In a violent world, violence seems to be the most logical response. So when guys like me insist violence actually isn't a logical response, we're often challenged with a typical rejoinder question: "What would you do if, say, someone broke into your home with a gun to kill Kendra and your three fur babies?"
The challenger often uses this question as a way of demonstrating that my (the pacifist's) conviction about violence is inconsistent, and that the existence of violence is necessary. It's often posed in such a way that if the pacifist cannot give a satisfactory answer then violence is apparently vindicated, even in terms of warfare, despite the fact that the analogy between personal and collective violence is flawed. I think the question suffers from a number of debilitating assumptions that are almost always unconscious to the challenger. There's no such thing as a self-interpreting situation so let's get at the assumptions of the question before I even attempt a response.
1. Determinism
The question, as it's usually posed, assumes I'm the only one making decisions. My relationship to the perpetrator or Kendra is supposed to be one which unfolds mechanically. The attacker is assumed to be wanting to inflict the maximum amount of evil as possible. Kendra is assumed to be completely at the mercy of my decision (we'll get back to this in a moment), which will apparently decide the entire outcome of the situation.
In the end, though, this assumption is completely unrealistic. There simply aren't two paths along which the scenario can run, and it's certainly not the case that the scenario is determined solely by my decision. I'll grant, however, that if you assume there are only two ways this can play out, then the situation becomes self-fulfilling; I'm just not creative enough in that circumstance to come up with a third option. Thing is, that's not a problem with the situation at hand; it's a problem with my lack of creativity.
2. Control.
People who ask this question usually don't think about the control they assume I have. They want to argue that I'm omnipotent. They assume that if I want to stop the attacker, I can. This might be true, but in the event of a serious and considered attack, with a weapon, it's unlikely. And what happens if I mount a counterattack but fail? What then? Given the chaotic nature of violence, I probably would simply introduce more suffering into the situation than it would already have had.
3. Knowledge
The question assumes my omniscience. It assumes that I have all the relevant and necessary information to make sure that only one of two scenarios plays out (either I get the attacker or the attacker gets Kendra). I'm not so sure this is realistic, since the outcome of any conflict is unpredictable, both in personal or collective forms of violence. There are in reality multiple people making multiple decisions, and the outcome cannot necessarily be accurately predicted. That's borne out in research, and it's the reason that police and military train and retrain to evaluate a myriad of variables in violent situations. Good guys with guns don't stop bad guys with guns, usually. Guys with training and retraining stop guys with guns.
4. Individualism
People who pose this question to me always assume that the actors in the question are individuals and that the decisions and outcome to the question are individual matters. It ignores the fact that I am a husband to my wife and a dad to our fur babies. They probably don't want me involved in a scenario that will likely end in violence, and therefore I'm not the only one who gets a say in this. They hold certain values (Kendra, that I don't die, and the fur babies, that dad lives to give them treats at 4 in the morning). They most certainly, then, would not want me to act in a way that contravenes those values; particularly, they may not want to be protected by lethal violence. If I had to guess, I'd say they feel the same way about me that I feel about them, and wouldn't want any of us in more harm's way than is necessary. If, though, it comes to it, I'd rather die than kill, so I'd sacrifice myself.
5. Righteousness
This is the one assumption that always gets interlocutors angry when I bring it up. Because Americans, as Americans, always assume the guys doing the defending are righteous. In this scenario, they're assuming in particular that I am the righteous actor. That is, folks who ask this question always assume that I'm able to calculate what would bring about the best outcome, and also that I am qualified to be judge, jury and executioner (and to perform all those roles in one second). It assumes I have what it takes to be honest about this decision, that I am fully objective. This is never the case, particularly in anything like the situation hypothesized.
6. Alternatives
The questioner assumes that the attacker is acting in a way I perceive to be wrong without good reason for doing so. There's no room for the possibility that the offender is Jean Valjean, or an oppressed person rising to destroy a symbol of domination. Conversely, the assumption is that I have not acted with evil in any way toward this person. If any of those are true, it fundamentally changes the nature of the question.
7. My masculinity
I love how this question assumes that if I don't act, I'm not a "man". Inherent in the challenge is a question about my virility to defend those entrusted to me. This is, of course, irrelevant to a discussion about violence, but the challenger makes the most of it anyway. And it is a blatant form of emotivism that undermines any attempt to answer a serious philosophical question about my pacifism.
8. Sexism
Which is another way of saying that the question, in its essence, is sexist. The victim is nearly always a dependent being, typically a woman, who needs the protection of a stronger male. She is simply prey, an object. Anyone who knows Kendra, knows that's crap.
9. Egoism
There's an implied question that's always a subtext to the question being asked, particularly when it's addressed to me, because I'm a Christian pacifist: "Perhaps as a Christian you do have the right to sacrifice your own welfare to be loving toward an attacker, but do you have the right to sacrifice the welfare of others for whom you are responsible?" It's a subtextual question that makes the initial question appear to be altruistic. However, it's really egoism (mixed with a nasty dose of sexism): I must defend my wife or my fur babies precisely because they are mine. Indeed, at the heart of the question, what an interlocutor is asking isn't being asked because we're talking about a neighbor, but it's being asked because we're talking about my family. The question is never asked in relation to little Iraqi children, or even the children of the attacker. What this exposes, then, is a selfishness at the core of the question -- sure, it wants to wear a halo of altruism, but the structure of the question is self-oriented and -interested.
I'm not suggesting that self-interest is always bad, but I think starting there probably isn't the best place to start thinking ethically about violence as a Christian. Egoism is great Objectivism (so Ayn Rand would love it), but it's hardly Christian (I can't imagine Jesus saying something like this). In fact, if we're getting serious in thinking Christianly about the question, Christian faith relativizes the self while affirming the dignity of the enemy -- I'm to love my enemy, precisely because they're my neighbor (that's sorta the point to that whole Good Samaritan parable).
The challenger often uses this question as a way of demonstrating that my (the pacifist's) conviction about violence is inconsistent, and that the existence of violence is necessary. It's often posed in such a way that if the pacifist cannot give a satisfactory answer then violence is apparently vindicated, even in terms of warfare, despite the fact that the analogy between personal and collective violence is flawed. I think the question suffers from a number of debilitating assumptions that are almost always unconscious to the challenger. There's no such thing as a self-interpreting situation so let's get at the assumptions of the question before I even attempt a response.
1. Determinism
The question, as it's usually posed, assumes I'm the only one making decisions. My relationship to the perpetrator or Kendra is supposed to be one which unfolds mechanically. The attacker is assumed to be wanting to inflict the maximum amount of evil as possible. Kendra is assumed to be completely at the mercy of my decision (we'll get back to this in a moment), which will apparently decide the entire outcome of the situation.
In the end, though, this assumption is completely unrealistic. There simply aren't two paths along which the scenario can run, and it's certainly not the case that the scenario is determined solely by my decision. I'll grant, however, that if you assume there are only two ways this can play out, then the situation becomes self-fulfilling; I'm just not creative enough in that circumstance to come up with a third option. Thing is, that's not a problem with the situation at hand; it's a problem with my lack of creativity.
2. Control.
People who ask this question usually don't think about the control they assume I have. They want to argue that I'm omnipotent. They assume that if I want to stop the attacker, I can. This might be true, but in the event of a serious and considered attack, with a weapon, it's unlikely. And what happens if I mount a counterattack but fail? What then? Given the chaotic nature of violence, I probably would simply introduce more suffering into the situation than it would already have had.
3. Knowledge
The question assumes my omniscience. It assumes that I have all the relevant and necessary information to make sure that only one of two scenarios plays out (either I get the attacker or the attacker gets Kendra). I'm not so sure this is realistic, since the outcome of any conflict is unpredictable, both in personal or collective forms of violence. There are in reality multiple people making multiple decisions, and the outcome cannot necessarily be accurately predicted. That's borne out in research, and it's the reason that police and military train and retrain to evaluate a myriad of variables in violent situations. Good guys with guns don't stop bad guys with guns, usually. Guys with training and retraining stop guys with guns.
4. Individualism
People who pose this question to me always assume that the actors in the question are individuals and that the decisions and outcome to the question are individual matters. It ignores the fact that I am a husband to my wife and a dad to our fur babies. They probably don't want me involved in a scenario that will likely end in violence, and therefore I'm not the only one who gets a say in this. They hold certain values (Kendra, that I don't die, and the fur babies, that dad lives to give them treats at 4 in the morning). They most certainly, then, would not want me to act in a way that contravenes those values; particularly, they may not want to be protected by lethal violence. If I had to guess, I'd say they feel the same way about me that I feel about them, and wouldn't want any of us in more harm's way than is necessary. If, though, it comes to it, I'd rather die than kill, so I'd sacrifice myself.
5. Righteousness
This is the one assumption that always gets interlocutors angry when I bring it up. Because Americans, as Americans, always assume the guys doing the defending are righteous. In this scenario, they're assuming in particular that I am the righteous actor. That is, folks who ask this question always assume that I'm able to calculate what would bring about the best outcome, and also that I am qualified to be judge, jury and executioner (and to perform all those roles in one second). It assumes I have what it takes to be honest about this decision, that I am fully objective. This is never the case, particularly in anything like the situation hypothesized.
6. Alternatives
The questioner assumes that the attacker is acting in a way I perceive to be wrong without good reason for doing so. There's no room for the possibility that the offender is Jean Valjean, or an oppressed person rising to destroy a symbol of domination. Conversely, the assumption is that I have not acted with evil in any way toward this person. If any of those are true, it fundamentally changes the nature of the question.
7. My masculinity
I love how this question assumes that if I don't act, I'm not a "man". Inherent in the challenge is a question about my virility to defend those entrusted to me. This is, of course, irrelevant to a discussion about violence, but the challenger makes the most of it anyway. And it is a blatant form of emotivism that undermines any attempt to answer a serious philosophical question about my pacifism.
8. Sexism
Which is another way of saying that the question, in its essence, is sexist. The victim is nearly always a dependent being, typically a woman, who needs the protection of a stronger male. She is simply prey, an object. Anyone who knows Kendra, knows that's crap.
9. Egoism
There's an implied question that's always a subtext to the question being asked, particularly when it's addressed to me, because I'm a Christian pacifist: "Perhaps as a Christian you do have the right to sacrifice your own welfare to be loving toward an attacker, but do you have the right to sacrifice the welfare of others for whom you are responsible?" It's a subtextual question that makes the initial question appear to be altruistic. However, it's really egoism (mixed with a nasty dose of sexism): I must defend my wife or my fur babies precisely because they are mine. Indeed, at the heart of the question, what an interlocutor is asking isn't being asked because we're talking about a neighbor, but it's being asked because we're talking about my family. The question is never asked in relation to little Iraqi children, or even the children of the attacker. What this exposes, then, is a selfishness at the core of the question -- sure, it wants to wear a halo of altruism, but the structure of the question is self-oriented and -interested.
I'm not suggesting that self-interest is always bad, but I think starting there probably isn't the best place to start thinking ethically about violence as a Christian. Egoism is great Objectivism (so Ayn Rand would love it), but it's hardly Christian (I can't imagine Jesus saying something like this). In fact, if we're getting serious in thinking Christianly about the question, Christian faith relativizes the self while affirming the dignity of the enemy -- I'm to love my enemy, precisely because they're my neighbor (that's sorta the point to that whole Good Samaritan parable).