War Is A Crime

The power of mass demonstrations to mobilize activism and move those in positions of power is minimized, first and foremost, by those opposed to popular power. Do not listen to them. Make them listen to us!

Can you give two days to stop the slaughter of innocents and the shameless profiteering from their blood? If you can give more, so much the better. But by giving two days, you will guarantee that others will give more. You will be part of building the necessary momentum, the key ingredient in read more

I asked my Facebook page which high school teacher they’d least like to have had a gun in their desk. Go read their answers.

I’d elect those people over any recent president or any current member of Congress.

These bursts of public discussion with dashes of sanity thrown in that follow each particularly media-covered mass-shooting are always encouraging. And it’s especially encouraging to have young people being allowed to have a say.

But let’s be clear about the limitations of what’s happened read more

Psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl said, “There are two races of men in the world, but only these two – the ‘race’ of decent men and the ‘race’ of indecent men. Both are found everywhere; they penetrate into all groups of society.”

This is a powerful conclusion from a man who witnessed the very best and the very worst of humanity. He gives us a valuable lens to look at the world as we try to make sense of what’s going on around us.

Yet we easily forget Frankl’s read more

http://troymedia.com/2018/02/15/social-change-starts-within/

As we look at the world, it’s very easy to give up hope. We see a lack of integrity in politicians and obscene wages for business leaders, and we fear for the future of our planet.

Some try to tell us that the path to progress is to change the system. If we can overthrow the corrupt establishment, they tell us, we can form a new regime that’s just and equitable. The problems are caused by “those other people.” If we replace them, read more

http://troymedia.com/2018/02/08/down-syndrome-life-worth-living/

By observing history without judgment, we can learn from our mistakes. By examining primary documents – artifacts from a particular era – we can begin to understand the thinking of the people of that time.

In an effort to create a more objective perspective, I tell my students to imagine that they’re living in the future looking at our current society. How will history judge us?

By asking this question, we become aware of the read more

World Beyond War has been raising funds for and renting billboards in opposition to war. We’ve run into censorship from numerous billboard companies but persevered, and more billboards are on their way.

First we put this message up here in Charlottesville, Va., and then in Baltimore, Md. (see explanation of the 3% calculation here):

Now we’re putting these two images up on billboards in Syracuse, NY, where drone pilots participate in U.S. wars from Hancock Air Base:

For 8 hours a day for 16 read more

This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com. To receive TomDispatch in your inbox three times a week, click here.

It’s been a long time since I stood in a classroom and taught anyone anything, but each June for years I’ve appeared before classes of college seniors to give a graduation address ushering them into our grim world. True, those speeches didn’t take place before flesh-and-blood audiences but on what I’ve come to call read more

It’s sort of silly that it matters. The United States bombed North Korea flat with ordinary, non-bioweapons bombs. It ran out of standing structures to bomb. People lived in caves, if they lived. Millions died, most of them from regular old non-scandalous but mass-murderous bombs (including, of course, Napalm which melts people but doesn’t give them exotic diseases). North Koreans to this day live in such terror of a repetition of history that their behavior is sometimes inexplicable and bewildering read more

If you had just asked me if peace needed a “business plan,” I’d have replied, “Sure! Just like it needs a toupeed golfing fascist reality-TV creep in the White House! That’ll just about fix everything! War is over! Thanks!”

But after reading Scilla Elworthy’s book The Business Plan for Peace, I say, “Yeah, OK, that sounds pretty good, actually. Here, let me tweak it some!” In fact, I’ve added this book, despite some quibbles, to my bookshelf of war abolition advocacy. read more