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Terça-feira,
17/9/2002
When in doubt, blame the US
+ de 1800 Acessos
Noel Malcolm, no Eletronic Telegraph, em resenha do "After the Terror", de Ted Honderich, e do "The Eagle's Shadow: Why America Fascinates and Infuriates the World", de Mark Hertsgaard. Sobre o primeiro:
"The key points of the argument are as follows. There is no real difference between an act of omission and an act of commission. This means that each time I fail to give money to Oxfam to save the lives of starving Africans - for example, each time I spend money on a holiday - I am responsible for killing people. Therefore we are all, in a real sense, murderers, and the West is collectively responsible for the elimination of human life on a colossal scale. (Western interventions to help starving Africans, such as the ill-fated American operation in Somalia, naturally pass unmentioned here.)
If terrorists were to try to correct this injustice by murdering thousands of people in New York, that action would not be justified - because it would be "irrational", that is, not likely to achieve its intended effect. (Note in passing that if a more rationally calculated method could be devised - eg kidnapping the children of rich Westerners and demanding ransoms - this argument would apparently support it.) But even so, Honderich insists, if such terrorists did massacre people in New York in such an unjustified way, we, the people of the West, would bear "moral responsibility" for their actions.
By this point, readers may be wondering whether Professor Honderich believes that Osama bin Laden, in attacking the World Trade Center, was trying to persuade the West to feed Africans. The answer seems to be "yes". But he cannot quite bring himself to say this, resorting instead, in one of the most weaselly paragraphs of the book, to a rhetorical question ("Is it possible to suppose that the September 11 attacks had nothing at all to do with . . . Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia and Sierra Leone?") and a nudging hint ("In thinking about it, remember that the attacks on the towers were indeed attacks on the principal symbols of world capitalism")."
Conclusão de Malcolm, impecável: "Not spending £15.99 on this book is one act of omission we should all feel impelled to commit."
E a minha: corra e leia o artigo, porque, ao contrário do livro de Honderich, é bom e gratuito.
Postado por Eduardo Carvalho
Em
17/9/2002 às 13h40
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