What colossal ego to think that my life, the life of a Chicago lesbian, is worth more than that of a mother and child in Baghdad? There is a remote possibility that I might die violently at the hands of a fanatic terrorist. But then, I might die violently from any number of causes. In this proposed 'pre-emptive war' the odds that they will die are dramatically increased. The child may be left without its mother, the mother without her child, or at the very least their lives will drastically change as they scrabble for survival.
February was a cruel month. Dozens died in the blizzards that tore across the country. Twenty-one more were crushed to death in the E2 stampede, at least 96 died during a fire at a concert in Rhode Island. Almost 200 perished in a South Korean subway fire-bombed by a deranged man. Seven were lost in the Columbia space shuttle conflagration. Israelis and Palestinians continued their cycle of murder and retribution. Death waits for us all. Ten Februarys past I grieved as my friend, gay activist Chipp Matthews, died from AIDS. Six Februarys ago, I watched my mother as she lay dying consumed by the gangrene she refused to let them treat by amputation. Terrorism must get in line with automobiles and disease.
For those of us left behind, there is the sorrow of life without loved ones. The lingering regrets evinced in Ivan Albright's great painting at the Art Institute: 'That which I should have done, I did not do.' Poets have always understood the dichotomy of ever-present death. 'When I am dead and o'er me bright April shakes out her rain drenched hair, though you shall cry above me, I shall not care.' The mixed emotions on seeing dead youth. Be it from a gang drive-by or 'to an athlete dying young': we mourn the life not lived, the potential not realized. But the dead youth remain forever strong, forever beautiful, preserved in memory like sculptures by the ancient Greeks. A 17th-century cleric saw death as slave to chance, fate, the whims of kings, or desperate men. Nothing has changed.
I have often wondered why so many Americans are terrified of death. It is the natural endgame of all things. For some professing certain religious faiths, death should be a welcome passage to a better world beyond. For others, it is the step off a precipice into the unknown. It can't be avoided. It will come to all of us. Many people my age are not afraid of death; some would even welcome it. It is the manner of dying that holds terror. Protracted pain, the piecemeal loss of health and senses, losing friends and loved ones—the eventual final passage alone.
Like death, war is always with us. As a child it is how we learn history. One nation battles another for territory, resources, entangling alliances; these become the milestones we recite by rote. Egypt, Persia (now Iran), Assyria, Greece, Rome, Macedonia (later Yugoslavia), Spain, Napoleonic France, the British Empire, the German Reich, all had their periods of conquest and dominance. So now America is ascendant. Our story, too, told in wars—the Revolution, Civil War, Mexico, Cuba, the Phillipines, WW I. I was born just before WW II, was raised on parades and patriotic music and taught to hate enemies in the abstract. I was still a child when we invented the 'Cold War' and then we 'defended democracy' in the killing fields of Korea, Vietnam, Central America, and Iraq.
Terrified families in the London Blitz sent their children to the countryside in hoped for safety. With the threat of nuclear weaponry, there was no where to send us as children of the Cold War. We were taught to hide under desks. Our families built and stocked bomb shelters. Chicago had NIKE anti-missile base installations all along the lakefront. All at a great cost in the psyches of children and defense dollars. To what end? Eventually, as after all wars, the enemy became our trading partner and friend. We pulled down the useless missiles and put pantries in the shelters.
Now we have duct tape, heavy-duty plastic, and the same outlay of fear and dollars. Department of Homeland Defense? Impossible! If terrorism could be defended against Israel and Palestine would be happy neighbors and Ireland a gentle land. It's inept and worse, it's all a money pit dumping dollars into a military-industrial machine that could be better used to save lives with programs at home and abroad. Panic bulletins. Code Orange—oops. Sorry. That informant flunked a lie detector test, our error, didn't mean to upset you. But, we'll be right next time. What is this fear that persuades us that we should trade hard-won freedom and rights for the gamble on a few more days, a few more hours?
There may be 'justified war.' It is wrenching to think my taxes buy bullets. I don't want to sanction striking the first blow against Iraq or any other country. I think I would rather take a chance on dying first, before starting a war in which that mother and child become 'collateral damage' or we would lose an ally to 'friendly fire.' All words in quotation marks are PR phrases that sanitize the reality of death, and that stinks.
Copyright 2003, by Marie J. Kuda
e-mail: kudoschgo@aol.com
