Londe is a third-year linguistics student.
By Zsuzsa Londe
This would be the time for President Bush to seize the moment
and educate the world that peace is our primary goal even if our
immediate human emotions would dictate otherwise.
This would be a good time for the president to explain to the
Americans who have lost loved ones on that terrible Tuesday that we
cannot use violence as a reaction to their feeling of anger.
This is our chance to spread peace and unite the world instead
of perpetuating violence.
To attack Afghanistan in retaliation of the ghost enemy will
divide the world, result in the deaths of thousands of more
innocent people and justify bin Laden’s further actions both
in the names of his beliefs and of protecting his host country.
Retaliation or revenge are the wrong courses of action. We
don’t need a show of force since single-minded extremists
will not change their convictions by seeing the U.S. military in
the sky.
Invading a country is not going to “smoke out” the
one person we should be looking for. Terrorism is an act of a few
individuals whose focus on certain ideals is so extreme that they
will not spare any expense, whether it is the lives of their own
group members or that of thousands of other people.
Even if they have followers, they are the responsible
individuals ““ the Hitlers and Milosevics of today who need to
be disarmed and removed from wherever they are, so that they can be
set before an international court for punishment.
Disagreements between groups of religious beliefs have been
around since those religions began. Hate, a human emotion, has been
around since mankind has been around. The ways in which actions can
be taken to express hatred has changed.
Fortunately, not too many people could have planned an extensive
hate-attack like the one last Tuesday.
Unfortunately, if we don’t eradicate terrorism others will
feel licensed, even heroic to follow suit in similar low-tech but
dangerous ways.
No matter how well-funded the FBI could be, we cannot anticipate
the endless number of ways in which cities and countries can be
damaged.
The only way to eliminate terrorism is by enlisting the help of
all nations; countries housing terrorists need to receive help so
they can prevent the staging of another terrorist attack.
This is a great opportunity to unite all the nations, ask them
to forget our differences and fight the common enemy that so deeply
disturbed our world.
This is a time, also, for each of us to show even more
understanding toward our classmates, neighbors, anyone of different
beliefs, different color or dress code and reassure them that it is
everyone’s right to embrace any kind of faith as long as we
can all live peacefully next to each other.
Diversity is awesome.
Let us honor those who died in this horrible tragedy by showing
that they gave their lives to usher in a new era of a united world.
Let us hope that we will be able to think about them in the future
every time we relax in our seats on planes, at Olympic stadiums and
in big cities.
Let us hope that our government will not choose military action
but will lead the world to a new way of thinking.