ceding moral highground

The fear, infact the only fear, I contemplate in an argument is the fear of ceding moral high ground. It truly does not matter whether I am on the losing side or the winning side. A winnable argument can be rendered useless by a questionable morality. It also accelarates losses further down the road, for a losing side.

No outsider or outside of self would contribute to such a threat as much as self.

In the movie, Gandhi, one among a few scenes I remember from has to do with the danDi maarch. It is a scene about non-cooperation movement by satyaagrahi's who defy the orders to make salt in a coastal village named danDi in Gujrat (a NW state in India). The scene is described in many texts. As a batch of satyagrahi's walked over to the site in a row with the intention of picking salt from ground, police charge on these unarmed villagers. The batch falls to the ground and a number of women wokers rush to the scene to treat them or pull them aside. Second batch moves forward. These batches keep coming. They keep taking the beating with no resistance. The saga goes on till dusk.

There is a NY Times reporter, Vincent Walker (played by Martin Sheen) to witness on site and as shown in the movie to be rushing to a nearest phone. His dictates a telegram to Times: After today, the west can no longer claim the moral high ground. It did not take long after that for British to seek an exit from India.

Indians were no better than Britishers. British saw an opportunity and held India as a captive. Capable Indians did that to their own people. Such comparisons were unnecessary until the point of relative greatness on the part of Indian and in great numbers in which it is practiced was made evident to the world. The political masterminds of the time understood that & the British had no choice but exit.

The aggressor is seen always as beginning at a low point from any vantage. Saddam Hussain was seen as having no moral ground to begin with when he rolled into Kuwait. Current President Bush is seen across the world as not having such a ground either. These positions are not comparable however similar they might look from a moral stand point. Not withstanding that, it provides neither consolation nor comfort for a world citizen that America is a liberator of Iraqis.

America has shed nearly two-thousand soldiers thus far in Iraq. When is the war going to be too expensive (in deaths)? No-one would ask a losing side how many of their people died. Iraq is a losing side, so far. As the time wears out, if Saddam is forgotten, America would stand on the losing edge. That is a point when people in the world would begin to not notice or count the number of American deaths.

World offered essentially a blank check to America after 9-11. An incident of that magnitude can change the world. The terrorists funded by Bin Laden fell to the lowest point after 9-11. While those terror seeking organizations continue to self-destroy themselves, the civilized nations can not afford to fall into that trap.

That is a place America can not afford to be in. Moral high ground is the only thing that will come to rescue. The equation is a real simple one at this point. The complexities of cold war are literally under water in Atlantic. World will forget Abu Graib. World will forget WMD. World will forget civilian deaths in Iraq. If America plays a visible role with the following: Africa must be rescued. Middle-east must be settled. Arms in the world should go down. Environmental treaties honored. Fight the disease in the world. Leave Iraq to UN. Offer mea culpa on intelligence (to no one in particular). Get Bin Laden. Curse the French for abandoning friends in difficult times. (I have been a supporter of getting rid of Saddam by what ever means it took, and there is no change in that position -- this is about moving forward). Moral ground's only purpose is to stay afloat above the water and not sink. It's purpose is to protect the interests of future generations.

We go from the international circles and conundrums to the local issues to the state of Andhra Pradesh. Virasam (the self-proclaimed revolutionary writers association in AP) may not have gained much in its literary status with the imposition of ban on them by the AP State Government. They may treat the present ban as a feather in their cap. They have no clue about revolution, the government is the one that acted as a revolutionary in the true spirit of not ceding one inch in strategy and never showing their cards in public. Everyone would only guess what the Government would do next as everyone else's position is very well fixed. That gives an added advantage to the establishment.

Moral highground is never fixed. It shifts with people. It seeks to attract majority to its side. If minority is repelled by it, it shifts with the unexpected swiftness. The establishments will continue to be ruined because they are either too slow to recognize such shifts or because they are too lazy to act on such signs. The Governement of AP should release the so-called virasaM from its list of banned organizations while continuing to pursue every legal case on each individual, if there is sufficient evidence to support any other banned organization. Governement can not afford to test its own limits. MLA Narsi Reddy's murder on Independence day along with ten other people offered a blank check to the establishment by the majority. That has happened once before with the cold-blooded murders in Vempenta by the so-called maoists. These incidents require a measured response from the perspective of public while following through the most rigorous course on the inside. Establishment in Andhra Pradesh gets high marks on this while virasaM gets a zero.

One last thought on this:

Moral authority is never retained by any attempt to hold on to it. It comes without seeking and is retained without effort. - Mohandas Gandhi

But Gandhi lived in different times & it is hard to believe that he once walked on this earth. Today, retaining Moral authority requires considerable, visibile effort. If no effort provides the evidence of such in populace, one must seek it with more effort.