…or, why hippies are idiots.

So I wrote a reply to a "we're killing the planet" blog, and part of it I decided to repost here:

There are a bunch of idiots who think that everything should be peace - peace, peace, peace. No fighting, no violence, no killing - a utopia on Earth, as it were. Problem with that is, it's been tried. And it failed. There's a book I read once - "The Arcadians." A bunch of naturalists back in the nineteenth century decided to live in nature and be nonviolent - they failed. Within a couple of weeks, one was drinking (alcohol, not water) and they were all angry at each other. The settlement fell apart.

Now, I'm not saying peace is bad - far from it. Peace is a good thing. It's just when people try to take the pie without paying the pieper that things get sticky. Humans are basically evil. And not in the "Ooh, we're killing trees! We're evil!" kind of way - in the "I'm going to kill you because I want your house" kind of way. There is NO WAY to have a perfectly peaceful earth. Those that only act in peace are trampled by those who act out of desire - just like the Vikings and those they raided. In order to keep the Vikings away, peace-loving villages without standing armies would basically give the vikings money in order to uphold that peace. Remember 9/11? The reason behind that horrible act? Why did the terrorists decide to fly a plane into the WTC? Why did they attack the United States? Were we doing something to them? Were we attacking them? No. We were being "peaceful." Holding "peace talks." Trying to negotiate for "peace." However, we happened to be supporting Israel - which was something these terrorists didn't like. So they walked onboard a bunch of planes, took them over, and killed thousands of Americans. We were being overly peaceful - and it cost us. But - and here's where things took a turn for the better - we didn't sit and take it. We stood up and fought back. We became active and vigilant in our defense against terrorism - and since that day, there have been no more World Trade Center disasters. Our current peace is preserved not through peacemongering, but through defensive war.

In closing, there's a sentence that easily applies here: "Peace is good. Peace without war… is impossible."