When I heard that the American ambassador to Libya had been killed in a surprise attack on an U.S. embassy outpost in Benghazi, I felt it very much, as a wound on the body of our country. We are not collections of atoms in the void. We are made possible by the polities in which we gain the features of our humanity. A man is sent into the field to represent us all abroad. He is murdered there. It’s a violation of the most serious kind, of the peace between nations that an ambassador mediates, of our honor, of our perimeters.
Abigail L. Rosenthal is Professor Emerita of Philosophy, Brooklyn College of The City University of New York. She is the author of A Good Look at Evil, a Pulitzer Prize nominee, now appearing in an expanded second edition and as audiobooks. Dr. Rosenthal writes a weekly column for “Dear Abbie: The Non-Advice Column,” where she explores the situation of women. She thinks women’s lives are highly interesting. She’s the editor of The Consolations of Philosophy: Hobbes’s Secret; Spinoza’s Way by her father, Henry M. Rosenthal. She’s written numerous articles that can be accessed at Academia.edu .
