Rationalized Cowardice.

I went to dinner with a lovely young lady the other night. We also went to a movie and got to see the preview for Lions to Lambs. I didn't think much of it but at the end of the movie, she mentions to me that she didn't want to see Lions for Lambs because she didn't believe that terrorism was real. She thought it was something made up by the Bush Administration to take away our civil rights. That effectively ended out date and any possible respect I could have had for her. First of all, I wonder what were the rights she was complaining about losing. As a beautiful white woman, I'm rather sure she's not under any risk of being sent to Gitmo. But that wasn't what really bothered me. Her attitude is indicative of the general cowardice I see here in SF. Make no mistake-- this idea that terrorism doesn't exist has nothing to do with reality. It's all about justifying inability.

People here don't want to see Islamic Terrorism for the problem it is because they have no way to combat. it. They cannot fight back physically and all the bullshit they've spouted for some many years prevents them from even considering such an action. So they're left with a couple of options. They can put their fate in the hands of others (thereby indebting them in a way they could never allow) or they an define away the problem and pretend it doesn't exist. That's much simpler because by doing that, they make the bad guys people whom they have some way to affect, not people who just want to kill them. I've asked people here what would they do against somebody who was there to kill them? They invariably say that they would reason with him and try to get on his good side. That's silly and ridiculous. If a person means to kill you, you cannot convince him otherwise. You cannot be on his side. That terrifies most people and rightly so.

Plain and simple: most pacifism here is just rationalized cowardice. These miserable people only show courage against those they know would never hurt them. Pathetic.