Earlier this year, my parents packed their bags for Iraq while my older brother chastised them for ignoring God's message of peace. My younger brother quickly followed. They have been there for months. My parents send e-mails about falling asleep to the sound of mortars exploding in Baghdad. My brother calls periodically and tells us horror stories. Thus far, he has gotten a concussion from the reverberation of a bomb, ridden in a boat, which, he later discovered, had a bomb attached to its side (it just didn't happen to go off) and he has been shot at by Iraqi soldiers. I worry that there are worse things he just doesn't say. Given my family situation, it is not surprising that I have become more and more interested in intervention and its justifications.
When this war started, I heard a myriad of reasons in support of our intervention - we need oil, Iraq is funding terrorism and must be stopped, Iraq is Saddam Hussein is al-Qaida is Islam is Evil will destroy all that we know and love. Then I was willing to listen, even if I didn't agree. Then it seemed that people honestly believed that the American way was being threatened, whether physically or economically, and we were acting in self-defense.
Now, I hear only one reason for our "intervention" - we are bringing freedom and democracy to the Iraqis. This leads me to a complicated question: As a liberal society, it is acceptable for us to facilitate liberalism through coercion? Is it our responsibility to do so?
Regardless of the many shades that liberalism takes in America, most Americans do subscribe to a liberal philosophy. This philosophy values freedom, choice and a participatory government. This philosophy is also based, at least in part, on a theory of natural rights. Presumably, natural rights are universal. Given that we believe in these abstract ideas, the question of intervention is complicated and contorted. I believe that all people, regardless of ethnicity, gender or nationality, deserve freedom, a choice about how they live their lives and the opportunity to succeed and the opportunity to follow their dreams.
But what of those countries who claim not to want these things? What of people who claim not to want these things? Who am I to tell a woman that she should want independence and a job instead of security and love? Or to tell a man that family pride is not more important than his own vision of life; that he doesn't have to enter the family profession? The answer is, I am no one. This is very clear to me. If people truly want to live under dictatorships or Sharia law that is their own business. Freedom is the freedom to make your own decision, even when others think you are wrong.
When I try to apply this to real life, it becomes more complicated. If born into a society, a strict religious sect or family that already operates under oppressive principles, does a person have the option of dissent? Are they able to speak out? How do we really know if the majority of people in North Korea, Iraq or Iran are happy with the current state of affairs? We may hear a few dissenters, but they may be the minority. Or they could represent the majority and be the only people willing to risk speaking out.
I welcome dissent, however, I do have an opinion. We cannot and should not engage in coercion to "free" other people unless we are 100 percent sure that they themselves desire freedom. Are we to invade Islamic countries every generation in the name of freedom? Oh, you voted for Sharia law again this century, we'll be back in 10 years to destroy your civilization and give you the choice again. I think not. My musings on the subject have led me to believe that intervention is only justified if one is aiding an internal revolution in their fight for freedom. In this case, it is certain that at least a large percentage of the population feels oppressed.
I am proud of my parents and my brother. I hope that this war is worthwhile, that we are bringing freedom to a people who truly want it and simply never had the means to fight for it. However, if it had been up to me, our brothers and sisters and parents would still be home.
Erin Wildermuth is a senior in the School of International Service and a libertarian columnist for The Eagle.
