
Scott Adams: Connect citizens all over the world with a pen pal website to prevent new wars - DXL
http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2008/02/i-will-get-that.html
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pc
The underlying assumption -- that social connections will act as a barrier to
war -- seems pretty flawed. Extensive connections didn't prevent any of the
European wars between, say, 1700 and 1945. A country is more likely to have an
internal war than one with any given outside nation.

Maybe, as an American, Scott associates wars with far-off, little-known lands.
True in recent times for the US maybe, but certainly not for most conflicts.

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Electro
You make a good point, the main reason the EU started was to prevent wars and
it has worked. Since the formation of the EU, there has been no wars between
its member nations, and that's saying a lot when sneezing in a foreign country
was about all the justification needed.

Merely connecting people won't act as a barrier to war, but I think forming a
universal governing structure would; however unlikely it is to actually
happen. There's a saying that states democracy is just a farce to control the
masses by giving the illusion of control, well I would say the EU does the
exact same thing.

I can't speak for EU politics of late, I've rarely been in the UK the past
year, however last I was keeping track the UK had a major problem with French
farming subsidies (basically French farmers were being paid to be
uncompetative) and the French wanted the UK to stop getting discounted for
payments to the EU (each country pays like a tax that's supposed to benefit
the whole, however the UK was paying less than it was getting in even though
we're the richest country in the EU).

So, personally, I would say no level of communication will prevent war unless
you're economically and socially tied as in the EU. I mean Kings would marry
their daughters to Kings of other countries in an attempt to prevent war, the
British bloodline has French descent in it. Even look at Richard the
Lionheart, he barely even spoke english! Yet no amount of ties between England
and France ever stopped war until the EU. Simple fact.

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hugh
Actually I think the European thing is just an example of a broader
phenomenon: democracies never go to war with other democracies.

(I went googling to make sure that was true, and found this:
<http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/demowar.htm> which goes through all the
potential counterexamples. So I'll amend my statement to say that democracies
_hardly ever_ go to war with other democracies.)

So the idea is really a bit redundant -- two countries probably won't go to
war if the people have anything to say about it anyway. Only when you have
decisions being made by a dictator on at least one side are disagreements
likely to turn into wars; democracies tend to compromise.

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foonamefoo
I'm glad you went through and found that; the US has ravaged third-world
democracies for a quite a while now.

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eru
And what about the McDonald's-rule: "Two countries with McDonald's don't go to
war with each other."?

Does it hold up?

Edit: The answer is in the linked page. (It's "No, but better than the other
rule.")

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DanielBMarkham
I love Scott, but this shows a fundamental lack of understanding for why wars
happen. The American Civil War comes to mind as the first counterexample.
There are dozens more.

Nations don't resort to armed conflict because the citizens don't know each
other that well. In fact, the counterexamples are very interesting -- I'm
thinking of German presence in Great Britain before WWII. People demonize
citizens of other nations after war is started, but that's more of a moral
crutch than anything else. I think Scott confuses correlation with causality.

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SuperThread
I think that you have to distinguish between wars in which the outcome is
uncertain—that is, wars in which real risk to both sides is present—and wars
that are essentially a big guy beating up a little guy.

I agree that the former kind of war would happen with the same frequency if
this pen pal idea were implemented—the motivation for such wars need to be
large enough to overcome the personal danger that they produce, and so would
easily overshadow semipersonal connections with citizens of the opposite side.
I think that the latter would very much be deterred, though, because the
motivation for such wars can be miniscule, to the point where even the
humanization of the "enemy" could be a significant deterrent.

~~~
DanielBMarkham
I must admit finding it hard to make the distinction you suggest.

Would the American Civil War be a big guy beating up on a little guy? After
all, the North was ten times as populous, and many, many times as rich. Nobody
on either side thought the war would last very long.

How about the Romans and the Germanic tribes? Nobody in their right mind
thought those Barbarians could stand up against the full might of the Roman
Empire very long.

Wars are fought until one side decides to stop fighting. This means that "big
guy/little guy" wars and "outcome is uncertain" wars don't seem to be that
different. In fact the determining factor would seem to be how easy it is for
one side to quit. But how would you know how much it would take to make the
other side stop fighting until it actually happens? From the history I've
seen, when both sides are very intimate with each other's language and culture
-- that's when some of the deadliest, nastiest conflicts take place.

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mynameishere
The elites make the wars and the elites already know each other.

[http://cache.viewimages.com/xc/1424016.jpg?v=1&c=ViewIma...](http://cache.viewimages.com/xc/1424016.jpg?v=1&c=ViewImages&k=2&d=17A4AD9FDB9CF1939057D9939C83F10683233376E4B9D8B75A5397277B4DC33E)

[http://cache.viewimages.com/xc/3359879.jpg?v=1&c=ViewIma...](http://cache.viewimages.com/xc/3359879.jpg?v=1&c=ViewImages&k=2&d=0629904139C22E581803B2105665E7FCA55A1E4F32AD3138)

[http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/triumph/hitler-
chamber...](http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/triumph/hitler-
chamberlain.jpg)

<http://www.btinternet.com/~sbishop100/alicky9.jpg>

~~~
DaniFong
That's true. But it's becoming _less_ true. Consider how long the anti-
vietnam-war movement took to get started. Now consider that Iran is one of the
first countries where there is popular _preemptive_ dissent against conflict
in the USA. Things may be bad, but one some dimensions, they're getting
better.

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Fuca
I spend a year in the USA and I can tell this will work, the feeling for that
country gets very close as home or your native country.

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klein_waffle
I have a new proposal. Let's force all families to write letters to each other
occasionally and even phone each other. This should stop domestic violence,
no?

~~~
tyler
Well... Meaningful communication between members of families prone to domestic
violence, certainly could be helpful.

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uberstuber
Whether or not such a program would stop wars, it would still be a good thing
to do, especially for Americans.

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nickb
Damn, stars are aligning.

