In the News
No to War in Ukraine! No to Use of Force!
Government’s Nonsensical Definition of “Peaceful Resolution”
The Liberal Government of Canada has a remarkable propensity for defining concepts and terms any which way it sees fit. A case in point is a January 18 “read-out” of a call among selected cabinet ministers, military personnel and senior public servants on the subject of the situation in Ukraine.[1] The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), without ever mentioning NATO, informs that the call emphasized “Canada’s commitment to continued coordination and engagement between allies and partners. “
The read-out states that Defence Minister Anita Anand “highlighted” the role of the Canadian military in building Ukraine’s military capacity through Operation UNIFIER training more than 12,500 security forces since 2015, with a continued presence of 200 Canadian Armed Forces members in Ukraine.
The read-out then continues to say that the ministers discussed the importance of “a peaceful solution through dialogue.”
A dictionary definition of the word peaceful gives us equivalent words such as
– nonaggressive,
– nonbelligerent,
– noncombative,
– unaggressive,
– unwarlike,
– anti-militarist,
– anti-militaristic,
– anti-violence,
– anti-war.
Near antonyms for peaceful include:
– armed,
– martial,
– militant,
– military,
– warlike,
– aggressive,
– assertive,
– bellicose,
– belligerent,
– combative,
– contentious,
– quarrelsome,
– antagonistic,
– argumentative,
– fierce,
– gladiatorial,
– hostile.
Most people would say that as concerns international affairs a peaceful solution would necessarily be a solution with rejects the use of force to achieve aims no matter what they are. The reference in the formulation “a peaceful solution through dialogue” would presumably be versus a peaceful solution through some means other than dialogue. What those means are, the PMO does not say. If it means versus “through war,” then the cause of the war should be spoken about clearly to indicate who is the belligerent and what are the aims of the war, or, for that matter, of the dialogue.
For the past 30 years, the U.S. has issued threats and peremptory orders accompanied by belligerent deployment of military forces, wars of aggression and occupation, destruction and slaughter of civilians under one guise or another. It has shown through its deeds that the word “dialogue” means “submit or else.”[2]
These are facts. This is how it has dealt with Saddam Hussein of Iraq, Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia, the Taliban of Afghanistan, Muammar Ghadaffi of Libya, Bashar al-Assad of Syria and also how the Yemenis are being dealt with to justify the genocide committed against them, or, for that matter the edicts issued against Palestinians to abandon their ancestral homes or face the consequences of a forcible eviction. And there are many other examples.
Within the country, how the government engages in “peaceful dialogue” with indigenous land defenders and their allies is well known. In the name of the law, the constitution and a so-called rules based system, the definitions of the words “peaceful” and “peaceful dialogue” it wants Canadians to accept are unconscionable — neither right nor reasonable. Words with a similar meaning to unconscionable are:
– unethical,
– amoral,
– immoral,
– unprincipled,
– indefensible,
– wrong,
– unscrupulous,
– unfair,
– underhand,
– dishonorable,
– dishonest,
– corrupt,
– depraved,
– shady.
Canada’s definitions of the word “peaceful” and the expression “peaceful dialogue” are indeed all of the above. Besides failing to convince Russia and some of the incompliant countries of the European Union and others to submit to U.S. dictate unconditionally, the government is also having a hard time convincing Canadians that it is seeking peaceful solutions to anything — nationally or internationally. On the contrary, it is governing by dictate, inciting passions as a means of defeating rivals for power, engaging in disinformation, and throwing epithets at those who do not agree with it. It is slandering and attempting to isolate those who speak out in favour of views that the government has declared are “illegitimate.”
This is clearly a problem; for the government and for Canadians. This problem requires a solution which favours the peoples of Canada and the world. Such solutions would begin by rejecting the use of force and disinformation to solve problems, both within Canada and internationally.
Note
1. The call included Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Chrystia Freeland, Minister of Foreign Affairs Melanie Joly, Minister of National Defence Anita Anand, Minister of International Development Harjit Sajjan, Minister of Emergency Preparedness and Queen’s Privy Council President Bill Blair, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Sean Fraser, and Minister of Public Safety Marco Mendicino, Chief of Defence Staff General Wayne Eyre, Interim Clerk of the Privy Council Janice Charette and unnamed “other senior officials.”
2. The Merrian-Webster Dictionary defines the word peremptory as “insisting on immediate attention or obedience, especially in a brusquely imperious way,” such as “‘Just do it!’ came the peremptory reply.”
Similar words listed include:
– brusque,
– imperious,
– high-handed,
– brisk,
– abrupt,
– summary,
– commanding,
– authoritative,
– overbearing,
– dogmatic,
– autocratic,
– dictatorial,
– bossy,
– domineering,
– arbitrary,
– arrogant,
– overweening,
– lordly,
– tyrannical,
– despotic,
– imperial,
– magisterial,
– authoritarian,
– emphatic,
– firm,
– insistent,
– imperative,
– positive.
In law the word means not open to appeal or challenge; final — “there has been no disobedience of a peremptory order of the court.”
Similar words include:,
– incontrovertible,
– irreversible,
– binding,
– absolute,
– final,
– conclusive,
– decisive,
– definitive,
– categorical,
– irrefutable,
– unconditional,
– unchallengeable,
– unappealable.
Origin of peremptory:
Late Middle English (as a legal term): via Anglo-Norman French from Latin peremptorius ‘deadly, decisive,’ from perempt- ‘destroyed, cut off,’ from the verb perimere, from per- ‘completely’ + emere ‘take, buy.’
(TML Daily, posted January 31, 2022)
