It's the dog days of summer. Days are longer, nights shorter and recently the universal thermostat is set to "spontaneous combustion". Along with the heat come those annoying insects: gnats and mosquitoes. They either bite you when you aren't looking or manage to get in the tear duct corner of your eye causing you to spend a few very uncomfortable minutes removing the dead insect.
I was sitting down with my father earlier today, discussing the Israel / Hezbollah conflict, Iran and the oil threats and other light topics from recent news. The sun was setting and I was about to get up and get another glass of the sun tea my father loves to make during the summer months. Suddenly I was attacked, for no reason other than the fact that I was there. I violently smacked my shoulder, killing the mosquito that had bitten me, leaving a smear of my own blood halfway down the top half of my arm. Her (because only the females bite), little legs eviscerated and torn from her frail body, and the head is nowhere to be seen. I picked off the remains of part of her wing, but found nothing else of her. She was dead, and I was happier about it. It was one less mosquito relentlessly attacking me, and one less mosquito attacking someone else like me for I what I perceive to be no good reason other than "It's what they do". After getting my tea and sitting back down, I lit another cigarette and changed the subject with my father.
"Dad, do you suppose I should have let that mosquito live on the grounds that it was less evolved, ill equipped to take me on, and smaller than I?", I asked.
My father looked up at me funny and snorted, "Are you serious? I hate Georgia mosquitoes, they have no class. Up north they never bit me, but down here they don't leave me alone. The more of them that die, the better off we all are".
Normally I wouldn't have asked my father a question this simple. Every time I visit him, he tells me how much he hates the Georgia mosquitoes and how they have no class. It was a question I had asked as bait for the following rational.
Man VS Mosquito.
Man has had millions of years to evolve, and the mosquito much longer; however man has ended up close to the top of the food chain, if not AT the top. We're much larger, faster, stronger, and intelligent than a mosquito. Let's take a look at the contenders shall we:
SHAWN GORDON
* WEIGHT - 190lbs (give or take a few).
* HEIGHT - 6'1"
* REACH - 2'+
* SPEED - Average
* SIGNATURE MOVE - "OPEN HANDED PIMP SMACK OF OVERWHELMING DOOM"
* TASTES LIKE - CHICKEN
MRS. MISQUITO
* WEIGHT - about 2 milligrams
* HEIGHT - about 2mm
* REACH - less than 1mm
* SPEED - 1- 1.5MPh
* SIGNATURE MOVE - "MERCILESS BITE OF EXTREME ITCHY ANNOYANCE"
* TASTES LIKE - UNKNOWN
FIGHTING FAIR
It's obvious that the mosquito is out classed on every front. They simply do not have what it takes to match mankind in an all out battle, at least on a one on one basis (and I've not taken on a swarm of them but feel confident I would leave a wake of mosquito parts as I walked away if I did).
Let not thy will roar, when thy power can but whisper.
-Dr. Thomas Fuller
It's not a contest that I'm in full control of my actions, and make the choice to kill the mosquito, but does the mosquito know what it is doing is wrong? Then because of this, does it make the actions of the mosquito wrong (or by what standard does it become wrong)?
See, if the human race becomes a powerful country (like the US or Israel), where they have all of this technology and a good amount of resources at their command, whereas the mosquito becomes a smaller less evolved (or developed), country (like Iraq or Lebanon), is it still right to swat at them for their attacks? Is it my fault for being more evolved and better equipped than the mosquito? Should the mosquito be held accountable for the action it instinctually undertakes? There has to some kind of middle ground that balances this all out, but where?
The amount of resources and the technology that a country like Israel has is largely due to help it has received. The US has funded Israel for many decades. I believe this to be because it is closer to Christianity than Islamic nations are. Since the past Presidents of the US have been Christians of some denomination, it is then natural to want to help a country who is similarly aligned. Syria won't help Israel because it attacks a group of Muslims, but if Israel were Muslim, and attacking a Christian nation, I'm feel confident Syria would also fund Israel. It is natural to help a "brother" out. Herein lies a very big problem. Who is listening to what needs to be said?
STAYING NEUTRAL
Just as I perceived the mosquito to have no purpose but to suck my blood, Muslims and Jews perceive each other to have no good purpose (or so the recent pictures painted would have me believe), and recently voices of reason are drowned out by arrogant screaming matches, finger pointing, death, destruction, and little wings strewn about the ground with blood smeared across our hands.
Washing one's hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful, not to be neutral.
-Paulo Freire
Should we then allow the mosquito to live after biting us? After all, it was doing only what its instincts lead it to do. Despite their ill equipped bodies and their relatively primitive minds, killing the mosquito may still seem like a good idea. They bite, spread disease, cause discomfort and there seems to be too damn many of them for my personal taste.
So, I advocate a hypothetical genocide based on my personal comfort levels without taking an interest in the effects of my actions prior to committing them. This is beginning to look a lot like world news to me. I take time to plug in the bug zapper, migrate closer to it, and grab some more tea. Oh, the mosquitos will continue to die, but it is not by my hand that this is done. I'll simply opt out of a direct fight.
Power is something of which I am convinced there is no innocence this side of the womb.
-Nadine Gordimer
Having adjusted our seats to be closer to the glowing blue bulb of sizzling death, I continue to subject my father to my thoughts aloud, pausing only to see if he so far agrees or disapproves on grounds of logical misconduct. I receive indication of neither…and I hate to be ignored.
I notice that the bug zapper becomes the adoration of the many nocturnal insects to include our mosquito enemies. At this point I'm not swatting at mosquitoes anymore, so I'm not directly killing them, however the bug zapper I plugged in is. Have I supported the death of these insects even though I directly lead no such assault on them? I no longer care that they exist, they aren't bothering me anymore, and... Something else is making sure I don't have to worry. I am still party to their death, even to a small degree. On the other hand, if I didn't plug it in, my dad would have. In the end, they'd have still died. I finish up one last cigarette and my glass of tea before heading home to write this.
AN END TO THE MEANS OR A MEANS TO AN END
In conclusion, with regards to nature and balance of power, I would say that the fault lays on everyone yet no one. It's simply how things are. Hezbollah and Israel are not on a level playing field in terms of military force. Claiming that Hezbollah is weaker is no reason to ask Israel to stop retaliating. It is not the fault of Israel that Hezbollah is militaristically weaker. Trying to shift power from one side to another in an effort to balance things out, solves nothing. You end up with hard feelings. Those with most of the power are reluctant to give it up because they trust no one; while those without much power are too eager to get more.
You can have power over people as long as you don't take everything away from them. But when you've robbed a man of everything, he's no longer in your power.
-Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn
What separates man from animal? My God says free will and compassion are the gifts that were granted man. These are both our strengths and our weaknesses. There is also that whole opposable thumb thing too, but I can manage to pick stuff up without my thumb at times.
Nature has a way of balancing things out on its own, and pushing things along at a rate faster than intended will result in wars. In summary:
We have, I fear, confused power with greatness.
-Stewart L. Udall
We thought, because we had power, we had wisdom
-Stephen Vincent Benet
All the while, the problem perpetuates itself.
Justice without force is powerless; force without justice is tyrannical.
- Blaise Pascal
Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation, are people who want crops without ploughing the ground; they want rain without thunder and lightning; they want the ocean without the roar of its many waters. The struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, or it may be both. But it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand; it never has and it never will.
- Frederick Douglas
As for the mosquitoes, I've will give the dead ones no more thought, and the ones that still live will die by my hand if they land on me. After all, it is not my fault that I outrank them on the food chain.
AUTHORS NOTE The above analogy between humans and the US and Israel, and mosquitos and Hezbollah or Iraq are not in place to belittle or glorify any groups, race, religion, creed, or nationality; in whole or part. It is merely an analogy that I've used to show the difference in available force based on technology and history. I believe that neither group is more or less deserving of a degree of civility and acknowledgment. Above all I believe that a person regardless of anything deserve to be judged on an individual basis and not off of a stereotype. So, please, if you found my analogy offensive, it was not my intent to portray any group in bad light.
