March 2011 Archive

On March 11^th at 2:46 pm, an earthquake measured at 9.0 on the Richter scale hit Japan creating a Tsunami of 60 feet high that swept the island as far as for 10 kilometers. According to the most recent information more than 10,000 people lost their lives and more than 17,000 are reported missing and approximately 240,000 were left homeless.

The Japanese nation stricken with unbelievable adversity has reacted in an exemplary fashion.

The Emperor Akihito said on a rare live television appearance:

“I hope from the bottom of my heart that the people will, hand in hand, treat each other with compassion and overcome these difficult times.”

It appears that the Japanese nation is doing just that.

The civilian voluntary assistance has been astounding.  There has been no report of looting, rioting or profiteering from the threefold disaster of the earthquake, the Tsunami and then the nuclear accidents. The Japanese society is a very cohesive one with a strong culture of civility.  Japan has a very highly dense population. Civility may be the way the Japanese cope with that density. It is interesting to know that Japan has the lowest number of attorneys per capita than any other economically well-developed country.

One cannot develop character on the national or individual level overnight particularly not in a crisis.

As Hannah Beech said in her Time Magazine featured article “How Japan Will Reawaken”- “Natural disaster lay bare the best and worst in people, stripping away hubris and artifice.”

We are all subject to a potential Tsunami in our professional or private life. Something totally unexpected can happen and sometime changes everything to the point where our lives will “never be the same.”  Such changes can be brought for example by the death of a loved one, a diagnosis of terminal disease or sudden financial ruin. How we will face those challenges will depend on our character and how we have applied our values in the way we live.

As Samuel Johnson once said:

“Adversity has ever been considered the state in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself.”

The Obama Administration, the media and groups of influence are debating whether to impose a No-Fly Zone in Libya to prevent Colonel Qaddafi from using his airplanes to shoot and kill his own people.  Those that argue against it claim that it could lead to further U.S military involvement in Middle East affairs and that it is a slippery slope to escalation.

Those arguing in favor of imposing the No-Fly-Zone argue that it will save lives and will activate the process in the removal of a brutal and merciless dictator.

Nicholas Kristof, in his Thursdays Op-Ed entitled “The Case for a No-Fly Zone-This is a pretty easy problem, for crying out loud” makes the point clearly that inaction could risk that: “this ends up like the abortive uprising in Hungary in 1956, in Czechoslovakia in 1968 or in Southern Iraq in 1991.”  In his article Kristof quotes General McPeak, a former Air Force Chief of Staff who said: “I can’t imagine an easier military problem. General McPeak added that “just flying a few jets across the top of the friendliers would be probably be enough to ground the Libyan Air Forces, which is the objective” and that “just the mere announcement of this might have an impact.”

Lebanon on behalf of the Arab League is drafting a resolution to be submitted to the Security Council to establish a No-Fly Zone over Libya.

There are times to talk and ponder about consequences and moral dilemmas and there are times in life when immediate action is required. I believe this is one of them.

We often hesitate to intervene in other people’s lives and business and in most cases it is a good idea not to get involved. However there are times when we should not hesitate to intervene.

Intervention in the situation of loved ones addicted to drugs and alcohol have had life changing successes. According to the Family First Intervention, an organization accredited by the National Association of Forensic Counselors, the success rate in drug and alcohol intervention is 90%.

How can we determine when we should act and when we should remain passive? It is not always an easy determination to make.

Let me list a number of questions we should ask ourselves before making that determination:

1.     Is the situation life-threatening?

2.     Do we have a direct or even indirect responsibility in the existing situation we are considering getting involved in?

3.     Would we advocate for the intervention if we were the ones to benefit from it?

4.     Would we regret it for the rest of our lives if, our inaction resulted in catastrophic consequences?

If we answer “yes” to any one of those questions, then, I believe intervention is called for.

In some circumstances, it does take courage to do what is right.

As Winston Churchill once said:

“Without courage all virtues lose their meaning.”