Nonviolence

Peace Activists To Shut Down Nuclear Weapons Base

January 13, 2015 Leonard Eiger, www.gzcenter.org Resist! Nonviolence, Nuclear Weapons, Wars and Militarism

The vigil and action are part of Ground Zero Center for Nonviolent Action's annual tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr. The day will include nonviolence training, education on efforts to stop a new generation of ballistic missile submarines, as well as a keynote talk by Bruce Gagnon, Coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space. Participants in the annual peace walk led by monks from the Bainbridge Island Nipponzan Myohoji Buddhist Temple will take part in Saturday's event. On Monday, January 19th Ground Zero Center will take part in the Seattle MLK Rally & March, walking with a fullscale inflatable Trident II D-5 missile depicting one of Dr. King's famous quotes: “When scientific power outruns spiritual power, we end up with guided missiles and misguided men.”

Resistance And Transformation

December 28, 2014 Malik Yakini, www.michigancitizen.com Resist! Free Speech and Assembly, Nonviolence, Protest

I applaud the young people who have reinvigorated our movement! I am not among those who will criticize others who are marching, dying-in, walking with their hands up, chanting “I can’t breathe” or setting fires and throwing rocks. It is unintelligent and unhealthy to have a foot on your neck, and not use all means available to remove the foot. All resistance to oppression is healthy for the oppressed. The writings of Frantz Fanon are instructive in this regard. In his classic book, “The Wretched of the Earth,” Fanon, speaking of the oppressed, says, “Once their rage explodes, they recover their lost coherence, they experience self-knowledge through reconstruction of themselves…” I am encouraged by this latest wave of resistance. But, while this activism is encouraging, and protesting is significant, it is clearly not enough. We need a long-term strategy guided by a clear vision of the society that we seek to bring into being. If we are to move this strategy forward, as our revered ancestor Kwame Ture (formerly Stokley Carmichael) advised, we must belong to an organization. “The only way you can help your people is by helping to organize them, and the only way you can do that is by joining an organization.”

Murder Of New York Police: Violence Will Not Reduce Violence

December 21, 2014 Staff, www.PopularResistance.org Educate! killed by police, Nonviolence, Police abuse, police brutality

Popular Resistance joins with #BlackLivesMatter and Ferguson Action in being shocked and saddened by the deaths of two police officers in New York. We extend our sympathy to the families, friends and colleagues of the people killed by an obviously troubled person. Civilian violence is not the solution to police violence, indeed it will lead to an escalation of violence. We need to de-escalate violence between police and the people and not want to do anything to encourage its escalation. It is important to emphasize that these murders were not connected to the movement against police abuse, brutality and racism. The three murders by a troubled man, two police officers and his former girlfriend, are not acts of protest but of someone who needed mental health treatment. Organizers of these nationwide protests have consistently emphasized nonviolence. Peaceful protests across the country have begun to move the issues surrounding the re-making of the relationship between police and the people. Popular Resistance does not want to see that progress undermined by violence, especially the killing of anyone -- civilian or police.

You Are Not My Enemy. Violence Is My Enemy

December 21, 2014 Peijman Kouretchian, Strategize! Nonviolence, Police violence, Racism

When protests breakout there is often an abundance of rage. Where is this anger usually directed? At people. Often towards the police, or individual officers. This results in dehumanization, seeing others as less than human. When we dehumanize others, violence is justified against them, and the system which created them remains unchanged. The way out of this cycle is two fold: 1) Attack and transform the systems that created these individuals. 2) Refuse to hate individuals and instead empathize. Empathy is the art of connecting to the real experience of another person by looking at the world from their perspective. It is at the root of all social evolution, and according to Gloria Steinem, “the most revolutionary emotion.”. When we empathize and look at other’s actions from the point of view of human needs, it becomes easier to understand why someone acts the way they do, even if the strategies they are using to meet those needs are flawed, and possibly unacceptable.

Power Of Protest: Seneca Lake Judge Reconsiders Sentences

December 9, 2014 Charlie Haeffner, www.odessafile.com Resist! Blockade, Fracking, Nonviolence, Seneca Lake

"Judge Berry told us tonight he doesn't like to jail people because sometimes his granddaughter stops speaking to him." That's true, too. He did. In fact, as I sit here recalling that particular evening, the judge said a number of things that were interesting, if only for the fact that other court sessions -- at least those I've observed -- don't veer as readily into the interpersonal. The evening was noteworthy too because the direction of court cases there (at least those begging jail sentences) took an abrupt turn. The prevailing philosophy went from "Go Directly to Jail for 15 Days" to "Let's Talk About It." "I don't like putting people in jail," he said, adding that he has a granddaughter who doesn't like it either, and on occasion "doesn't speak to me" because his job requires such difficult decisions. "For those of you who have a grandchild," he said, "to have a granddaughter" react like that "is terrible."

Narrow-Minded Focus On Military & Weapons Makes Us Less Secure

November 23, 2014 David J. Ragland, www.theportlandalliance.org Educate! Ferguson, militarism, Nonviolence, Violence

Researchers for some time now have been able to understand how freedom from violence and the threat of violence, community-based economic development, authentic democratic processes and transparency increase human security. Violence and security have often been linked; human security research suggests they are mutually exclusive. Choosing violence to attain security precludes that very security for anyone who critiques violence, as thousands have learned in Ferguson. Clanging claims that we live in a great democracy that protects everyone’s rights sound awfully hollow to an unarmed protestor who has just been injured and arrested by a jack-up cop strapped with an official lethal sidearm and a legal system that affords him every benefit of every doubt. Democracy is not just a system of voting but an approach to governing that recognizes obstacles to participation and development and listens, trying to hear what communities need.

Ferguson And The ‘Us Vs. Them’ Illusion

November 23, 2014 Robert C. Koehler, www.commonwonders.com Educate! Ferguson, Nonviolence, Police abuse

The political, governmental and media consensus of who we are — is blind and deaf to history and locked into us-vs.-them thinking. Security, whether domestic or international, is a game played against presumed and, often enough, imagined enemies. Thus, prior to the governor’s decision to call out the Guard, the FBI had issued an intelligence bulletin warning local officials that “the announcement of the grand jury’s decision … will likely be exploited by some individuals to justify threats and attacks against law enforcement and critical infrastructure,” according to the Washington Post. If nothing else, this sort of consciousness remains utterly unaware of its own contribution to the trouble. As law enforcement ups its level of militarized authoritarianism, it agitates the elements predisposed to regard it as the enemy and seek its humiliation and defeat. This is a small segment of the protesters, but no matter. Preparing for war requires, first of all, an oversimplification of the social context in which the preparers operate. Once this is accomplished, the warnings become self-fulfilling prophecies. In other words, what matters is that there’s an “enemy” out there.

Who Says Ferguson Can’t End Well

November 19, 2014 David Swanson, www.warisacrime.org Organize! Ferguson, Michael Brown, Nonviolence, Police abuse

We should understand that the violence in Ferguson is not new and is not limited to Ferguson. It did not begin with a particular shooting. It did not begin with any shooting. It began with a system of oppression that keeps people in misery amidst great wealth. Just as that injustice is inexcusable, so is any violence in response to it. . . courageous, disciplined, principled, and truly loving actions of those resisting injustice creatively and constructively. Such actions are not always successful and not always well-planned to the satisfaction of scholars. But they have long been far more common than is acknowledged on the television or in the history books. As AJ Muste told strikers confronted by the military "...Then I told them, in line with the strike committee's decision, that to permit ourselves to be provoked into violence would mean defeating ourselves; that our real power was in our solidarity and in our capacity to endure suffering..."

Breaking The Cycle: Non-Cooperation

November 18, 2014 Jerry Maynard, www.reflections4thejourney.blogspot.com Strategize! Activism, Noncooperation, Nonviolence

Americans tend to only act upon their convictions when it gets to a point of extreme necessity. We tend to live in a culture that runs on the notion of "as long as it does not affect me or my friends/family, then it does not concern me". Yet, when tragedy hits us, and our bubble is busted, we cry out in outrage. As long as we are "comfortable" and have a feeling that we are "secure", we are willing to let others go on with what they are doing/saying even if it is unjust or immoral. This is why after 911 Americans were more than willing to let the Federal Government invade privacy and violate civil liberties. Most Americans felt uncomfortable due to the sense that they lost the false security that this culture thrived on. But there seems to be a shift in the wind....The cycle is beginning to break......

Hundreds March To End Violence In Wilmington

November 9, 2014 Ryan Hall, www.paceebene.org Organize! Nonviolence

Wilmington, Delaware held a “March for a Culture of Peace” Campaign Nonviolence organizer June Eisley reports that it was a glorious day, filled with peace and love. Turnout for the march was estimated to be approximately 250 people from all walks of life. Many faith-based and community organizations from the city and outside the city joined together. The t-shirts on the poles in the pictures represent those killed by gun violence in Wilmington from 2013-to date–39 total. Over 40 groups co-sponsored this effort, and now our work will begin to work together to Build a Culture of Peace in Wilmington.

New Documentary From Occupy The Farm

October 25, 2014 Staff, www.occupythefarm.org Resist! Food and Agriculture, Nonviolence

Independent filmmaker Todd Darling has created a stunning documentary about the Farm and the power of direct action. It has been picked up by the largest theater owner in the nation, Regal Cinemas, and opens November 7th, in Berkeley! It will play for two weeks here before heading to LA and NYC. The Gill Tract Community Farm is flourishing! A 1.5 acre UC/Community collaborative pilot project is flourishing and growing on the Gill Tract. A recent blitz of love and energy from the Permaculture Action Tour brought over 300 farmers to install a medicinal garden mandala and permaculture beds.Check out this blog for a peek into that day.

Lifetime Activist, David Hartsough, Shares Wisdom and Vision for a Just World

October 15, 2014 Podcast Activism, Nonviolence, Peace, Wars and Militarism

David Hartsough has dedicated his life to working for peace and justice and continues now with one of his greatest

Mahatma Gandhi’s Birthday: Creating A Nonviolent World

October 2, 2014 Robert J. Burrowes, www.PopularResistance.org Educate! Arts, Gandhi, Nonviolence, Poetry

As we celebrate Mahatma Gandhi's birthday on October 2nd, the International Day of Nonviolence, we have the chance to reflect on our progress in creating a nonviolent world. Obviously, creating a nonviolent world has many facets and is a long-term work-in-progress. But if we are to regenerate human society in accord with principles of love, nonviolence, justice, equity and sustainability, it is emphatically clear that we need to dramatically recreate much of our culture, particularly in the West, where hatred, violence and injustice are 'built-in'. How can we do this? According to Gandhi: 'If we are to reach real peace in the world, we shall have to begin with the children.' So, as we reflect, I would like to encourage people to consider and, hopefully, adopt Gandhi’s suggestion before it is too late. I have spent my life trying to work out why humans are violent and, in the end, I discovered that Gandhi was right. Without even realising it, we humans terrorise our children and inflict phenomenal violence on them. How do we do this? We do it by 'socializing' our children. That is, we inflict visible, 'invisible' and 'utterly invisible' violence on our children in order to make them do what we want.

Campaign Nonviolence Builds Across Country

September 26, 2014 Ryan Hall, www.paceebene.org/ Organize! Nonviolence

We've arrived at day five of Campaign Nonviolence Week of Actions! Reports of marches, vigils, rallies, trainings, prayers and meditations for a culture of peace and an end to war, poverty and environmental destruction continue to roll in from across the country! Today we posted a great op-ed written by CNV organizer Mary Ellen Quinn in Bangor, Maine , entitled "At home, in football, in Iraq, we dwell in a culture of violence — but we’re not paying attention." American Samoa held a nonviolence symposium at their local community college to teach nonviolent methods that address poverty, war and the climate crisis and they're preparing for a Friday anti-violence march; Merrimack, NH held a peace procession between two local weapons manufacturers including a drone facility; activists held an anti-drone rally at Volk Field in Wisconsin; and CNV organizers in Chicago, ILCNV3 held a march through downtown for peace, people and the planet that included great speakers including Pace e Bene Director, Ken Butigan, and CNV volunteer and DePaul student Nico May.

Tackling The Climate Catastrophe Strategically

September 25, 2014 Robert J. Burrowes, www.popularresistance.org Strategize! Climate Change, Environment, Nonviolence

If you like to ask or beg your oppressor to go easy on you, then you do not need to read this article. And if you like to do what makes you feel good at the time, irrespective of its strategic impact, then this article is not for you either. My interest in tackling violence, in whatever form it takes, has always been to take action myself that leaves the perpetrator powerless (but, hopefully, a convert too). I also like to be strategic so that the impact of my action is long-lasting (in fact, preferably permanent) and structurally reduces the violence in our world. Here's how I work. I never vote or lobby elites, nor do I participate in actions designed to do this, such as the recent People's Climate March in New York (and elsewhere). My analysis, reinforced by decades of casual observation, is that lobbying elites is a complete waste of time and that a strategy that focuses on engaging 'ordinary' individuals and a diverse range of grassroots groups to take action in the desired direction is far more effective.

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