In Three Guineas (1938), English novelist Virginia Woolf, said the following:
Therefore if you insist upon fighting to protect me, or “our” country, let it be understood, soberly and rationally between us, that you are fighting to gratify a sex instinct which I cannot share; to procure benefits which I have not shared and probably will not share; but not to gratify my instincts, or to protect myself or my country. For…in fact, as a woman, I have no country. As a woman I want no country. As a woman, my country is the whole world.
Like Virginia Woolf, I echo her last sentiment. My country is the whole world. The idea that all of us belong to one country speaks to the universality of the human experience. We are more alike than not.
Never before has man had more ways to communicate, in more languages, and at a faster rate of speed. Yet, much of what is said, and done, is counterproductive in securing peace, happiness, and prosperity for all of the world’s people.
Today, I was continuing to read a book that contains first person accounts of the lives of various people who live in Afghanistan, a place called the “poorest country on earth.”
One story tells of an ordinary citizen there who possesses a Ph.D. in Chemistry from Germany. Due to his ostentatious appearance of wealth (an old Mercedes in the yard that he drove back from the Soviet Union), he and his family were targeted to be pushed around, and stripped of all of their valuable earthly possessions.
The only thing they were able to take with them, when they were thrown out of their home, was the gold jewelry that his wife hid under her burqa. Luckily, upon selling the booty, he was able to buy an ax and some wood that he could whittle into bundles of firewood or stove wood. In that manner, the family survived, while he essentially donated his teaching skills, mornings, as he did not often get paid, and when he did, the pay was little.
There has been violation after violation of basic human rights in that country, first under the Soviet occupation, then under the U.S. backed mujahedin, and later the Taliban. The riveting stories in the book, Love and War in Afghanistan, mention such horrific ugliness toward fellow human beings, it is a wonder that Allah could allow the perpetrators of such criminal activity to continue to exist.
Why is there such a dark side to people? Perhaps that is the basic question that is at the very root of all of the troubles of humankind, barring floods, hurricanes, and other weather-related activities.
I am sure that I have more questions than answers. Somehow, deep in my heart, I pray that our legislators in Washington will search their hearts very carefully. We seem to be more entrenched in the business of war, every day.
We should know 1) who we are fighting, 2) why we are fighting with them, and 3) what could be the terms of agreement for the fight to end.
I wrote to my Senator, urging that Logic be applied to seeing that the war end promptly. The response of silence has been deafening.
Peace,
Patricia Cummings
