Blog Post 2 - Intervention

After our debate in class today, I feel that I have a clear stance on what I believe what the U.S should do about the Civil war in Syria and how they should intervene. Out of all the readings, I agree with Betcy Jose's argument.  In any type of war or crisis in a country, the civilians should be protected first.
Those civilians are the ones who have to rebuild after the mess that was created by the government, but nothing can be rebuilt if Assad is killing his own people. A quote that stuck with me in the Jose reading was, " [Assad] has not even spared well-entrenched mores, such as those protecting healthcare workers". Syrian healthcare workers are taking care of civilians and the lives of people who are physically fighting in the war. Why wouldn't want to protect the healthcare workers that can help prevent any more casualties, even the people that are fighting on his side? I also think it is important to think about the civilians because I think we are objectifying them. Frequently we are seeing images of children that are dead and suffering from gases and it just makes others see these civilians as another casualty in a war instead of a life that is so valuable being only to be seen on TV at the most horrific point in their life. We need to grow in our sympathy for others and these images are not acceptable. Why is the US only thinking about getting rid of the weapons? The US needs to find strategies to get Syrians out of a literal war-zone. There is something very disheartening that the only thing we are thinking about is fighting back and not protecting others.
Lastly, I agree with Jose because I want to make sure that we do not normalize chemical weapons, which will, in turn, normalize civilians being apart of war as well. They did not sign up to be killed in their own country so we need to do the best we can immediately to save the Syrians.


Comments

  1. profshirkOctober 22, 2017 at 1:21 PM

    Victoria,

    What do you think can/should be done to protect the civilians in Syria along the lines of what Jose argues?

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownOctober 23, 2017 at 8:34 AM

    I agree with Jose's article that the safety of the civilians is crucial and they are dying in various ways other than chemical warfare. However, how do you feel is the best way to go about this situation? If the Assad regime stays in power he will most likely continue destroying his own people and taking away their basic rights to live. I agree that we should not only just focus on chemical weapons but rather broaden our mindset and think about the lack of rights the people in Syria have. How do you feel we should protect their rights?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Jared RostkowskiOctober 24, 2017 at 3:48 PM

    I agree that the safety of civilians is one of the most important things in the whole Syria situation. But going into Syria just to protect civilians or evacuate civilians without fighting would be very difficult. As long as Assad is in power, civilians will not be safe, so if the goal is to protect civilians, getting rid of Assad may be a good place to start.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Tom PilatOctober 24, 2017 at 4:11 PM

    I think that you made your opinion very clear about how you feel and that basic human rights should be shared everywhere in the world, especially in Syria. However, this conflict is a mess, and protecting civilians is no easy task. As of right now, Assad shows no signs of stopping his destructive path to maintain his control. So I believe that the only way to protect civilians, maybe only for a short term, would be to get rid of Assad. Also, getting rid of Assad would most likely lead to another power struggle, which could just mean another situation in which innocent civilians are being wrongfully killed.

    ReplyDelete

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