Do not cloak your cowardice with “non-violence” there is no honor in cowardice

A great article on Ghandi's position on violence

1920

When there is only a choice between cowardice and violence, I would advice violence,"

"Thus when my eldest son asked me what he should have done had he been present when I was almost fatally assaulted in 1908, whether he should have run away and seen me killed or whether he should have used physical force, which he could and wanted to use, I told him it was his duty to defend me even by using violence...Hence I advocate training in arms for those who believe in the method of violence...But I believe nonviolence is infinitely superior to violence... forgiveness may be more manly than punish.

1924

 "My non-violence does not admit of running away from danger and leaving dear ones unprotected. Between violence and cowardly flight, I can only prefer violence to cowardice," he added that "non-violence is the summit of bravery."

1935,

 "Non-violence cannot be taught to a person who fears to dice and has no power of resistance."

1939, 

as the struggle for independence was peaking:

"For I cannot in any case tolerate cowardice. Let no one say when I am gone that I taught the people to be cowards...I would far rather that you died bravely dealing a blow and receiving a blow than died in abject terror...fleeing from battle is cowardice and unworthy of a warrior...

cowardice is worse than violence because cowards can never be non-violent."

 http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/gandhi-jayanti-non-violent-mahatma-gandhi-preferred-violence-over-cowardice/1/312776.html

Firearms in the right hand for the right reasons (Sounds OK till you get into the detail of GreenPolitics)

From an article by one of the Greens Party of NSW
http://thebigsmoke.com.au/2014/10/16/firearms-right-hands-right-reasons/

"While public safety must be the priority, the fact is guns can be a necessary tool of the trade for people in regional and rural NSW. Farmers who see their stock attacked by wild dogs or foxes, or who have their fences and crops destroyed by wild pigs or goats, often have a demonstrable need for firearms in order to control these animals. Equally, those farmers who raise livestock will, from time to time, need access to firearms to euthanise seriously injured or distressed stock."

I am not sure how many Farms NSW Greens Members have been on or how long they may have spent on the farms. However my experience is that the Farmer has quite a lot to do apart from roam around his property shooting feral pests.

Assuming the farmer is undertaking the regular baiting programs, which can of course be scheduled into the work cycle.

As a side note: Recent CSIRO published study said as many as 69% of all foxes will survive a baiting program. Given that to control foxes you need to cull about 65% of the population each year, baiting will, still leave a farmer significantly short of effective control number.


Pest control is not a matter of just putting "shoot all the feral goat/pigs/foxes/dogs today" in your diary and going and getting it done.

The best advice available is that you need to run multiple coordinated and the opportunistic controls regularly & frequently.

With most of the farmers I know working from sun up to after dark most days, the idea that they have time to be running fox drives, driving around paddocks to find and shoot mobs of pigs or goats on a high frequency is ridiculous.

This is where utilizing recreation hunter/shooter plays a role on many farms.

Every recreational hunter on a property/in a forest increases the chance of pest animal encountering a control method (ie shooting). Not only that but they represent extra eye and ears on the property to report back on feral animal movements and sighting.  I do not see anything in the anti hunting propaganda and publications that recognises or acknowledges this reality.

All I see is that the Anti Hunting Activists seeking to dumb down the debate so that the only element allowed to be discussed is "Are YOU FOR or AGAINST "killing as a past time". 

If the same approach was applied to the professional pest controller is "killing for profit" or even "Killing for fun & profit"

So  back to #GREENS premise that it is "only reasonable that property owners should have access to the tools required to control these  (pest)  populations". 

Recreational Hunters are one of the control methods that should be available to farmers. 

In a co-ordinated and planned control program Baiting, Traping & Shooting should all be employed to ensure maximum chance of success.

To require that the entire "Shooting" component must be done by Farmer or Paid Worker when there are thousands of volunteers ready to do the work (& already doing the work) is an unnecessary and unproductive burden to place on the Agricultural Sector, let alone the Public Purse (in the case of State Forest and National Parks)

As I have written else where, I do not see a lot of evidence based policy being set out in the above article. I certainly don't see a lot of evidence of a working knowledge of farming in Australia.

What I do see is a determined attempt to stop people from hunting.
 What I do see is a deliberate and deceiptful attempt to dumb down discussion so that Greens can WIN and ideological point irrespective of the costs of the fight.




 
REF:
 (1) Effects of coordinated poison-baiting programs on survival and abundance in two red fox populations http://www.publish.csiro.au/paper/WR13202.htm 

(2) Required Annual Population reduction to achieve halt in growth

Source: http://invasives.org.au/files/2014/02/fs_rechunt_NSWvfacts.pdf

The biggest threat to public safety in NSW per the March 28 Election Manifestos of ALP, LNP and GREENS is.....

Just so you understand how things are on March 28.

The ALP has lined up behind the Greens on tougher Firearms and Ammunition Laws.

This means that Liberal, Labor and Greens are all agreed that a key threat to public safety in NSW :

-is not the guys who import illegal drugs
-is not the guys who manufacture illegal drugs
-is not the guys who supply the drug trade with illegal guns
-is not the guys who protect the illegal drug trade with violence, intimation bribery and murder
-its not even the guys who break into farms, businesses and homes to steal guns

Similarly
- it is not those people who week in week out preach that young men and women should join in an armed struggle against western values and democracy
-its not those people who support with funds, equipment and man power organizations that behead, burn to death and stone people who they don't like
-its not the people who are in the country on fake passports who are planning to undertake public beheadings
-its not the people who believe so strongly in their ideology that they attempt to kill police in a carpark
-its not people who are out on bail after committing violent crime, say like setting fire to your wife,
-its not people with a history of violence, who have been reported to police 18 times for threats of violence

Also
-its not the police who supply Bikkie Gangs with information
-its not the politicians who defraud the state of millions in say....coal mine licences
-its not the people who rob assault rape or murder people

No Dear friend, the KEY risk to public safety in NSW is YOU.

Yes yes we know you have a job, pay tax, pay your rent/mortgage on time, attend the P&C, Volunteer for the RFS, help out at the local sports club as coach or manager or official. We know your kids attend school, do the best they can, behave themselves (for teenagers) & even have part time jobs.

BUT the ALP, the GREENS & the LIBERAL & NATIONAL Parties also know that you are one dangerous crazy feather plucker, just waiting for the moment to strike...........

AND the ALP, GREEN LNP alliance have joined forces to make sure that they shorten you LEASH again this election.

If you Fish, Hunt, Target Shoot, Drive a 4WD YOU are THE PROBLEM & They have got YOUR NUMBER and are comming for you.

SO if you HUNT, SHOOT or FISH & you DONT VOTE SFP on March 28

I only have one thing to say..........................

Cultivate the cool courage to die without killing (Mohandas Gandhi)

Continuing on from my last post,  I am sharing this piece by Mohandas Gandhi  to stimulate a more thoughtful discussion about self defense & the use of violence.


In my reading, this was the crucial point:

"My creed of nonviolence is an extremely active force. It has no room for cowardice or even weakness. There is hope for a violent man to be some day non-violent, but there is none for a coward."

No Cowardice

 

I want both the Hindus and Mussalmans to cultivate the cool courage to die without killing. But if one has not that courage, I want him to cultivate the art of killing and being killed rather than, in a cowardly manner, flee from danger. For the latter, in spite of his flight, does commit mental himsa. 

 

He flees because he has not the courage to be killed in the act of killing.
 

My method of nonviolence can never lead to loss of strength, but it alone will make it possible, if the nation wills it, to offer disciplined and concerted violence in time of danger.

My creed of nonviolence is an extremely active force. It has no room for cowardice or even weakness. There is hope for a violent man to be some day non-violent, but there is none for a coward. 

 

I have, therefore, said more than once....that, if we do not know how to defend ourselves, our women and our places of worship by the force of suffering, i.e., nonviolence, we must, if we are men, be at least able to defend all these by fighting.
 

No matter how weak a person is in body, if it is a shame to flee, he will stand his ground and die at his post. This would be nonviolence and bravery. No matter how weak he is, he will use what strength he has in inflicting injury on his opponent, and die in the attempt. This is bravery, but not nonviolence. If, when his duty is to face danger, he flees, it is cowardice. In the first case, the man will have love or charity in him. In the second and third cases, there would be a dislike or distrust and fear.

My nonviolence does admit of people, who cannot or will not be nonviolent, holding and making effective use of arms. Let me repeat for the thousandth time that nonviolence is of the strongest, not of the weak.
 

To run away from danger, instead of facing it, is to deny one's faith in man and God, even one's own self. It were better for one to drown oneself than live to declare such bankruptcy of faith.

 

Source:  http://www.mkgandhi.org/nonviolence/phil8.htm

 

The strength to kill is not essential for self-defence; one ought to have the strength to die (Mohandas Gandhi)

Welcome to 2015.

The close of 2014 saw some terrible things occur in this country.

Those of us who spoke up for the right to be able to defend ourselves and others against the aggression of violent bullies and criminals where once more shouted down & ridiculed by the main stream media.

I am sharing this piece by Mohandas Gandhi  to stimulate a more thoughtful discussion about self defense & the use of violence.

I think we do all agree on this:

To deliberately give or even risk your life in order to save another is undisputed bravery.






Self-defence by Violence

I have been repeating over and over again that he who cannot protect himself or his nearest and dearest or their honour by non-violently facing death may and ought to do so by violently dealing with the oppressor. He who can do neither of the two is a burden. He has no business to be the head of a family. He must either hide himself, or must rest content to live for ever in helplessness and be prepared to crawl like a worm at the bidding of a bully.

The strength to kill is not essential for self-defence; one ought to have the strength to die. When a man is fully ready to die, he will not even desire to offer violence. Indeed, I may put it down as a self-evident proposition that the desire to kill is in inverse proportion to the desire to die. And history is replete with instances of men who, by dying with courage and compassion on their lips, converted the hearts of their violent opponents.
 

Nonviolence cannot be taught to a person who fears to die and has no power of resistance. A helpless mouse is not nonviolent because he is always eaten by pussy. He would gladly eat the murderess if he could, but he ever tries to flee from her. We do not call him a coward, because he is made by nature to behave no better than he does.
 

But a man who, when faced by danger, behaves like a mouse, is rightly called a coward. He harbors violence and hatred in his heart and would kill his enemy if he could without hurting himself. He is a stranger to nonviolence. All sermonizing on it will be lost on him. Bravery is foreign to his nature. 

 

Before he can understand nonviolence, he has to be taught to stand his ground and even suffer death, in the attempt to defend himself against the aggressor who bids fair to overwhelm him. To do otherwise would be to confirm his cowardice and take him further away from nonviolence.
 

Whilst I may not actually help anyone to retaliate, I must not let a coward seek shelter behind nonviolence so-called. Not knowing the stuff of which nonviolence is made, many have honestly believed that running away from danger every time was a virtue compared to offering resistance, especially when it was fraught with danger to one's life. As a teacher of nonviolence I must, so far as it is possible for me, guard against such an unmanly belief.
 

Self-defence....is the only honourable course where there is unreadiness for self-immolation.
 

Though violence is not lawful, when it is offered in self-defence or for the defence of the defenceless, it is an act of bravery far better than cowardly submission. The latter befits neither man nor woman. Under violence, there are many stages and varieties of bravery. Every man must judge this for himself. No other person can or has the right.

 

Source: http://www.mkgandhi.org/nonviolence/phil8.htm