#61: Lessons from Corona Crisis (PART 2)

【Killer is Hero?】
In the few months of living through the current pandemic, we’ve come across an increasing number of people beginning to call this corona crisis a war.
 
America will win this war against the coronavirus!
 
That’s the slogan widely repeated throughout the country via TV and internet. Then, top it off with a military airshow, flying fighter jets over Manhattan “to salute those working on the frontline of the COVID-19 response.” All of this is a disturbing development as it glorifies war at the expense of human lives lost in the pandemic.
 
Practically, America today is obsessed with touting our military troops as heroes. It’s almost woven into the fabric of our culture since well before the pandemic, as if patriotism is defined by calling our men and women in uniform a hero. Likewise, politicians repeat the same line over and over again in prominent speeches. And military discounts are offered all over the place – stores, restaurants, and even car insurance.
 
The men and women in uniform, depicted as brave and strong, holding machine guns in their arms, flying fighter jets, and motoring tanks through the rugged terrain. We’re bombarded with such images on TV and internet, many of them recruiting ads run by the military, portraying themselves as the Heroes protecting our life and livelihood. Presenting the military as an employer of choice who’ll help you pay for your college education and health insurance.
 
Swayed by these images, the ordinary people, looking for work to make a living, join the military. And once you get employed there, you’re an automatic Hero. It doesn’t matter what your personal values are. Nor are you questioned how good a human you truly are. You join the military, and you’re a hero. What kind of a Hero is that when you automatically become one by just getting a job, ultimately, to kill fellow humans?
 
In a society as such, an increasing number of people are glorifying war at the expense of human lives lost in this pandemic, by calling this corona crisis a war. While our medical professionals desperately ask for more personal protective equipment such as facemasks and medical gloves, our military is busy performing an airshow, and our media is restless touting the medical professionals as Heroes fighting on the frontlines, as if they’re combat soldiers. By repeating the war slogan over and over again, an immature patriotism is aroused, and war is glorified.
 
In all fairness, people call this pandemic a war because we’re stunned by the staggering number of deaths every day. Because we see the images of patients flooding the hospitals, and medical professionals struggling to treat the ill. Because we hear the horrific stories of patients who die on hospital floors, and bodies after bodies loaded onto refrigerated trucks.
 
Nevertheless, it’s unwise and dangerous to call this corona crisis a war, because it’s not. Calling it a war only creates cover for those who want to glorify war.
 
While we humbly admit how little we know about this virus uncovered only a few months ago, what we do know is that scientific evidences overwhelmingly indicate it evolved in nature. On the contrary, war is what rulers deliberately wage to preserve their own power, by peddling fear and hate in people’s minds.
 
To do so, those who wage a war will justify any means no matter how dirty, inhumane, or dishonorable, for their desired end. It’s victory at any cost; violence, discrimination, threats, lies, cover-ups, destroying evidence – you name it, they’ll use it. They’ll justify taking away freedom, livelihood, the human rights, and life of innocent people.

Under such condition, killing fellow humans becomes an honorable deed, and refusing to kill becomes a criminal act. And just like that, war topples the human morality upside down. We must repudiate war because it forces us to kill and praise killers.
 
On the contrary, providing medical care to the patients of coronavirus doesn’t destroy our moral conscience like that. That’s why the corona crisis isn’t a war – they’re intrinsically different. As such, calling it a war only creates cover for those who want to glorify war.
 
“Our military troops are heroes because they go in harm’s way, risk their own lives, to defend us,” some people say.
 
If so, then so are the workers and volunteers who leap to the disaster scenes or emerging countries to rescue and help the people struggling for survival. And in this pandemic, so are the medical professionals, grocery workers, delivery people, postal workers and many more who go in harm’s way to help us all. In truth, very many people do so not just at times of war, but at times of crisis.
 
Nonetheless, only the military – whose job, ultimately, is to kill fellow humans – often gets the special praises and perks. Isn’t that a classic example of the rulers’ propaganda to ensure that we glorify war, so they can wage a war?
 
Let us not use this corona crisis to glorify war. Rather, let us stay alert to how our emotions of fear, patriotism, and mass hysteria may be abused by the government, heightened by the media, and misdirected by the public to steer us to glorify war. Let us think with our own heads and learn from this crisis.

Read Next: Lessons from Corona Crisis (3)【Global Warming】
Read Previous: Lessons from Corona Crisis (1)【Trust】
 
Complete Series: Lessons from Corona Crisis (1)～(4)
[1]   [2]   [3]   [4]   
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Read Theme: Violence/Peace