APPEASEMENT AND PIXIE DUST

 

APPEASEMENT AND PIXIE DUST

Every negative action has a negative consequence.

 

One of the definitions of appeasement and with historical provenance is the following: To buy off an aggressor by concessions usually at the sacrifice of principles.  Start to feel a bit uncomfortable, because we all know that this is currently playing out with some of the worst state actors in the world.  The appeasement of the likes of Trump, Putin and Netanyahu as the top three running for the title of the worst of the worst.  So, why lump in pixie dust?  All it takes is faith, trust and just a little bit of pixie dust.  Pixie dust is about that insatiable human need for deception, of preferring to look the other way and . . . looking for a convenient way out.  Pretending that everything will be okay and hoping that all will end well.  Spread it around in large enough quantities and keep your fingers crossed.  Pixie dust is hoping for a miracle and in this case, hoping that appeasement will work.

It doesn’t work.

Appeasement doesn’t work.  Never has and never will.  Appeasement in all its forms is about deliberately turning a blind eye and we don’t just do it with the world’s worst aggressors, we’re doing it in every aspect of our human existence and every little bit of success is celebrated like a victory, as a turning point, a proving point; saving a piece of green or reestablishing a species habitat and watching a comeback, while in hundreds of places all around the world it is only getting worse: species extinction, loss of habitat, deforestation, desertification, pollution, resource depletion, farmland lost to more human development.  The sorry list of human incompetence is only getting larger by the day.  Pixie dust is all about deceiving ourselves, self-congratulatory tokens that hide our overall failures to reign in an out-of-control species.  As an objectivist I have an obligation to call it out as it is and not to walk around with rose tinted glasses pretending that all will come out in the wash, spic and span.

"There will be no war in our time."  Famous last words!!!

The sane leaders of the world are reacting today in the same way as their predecessors did with the likes of Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin and dozens of other psychopaths that managed to run their nations into the ground with unprovoked wars and naked aggression, all instigated  to satisfy their personal egos and insane agendas.  Shame on the likes of Carney and NATO allies for condoning renewed attacks on Iran as deserving.  None of them have the backbone to tell Trump off and to go home.  To stop his attacks, his threats, his bullying and acts of unprovoked aggression towards others.  You don’t go around threatening the sovereignty of friends and neighbors, of attacking anyone period, of starting wars and covering it up with bombastic lies and veiled accusations.

Psychopaths like Trump, Netanyahu and Putin will never follow the path of reason and they don’t need any excuses for their behavior because they will invent one on the spot.  All of them lack a moral compass and the end justifies the means, even if that includes starting a murdering, destructive rampage that destroys the lives of millions.  They are immune to the rule of law (in their own minds), of common decency and respect and in the proper use of diplomacy to settle disputes (real or imagined).  Governing is all about the respectful application of justice to serve the greater good of all people, and that includes respecting the rights of visible minorities.

We’re on a collision course with destiny.

When bad actors put the ship of state on a collision course and all the crew on the bridge engage in is a raucous, idiotic debate, as in: should we stop, reverse, slow down or change direction?, all the while the ship is plowing full steam ahead and the inevitable collision will take place.  When humans get caught up in a conflict mode there is no turning back.  Appeasement and pixie dust can be compared to a child believing that the sandcastle build on the beach will still be there if they return next year.

So, why do sane leaders still believe that appeasement will work?  Might work!  Hope that it will work?  It is the inevitable that frightens them.  None of them will shy away from a fight, but they all know that when forced into one that the outcome will be the same as every war ever fought.  A huge waste of time and energy, of effort and resources and countless human losses and lasting trauma.

Provoke conflict and see what happens!

The Strait of Hormuz was free and wide open before the US and Israel decided to go to war with Iran and shut it down.

It is the US navy that maintains the blockade.  It is the US under the leadership of Trump that started an unprovoked war with Iran; a nation that has seen its attempts of the pursuit of nuclear power sabotaged, bombed and banned, time and time again, by the US and Israel.  And, lo and behold, Iran has never been able to respond in kind.

And yet, despite all that uninvited aggression, the sanctions and the bullying, Iran kept the Strait of Hormuz open!  And now the world is paying the price and yet they (world leaders) continue to appease the aggressors!

Poke and provoke.

Aggressors will continue their attacks unless they are stopped in their tracks.  They will continue to test the waters to see what they can get away with.  Look at what Trump has been getting away with at home and abroad.  And who will be next?  Canada, Mexico, Cuba, Greenland?  No apologies.  No backpedaling.  How much appeasement will it take before the blinders come off?

                                  

                                      Calling on all fairies

Who’s kidding who, my fairy friends?

Pixie dust swirling inside a glass bowl.

A snow job if there ever was one.

Lies have never fixed what is broken.

The innocent don’t rise from the dead.

The soldiers we need don’t carry weapons,

Only loving arms.

Save your pixie dust, my fairy friends,

For the gullible and the naïve.

I’ll save my tears,

For those who really deserve it.

 

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