A Quote by Noam Chomsky
On humanitarian intervention in general, I guess my view is not unlike the view that was attributed to Gandhi, accurately or not, when he was supposedly asked what he thought about western civilization. He is supposed to have said that he thought it would be a good idea. Similarly, humanitarian intervention would be a good idea, in principle.
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I think no one knows what humanitarian intervention means. If I were a person who was non-American, I would think humanitarian intervention is just another name for United States imperialism.
What happened in the following years? Well, I think that among the educated classes it stayed the same. You talk about humanitarian intervention, it's like Vietnam was a humanitarian intervention. Among the public, it's quite different.
I've been asked a lot for my view on American health care. Well, 'it would be a good idea,' to quote Gandhi.
It is said that Mahatma Gandhi, when asked about Western civilization, remarked, 'I think it would be a good idea.' That's how I feel about intelligent life on Earth, especially when I think about the question of what truly intelligent life might look like elsewhere in the universe.
I refer to calls for humanitarian intervention in the affairs of another state - a new idea, this - even when they are made under the pretext of defending human rights and freedoms.
If I were a person who was non-American, I would think humanitarian intervention is just another name for United States imperialism.
The humanitarian wishes to be a prime mover in the lives of others. He cannot admit either the divine or the natural order, by which men have the power to help themselves. The humanitarian puts himself in the place of God.
But he is confronted by two awkward facts; first, that the competent do not need his assistance; and second, that the majority of people positively do not want to be "done good" by the humanitarian. Of course, what the humanitarian actually proposes is that he shall do what he thinks is good for everybody. It is at this point that the humanitarian sets up the guillotine.
I see nothing wrong ethically with the idea of correcting single gene defects through genetic engineering. But I am concerned about any other kind of intervention, for anything else would be an experiment, which would impose our will on future generations and take unreasonable chances with their welfare ... Thus such intervention is beyond the scope of consideration.
Hoping to garner the support of the American people, proponents of regime-change wars routinely cite humanitarian concerns to justify military intervention in foreign countries. But here is the reality: As a direct result of our intervention in Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, human suffering increased dramatically.
Who thought it would be a good idea to undermine art in the school curriculum? Who thought studying the history of our visual culture was a waste of time? Who thought that only private schools should have that privilege? Was it someone who said we don't need experts?
My message to the Turkish people is never to view any military intervention positively because through military intervention, democracy cannot be achieved.
Market bashers ... might understand the claim that in some particular field, markets required no intervention--though they'd be skeptical--but the notion that, on general principle, complex systems ran themselves just fine without benign intervention seemed like it could only be the product of a quasi-religious faith. ... Of course, this gets things almost precisely backwards. It is the idea that all order must be explained by a functioning mind at the helm, not its denial, that has the closet affinity to the religious instinct.
The Great Seal was an early proclamation of 'humanitarian intervention,' to use the currently fashionable phrase.
My agent called me and said, they watched you do Chopped Champions and they thought you'd be good for this competition. What do you think? And I said, well, what do you think? He said he thought it would be great and I said let's do it. When you decide to do this, you don't really think that you're going to win it. I thought it would be fun, good to test my mettle; games are fun like that. Why not? I'll try it.
I have no idea what I would be, I really don't have the vaguest idea what I would be, if my father had remained a Boston cop. I don't have any idea what I would have thought the horizon was.
Our present political world-view, current in Germany, is based in general on the idea that creative, culture-creating force must indeed be attributed to the state.
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