THE PROBLEM OF PEACE

The intention to cause harm is not made public, which is why the state is often confused with democracy or a particular political regime… but this is secondary; the state is an armed entity.

States claim to «defend» themselves or to defend human rights when they attack, concealing their nature as armed entities. Arms are tools to kill and harm and war is their relationship, so our way to improve an arm is making it more harmful, overcoming defenses, causing greater damage in a single strike, and so on. We serve the state toward this end, organized hierarchically, a structure that deprives us of freedom and humanity in order to harm others. Even ideology or politics serves this purpose, as is the case with democracy—not because it is a superior system in moral or human terms. It is evident that if democracy made the state vulnerable, the state would reject it. Rousseau explained in detail to the Enlightenment thinkers, who were not democrats, that democracy made Greek city-states stronger than other states, a fact later demonstrated by Napoleon.

Except for weapons, everything exists to serve us, and we also understand everything by its purpose: a car transports us more quickly, and its improvement lies in being faster, safer, able to carry more, and so forth. A television is a receiver of distant images and sounds, and it is better if its images and sounds are clearer, if it consumes less energy, and so on. Objects carry within them an implicit purpose, including the when, how, by whom, etc., they should be used to best fulfill their purpose.

Except for weapons, there is no contradiction among humans; on the contrary, there is harmony and concord, and no voting is needed. But to eliminate weapons, we must first see them for what they are, expose them, and unite in such a way that renders them useless and redundant. Our relationships would then become human and rational, with those same objects serving as an objective reference point for us, as we cooperate to serve one another.

The proof of this is that the purpose of these objects can be made public (universal), whereas weapons are concealed through repression, secrecy, and mystification. This became even more pronounced with Protestantism (as the Turkish threat in Europe was no longer imminent), and even more so with the French Revolution, Romanticism, and so on, to the point where today the state claims total authority over the thoughts of its subjects. People are unconscious of what was obvious in the past to anyone: that justice, goodness, and so forth are based on our humanity, our capacity to put ourselves in another’s place—whether they are suffering or rejoicing—and thus identify their need or abundance, actually the same understanding as we understand the end of things according to their use or service.