By War. I do not understand it. The word itself has so many interpretations, meanings, and emotions attached to it. Part of me does not want to understand it. To be able to comprehend something so awful would seem to somehow justify it. I do not want to justify it. I don’t want to see justice in war. All I see is death. Unjustifiable death. We visited a cemetery yesterday in Belgium where thousands of soldiers who fought and lost their lives in World War One are buried. This cemetery holds just a fraction of the millions of bodies from the Great War who are now empty; soul-less. I kept asking myself for what? For what did they die for? Their country? Honour? Glory? We are told war brings peace, prosperity and justice. The myths of war. What are the reasons behind the propaganda? Money? Politics? Power?
War robs lives. Even the lives that were not physically taken are no longer their own. They become shells of their former selves that are forever changed. They are robbed of their memories, their emotions and their relationships.
World War One. The Great War. The War to End all Wars. Apparently not. We are surrounded by war.
I had a conversation with a woman who lives in Belgium today. Belgium is a country that still holds physical evidence of the destruction of war within its people, architecture and land. Something she said about North America stuck out to me. She was comparing the films from her country to mine and said that the movies that are made in Belgium are “too sweet to be true” and the movies that come from America are mostly focused on action, destruction, and death. It made me think about the perspective we as North Americans have on war, being a country who has not felt the horrors of it like Europe has. Would we be so apathetic towards the war in Afghanistan if our cemeteries were overflowing with unmarked soldiers graves? Something needs to change.
War. I do not understand it. I do not pretend to. What I do understand is the power and importance of life and the need to protect and preserve the value in it. Some say that in war the end justifies the means. When will the means no longer be needed? When will the end be now? When will the value of life outweigh death?