Questões Militares

A questão refere-se ao texto destacado a seguir.

When my family first moved to North Carolina, we lived in a rented house three blocks from the school where I would begin the third grade. My mother made friends with one of the neighbors, but one seemed enough for her. Within a year we would move again and, as she explained, there wasn’t much point in getting too close to people we would have to say good-bye to. Our next house was less than a mile away, and the short journey would hardly merit tears or even goodbyes, for that matter. It was more of a “see you later” situation, but still I adopted my mother’s attitude, as it allowed me to pretend that not making friends was a conscious choice. I could if I wanted to. It just wasn’t the right time.

Back in New York State, we had lived in the country, with no sidewalks or streetlights; you could leave the house and still be alone. But here, when you looked out the window, you saw other houses, and people inside those houses. I hoped that in walking around after dark I might witness a murder, but for the most part our neighbors just sat in their living rooms, watching TV. The only place that seemed truly different was owned by a man named Mr. Tomkey, who did not believe in television […].  

To say that you did not believe in television was different from saying that you did not care for it. Belief implied that television had a master plan and that you were against it. It also suggested that you thought too much. When my mother reported that Mr. Tomkey did not believe in television, my father said, “Well, good for him. I don't know that I believe in it, either”.

“That's exactly how I feel,” my mother said, and then my parents watched the news, and whatever came on after the news.

SEDARIS, David. Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim. Recurso eletrônico. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 2004, p. 5. 

A questão refere-se ao texto destacado a seguir. 

Since from August 1914 to November 1918 Great Britain and her Allies were fighting for civilization it cannot, I suppose, be impertinent to inquire what precisely civilization may be. “Liberty” and “Justice” have always been reckoned expensive words, but that “Civilization” could cost as much as I forget how many millions a day came as a surprise to many thoughtful taxpayers. The story of this word’s rise to the highest place amongst British war aims is so curious that, even were it less relevant, I should be tempted to tell it […].

“You are fighting for civilization”, cried the wisest and best of those leaders who led us into war, and the very soldiers took up the cry, “Join up, for civilization’s sake”. Startled by this sudden enthusiasm for an abstraction in which till then politicians and recruiting-sergeants had manifested little or no interest, I, in my turn, began to cry: “And what is civilization?” I did not cry aloud, be sure: at that time, for crying things of that sort aloud, one was sent to prison. But now that it is no longer criminal, nor unpatriotic even, to ask questions, I intend to inquire what this thing is for which we fought and for which we pay. I propose to investigate the nature of our leading war-aim. Whether my search will end in discovery and – if it does – whether what is discovered will bear any likeliness to the Treaty of Versailles remains to be seen.

BELL, Clive. Civilization: An Essay. 1ª ed. 1928. Harmondsworth,

Middlesex, UK: Penguin Books, 1938, p. 13.