Naive=Manipulatible?

One of the responses to the last post was that the naivete of my "pure" equated with gullibility.

Well, although I admire the commenter, I don't agree. Naive means innocent or deficient in worldly wisdom. I don't think that equates with stupid. And the people I were describing weren't necessarily pure in the religious sense, though that isn't precluded. They were people who genuinely cared about the happiness and well-being of others, were willing to sacrifice their own happiness, even lives, for the benefit of others.

True, people have sacrificed themselves for war and oppression, no doubt, and no doubt they thought they were doing it for the greater good, were convinced that this was the only choice against an "evil" threat. But that's manipulation via hatred and fear. The individuals I'm talking about can't be manipulated like that.

Pure, in this case, isn't about what God you believe in (if any). It's about what you are willing to do and why. Pure in this case precludes being manipulated by hatred and fear because they don't hate anyone. You can't trick them into smiting an enemy because they won't smite anyone, sometimes even in self-defense. They aren't the ones blindly marching along to war because someone convinced them it was a good idea - they are the conscientious objectors who have been there during every war, from the very beginning, often killed for their intractable stands with regards to their own beliefs. Not killing, dying. Even in modern times, they often face years of hardship in response to their unwillingness to kill others.

A faith is something you die for, a doctrine is something you kill for. There is all the difference in the world.
- Tony Benn

They are the quiet unsung heroes who hid thousands of Jews in Germany and the surrounding countries (and likely shared their fates as a result). They are the quiet unsung heroes who helped ferry escaping slaves from the South. They are the quiet and unnewsworthy neighbors who provide blood in a crisis, come help clean up after a disaster, pick up the pieces after a handful of fanatics kill indiscriminately, even though they know the dangerous rubble they sift will likely only provide bodies. They are the firemen who rush into a burning building and the policemen who take a bullet for an innocent bystander.

They are the volunteers who bring water and what comfort they can to a people orphaned and alone after their families were swept away by a tsunami and dig the bodies of children out from a village lost to a mudslide after Hurricane Mitch. They are doctors and, yes, even missionaries, who brave disease and death by violence to help those who have no one else to aid them.

The loud fanatics who have lost site of humanity in their railing against this label or that label can call themselves any number of things. Pure may even be one of them, but it's a lie. It's not about religion or color or lineage or gender or any other label. It's about not letting oneself become a monster because you care about other people, all other people. And, though they don't get the headlines and don't rant on blogs, they do exist, more than we know, more than the world acknowledges, which is why I'm convinced the world is getting better.

For this cause I too am prepared to die, but for no cause, my friend, will I be prepared to kill.
-Mahatma Gandhi

I am not one of them. Oh, I try to do the right thing and try to be part of the solution, but there are things I'd kill for. But I admire them for their unwillingness to ever compromise who they are.

At least, that's how I see it.

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