Try writing on an issue, comments appreciated (GRE essay sample)

[Charlie_Yu]

ISSUE212"If a goal is worthy, then any means taken to attain it is justifiable."

Be it TV drams, movies, or historical events, there are cases and cases of leaders sacificing a lot, even many lives including their friends and relatives, for a goal that they considered worthy. Is this justifiable?

I have to admit that sometimes a goal is worthy that even attaining for it by radical means is justifiable, as we learnt in history lessons. French Revolution was one of them; many lives were lost as a result of revolution, but it turned out worthwhile when the French peasants had been free from the tyranny of Louis XVI that the tax rate was devouring the peasants' crop productions in order to support the luxury lives of the nobles, and the result is a free and democratic country. Had French Revolution not happened many people would have died of hunger, which makes lives lost at least justifiable to some extent.

However, humans do err, and some goals, although they might be worthy, are not attainable even by radical means. The result is great sacrifice for nothing. During the 1950s-1960s, as the leader of Communist China, Mao had the idealistic goal that communism will eventually lead to equalization of wealth, that the farmers would not have their hard-earn wealth squeezed by the landlords. However, what he did trying to accomplish this goal were not effective, sometimes even damaging. The result is that although millions of people died of strvation, his dream was too idealistic to come true and people died for no worthy cause.

Even wrose than that, whether a goal is worthy for radical means differs by person. While a goal may be worthy for any means for you, the same is not for me. Unfortunately this often results in tyranny. After the horrific 911 attacks, the US president George W. Bush said he would arrest the suspect of the attacks, Osama bin Laden for any cost, and the US army rallied Afghanistan and tens of thousands of citizens were killed in the progress. Bush may consider this a worthy cause; the dead Afghanistan citizens and their families definitely didn't think so. This is not much different from a tyranny. Not to say that Bush failed his goal of arresting Osama.

While sometimes it is justifiable to attain a worthy goal by any means, even where lives may be sacrificed, more often than not it is just an excuse for a tyranny.