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The Lemming Lesson
North Miami Beach, FL March 28, 2001 Aaron H.
Schectman
THINKING ALLOWED
Essays on issues, ideas and reflections on the times. Published now and
then, Opinions pro or con are welcome.
THE LEMMING LESSON
It is not easily understood that the lemmings (small hamster sized animals)
have never learned that their destructive march to the sea has never earned
them relief from what devils them. We humans think when we try to destroy
ourselves we should learn from a hard lesson and stop that behavior.
Unfortunately some humans, particularly the Arab peoples of the Near East
like lemmings, believe that continued self-destruction is necessary in order
to achieve their aims. Non Palestinian Arabs see no reason to argue against
sacrificing Palestinian children in self-destructive acts.
What is particularly hard to see is why the Palestinian People continue to
think Israelis will accept having stones thrown at them as a proper method
of communicating. Then, too, Israelis who bargained and compromised heavily
do not think that bombs set off by Palestinians is an acceptable way of
negotiating permanent peace. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth is
what is being practiced in that part of the world. That is a practice as old
as lemmings inexorably marching to die in the sea.
Some believe that lemmings take crusades to the sea when their population
explodes and their birth rate exceeds their ability to feed themselves.
There are simply too many of them and then they have this urge to destroy a
large proportion of their population. Like the animals they are they act on
this urge.
When articulate people act like lemmings instead of using communication and
compromise they cease to make sense. Sending children to throw stones at
armed troops and placing bombs where they can and do hurt innocents is not
an articulate argument. The real argument on the part of the Palestinians is
that they do not want a settlement of their dispute with Israel on any terms
except the extinction of Israel.
You can learn a lesson from the behavior of lemmings but the Palestinian
and Arab peoples have not learned it. It is simply not an acceptable human
behavior to behave self-destructively like the lemmings do. Carol's
Evaluation:10 out of 10.
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