Choose Love Over Fear

Appropriate for 9/11, and appropriate for now

On September 11th, 2001, after hearing the news about the twin towers, the first words I saw were “Choose love over fear”.

I had printed them on a seldom used white board the night before after reading an article in the Utne Reader that had moved me.

At first, it seemed incongruent. What did choosing love over fear have to do with 9/11? But then I saw these words used in response to that day’s event by the Dalai Llama and others.

Again, we’re at a politically precarious moment, and perhaps it’s a good time to ponder these words.

What does fear do to us? It can paralyze us, it can make us look for people to blame, it can generate fight, flight or freeze responses. Often we become reactive. Do we make good decisions when we feel fearful? I would argue that no, we probably don’t when we’re in a fearful state. Fear often puts us in a defensive posture. The term ‘looking out for number one’ comes to mind. Fear can also lead to paranoia.

Often, fear makes us easy to manipulate, and I believe it’s at the root of the rising fascism we’re seeing. This is by design. The powers that benefit from never ending wars and increasing austerity want people to blame identifiable groups for their troubles, and not the system that is causing them.

What about love? When we have deep concern for the well-being of others, what do we do? Generally we look for reasonable solutions that will ensure that people are looked after. We look thoughtfully and carefully at situations to try to get an accurate understanding of what is really going on. We allow all of our emotions — fear, sadness, concern to be felt — but not to take over. Our vision is more expansive as we try to see into the future and what would be beneficial in the long term.

We need the level-headedness that love brings us now, in these precarious times.

To me, choosing love over fear easily becomes choosing peace over war. Here’s a good article explaining why the USA has so many ongoing wars. Wars are manufactured, not for the benefit of humanity, but for the profits of people in the military industrial complex and its many subsidiaries. Here’s an excerpt from that article:

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone, it is spending the sweat of its labourers, the genius of its scientists, the hope of children.” (President Dwight Eisenhower address to the North American Society of News editors, April 16, 1953)

What can we do to make our world more peaceful, and more conducive to the well-being of all? How can we put humanity onto a path of healing instead of the destructive path we’re now on?

First of all, we need to become aware of the fact that war isn’t just unnecessary, but it’s destructive on all levels.

Murdering innocent people is illegal in every other context. Why should it be legal during wars?

And the greenhouse gas emissions associated with war are never talked about. Here’s an excerpt from an AI generated report on the emissions associated with Israel’s first month of war with Gaza in 2024:

The emissions from the first 120 days of the Israel-Gaza conflict exceeded the annual emissions of 26 individual countries. This period saw intense military activity, including bombing raids, reconnaissance flights, and rocket attacks, which significantly contributed to the carbon footprint.

According to a study, the emissions from the first two months of the conflict were greater than the annual carbon footprint of more than 20 climate-vulnerable nations, with around 90 percent of emissions stemming from aircraft missions.

The total emissions, when factoring in the construction and fortification of war infrastructure by both Israel and Hamas, surpass those of over 36 individual countries.

This report gives additional information.

War is a humanitarian and environmental disaster that robs our societies of money and resources that could be spent on things that benefit the greater good; things like better health care, education, environmental restoration, housing, public transit and child care to name a few.

How do war profiteers get away with this? By instilling fear in the general public, and by inciting fear and hatred of people who probably just want to live their lives in peace like everyone else. Here’s a good breakdown of how this works.

Another area where fear is used to the disadvantage of others is the prospect of tanking western economies.

What does fear look like? Hoarding. Keeping our heads down. Get rich quick schemes that often backfire.

What about love? Community development, helping each other, building sustainable local food systems and barter networks are some of the things that come to mind. Lobbying governments when we can.

Admittedly, in the western world it’s hard to consider our political systems democracies. We get to choose which brand of neoliberalism wins the day, and that system always benefits the very wealthy at the expense of everything else.

And now our governments are using our tax dollars to fund Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza. If we object to this, we’re told that we’re anti-semitic. Not only is this morally abhorrent, but it’s an insult to our intelligence. Please don’t fall for it.

The lukewarm attempts at ceasefires feel more like theatrics than anything genuine. Many believe the west is in decline, and that the death throes it exhibits are extremely dangerous to all of us. I sincerely hope we make it through these times.

I hope we collectively have the where with all to choose love over fear, and peace over war. I hope we decide to support each other and develop systems that sustain all of us through whatever happens next.

It’s when we build community together, get to know each other and create local support systems, that brilliant solutions to today’s problems can emerge.

And we also have online communities where we can share what has worked.

Shareable is a website that has all kinds of great ideas for community development. I hope you’ll take a look, and start using some of these tools if you find them useful. Here also is an online system, the Community Exchange System, that enables people to easily barter with each other.

Choosing love over fear has real world results. And creating trusting and helpful communities is the first step on the path to a better future.

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I love the BDS campaign and the effect it’s having on Israel’s economy.

Here's an excellent list of products from Israel: https://boycott.thewitness.news/browse/1

Here's a way to help others not in your bubble to boycott Israel: https://www.cjpme.org/stickies_2024_en

And here's where you can support Palestine by buying a keffiyeh: https://www.hirbawi.ps/