On Libya

[Matthew Cissell]

No. The people in Libya opposed to Ghaddafi would have been better off had they 
never picked up the weapons. As Gene Sharp points out using violence is inviting 
your authoriatian enemy to use his greatest weapon without discretion. That's 
why Libya looks quite different from Egypt & Tunisia right now. Notice that 
people in Syria aren't arming themselves.
    Of course, had I been in the Warsaw Ghetto during the uprising I think I 
would have found it hard not to take up arms.
    Oh, one more thing. I never like that part in the Bhagavad Gita where Krisna 
tells Arjuna not to wrrying about killing folks. Just an ancient justification 
for killing. No wonder Bhudda wanted to put that all behind.

MC otis



----- Original Message ----
From: Richard Ryan <himself at richardryan.com>
To: Richard Fiero <rfiero at gmail.com>
Cc: pynchon-l at waste.org
Sent: Wed, May 4, 2011 11:25:49 PM
Subject: Re: Bin Laden

Want to make sure I understand:  you think the Libyan rebels would be
better off if they "put down their weapons and went home"?

On Wed, May 4, 2011 at 3:46 PM, Richard Fiero <rfiero at gmail.com> wrote:

> Anecdotally we see that the results of the peaceful Egyptian revolution were
> far more successful than the Libyan uprising where peace could be achieved
> by the rebels putting down their weapons and going home.
>