when you wake up it’s a new morning

Yesterday I had to make a difficult decision once again:  Taizé-prayer or an interesting debate? As usual, I chose the one-time thing – which is the reason why I haven’t been to the Taizé prayer since June, even if it is held twice a month.

Not going to the debate would have been better for my inner balance.

It consisted of a lecture of famous professor Martin van Creveld, a „leading expert on war and military strategy“ who talked about his book „Culture of War“, a reaction to it by prof.dr. Mient Jan Faber, an important peace activist and professor for Human Security in War Situations and Dr. Leon Wecke.

Prof. Creveld’s main point was that war was inherent to human nature and that war existed „because men love war and women love warriors“. He went on to say that a loss of culture could result in terrible things: a soulless world alike to Brave New World, „men without chests“ and, worst, feminism.
Because women should know their place, as is already written in the bible. And any organisation in which too many women work will go downhill, especially the military.

How „men without chests“ could be a bigger problem than innocent human beings being killed he did not say. Generally, his arguments were not very well-connected, he was jumping to conclusions (war results from human emotions, ergo to eliminate war we must eliminate emotions and we don’t want to do that) and everything was presented in poor English, shouted for emphasis.

The speakers on the side of pacifism convinced me anew that I prefer that line of thinking. They presented well thought-out arguments in a quiet manner, to which Mr. van Creveld responded: „Peace! Is! Boring!“

Later, the audience could ask questions. One guy asked whether Mr. Creveld didn’t think that his conclusions about human nature were influenced by his own fascination with war. Creveld: „This is not about me. This is about the truth. Why else would there be 200 people sitting here?“ – Because we didn’t know how much nonsense you were going to talk! Also, the man was radiating „meeeeeeee“ with every word he said.

He repeatedly stated that his intention was „to find the truth, as an academic“ and that he didn’t care what anybody thought of it. I asked if „as an acedemic“, he considered it „suitable to cite the bible and science-fiction books“ to undermine his arguments. His answer: „It depends on how you use these sources. If I used the bible to argue that the earth was made 5000 years ago, it would not be valid. But I don’t see any problem with the way I do it.“ Dear Mr. Creveld, how is citing that Eve was made of Adam’s rib and women are therefore inferiour any different than citing that the earth was made in 7 days?

It’s been a long time since I have heard anybody talk so much crap and I’ve never heard anybody presenting that kind of crap as academic „truth“ in such an arrogant matter.

Yes, maybe war is part of human nature. Maybe there will always be wars (and the way to prevent them is surely not to arm everybody with nuclear weapons, as Mr. Creveld suggests). I was hoping on new insights and a deeper discussion and this clown was a disappointment.

(I wanted to watch the film „Buddha collapsed out of shame“ afterwards to distract myself from my anger. The debate was held in LUX, a cinema/cultural center. Unfortunately, the movie wasn’t shown anymore. What an evening.)