The Sword of the Commoner

I was reading the Guardian Online earlier today when I came across an article entitled "Pupils import torture tools to highlight UK arms loopholes", the link to this article is here Guardian Story.

This story tells the tale of how easy it is to subvert/exploit loopholes in our laws against the export/import of implements that may be used to torture other human beings.

This article reminded me of the story in Chuang Tzu entitled "The Lover of Swords" about a king who loves swords and swordsmen and concentrates on them so much, pitting them against each other, that he doesn't pay attention to what is happening in his state. When Chuang Tzu goes to see the King, he talks about 3 swords: the first is the Sword of the son of heaven, which Chuang Tzu describes as part of the landscape; the second is the Sword of the noble prince, is made up of the people of the land; the third is the sword of the commoner, the one that cuts through actual bodies.

As Chuang Tzu puts it "The people who use the sword of the commoner are no better than fighting cocks who at any time can have their lives curtailed."

Most of the time, when a state chooses to use implements of torture it is because those who run the country are afraid of their people and they have to use the "sword of the commoner" to keep them in check. But this method only works for a while - it is not effective forever.

However, in our modern day society, as in the past, we are all interdependent - these tools of torture do not manufacture themselves, they have to be created, sold and exported. So although the torture is not carried out by the manufacturers themselves they are just as guilty of using the "sword of the commoner" as those that they sell their products to. But like Pilate, because they have not 'intended' their products to be used for this purpose, their hands are clean.

No society is perfect, and in our current western society, where we are worried about terrorism and the state starts to chisel away at our rights and liberties - how far do we go before these tools of torture are being used here? In order to avoid being in the situation where 'he who lives by the sword, dies by the sword', we need to make ourselves aware of what the products of some of our companies can be used for. And once we are aware of it we need to do something about it.

The kids mentioned in the Guardian article have done us all a favour; they have showed us how easy it is to get hold of this type of equipment, these 'swords of the commoner'. We need to remember that we too can have our lives curtailed at any point - and by lives I don't just mean the difference between life and death, but also the difference between liberty and tyranny. The gap between these things is a lot smaller than you think.

Tag Taoism Torture Sword