The Repugnancy of Moral Preening

There is something morally repugnant about the moral preening of those who equate the violence of the victim with the violence of the aggressor.

In the case of the current Hezbolla / Israeli conflict that kind of above-the-fray posturing is most evident on the Left and among the Europeans. The fact that Israel gave up the a large number of settlements and much land to allow the Palestinians to create their own state, a piece of property from which they are now subject to cross-border raids, kidnapping and rocket attack is dismissed. All that matters is the images of elderly Arab women and young Arab children who – having been used as human shields by the jidhadists, now fill the news reports. As an interesting sidelight, have you noticed that the casualty reports are exclusively devoted to the very old and the very young? Is it possible that the Israelis have developed weapons that manage to miss everyone except grandmothers and little girls?

A perfect example – almost a self-parody is this commenter from The Volokh conspiracy going under the non-de-plume of Erasmussimo:

While I strenuously condemn the exaltation of murder, I go further: I condemn murder when it's done oh-so-reluctantly as well. The Lebanese child who dies in from an Israeli bomb is just as dead as the Israeli child who dies from a terrorist rifle butt. Both murders are to be condemned, both should be prevented, neither can be defended.

I must also enter into the discussion the fact that for every Israeli who has died at the hands of Muslims, roughly ten Muslims have died at the hands of Israelis. The Americans have "achieved" an even higher kill ratio. This kill ratio cannot be justified by any principle of ethics.

Here we have the perfect equivalency: a death is murder whether someone dies inadvertently from a bomb aimed at terrorists, or whether a terrorist deliberately bashes a child’s head in. One can almost hear the high pitched outrage: the ascent to the moral “high ground,” the contented purr of the morally superior ubermensch sitting somewhere safe in his room, behind a computer screen, passing judgment on men who must fight for their lives and the lives of their children and grandchildren, lest they and their progeny die with a rifle butt to the head or a bomb set off in a crowded bus.

And then the inevitable moral calculus: how dare you fight back effectively. How dare you kill more terrorists than terrorists kill your people. The Erasmussimos of this world demand that since there is moral equivalency, there must be death equivalency. Until both sides take a “time-out.” At which point, as surely as the sun rises in the East, Katushas will rain down on Israel and the Erasmussimos will avert their eyes.

Because it’s only Joooooooos dying.