Lines in the Sand...

A good number of conversations these days eventually turn to lines in the sand. I always try to convey that there are many things a person could suffer that are far worse than fighting or death, as this great quote illuminates:

"War is an ugly thing but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feelings which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.

A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."

-- John Stuart Mill