think we really need to focus on is building infrastructure and giving interest free or very low interest loans so that these people can start their own businesses. I never really discussed this topic before I came to AU, would you agree with my proposal?

http://www.worldvision.org/content.nsf/sponsor/for-sponsors-donation-integrity

Teach a man to fish: and get that MONEY

States are unequally prepared for global economic competition and it is not fair. A solution for this unfairness is if the developed nations of the world who see a country struggling to develop and their people are suffering for it then we should teach them to fish. Look at America and how we developed as a nation. We were born from one of the most powerful empires of all time. We didn’t come into existence by ourselves either; we had a lot of help, if it wasn’t for the rest of Europe especially the French who knows if we would have won our war of independence. When we were born we were the only country on our side of the planet, we had a giant ocean to the east protecting us from the armies or Europe and another giant ocean to the west along with a huge expanse of land. Also after two relatively short wars we have had two friendly neighbors to the North and South. We were able to develop so fast and easily compared to other countries in the world because of these conditions. We never had to devote as much to our military for defense until WWII but we were already industrialized and had been experiencing economic success and failure.

The countries history must also be taken into account when judging the fairness. Earlier I talked about how America was able to develop and succeed much easier compared to a lot of other countries because of the circumstances. Look at countries that are post-colonial. I know there are countries like America, India, and Hong Kong that have been very successful since their former colonial rulers left and either granted them independence or was forced to. Look at Africa, European countries controlled almost the whole continent at one time and except for a select few most countries there aren’t doing well. They have been left with many problems like diseases and political corruption. To be fair to the former colonial rulers some of these colonies were asking for independence when they weren’t ready for it like Algeria, Angola Haiti. Look where they’re at now.

It isn’t fair that some countries are better prepared for global economic success than others. Countries that are successful like the United States and most of Europe should try and help these countries that aren’t as well off. Giving them money hasn’t worked out, their governments have horded the money and aide. A better solution like I stated above would be to teach them how to fish. By helping develop their industries, education systems, agriculture and infrastructure. If we give them some fish they’ll eat for a day, if we teach them how to fish they’ll eat for a lifetime. Also if we teach them how to fish they will buy fishing equipment driving the world economy. Eventually their economy will come full turn when they sell the fish and buy steak.

It isn’t fair that some countries are better suited for global economics and development. As more privileged nations we should help them with their development and economies. Money in the form of short term aide is fine, but money without industry, education, agriculture, infrastructure of the tools to make them is not good. Nothing will come of that country.

Reflection Week 11:

Thursday’s discussion made me wonder what it means to be wealthy. The definition of wealth is varies from person to person, but we all seemed to agree that being wealthy meant having the opportunity to succeed and the choice to by the coach bag rather than the knock off. We also talked about how the poorest person in America is much better off than poor people in most other countries, some people didn’t agree with that.

Wealth is more than just money, it is an education. In America we may not have the best public school systems but our colleges are the best in the world. Although it is hard and it takes a lot of work which will make it hard for preoccupied people like single moms or parents working two jobs to keep food on the table, it can be done. Colleges are constantly giving out grants, scholarships and loans like it’s their job. Both sides of wealth whether it is monetary or knowledge side of it can be related to the economy. Obviously if the economy isn’t doing well people aren’t going to have as much money as if it was doing good the same goes for knowledge. Sure people can still go to college on grants, scholarships and loans but the schools are feeling the money crunch as well.

If you lose job it’s not just tough luck anymore. There are 46 to 79 weeks of unemployment benefits available in all states and soup kitchens for people who just can’t pull the money together for food anymore. There is another solution… communism, but that didn’t go over well.

Week 10 reflection:

This week while we were talking about the terrorist threats and security measures we could take against them the TSA and other airport security measures were brought up and deemed pretty much useless. We said that most terrorist attacks are uncoiled by our intelligence agencies before they reach airport security. In that case do we still need airport security measures?

We absolutely need them. Do you want to take the chance? What if someone was going crazy and acted on his or her own accord and decided that they wanted to bring a gun or homemade bomb on a plane. How would you stop them if you had minimal or no security? That’s right you wouldn’t, and you’d have 200+ dead civilians on your hands. Having the massive security measures with the full body scanners and the somewhat impatient TSA agents do cause some fear in people, there would be a lot more fear if you could just walk onto a plane without going through security. Some say that we are legitimizing terrorists with having security check points. I think that they are legitimate to an extent. We take what they say seriously, for example if they say we are going to bomb the Eiffel tower then there is a lot more security at the Eiffel tower. Others think that since we upgraded security at airports after 9/11 we forced the terrorist to upgrade in their attacks and threats. If we didn’t upgrade and the terrorists didn’t try to adapt they would commit the same attacks as we sat back and watched. We’re in a war where we are constantly trying to be more clever than the terrorists the vice versa. The only way to stay secure is to make sure you always have the biggest stick and that you’re swinging it.

Back to the security check points. They are necessary, we need to do everything in our power to try and stop attacks on our country and this is just one step we could take. If the people think that security at airports is getting to extreme and the government takes a step back on it. If an attack happens everyone will look at the government and say “well you should have known better and not listened to us”.

If we are diseased we aren't secure

The greatest threat to security both internationally and nationally other than terrorism and the effects of it, has got to be the spread of diseases. If a disease breaks out in a country and that country has trouble containing and/or fighting it then they could be in for some trouble. Countries bordering them will most likely shut down their borders and if the sickness becomes severe they may possibly militarize their borders as well.

For the country or countries that have this disease this would be horrible. Their government would lose credibility in the eyes of the world for not having adequate health care systems or clean water. Their government wouldn’t just lose credibility; they would lose control of their country if the international community didn’t step in and donate a vaccine or step in with peace keeping troops because there would most likely be looting on a massive scale.

Do you guys remember the swine-flu? It jump and make it to countries like the United States and China but thankfully it kind of died away, but it is still around though so get your flu shot. The swine-flu accomplished what any terrorist group would want to do kill a few, injure some and scare millions. It caused a good amount of panic across the world. I remember someone in China had the swine flu so the government shut down the hotel and locked down everyone in there until the guests were healthy, with Chinas massive population I’m surprised they didn’t have a massive outbreak.

We can't focus on preventing terrorist attacks if we are trying to contain a disease.

Reflection week 9: what is security?

What is security? The actual definition of security is freedom from danger, risk, etc.; safety, but what does it mean for a nation to possess security? Having the strongest or one of the strongest militaries in the world is definitely a key component to having a secure country before 9/11. Now to have a secure country means not only having one of the best militaries and intelligence agencies like it did last century, but also having a strong economy and base of citizens that support it. This was proven how by the rise of America and the fall of the Soviet Union going into the 1990’s. America had a stronger economy and a population that supported its government, neither of which the Soviet Union had which is why they crumbled.

Today I would like to think that we are completely secure, but I know we aren’t, even though we have the strongest military and economy. The difference is that the people aren’t completely behind this war. The terrorists have done their job well, as every night on CNN and ABC nightly news there are new reports of terrorists attacks all over the world. We are at war with terrorism and sometimes it’s hard to tell who’s winning.

Fighting terrorists is different than fighting a country because they don’t have a home base or a diplomatic status. Now the focus is fighting and containing the spread of terrorism instead of communism, terrorism is harder to fight because no one knows where it’s going to come from compared to the Soviet Union and communism which you knew was coming from the kremlin. Times are changing and to stay or become secure we must adapt to those changes. So are we secure? In my opinion we aren’t, because we are not free from danger, but if we keep up the offensive I think we will get there.

RISK vs Reward in real life

In our game of risk the hegemons groups victory meant that the people in their group were put into a good mood and if they weren’t already a better mood for the rest of the day. Since the red, brown and yellow groups ended with fewer territories than they started with and farther from their goals than they started with as well. Being the head of state of the green team I felt good about the game because we didn’t reach our goal, but we still made progress and needed only one or two more turns to reach our goal.

If our risk board was a screen to what was really happening in the world then our moods would be a bit different. The United States would be in full swing celebration mode after they got over the loss of the massive troop loss they had in China, because they took out the Ukrainian ultra-nationalists. The Ukrainian ultra-nationalists wouldn’t be in the Ukraine anymore and would be very sad seeing that the United States took it. The religious movement countries would be upset seeing that they were pushed to the brink of annihilation.

In real life one countries victory can mean the total demise of another. For us in a game of risk it may be a better mood and or grade.

Reflection on week 8

This week of class was awesome! Risk was my favorite childhood board game. I remember every Thanksgiving my cousins and I would play it, also I was really excited to go to salome because I’ve never been to an opera before.

When our game of diplomatic Risk first started I never thought it was going to get as serious as it did. I thought people would only focus on it in class, but we have had a lot of little head of state meetings outside of class; discussing and planning what to do to try and meet all of our goals. I’m also glad that I got to be head of state for my team in the game because I’m a really shy person and the position puts me on the spot and forces me to make tough decisions when everyone is watching. All in all I really enjoyed this past week, other than the paper.

Reflection on week 7

Having no class on Monday and no lab on Wednesday this week was all about the simulation. I was in the AIAM group which represents international auto manufactures which meant we obviously wanted to abolish the tariffs and domestic content requirements. Before my group and I started researching reasons to get rid of the tariffs and content requirements, my personal viewpoint was to keep them. I never had a real reason for wanting to keep them because I didn’t know much about the issue.

Before I started researching for the simulation I thought that keeping the tariffs and content rules would help keep American jobs. After finding information for my group’s presentation my opinion started to change and I realized that getting rid of these tariffs and content rules would actually help to not only keep jobs here but also create jobs and help the economy out as well because it would lower the prices on cars sold and promote innovation which would help the environment.

Going into the project I never thought that my views would change. I thought it was really cool and am glad that a project for class could change my views on something.

Reflection of Week Six:

This week we talked about marginal groups and problems they could cause for the establishment. This shows us that the government needs to include everyone’s opinion in their decision and policy making. Marginal groups can become problems anytime they want to. In France and throughout the rest of Europe there have been bomb threats on tourist sites such as the Eiffel tower and other cities throughout Europe. This is thought to be a response to Frances new legislation of the banning of Burqas. There was a similar situation in Moscow Russia when a there was a terrorist attack on the subway system in the form of a bomb by a group known who want Chetznia to break away from Russia. The Chetznians would be considered a marginalized people.
Now the marginalized can become a problem whenever they want, which is a problem. They could and a lot of times do resort to violence as see today and throughout history. There will always be groups of people who will be mad at the governments of the world, but we could help make the problem smaller by keeping their interests in mind when we make our laws and policies.

A constructivis view on a UN ambassador to aliens

It is a good thing that the UN has decided to appoint an ambassador to the aliens from any perspective. You can’t just ignore them, they’re here and no one knows what their intentions are but if they aren’t good maybe we could persuade them.
From a constructivist this could be a very good thing or a very bad thing. We may be able trade and learn a lot from each other. What if they could use some medicine and have clean energy technology to trade? This is something we would want to look into. Or they could be here to wage intergalactic war; this is also something we need to look into. Sure we need to be concerned about their military power if they have any, but that can’t be our only concern. This political ad from the Reagan administration puts into perspective the kind of view we should take on the aliens http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NpwdcmjBgNA.
Like everything in life we should prepare for the worst and hope for the best. It’s better to be safe than sorry, that line may be cliché but this could lead to great advances in technology, absolutely nothing (a district 9 scenario) or total annihilation.

Machiavelli: Bold or Stupid?

Even though for the most part I didn’t agree with what Machiavelli had to say in “The Prince”, I definitely agree with this statement and think that it is good advice. This statement holds true in all of life not just political life. It is always best to take the initiative in everything in life.
Machiavelli is a pretty bold guy he tells anyone reading the book that when you are taking over a country that is ruled by a family that you should kill them, this seems a bit like taking advantage of the situation but if you are seeking fortune then this is the path to take. It’s what leaders like Hitler did. Germany was going through political struggle with the fall of the Weimer Republic, and when the going was good he had plenty of fortune.
This seems to go along with his previous advice because he seems to give “bold” advice like when you take over another state to kill its ruling family if it has one and to disarm its citizens. This is a pretty “bold” move. Also he is advising leaders how to stay in power and if they want to stay in power during “political strife and struggle” then they have to be bold especially because the strife and struggle is happening on their watch.

Reflection of Week two:

This past Saturday we went to the D.C United game. I was really looking forward to this because I’ve played soccer my whole life, it’s one of my favorite sports, I have never been to a professional soccer/football game in America or the rest of the world and we’ve just finished reading Foers book “How soccer Explains the World”. Even though I’ve heard that American professional soccer is nowhere near as exciting as European or South American I was looking forward to experience the atmosphere of the sport. From across the stadium the atmosphere looked just like the games in Europe, with the people waving the teams flags, singing songs that if you don’t know what they’re singing it’s impossible to understand and the jumping up in down in unison.

I was glad to see that there weren’t any Allen Garrisons running through the crowd beating Columbus fans or fans shouting ethnic slurs to people of Ohio (which would be pretty hard to come up with). It was easy to see that most people at the game were treating it as any other sporting event in America, just sitting back watching the game, standing up when we had a chance to score or yelling at the referee rather than shouting racial slurs to the other fans or team. I guess it’s hard to shout those at each other because of what makes this country great, our diversity. I saw all different kinds of people who I’m sure support many kinds of religions wearing D.C United shirts, who were all United under their team rather than a race, religion or region.

"Should the world be organized into sovereign territorial nation-states?"

The world should be divided up into sovereign territorial nation-states. This is so because it seems the most suited for keeping long time peace. “The Nation-State and Global Order” describes a nation state as “distinct geographically defined territory over which it exercises jurisdiction: second, has sovereignty over its territory, which means that its jurisdiction is theoretically exclusive of outside interference by other nation-states or entities; third it has a government made up of public offices and roles that control and administer the territory and population subject to the state’s jurisdiction.” This is how people want to be governed, they don’t want opposing forces coming in and telling them what to do and what to think.

There are a few exceptions of city-states such as Singapore and the Vatican. City-states might work but we wouldn’t be as technologically advanced as we are today. It would be harder to establish relations with other city-states because there would be so many, making it difficult for scientists to communicate and share ideas to create anything such as medicine or faster ways of travel, in a nation-state system they would be from other parts of the world but this wouldn’t matter. There are also a few exceptions for tribes like the Kurds who live in the mountains in Turkey, Iraq and Iran. If we had tribes I think they would eventually ally with each other creating larger tribes and in a sense city-states and/or nation states, but life with in a tribe would be much harder, we wouldn’t have any of the amenities we have today. Empires in these days would mean total war with the advanced military technology we possess. The last true empire was the Japanese Empire and they didn’t last as long as a traditional empire.

As history has shown us empires are always trying to expand by taking over any land they haven’t been to yet. They don’t recognize any country, city-state or tribe that is not their own and will go to war with one if it does not succumb to it. If the world was split up into empires today, the world would most likely end because of the weapon technology that today’s countries possess. It would only work if we decide to create a boundary, but that’s not the mentality of an empire. We would be at war until there was one empire standing; empires also usually impose their ideals on the people they conquer which no one likes. City-states would probably be run by warlords and have constant skirmishes, every now and then a few might come together forming a small kingdom, then fall apart much like early European ones in Christendom. Tribes would eventually ally with each other and form confederations like the “Iroquois Federation” for protection.

In conclusion being divided up into sovereign territorial nation-states is best for our world. People don’t want ideals forced on them from an empire or to live without the amenities we have today. It seems that even if we weren’t nation-states we would become them, empires would crumble into city-states and tribes who would form nation-states because it is the best and easiest way to govern.

Reflection - Week One

Two very shocking and upsetting things were brought to my attention this week:

1) AIDS is a big problem here and this country is the only large-scale contributor towards its prevention worldwide.

2) Americans are not as passionate about national sports teams and our place in the international community as the rest of the world.

Hearing the AIDS presentation made me feel a little sad, embarrassed, and frustrated. Sad because of how the world is not doing enough to help the poor people living with HIV/ AIDS. Why not? Who cares what their situation is? These are real people here, with a real disease that isn't just going to go away. On that note, I felt a bit embarrassed that I never really paid attention to this issue before for many of the same reasons people are not contributing money. I judged the people with the disease, people I don't know personally nor cared to. I judged people based on the little I knew. Finally, I was frustrated with myself and with those other judgmental people. The world should take a better stand in fighting HIV/ AIDS in the future. If only the world were more open-minded and accepting of other cultures and ways of life, we could probably come up with effective solutions to stop the spread of HIV/ AIDS across the globe.

The other thing I learned this week that frustrated me was America's apathy towards the world. We don't pay much attention to participation with other countries in sporting events and tend to hold a better-than-you attitude toward other countries. When Thomas mentioned our melting pot of a country, I was thinking about the difference between a "melting pot" and a "cultural mosaic" culture. Yes, we are a melting pot. We have all the other cultures of this nation mixed into ours. This does not mean, as Thomas said, that "America is globalization." If we were a cultural mosaic, one could argue that we are. If we just pieced all of our different cultures together, each keeping their individuality (as a mosaic suggests), then we could say we are globalization. But we have to care about other cultures, not just be so intent on making everyone else like us. We also have to branch out and be social with other nations through things like sporting events outside the Olympics. How do we do this? How do we get our country to be more of a mosaic? I believe this starts with us. This generation of college students must initiate the acceptance of other cultures. One day, we will be the ones in policy making positions. If we gain the acceptance of others now, we will be able to ensure others will later.

Reflection on first week of class:

I think that it’s absolutely crazy that we are the only country that is really trying to help AIDS victims around the world. I don’t know whether these other countries are helping themselves first or if they are just being selfish. If other wealthy nations like England, France or China would donate as much as we do then we would be able to treat a lot more people and have more money to fund the finding of a cure and/or a possible vaccine. If we are going to be the only country that is trying to help then it seems a little useless, I’m not trying to sound cruel but if we could help out with problems we have in our country now instead of helping AIDS/HIV victims in other countries then we probably should, but if other countries also decide to chip in then we could help the AIDS/HIV victims.

Also when everyone in class was talking about how Americans only come together for sporting events that we care about like the Olympics, I was raising my hand but didn’t get the ball, I was trying to say that the world basketball championships are going on as we were speaking, in fact America was playing Lithuania at that very moment. They started Friday I believe. Basketball is arguably the second most popular sport in the country and the world cup of it is on T.V. I haven’t heard any one mention it, the games aren’t on big name networks like espn, they are mostly on NBA T.V which if you don’t have an above average cable package then you won’t get. The main reason a lot of people don’t know its going on is because we don’t have our big name players like Kobe Bryant, Lebron James, or Dwayne Wade playing in it, this is because of insurance and injury issues on their new contracts this season, they all would like to play but as we said in class American sports is more of city vs. city rather than America vs. other countries, which in my mind is more exciting.

Iran and its conquest for nuclear weapons

                The biggest issue in world politics is Iran. They support and harbor terrorism giving Hezbollah Hezbollah UAV's which were used against the Israelis in 2006 and Al-Queda armor piercing rounds that rip apart our military vehicles in Iraq, they want to destroy one of our closest allies Israel, and are developing Nuclear weapons. If they destroy our ally in Israel we lose a front line on the Middle East, they have provided us wih a lot of vital information. Israel has almost always supported us and has openly acknowledged that they have our back when not many countries do. Iran is also facing internal problems with their leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who supposedly rigged an election to keep himself in power, openly denies the Holocaust when there is all the proof in the world that it happened, I was in Poland, I was in Auschwitz, it happened. The country also has hardly any rights for women which brings up the issue of an Iranian women who was charged with adultery after her husband died and was sentenced to death by stoning now that those charges were lifted due to international pressure the government is now charging her with murder of her husband They are gearing up their nuclear program getting nuclear material from Russia just this past week along with revealing new weapon of war also this past week, a bomber drone that can fly 620 miles (that range can attack most of our bases in Iraq). They are just ignoring United Nations sanctions and refuses to let international inspectors come in and see what exactly they’ve got going on in their nuclear plants that they say “are for nuclear energy”.

               Iran is a serious problem they may not have many natural resources but they do have arguably the most value in oil and they have a lot of oil which they could by other natural resources with. If Israel was to try a military strike on Iran’s biggest threat being its nuclear facility they would end up killing a bunch of Russian technicians, this would be bad because Russia is on the P5+1 and wants them to be tougher on Iran. Iran may say that their nuclear facilities are made for electrical power but they are enriching their uranium which is what you do when you want to make a nuclear bomb, so you be the judge with that. The latest list of sanctions bans countries from things they wouldn’t normally do like sell them aircraft or other military vehicles but it only recommends countries to not align themselves financially or inspect Iranian ships coming in and leaving their ports along with many more.

               If Iran is to be dealt with diplomatically which is the way we all hope happens, because their people don’t want their government, they’ve been protesting in the streets then we need to have much harder sanctions on them that for example we wouldn’t allow them to sell their oil which would choke them financially and they would have to allow us in to see their nuclear “power plants”. If that can’t happen then I agree with our government’s statement that all options are on the table which could include a military strike on their facilities.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100813/ap_on_hi_te/iran_nuclear_10

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2010/08/22/nr.walsh.iran.arms.cnn?iref=allsearch

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009/03/us-jet-shoots-d/



By: Alex H.

The Hydra: Violent Religious Extremism

The biggest issue in world politics today is naturally the most complex to tackle.  Violent religious extremism, in the form of Islamic militants, violent Zionists, or the KKK, is one of the greatest challenges the international community will have to face in the 21^st century. The use of religion as a political tool in veiled land and economic disputes in the Middle East and elsewhere threatens the security of citizens everywhere. Religiously affiliated terrorist groups (for example, Al Qaeda) continue to fuel the cultural myth of “the clash of civilizations,” a construct that will hamper international relations between the West and East until it is discredited.  In order to solve this universal problem, the international community must examine its roots in poverty, unemployment, and a deprived education system.  Terrorism in the Middle East is perhaps the most poignant and recognized example of the multifaceted nature of this political animal.

                                                     (Athenian red-figure vase, ca.475 BC, Palermo, Sicily)
 “Religious” terrorist networks in the Middle East have often been equated to the ancient Greek monster Hydra. According to Greek mythology, Hydra was a nearly invincible monster with seven heads. When attacked, each head would grow back two fold. The United States may hunt down existing Islamic militants in Afghanistan, however, the more fighters killed, the more that spring up in their place. This is why a unilateral military strategy for combating terrorism will not suffice. While other global issues can be dealt with in political or economic negotiations, religious extremism is a component of culture that will take generations to drain. As the ancient Greek myth of Hydra informs us, the best way to attack the monster of terrorism would be to burn its roots, or in other words nullify the next generation of potential recruits. In order to break this endless cycle, the world must provide the next generation of so-called “third world” citizens a less violent, healthier and more prosperous path in life.  To tackle the roots of violent religious extremism, sovereign nations, in conjunction with the international community, would need to focus funding on improving education for both men and women, increase employment opportunities, and implement social programs for youth.  In this way, counterterrorism can be viewed as a complex area of social work.

                                                 Hydra (9/30/01, Black &White World, page 9.)
    Because of its intricate nature, violent religious extremism holds the gauntlet for major issues facing the global community in this century. With increased globalization, internet communication, and the proliferation of dangerous nuclear weapons, violent religious extremism has raised the stakes for national security around the world. Just as Hercules killed the Hydra by scorching its necks before the heads grew back, the international community must imagine creative solutions to burn the roots of this persistent threat to international security.

By: Aubrey Rose

Authors Note: Historically, the Greek myth of Hydra has been equated to complex issues in society. While I have never read an in-depth comparison of terrorism and the Hydra, I cannot claim this as my own metaphor. While I have no specific article to cite, I want to offer the disclaimer that this metaphor has been used before and I do not claim it as my original creation.