Nonviolence

First US Citizen Convicted For Protests At Nuclear Weapons Base In Germany

June 1, 2020 By John LaForge, Counterpunch. Resist! Germany, Legal System, Nonviolence, Nuclear Weapons

A US Air Force veteran of the US war in Vietnam and two other nuclear weapons protesters were found guilty of trespassing and damage to property in Cochem District Court May 11, 2020, as a result of July 2018 protest action at Germany’s Büchel Air Force Base, where the United States positions 20 of its nuclear bombs and where German pilots train to use them in possible attacks against Russia. There have been repeated arrests and detentions of US citizens during protests at the Büchel base since 2017, but no charges have been brought to trial until now. The judge sentenced all three to fines equivalent to 30 times their daily income plus court costs. The fines ranged from 150 to 900 Euros ($165 to $990). Refusing to pay could see the defendants jailed for up to 30 days. The three were among 18 war resisters.

The Problem Of “Peaceful Protesters”

May 28, 2020 It's Going Down. Strategize! Nonviolence, Protest, State Violence, Violence

Across the world and across history, oppressed, marginalized, poor, and working-class people have used a variety of tactics to further their goals and fight back, and this includes things that could be considered violent. Overall, this means that when people refuse their roles within society and instead force the system into a state of crisis, that’s when we can create a situation in which we can forward our own agenda. This often means that people refuse to do the things that allows the system to reproduce itself. In the case of workers, people strike. In the case of renters, they go on rent strike. For the poor, they refuse to be passive: they riot. In the case of all, they defend themselves against the violence of State repression and the police: they fight back.

Disobedient Peace As A Form Of Non-Cooperation With Inhumanity

May 27, 2020 Peace Science Digest. Strategize! Injustice, Mexico, Nonviolence, Peace

Peace is often viewed as the absence of violence, individuals and groups getting along, and, simply, an orderly life within and between societies. In this view, peace is often thought to be achieved through (military) strength. Those who are part of dominant groups benefit from such understandings of peace. The author of this article suggests that the concept of peace has been abused and manipulated—emptied of content or associated with militarization and repression instead of with justice. To re-appropriate the concept of peace, he introduces the notion of disobedient peace—building knowledge collectively through reflection and action, questioning taken-for-granted assumptions about a complex social order and obedience to authority, and developing a moral identity and action plans to disobey inhumane social orders.

The Violence Of Non-Violence: Canadian Sanctions Policy In Times Of COVID-19

May 8, 2020 By Claudia Chaufan and Maria Victor Paez, Orinoco Tribune. Strategize! Canada, COVID-19, Nonviolence, Sanctions

While there is no shortage of evidence for the economic, social, and health effects of sanctions, both state and nonstate actors – among the latter, many ostensibly averse to the use of military force – neglect, when not altogether ignore, the devastation caused by sanctions. Take, for instance, the case of sanctions on Venezuela: the policy has frozen assets, banned banks from transactions, and impeded the sale of oil, Venezuela’s main source of income, making the purchase of essential goods such as food and medicine all but impossible, thus targeting not only the Venezuelan government but the entire population.

Here’s Why We Must Decarcerate Now

April 30, 2020 Henry Cervantes, Waging Nonviolence. Create! COVID-19, Decarceration, Nonviolence, Prison

My neighborhood in Chicago, “Little Village,” is the single largest jail site in the United States. The Cook County Jail is usually known as a place where violence occurs, like attacks on inmates and correctional officers, suicides and shootings outside of the courthouse. It has also become what the New York Times called a top national “hot spot” for the coronavirus in recent weeks. As of this writing a staggering 491 inmates and over 360 staff have tested positive for COVID-19. Six inmates have recently died because of the virus, and the numbers of cases continue to grow. There are several important efforts taking place locally, like the Chicago Community Bond Fund and The Bail Project, to reduce the number of people behind bars during this pandemic.

COVID-19: Harnessing The Obstructive Power Of Constructive Program

April 28, 2020 Phil Wilmot, Nonviolent Conflict. Strategize! Constructive Program, Nonviolence, Resistance

Crises bring out the worst and best in people, and they do so on a mass scale. Since the beginning of the Coronavirus pandemic, we have seen plenty of toilet paper hoarding and other selfish acts, but arguably even more goodhearted people asking, “What else can I do?” Movement organizers themselves have been asking, “What infrastructure do we have, and how can we pivot it toward crisis response?” These are important questions to be asking right now, but organizers should take them one step further. Choosing to repurpose one’s movement toward community needs in times of crisis has short- and long-term strategic value. In this article I share a few thoughts about how movements can build power by serving their local communities—immunizing their movements from losing momentum with a “vaccine” of constructive programs and obstructive strategies.

The Choice For Global Nonviolence Is Sharper Than Ever

April 11, 2020 Ken Butigan, Pace e Bene. Strategize! climate crisis, Nonviolence, Pandemic, Recession

Violence—which individuals and whole societies chronically reach for in the hopes of defending themselves, solving their problems or resolving their conflicts—makes no sense in coping with this dangerous reality. Violence will not flatten the curve of infection or heal those who have tested positive. If anything, violent policies and behavior—attacking the sick or restricting their access to treatment, or exploding into rage—will only worsen an already bad situation. Instead, people everywhere are increasingly unleashing the power and spirit of nonviolent engagement: compassion, courage, resilience, sacrifice and concerted action for the common good. In the midst of the terror of this moment, these facets of active nonviolence are spreading everywhere as we mobilize to prevent transmission, treat the sick, console the dying, comfort survivors, and learn vital lessons from the awful toll that this cataclysm is taking.

Iraq Protesters Form ‘Mini-State’ In Tahrir Square

December 15, 2019 Qantara.de. Create! Democracy, health, Iraq, Nonviolence

With border guards, clean-up crews and hospitals, Iraqi protesters have created a mini-state in Baghdad's Tahrir Square, offering the kinds of services they say their government has failed to provide. "We've done more in two months than the state has done in 16 years," said Haydar Chaker, a construction worker from Babylon province, south of the capital. Everyone has their role, from cooking bread to painting murals, with a division of labour and scheduled shifts. Chaker came to Baghdad with his friends after the annual Arbaeen pilgrimage to the Shia holy city Karbala, his pilgrim's tent and cooking equipment equally useful at a protest encampment. Installed in the iconic square whose name means "liberation", he provides three meals a day to hundreds of protesters, cooking with donated foods.

Kings Bay Plowshares 7 Found Guilty On All Counts

October 25, 2019 Kingsbay Plowshares 7. Resist! Catholic Workers, Nonviolence, Nuclear Weapons

Brunswick, GA – More than 18 months after they snuck onto the site of one of the largest known collections of nuclear weaponry in the world, a jury found the Kings Bay Plowshares 7 guilty of all four of the charges brought against them. The defendants face more than 20 years in prison for destruction and depredation of government property in excess of $1,000, trespassing, and conspiracy. Late at night on April 4, 2018 Mark Colville, Clare Grady, Martha Hennessy, Fr. Steve Kelly, S.J., Elizabeth McAlister, Patrick O’Neill, and Carmen Trotta used a bolt cutter to enter a remote gate at Naval Base Kings Bay in St. Mary’s GA and walked two miles through swamp and brush. They then split into three groups and prayed, poured blood, spray-painted messages against nuclear weapons, hammered on parts of a shrine to nuclear missiles, hung banners, and waited to be arrested.

Taking Next Steps For Nuclear Abolition

October 23, 2019 Kathy Kelly, Voices for Creative Nonviolence. Resist! Nonviolence, Nuclear Weapons, Peace

A recent op-ed in the New York Times suggests the Kings Bay Plowshares 7 message is entering public discourse. The defendants have clarified that the U.S. nuclear weapon arsenal robs resources desperately needed for food, shelter, health care and education. The New York Times notes if we could reach a total nuclear weapons ban, we could save roughly $43 billion each year on weapons, delivery systems and upgrades. “That’s roughly the same amount we’ve allocated in federal hurricane aid for Puerto Rico.” Marianne laments the madness which considers nuclear weapons a modern idol deserving of great sacrifice. She is rightfully wary of social and cultural developments that consider such madness normal. She and I commiserate about recovering from hip fractures, (I’ve been on the mend for the past month), but we both know that Steve Kelly’s invitation deserves our greatest attention.

Change Agent: Gene Sharp’s Neoliberal Nonviolence

October 12, 2019 By Marcie Smith, Nonsite.org Educate! Gene Sharp, Ideology, Nonviolence

Gene Sharp, the “Machiavelli of nonviolence,” has been fairly described as “the most influential American political figure you’ve never heard of.”1 Sharp, who passed away in January 2018, was a beloved yet “mysterious” intellectual giant of nonviolent protest movements, the “father of the whole field of the study of strategic nonviolent action.”2 Over his career, he wrote more than twenty books about nonviolent action and social movements. His how-to pamphlet on nonviolent revolution...

Expanding The Concept And Practice Of Nonviolence

September 28, 2019 Mike Yarrow, Westernfriend.org Strategize! Ideology, Nonviolence, Revisionism

First, let me confess to an itch about the term “nonviolence” – because it connotes a passive absence of violence rather than an affirmative presence of an alternative force for change, which Gandhi called, “a force more powerful.” I like Martin Luther King Jr.’s statement, “. . . true nonviolence is more than the absence of violence. It is the persistent and determined application of peaceable power to offenses against the community.” This is not just semantics! I know people who are intent on being nonviolent by trying to expunge violent thoughts and deeds from their lives, often by retreating from situations which might provoke violent reactions.

Rebelling From A Nonviolent Heart

July 14, 2019 By Skeena Rathor, Resurgence & Ecologist magazine Strategize! Climate Change, Extinction Rebellion, Nonviolence

As a movement Extinction Rebellion has consciously used the power of nonviolent civil disobedience as an embodied practice of love asking for the needs of the Earth and all its living splendor to be safeguarded. The work of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, and Marshall Rosenberg’s nonviolent communication or peaceful communication are nourishing reference points for Extinction Rebellion. Modern politics, religious dogma, and culture at large have bred a tremendously violent language. We have become trapped in moralistic judgments implying wrongness or badness on the part of people who don’t act in harmony with our values. With nonviolent language as an essential tool, we can accelerate the realization of our interconnectedness and our remembering of our instinct to protect and nurture what we love and that which loves and sustains us.

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