Must Read for Today: Lee Harris

I'm a huge Lee Harris fan. He doesn't disappoint as he ponders, as certain academics have wondered lately, whether we have overreacted to September 11th. His answer: quite the contrary:

The inmates of any jailhouse know that even mildest acts of aggression must be instantly and firmly challenged. If you are a newcomer and another inmate demands that you give him your candy bar, the worst thing you could possibly do would be to try to put the incident into perspective. You cannot say, "Well, it's only a candy bar, after all. No big deal," because, in this context, your candy bar is a big deal. It means everything. If you hand it over on demand, then you have also handled over your dignity. You have thereby informed not only the inmate making the demand, but all the other inmates watching you give into his demand that they too can all walk on you at any time. They too can take from you anything you have. They too can make you their flunkey or slave.

Of course, in defending your candy-bar, you may have to risk your life. But it is absurd to say that you are risking your life "only" for a candy bar when you are in fact risking it to maintain your autonomy and independence. The danger in such a situation is not overreaction, but, paradoxically, the failure to overreact.

Lee Harris is supposed to have another book coming out soon. If you want a taste of what the first one was like, check this out. It's from back in 2002, and it's one of the essays from this period that will still be worth reading twenty or forty years from now.