The trouble with guns: Sri Lanka, South Africa, Ireland

[ Australia ][ Jun 11 02:47 GMT ]
Sri Lanka's Tamils are only one group that continues to suffer as a result of this embrace of violence as a tool of radical change. In South Africa, Jacob Zuma's celebration of the "machine-gun" may be symbolic, but points to a residual problem in the political and social culture. Northern Ireland's season of armed killings and sectarian murder expose another unresolved legacy. There is a lesson here too for elements of the global left that still romanticise or indulge the "armed struggle" of (usually) far-away others. The politics of violence are a path to failure and regression. The trouble with guns is that they make the road to real progress so much longer and more painful. [ full story]