Allow me to begin with a parable -- here, an excerpt from a satellite radio broadcast in 2019.

Indian Lt. Gen. J.V. Singh, new Commander of Chinese and Indian troops in the U.S., yesterday pledged to minimize further collateral damage to civilians, though he emphasized his new command's excellent record on that score.

Outgoing Commander, Lt. Gen. Mohanty, is under investigation for "The Toledo Massacre." Occupation forces allegedly intentionally destroyed an occupied apartment building, said to contain a senior al-Qaeda-U.S. leader.

The explosions and subsequent fires killed 213 occupants and 3 firefighters. Gen. Mohanty said she regretted the loss of civilian life, but the target was "too high value to ignore."

"We must all share the burden," intoned Mohanty. "Otherwise, we will all share the same mass grave." The predawn raid seemingly dealt a lethal blow to a local terrorist network that has wreaked havoc on American soil.

"The civilian cost today, however sad, was worth it," Mohanty concluded.

The death toll grew after the media released details about the attack. Local residents took to the streets in protest against the killing of "innocent American civilians."

Local law enforcement joined with Indo-Chinese military forces to quell the growing civil unrest. Field Commander Zhang feared "infiltration by foreign radicals" and responded with overwhelming force, including air support.

Zhang's forces killed another 107 protesters and local residents.

Administration officials again expressed their outrage over mounting civilian casualties and promised to force an internal investigation by Indian and Chinese forces about these incidents.

Said White House Press Secretary Hoisington, "Our administration will not rest until someone gets to the bottom of this massacre."

The president is negotiating a new Status of Forces Agreement with India and China, which, according to Hoisington, "should increase protections for all Americans."

Candlelight vigils across America are scheduled for Saturday. Local law enforcement officials fear these memorials will give way to additional protests and agitation by radical domestic forces.

The Toledo Massacre casts long, dark shadows across all of America this weekend.

I follow my parable with a few observations about eyes, beholding, and the like. The strength of parables resides in what remains unstated and in the multiplicity of possible interpretations. Even meaning resides in the "eye" of the beholder, apparently.

Beauty: Crossing Kansas over the last month or so, preparing for my (hopefully) imminent departure, has engendered additional opportunities to enjoy its physical beauty. At the heart of the wind debate, after all, is an aesthetic dispute -- disagreements about what beauty is, and what value beauty has.

Western Kansas reveals its beauty in its expanse, its grandeur and evocativeness. The high, open plains bespeak the American Dream of freedom and possibility, of individuals in communities engaged with one another for mutual survival and shared growth.

I physically long for my native New England's lush woods and plentiful water, and no amount of time here would likely shake me of my deep, abiding love for the magnificent beauty that resonates in my heart and memories from my youth.

Nor, likely, would any amount of time there matter for those of you committed in your heart to other places.

Culture: Broadly conceived, culture offers us a useful point of comparison, even if we cannot completely convey everything we each believe about culture, including what it is. For instance, intersecting individual and societal forces (like religion, economy, ethics and law) help produce the worlds in which each of us lives.

One of the most difficult tasks for individuals is to "get outside" their own culture(s) for honest, critical reflection. Whole hosts of (culturally engrained) assumptions not only guide, but help determine what we do and who we are. So much so, we fail even to detect culture's enormous role.

Relying on only the dominant frame of reference to understand and evaluate differences rigs the game in favor of one culture. Honest reflection, when cultures come in conflict, is personally difficult and not widely welcomed across society (imagine that).

Ethics and/or morality: Great, necessary questions about good and evil, right and wrong, just and unjust are easily judged, once again, when one's framework is unchallenged and unchallengeable. Judgment is rendered as will to power, producing the world of its own judgment. The great ethical and moral questions are extremely challenging when debated in a classroom or coffeehouse, treacherous when practiced with weapons of individual and mass destruction.

These questions are made all the more perilous when not first debated before practiced.

The parable and these observations grow all the more severe when we debate at a distance from where the barrel of the gun is pointed. Nothing divides coalitions or communities faster than when the question of justifiable killing is debated.

The unquestioned, the unquestionable are invariably asked when other eyes behold. Eyes, too long clouded, clear: too long clear, cloud.

William Shanahan is an independent scholar, living and writing in Hays.