|
timoteo -> RE: A Toast for Guy Fawkes Day! (Nov. 6 2014 4:31:56)
|
quote:
Guy Fawkes was caught, the king was saved, and parliament was not blown up. Just as (one hopes) terrorists today are caught or neutralized before they can do their intended harm to an innocent public and its institutions. What's not to celebrate?
Well, apart from the unseemliness of celebrating months of torture, a kangaroo court, and a gruesome execution (only four days after the start of the trial) ... and for that matter celebrating by burning in effigy and stomping on a grave ... there are many reasons why we should not be proud of where we are today versus where we were then. Being content that justice was done in this instance is one thing, but Fawkes' case doesn't demonstrate the triumph of law over revenge, nor does it demonstrate the justness of the King's rule. Just the opposite - it was by a failure of government that these events transpired the way they did. The subsequent "celebration" was initiated by the government by playing up populist, anti-Cathoic sentiment, and was used to distract the populace from the problems of the day and to shift the resentment onto a repressed group of people.
First of all there's the religious intolerance and persecution that motivated this act. Four hundred years later, we hopefully recognize the injustice of the campaign by the British government to compel a state-sponsored belief system and to classify opposition to that system as treason. Yet today states still promote religions and persecute those who won't assimilate. This type of religious intolerance has caused countless misery and deaths, and continues to inflict us with war, terrorism, and poverty. These days Muslims get most of the blame for this, but clearly the problem isn't solely in the provenance of any one religion because Fawkes was fighting for Catholicism. And it's not like the British persecution of Catholics was isolated to 400 years ago - it has been endemic up until about 50 years ago and still persists today. Over the years the Guy Fawkes celebration has been a most public expression of anti-Catholic sentiment in England, and in fact it used to be customary to burn an effigy of the Pope at these events. From England, this anti-Catholic sentiment spread to the USA and other parts of the world and affected many societies for hundreds of years, leaving residual effects even today. To me, the "celebration" has a lot in common with cross burning in the South (USA) as an expression of hate towards a certain group of people. (Those are "joyful" celebrations too ...). Sure, I understand that many if not most of the Guy Fawkes day celebrants don't think this way anymore, but that doesn't make the institutionalized commemoration any less offensive.
Secondly, there's celebration of the use of torture to punish enemies of the state. Until recently, I thought that at least some governments had progressed beyond that. But it seems that most people have little faith in the rule of law, and when push comes to shove, whenever we are most concerned about "justice", we throw the rules out the window and resort to inhumane and base behaviour justified by our own righteousness. In my opinion, those who don't follow the law and don't respect the Constitution (USA), even when it's not on their side, aren't patriots, they're selfish nationalists who are as much of a threat to the ideal of a just society as any terrorist or criminal.
Anyway, I'm not against Guy Fawkes day, I just don't see the point of celebrating the events as if they were something to be happy about. I see the events more as a cautionary tale demonstrating why we need to do better. Go ahead and have a pint, just don't delude yourself into thinking that this is a cause for celebration. Maybe raise your glass in the hope that we've learned our lesson, in the hope of tolerance and justice in the future, in the hope that our governments will stop using fear hatred to rule, and in the hope that we can all live together despite our differences.
Bill, I'm sure you can read the not-so-veiled subtext in the above about my displeasure with US actions over the past 10 years, but please don't try to extrapolate that into a picture of who I am or what I believe in - I can guarantee you would come to the wrong conclusion.
|
|
|
|
