In the wake of events that continue to cause tremendous terror, I want to dissect the War on Terror from a linguistic and emotional perspective.
First, we say the War on Terror, but terror is not a thing so much as it is a feeling. So we have two options, we can name it the War on Feeling Terror or the War on Things that Make Us Feel Terror.
The War on Things that Make Us Feel Terror
I believe that our approach has officially been the latter, the War on Things that Make Us Feel Terror. We spend billions of dollars trying to eliminate individuals and organizations that are likely to increase the feeling of terror in the world. We try to squash regimes that promote activities that are likely to terrorize (make a population feel terror). We go to great violent lengths to make sure that these threats disappear.
However, in the process of threatening those threats, we make other people feel terror. John Oliver, in his episode on drone strikes, highlights how drone attacks make people feel terror. He interviews a 13-year-old Yemeni man addressing Congress a week after his village was struck by a drone:
“I spent a year living with an American family and attended an American high school. That was one of the best years of my life. The friendships and values I experienced and described to the villagers helped them understand the America that I know and that I love. Now, however, when they think of America, they think of the terror they feel from the drones that hover over their heads ready to fire missiles at any time. The Drone strikes are the face of America to many Yemenis.”
Later, a 13-year-old Pakistani boy whose grandmother was killed in a drone strike says:
“I no longer love blue skies. In fact, I now prefer grey skies. The drones do not fly when the skies are grey. For a short period of time, the mental tension and fear eases.”
John Oliver concludes, “Look, it is completely natural for us not to want to think about the consequences of our drone program, but when children from other countries are telling us that we’ve made them fear the sky, it might be time to ask some hard questions.”
War on Feeling Terror
So this is why I believe the War on Terror is subconsciously the War on Feeling Terror. In the wake of the Paris attacks, a trending phrase was #NotAfraid. First, I don’t believe that people were not afraid. I believe it was a desired feeling: “I want to feel not afraid.” So then it becomes, “I feel afraid and I want to feel not afraid.”
This is where a litany of references will spew out of my soul and onto the page. Books upon books are written about being fearless. Inside Out, the Pixar film about emotions with a 98% review on Rotten Tomatoes, originally wanted to show Joy vs. Fear instead of Joy vs. Sadness but suppposedly deemed it too dark for publication. A military veteran told me the other day that there is something worse than crying in the military: showing that you’re afraid.
So we have a fear of feeling fear. How to combat this? How to end the War on Terror?
One simple statement
It’s OK to feel terror.
Imagine, what if we spent $150 billion not on violent actions but on helping people at home and around the world learn to appreciate and accept that feeling terror is a part of being alive? To admit that we have no control over whether we feel terror, as it happens before we even consciously know it, and that if we fight against it, it will only bottle up and get worse and then we will subconsciously try to make others feel terror as well so that we’re not alone?
Once we come to peace with feeling terror, then terror will dissipate and we can return to basking in the magnificence of being human. We can return to loving our neighbors. We can return to loving ourselves. We can free our minds from the incessant chatter of anxiety. We can free our hearts to move about the planet and to dance with the light of other humans. We can come back to the little child in us that loves blue skies, loves new languages, loves smiling at strangers, and loves sharing our hearts with others.