Natural Humanists believe that no human being should ever be violent, or ever cause injury or death, or deliberate distress or harm, to any other human being, or to any other living creature, unless this is essential to protect their own or their loved ones’ life or health, or is unintentional and unavoidable, to allow them to move freely, and to meet their essential human needs.
Whether it’s a fist-fight in a school playground, a parent smacking a child, the death penalty as a punishment, abortion of an unborn baby, murdering other human beings in wars and conflicts, genital-mutilation of a girl or boy for religious or cultural reasons, deliberately and unnecessarily murdering animals for food or clothing, or testing non-essential cosmetics, toiletries or cleaning products on animals, all of these things are always considered to be immoral.
When it comes to war, Natural Humanists believe that any invasion of one country by another country, or any group of countries, or any terrorist act, should be treated as a breach of international law, and should be responded to by legal and peaceful means only, never by war, or by other forms of violence, destruction or aggression.
They believe that every country in the world should be asked to sign-up to an international agreement, never to invade another country, or to seek to take control of another country’s land or population. If they do, the agreement should ensure that none of the signatory countries, would then trade with that country for the duration of that illegal occupation, and for a minimum of perhaps 10 years afterwards, and that this could be extended by an additional 10 years, for every additional country that they invade thereafter, and for every additional full year that this country’s illegal invasion of each of these countries continues.
Any country agreeing to sign-up to such a peaceful treatment of invading countries, could be given incentives for doing so, if this was necessary, for example, favourable trading terms, or investment in their own country’s infrastructure, or low-interest loans from richer countries.
These signatory countries would agree to cooperate in trying to find and imprison any dictator or democratic President or Prime Minister, or any leader of a terrorist organisation, who is responsible for this invasion, and would also agree that this imprisonment should be for the rest of that leader’s life.
This imprisonment would be considered morally-justifiable, as every new leader of every one of the world’s countries, and of every terrorist organisation, would have been notified of this prison sentence at the time of taking power in their own country, and so their decision to invade would therefore be taken to be a decision to ‘volunteer’ for, and fully accept this lifelong imprisonment.
If a leader was imprisoned, they should, at all times, be treated with decency and respect, and given unlimited supervised video contact with their family, and the right for family to visit them, without financial cost, so that this punishment doesn’t unduly cause suffering to their family. They would also agree to that family being financially supported by these signatory countries throughout this imprisonment, so that the family didn’t experience any financial hardship, as a result of the imprisonment.
Natural Humanists believe that, even if any invasion did become permanent, no violence should ever be shown to the invaders, by residents of the invaded country, or by any other state, as Natural Humanists share, strongly, the Dalai Lama’s belief, that the “true hero is one who conquers his own anger and hatred”.
They believe instead that residents of the invaded country should offer peaceful resistance, in the same way that Mahatma Gandhi did to British invaders, who immorally controlled Africa and the Indian subcontinent, as, to quote Gandhi, “An ‘eye for an eye’ will only make the whole world blind”.