> > > The one single thing that (for me) pushes her beyond > > the pale is this: > > her virulent opposition, in both word and deed, to > > birth control - to > > some of the most desperately poor people in the world. > > Uncounted > > > hundreds (or thousands) of people exist in utter > > misery today who owe > > > their being and state directly to her words and deeds. > > I consider this > > > truly *evil*, and believe that her net contribution to > > the world is a > > > significant increase in the sum of misery in it. > > > > > > >
i must admit i don't know much about mother theresa. but it's interesting to compare views expressed about her and gandhiji here, in relation to the peace prize. i'm not comparing the personalities. they cannot be compared. nor the achievements. just the approach taken towards making an argument for and against. we know, being a great 'personality' is not about being so in every detail of your entire life (which is more the subject of biographies rather than conclusive evaluations). but we know gandhiji's views on western medicine. i have not made the effort to check the veracity of the oft-repeated claim that he refused his wife penicillin. the following, however, is a very peculiar view in his own words: "I have heard that many women who did not want to lose their honour chose to die. Many men killed their own wives. I think that is really great, because I know that such things make India brave. After all, life and death is a transitory game.... [The women] have gone with courage. They have not sold away their honour. Not that their lives were not dear to them, but they felt it was better to die with courage rather than be forcibly converted to Islam by the Muslims and allow them to assault their bodies. And so those women died. They were not just a handful, but quite a few. When I hear all these things I dance with joy that there are such brave women in India." (CWMG vol. 96: 388.89) usman p.s. f.w. deklerk and the sectrian duo in northern ireland were also given peace prizes as were rabin and peres (alongside arafat) for a major change of stance rather than actually achieving anything at the time the prizes were awarded. the latter was true of mandela too... but, yes, he had suffered - a lot - already. so the peace prize has been used as 'encouragement'... in mandela's case he earned the 'achievement' part afterwards. the question is: does the president of the most powerful nation of the world, claiming to be the leader of the free world, need encouragement of this kind... denying the same to, say, tsvangirai.. for that year at least?
