Paris Tragedy

It has been a long time since I posted here.  I felt compelled today to scribe my thoughts here today. It is hard to believe what the world has become - a violent place.  The latest episode has been played out in Paris by terrorist attack.  No ideology, no amount of anger should make anyone take an innocent life.  However, like entropy violence against the innocent is on the rise.  Call it whatever, war has never been a solution, may be a temporary band aid.  There is a root cause to every problem.  Treating the symptom without treating the root cause will not cure this dreaded disease.  When there is insurgency or terrorism, the immediate response is to fight that with force.  Again force is a temporary solution.  It ends up breeding more insurgents or terrorists or cynics.  How does a child who sees his or her parents blown away erase the picture from his or her mind?  People are not God.  They are made up of anger, hate, love, etc.  Only love and understanding can overcome hate and anger.  Terrorist can be a relative term.  A terrorist to one may be a patriot to another.  There are ample examples in the Middle East.  Many non-Israelis at one time perceived many Israeli leaders as terrorists.  Yasser Arafat was a terrorist in the eyes of Israel.  Force cannot win hearts; it can only suppress it temporarily.  One has to look beyond the guns to find out the root cause.  Generally it is out of fear of losing one’s identity or economic decline or high unemployment or religious orthodoxy or fanaticism.  Only in such situations extreme elements of the society gets sympathy from such sections as they feel that only these elements are their saviors and no one else cares.  If you want to stop large scale migration from one country to another, you have to stop ongoing war in that country or improve the living conditions of the country, or help remove oppression by their own rulers so that there is no incentive for the people to live their birthplace.  Problem solving cannot be a reactionary approach.  It has to be a well thought out root cause analysis.  Granted, while one is looking for the root cause, there can be temporary measures like using force to contain violence.  In the long run though, a civilized society’s aim should be to use less and less of brute force.  One has to find a sound balance between short term measures and long term solutions.