Ralph Peters is an Idiot

Just had to say it.

It may even be untrue.  The fact that ‘idiot’ can be interpreted variously is my sword and my shield.

Thomas Barnett linked Peters’ essay “Faith’s civil wars“  — an essay which may seem to be a 5GW maneuver disguised as a 4GW maneuver; so I could be wrong.   Thomas Barnett liked what he read.

Peters’ pedestrian, philistine, and flippant dismissal of “God is dead” is either a sign of his incredible ignorance or else a sign of some 4GW/5GW attempt to alter the minds and activities of those who read his op-ed. Here is Nietzsche’s remark:

God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?

—Nietzsche, The Gay Science, Section 125,  tr. Walter Kaufmann

Even if Peters is merely ignorant, the attempt was probably still 4GW/5GW, analogous to the pronouncement of some ancient prophet attempting to steer the lost sheep back into the fold.  After dismissing the “bit of nonsense” that God is dead, Peters asks, “Will the god of love and mercy triumph over the god of battles?”, a rhetorical question which could be restated thus:  O! ye fools and unbelievers, repent of your violent ways, for the Lord is a lord of love and mercy, not of battle! One might attempt to piece together the exact politics Peters would prescribe — and which, proscribe — from the shreds and patches USA Today has categorized under its Columnists’ opinions; undoubtedly, some will.  If Peters believes what he has written, perhaps he’d eschew any sort of political enforcement of his prophetic message and put his faith in the ability of his words to cause the manifestation he prescribes.

But by all appearances, he is speaking to the ignorant.  This probably means he is attempting to influence those who believe in  ‘superempowerment’ in the Robbian sense; i.e., to those who are linear thinkers, haters, for whom the dichotomous choice, of a God of Love or a God of War, may mean something.  Peters’ paradigm has nothing of co-optation in it, unless he means to co-opt his readers into his dichotomous thinking — and yet, it would seem that they are already there, making co-optation a moot point.

The not-so-ignorant, on the other hand, would see Peters’ faux pas:  Nietzsche’s thoughts run parallel with Peters’.  God is dead not because some being has died, killed by us, but because we have ceased to live in the belief that such a divinity organizes the world purposefully.  We can not trust in God’s love and power; we can have no faith in God.  We pick up knives — or write bills to enact into laws, or write our advocacy into op-ed pieces for USA Today — for the purpose of becoming The ordering principle. The chaotic advancement of globalization appears chaotic because, quite simply, no God is understood to be behind it.

To choose love over war is to decide to order the world purposefully.
 
Peters could have outlined this.  He could have said, O! ye dichotomous thinkers, know ye that this chaos is of God’s making; know ye that the Lord’s love includes this violent streak, and that those who serve the God of War serve but one God, the same God that is your God; or that those who serve the God of Love, despising violence and renouncing it, serve but one God, which is your God.  There is but one God, and his plan shall be fulfilled.  None shall escape it.  None may change it.  None may refuse to enact it, though all act freely. There is no God but God.

But of course, he wouldn’t dare.  Would he?  Perhaps he couldn’t dare, for fear of attempting a human-made order, in getting others to follow his commandment and in opposition to other human paradigms, and so defying the spirit of his own commandment.  I can’t help thinking that, if he dared to say such a thing, a great many people would laugh at him, and a great many more would yell P-Shaw! and set about trying to shape the world, through bombs and guns or through words like this blog post.

Nietzsche was the prophet.  Peters is merely one of the lost, anticipated by Nietzsche — for this reason:  although Peters may understand the lie he has told in ceremoniously dismissing Nietzsche’s words, and although he may be attempting a 4GW shaming or even a 5GW manipulation, using the idols others may recognize, he has merely added fuel to the fire that will burn in the veins of those most apt to pick up the knife or the legislative pen while giving nothing to the meek for combating that fire.  The fire cannot be shamed away, and though but one burn, it will spread to those who denounce it and see no way of fighting fire but with fire.

Perhaps Peters is a 5GWarrior who seeks to help the God of War; this is a possibility, but how would I know?

Additionally, he has ensured that there will be those who see some kind of Fourth Wall in his essay.  Perhaps my post here is merely part of his Grand 5GW Scheme, but I doubt it.

Essentially, Peters is merely rehashing the angst Nietzsche foretold, attempting some drawing of values for a world tending toward nihilism.  I can’t see how Peters’ essay, in itself, is anything more than a blip on the larger map.

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See also, on Phatic Communion, a consideration of an older Peters essay:  

        ”Oh the Epiphany and the Confusion!”