Violence for Violence?

Yesterday, thanks to several Blackberry broadcast jokes and "gifs" of Osama Bin Laden "alive in the Dominican Republic and dancing reggaeton", I found out that the United States had found and killed Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden. Wanting to know more, I looked up reports on cnn.com, and found this one:

CNN: "A Good Day for America"

I have to admit, I have mixed feelings about celebrating ANYONE'S death, even if he was a murderer. In Ancient Babylon (about 4000 years ago), this intellectual named Hammurabi came up with a law called Hammurabi's Code, which stated, "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." In other words, if you hit me, I can hit you back, 'cause that's just fair! I tend to agree more with Mahatma Ghandi, an Indian Human Rights Activist of the early 1900s (A.D.), who stated, "An eye for an eye leaves everybody blind." This "monumentous day in American history", the murder of Osama Bin Laden, speaks very clearly to these principles, in my opinion.

Thinking about terrorism, I remembered last year when we blogged about if Hitler was a terrorist. Check out the page for a blast from the past and to see your ideas last year about terrorism and if they have changed. Take time to read through it... it's pretty interesting, and amazing how your thoughts have grown so much in a year! Make sure to read the poem which, ironically, is called "Eye to Eye". It was written by a Palestinian teenager who lived through the "War on Terrorism". This poem was also made into a song, so you can see the power that WORDS can have to inspire AWARENESS and CHANGE. Here's the link to last year's blog on terrorism:

Was Hitler a Terrorist?

Feel free to share here what you think about all of this. I will leave you with the full quote (part of it I gave you in class today) from Martin Luther King Jr. about hatred and violence:

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral,
begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy.
Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it.
Through violence you may murder the liar,
but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth.
Through violence you may murder the hater,
but you do not murder hate.
In fact, violence merely increases hate.
So it goes.
Returning violence for violence multiplies violence,
adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness:
only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
(taken from: http://www.drmartinlutherkingjr.com/mlkquotes.htm)