As an ethos pacifism is compelling because it banks on the moralistic assumption that in any given war both sides are equally wrong. Hence those committed to a pacifist politics are ethically superior to those embroiled in these wars because they exist beyond politics, at the level of abstract morality, having transcended the militaristic concerns of those who cannot realize that the world would be a better place if they just chose to stop fighting. While it is correct to recognize that the politics of pacifism was originated by those who recognized that there was an unequal deployment of power in both sides of the conflict (i.e. Gandhi recognized that Britain was oppressing India, Martin Luther King Jr. recognized that white power was oppressing African Americans), this politics still bases its moral superiority on an assumption that violence is equally wrong, whether it is practiced by the oppressor or the oppressed. Indeed, according to this analysis, the oppressed becomes identical to the oppressor if and when the former chooses to behave like the latter––by resisting violently––and becomes morally tainted.By treating violence as ethically homogenous, whether it is performed by the oppressor or oppressed, we end up with the eventual reification of the conflict's meaning in and of itself: if the moral dilemma is over acting violently or not, then the moral dilemma of who is the oppressor and who is the oppressed is not the focus of the ethical dilemma… this reality, though (to be fair) recognized as significant by the originators of pacifism, vanishes bases on the fact that the ethical and moral focus is on violence and only violence. Both sides, regardless of which side has more power and has initiated the violence, are equalized because they both engage in violent activity. Pacifism thus attempts to create an alternate camp in every conflict that distinguishes itself primarily by condemning the violence of this conflict.Hence we end up with a politics of pacifism, the telos of its originators, that assumes the primary contradiction is between war and peace––between the war-mongers and those who reject violence altogether. A laudable politics in an abstract moral sphere, but a very naive politics in the sphere of the concrete. The hippy movement and its successors: give peace a chance, the commonality of humanity, and those who always argue that, in every violent conflict, "both sides are wrong." And though it is true that we need to recognize that every class struggle politics must begin by defining what side is on the side of total war and what side will lead to peace, this does not mean that we should pretend the primary contradiction is between war and peace in a context of uncompromising class and imperialist war where the oppressed need to resist so as to prevent their obliteration.But this banal politics of pacifism has resulted in a common sense analysis of conflict that, even in its progressive fictions, pretends as if war is primarily a state where both sides are equally wrong. The radical position, based on this narrative, is some "fuck both sides" position, where the heroes are war-resistors from both sides of the conflict who unite and demonstrate a solution to the conflict in their peaceful resolution. Brian K. Vaughn and Fiona Staple'srecently reminded me of this pacifist narrative where, perhaps in an attempt to comment on the violence of contemporary conflict, created a tale of equally powerful forces in a long war that are both challenged by two individuals from opposing sides who reject this war by, well,(indeed, a character even claims that "fucking" is the "opposite of war"), having a child, and embrace pacifism so as to demonstrate the problem of the war narratives of their respective sides. Human sentiment conquers violence, all is good in the world.notwithstanding (and, to be fair, it is very well written and drawn), this is pretty much the narrative of the radical anti-war camp that bases its rejection of war on the moral rejection of violence.Here is a myth: that wars are generally theatres in which all sides are equal. Here is the truth: in the modern era those wars where all sides are equal (whether equally reprehensible or equally powerful) are the exception and not the rule. Even in antiquity this is the case, though it is harder to prove and prone to the application of modern ethics upon a past that would have resisted a moral perspective wrenched from the jaws of history. Point being: it becomes extremely difficult to prove that war in general is a state where all sides are equal, that some if not one side is responsible for the violence existing in the first place, and that there are not oppressors and oppressed. An equal war where both sides are to blame? Maybe World War One, when it comes to the level of nation states, and this is why it was such a confusion. Otherwise, beyond these far-and-few-between situations where imperialist nations are entering into an arcane conflict about carving up the world (which is just an expression of the warfare the bourgeois wages upon the proletariat), it is difficult to find a situation where war is a state of equal conflict between two sides. Instead we discover situations where war only exists because one nation wants to expand into the territory of another, where a nation thinks it has the right to claim the resources of the world, where oppressors seek to make others oppressed. That war is mainly a decision between two equal powers to violently duel for resources on an equal playing field is rather uncommon. While there is such a thing as intra-imperialist rivalry, its manifestation in the killing fields of wars is an exception: politics is war by other means, it has other bodies in which to indulge its competition.But the pacifist rallying cry is "a pox on both houses" and this is taken as some critical rejection of war itself. In the early 90s I saw this pseudo-radical line applied to the situation of Israel-Palestine where it was considered supremely moral to declare that "both sides were equally wrong" and thus disappear the reality of oppression. Both sides were "wrong" because they both engaged in violence and that was all that mattered: not the inequality of these sides, not the fact that oppression produced violence in the first place, and definitely not the fact that the violence of the oppressed was either a desperate attempt to persist in survival or to get rid of the basis of its oppression altogether.Even when the pacifist recognizes this inequality (as Gandhi did, as Martin Luther King Jr. did) it is a secondary concern. For the pacifist, as noted above, the primary contradiction is between violence and non-violence, and thus when violence is being used by both (or all) sides this is what designates these sides as: they are united in their lack of morality, their collaboration in making, to riff off off Gandhi, the entire world blind. We can, of course, add other pacifist moralisms, most of which are cliches: you become the enemy when you use their methods, the oppressed becomes the oppressor when they resort to violence, revolutions are monsters that eat their children (which was, it must be said, a reactionary slogan about the French Revolution), and even that adage about not dismantling the master's house with his tools By treating violence and non-violence as a primary contradiction, the material basis upon which violence and war rests becomes reified. The fact of the matter is that war is a necessary part of any class-based society since every social formation to date is determined by class struggle. And the wars launched by the ruling class are not threatened by large-scale rejections of violence, no matter what those liberals committed to keeping the class war of capitalism operating eternally might believe about India, the Civil Rights movement, or what have you. The ethics of pacifism might seem less morally reprehensible than armed resistance but the same argument they use to justify their moral status doesn't help their cause very much: if violent revolutions "eat their young"––that is, perpetuate the same violence upon the former oppressors or some other oppressed camp––then what can we say of those non-violent movements that also led to a continuation of violence? That the people involved in these movements were more morally advanced than those involved in violent resistance? Gandhi's non-violent movement––if it was actually primarily responsible for pushing out the British, which is dubious at best––was also a movement of the Indian upper caste who are more than happy to keep the violence implicit in the caste system (and it is a very brutal violence) in place. They may have acted peacefully towards their national oppressors but they are complicit in a very violent system, like any class based social formation, where the violence is a structural fact.And yet the moral magnetism of pacifism is strong. Indeed: anyone who possesses any ounce of sanity (which means anyone who doesn't think according to what capitalism and imperialism designates as "sane") will prefer peace to war, violence to non-violence. This is why, in an old post , I discussed how violent resistance is necessarily "tragic"––if a better world truly was possible through non-violence, if those in power would exit the historical stage without struggle, this would be preferable but it is clearly not the case. Their institutions do need to be smashed and they will fight to prevent such a smashing.But since pacifistic morality is strong it possesses a certain level of ideological hegemony amongst those who want the violence of the current order to end. This is why the fables about the perils of war tend to locate their narratives in stories about wars where both sides are equally wrong and the heroes are resistors on both sides. Or why we should achieve revolution through the ballot box––why Syriza (forgetting the brutal class struggle that led to Syriza's victory and that will continue despite this victory) is the model we should follow [and yes, I know I promised an article about that but like I said before, I just don't have the mental energy]––which is the opportunist thesis of "peaceful co-existence with capitalism." Or why cops and soldiers aren't really our class enemy because they're just people who, regardless of their position in maintaining the power of the ruling camp, can be won over to the side of peace.We really want to believe that everyone is equally responsible for their violence, that the humanity of the oppressor and the oppressed can be discovered once both sides put aside their violent proclivities that unite them inhumanity, and that the contradiction between war and peace is reducible to the contradiction between violence and non-violence. But as Mao once quipped, with his typical and cutting dialectical insight, "We are advocates of the abolition of war, we do not want war; but war can only be abolished through war, and in order to get rid of the gun it is necessary to take up the gun." Why? Because the peace of capital is not peace for those who are exploited and oppressed to maintain this peace; those responsible for perpetuating this peace (which means war on the wretched of the earth at all times and in all ways) will not recognize a shared humanity beyond what is considered humane by their social order––an acceptance of business as usual, a refusal to complain about one's lot in life, and so the wars continue regardless of pacifist moralism. Capitalists can be pacifists too when they are short-sighted enough to reject those military interventions that are designed to protect their power… and when their workers resist exploitation then these liberal capitalists will preach pacifism and the morality of non-violence, refusing to recognize that the very act of exploitation is violence incarnate.