Since I have to see the old, bored fogeys standing on the street corner every so often waving around signs that say "NO WAR" and "PEACE NOW" and a bunch of other tired pacifist slogans with no hope of changing anyone's idea on the matter whatsoever, I thought I would write a post on the actual nature of pacifism.

You see, modern Americans are very tolerant, gentle, and morally guided people.  We have a very hard time criticizing people who seem simply to care about peace and hate violence.  I think the problem is that we see them as the innocent idealists, perhaps wrong, at worst, but certainly not morally at fault for their foolishness.  I'm afraid, however, I simply cannot tolerate the mealy-mouthed half-criticisms of the pacifist ideology in general.

What pacifism really is is the same thing as what most aspects of the modern left really are: indulgent, self-gratifying, and without worth.  The pacifist has the ability to feel good about being "peaceful" while never having to confront the difficult question of what could be worth their life.  The answer is unequivocally nothing.

Moral absolutes like pacifism are seductive thoughts.  They are simple, and the only onus they place on us is not to act.  But experience will teach that few values are, in fact, absolute.  Killing is usually wrong.  Deception is generally not a good deed.  If you were about to give birth to the spawn of Satan, you might even want to get yourself an abortion (I am not implying that Planned Parenthood will one day save the world).  To give oneself in to the notion that we should never take up arms in defense of anything is to reject the foundation of this country and even the virtues of the Bible.  Even Christ said to his disciples before he left them, "If you do not own a sword, sell your cloak and buy one."
I hope that we can see this pacifist ideology not as the yearnings of an innocent heart, but the whispers of a devil's tongue.

The best way to market a vice is to make it appear to be a virtue.  In fact, this is essentially the only way vice is marketed.  Pacifism falls into this category of vice appearing to be virtue.  A wolf in sheep's clothing, so to speak.  First of all, the tenets of pacifism, namely the notion that "war doesn't solve anything," have been as thoroughly disproven as the assertion that the Sun revolves around the Earth.  War, to be honest, has solved many more things than peace has.  War solved Hitler.  War solved communist encroachment on South Korea.  War solved the Taliban in Afghanistan.  War solved Saddam.  The only reason peace, while desirable, does not have as good a track record at solving problems as war does is that peace is not a means; it is an end.  If you threaten a man breaking into your house that you will blow his legs off with your shotgun if he doesn't leave the way he came (hopefully he can see the weapon in your hands...hopefully he came in through the second floor window), he is far more likely to accede to your demands than if you threaten him that you will curl up in a ball and beg for your life.

It is in this train of thought that I realized pacifism is not so much a mentality of peacefulness as of weakness, so I want to draw a line of separation between pacifism and restraint.  Plenty of us have seen or heard about anti-war protests in which the protestors deface property and even attack people.  Clearly, the driving mentality behind them is not peacefulness, or they would not resort to violence.  But what makes me say that pacifism is weakness?  The reason I make this claim is that pacifists generally do not only advocate a stance of unconditional non-violence (unless the target is conservatives), but rather a state of being unable to even threaten violence.  Pacifists advocate nuclear disarmament quite often, and even occasionally call for the complete abolition of the military.  What they want is not for us to be restrained in our use of force, or even for us never to use force.  They want us to be weak.  Even Gandhi would have a problem with that.  He said the worst trespass the British occupation committed against India was depriving the people of their guns.  If I might, I believe that puts Gandhi solidly on the "pro-2nd Amendment" side of the argument.

To deprive oneself of the capability of defense is to invite attack.  Or shall I use the old saying by the Roman, Vegetius: "Whoever wishes for peace, let him prepare for war."