Film for the Age of COVID: "Red Beard" by Kurosawa

Toshiro Mifune in Red Beard, a film by Akira Kurosawa

I am coming around to thinking that the greatest film Akira Kurosawa ever made was not a samurai epic, but the fable about strong compassion called Red Beard.

The story centers on two doctors. One is the 19th century equivalent of a newly minted medical school graduate -- in this case, someone who has had the benefit of "Dutch learning" in Nagasaki, and has now come to Edo (Tokyo) to be the shogun's doctor. The other, nicknamed "Red Beard," is a senior doctor who runs a clinic that principally caters to the poor. The older doctor appears to be a bit of a tyrant, but it is soon revealed that his priority is all-around well-being of the community.

The proud and self-promoting young doctor changes as he witnesses the behavior of the devoted older doctor.

The particular genius of Kurosawa is to show that Red Beard can be both unbelievably compassionate, and also strong and tough in a conventional sense. An example of the former is when he patiently tends to a young girl who has been traumatized by ill-treatment and repays his kindness by lashing out. An example of the latter is when Red Beard single-handedly defeats a gang of ruffians guarding a brothel. (Later, he rues his own behavior. "This is bad. A doctor should not do this.")

One after another, the people in the film seem to be "infected" by the compassion that Red Beard demonstrates. It is a veritable "cascade of compassion."

One of the very first blog posts I ever wrote was about the problem of violence, and whether mere "nonviolence" is an adequate counterweight to it. I wondered if we don't need to go beyond nonviolence to compassion. "It seems to me," I wrote, "that compassion is something that, once experienced, tends to become contagious." (See Is the Opposite of Violence Non-Violence? Or Is It Compassion? )

I continue to think a lot about how violence is "contagious," and how we can find a similarly "contagious" antidote. (See Violence: Taking Over Like a Virus )

In an excellent chapter on Red Beard in The Films of Akira Kurosawa, Donald Richie writes, "One can see what Kurosawa has had the bravery to do in this film. He is suggesting that, like the hospital, the world in which we live may indeed be a hell but that good, after all, is just as infectious as evil."

You can watch Red Beard on Kanopy.  (More suggestions of great films on Kanopy here.)

Steven Spielberg's "Munich" and My Munich ... and the Ring Road to Hell

(Originally published in July, 2010, as "Munich and the Ring Road to Hell" on the Compassionate Nation blog.)

They kill one of ours. So we kill one of theirs. That's the way it works -- isn't it?




I just watched Steven Speilberg's movie Munich again. It's the film about a group of Israeli assassins taking revenge on the people (ostensibly) behind the massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics in Munich.

The first time I saw the film, when it first came out, I found it exciting, poignant, and at the same time troubling. Watching it again, now with the benefit of recent efforts to think about how justice is administered, I felt sickened.

The film is a 2 hour plus meditation on a topic I discussed in a previous blog post -- the nearly insurmountable human impulse to say "They've hurt us so now we're going to hurt them." It is noteworthy that the film contains many references to the moral and legal obstacles to non-judicial retribution. For instance, at one point in the film, a member of the team of assassins points out that, "In Israel, we do not have the death penalty!" In other words, how can it make sense to carry out extrajudicial executions (assassinations) when your community's well-reasoned position is that execution (judicially killing) is unacceptable?

Another moment that jumped out at me is the point immediately after the events in Munich, when a member of the Israeli military argues for a different approach: "We've sent in the jets to bomb their military positions. That's a response!" It reminded me the degree to which the fundamental question we face is "Events have occurred ... without question, we must respond ... but what should our response be?" (viz. "The Response")

People can differ about whether Speilberg struck the right balance between thriller and morality tale in this film. The more important fact is that he made the film and it holds lessons for us today.

For instance: how are the actions of the team of assassins in "Munich," carrying out extrajudicial assassinations, different than the United States government's use of drone strikes to remotely kill our nation's enemies?

Violence is viral . . . violence begets violence.




Some years ago, I had the opportunity to visit Munich. I was driving while my friend navigated from a very simple map I had photocopied from a book. We managed to get on the ring road around the city, from which one of the main sights that can be seen is the Olympic Stadium. We had trouble figuring out where to exit to get into the city proper -- can't you read a map? you call this a map? -- and by the time we passed the Olympic Stadium the second time, tempers started to flare. We eventually made it to our hotel . . . but Munich and the Olympic Stadium have forever after, for me, stood for the proposition that going around in circles, stuck in the same rut and fighting about it, is a peculiar Hell that only humans could be capable of contriving.

Is the Opposite of Violence Non-Violence? Or Is It Compassion?

(Originally published in July, 2010, as "The Opposite of Violence Is . . . ?" on the Compassionate Nation blog.)

If you embrace the proposition that might doesn't make right, you are led to the question, "What, exactly, is our idea of how to govern?" Or, more broadly, "What is the way that we want our nation to conduct itself -- to "be" in the world?"

I found some provocative thoughts on this subject in a book by Mark Kurlansky, Nonviolence: Twenty-five Lessons from the History of a Dangerous Idea. The entire book is well-worth reading and thinking about. (A lesson a day for a month . . . ?) However, the lesson that stopped me in my tracks was Lesson #23.




Lesson #23 says "Violence is a virus that infects and takes over." This struck me as a very powerful truth; indeed, the peculiar characteristic of violence is that it always "infects" the victim with the desire to retaliate. Hence the tendency for violence to lead to more violence.

Perhaps the viral nature of violence is a remnant of our primordial nature, an impulse to telegraph the message, "Don't mess with me!!!" Certainly, when you think of it in terms of signaling, it becomes apparent why violence is so contagious -- it is far less important that retaliation or revenge be specific to the act or actor that provoked it; all that matters is that the message "Don't mess with me!!!" gets broadcast widely. Moreover, there is a degree to which we are inclined to engage in "scary" violence more than "lethal" violence. Like a true virus, violence evolves successfully when it avoids killing its host.

When I thought about Lesson #23, the viral nature of violence, I was forced to confront a problem: I wonder if "non-violence" per se -- that is, measured restraint -- has the same viral power as violence itself. Are we impelled by our inner instincts to emulate non-violent behavior in the same way that we are impelled to retaliate in the face of violence?

As I cast about for an alternative that has some of the psychological power of violence, I landed on "compassion." It seems to me that compassion is something that, once experienced, tends to become contagious. The more I thought about it, the more I became convinced that compassion has a gentle viral power on both the person exercising compassion, as well as on the receiver of compassion. To be sure, it is an impulse with different characteristics than the violence impulse. Nonetheless, there is no disputing that there are large numbers of people in the world who have felt the inner sensations generated by the practice of intentional compassion take over their lives, and those around them, in a viral way.

So . . . perhaps in the intentional practice of compassion we have a viable alternative to "might makes right" and violence. Can a government be "compassionate"? What might the differences be between the way individuals experience compassion, and the way compassion is enacted by governments?


Related post

A virus is able to be so successful precisely because it (most of the time) doesn't kill its host. I can't help thinking that we simply are not being intelligent about how to respond to violence. How might recognizing the "viral" nature of violence help us to respond to it more intelligently?

(See Violence: Taking Over Like a Virus)

"Problems from Hell" and Real Options Under Democracy

The unending crisis in Syria has underlined the lack of processes in the US system for pursuing options other than military intervention . . . .

Petitions bearing over 1 million signatures being delivered to Congress.
I was struck by this photo when I saw it hanging in the cafeteria of the Hart
Senate Office Building. It underlines for me that representatives take direction
from the citizenry. This specific image relates to the demand for bonuses for
former service members c. 1922. (You can read more about it on Washington
Area Spark Flickr page from which I accessed the image.)

As we consider how we can move towards a world beyond war, it is obvious that one key is to change the way we make decisions about communal action:

The inflection point will come when our systems of group decision-making begin to include norms of "more wisdom, less violence" in proportion to the scope and size of the decision-making forum.

Our thinking about what to do about education and about infrastructure can be helpful in focusing our thinking about the process question. We're trying to imagine a world beyond war, and to work backwardsf rom there, and to imagine what exertions (spending, training) might be rendered moot by the arrival of such a new state of affairs, and what might advantageously be put in the place of those exertions.

It is somewhat more difficult to consider political process (and the exertions involved) because we often don't think of process in terms of the preparation required. We tend to think of it as something that merely happens in the moment.

I think this is what my sister, Elaine Scarry, was challenging in her book Thinking In An Emergency.  The practical lesson for me from the book is: making and carrying out the best decisions for communal action -- particularly in a pinch -- can and does happen . . . and/but . . .  intentional design and rehearsal are necessary prerequisites.  (You can see Elaine, herself, briefly introduce the book in a video greeting to incoming students at Evergreen College.)

Best decisions for communal action -- design and rehearsal -- how might this be applied to transitioning to a world beyond war?

One possibility is to consider articulating a broader set of options for communal action within the US Constitution itself.

Right now, there are two main provisions for process related to military action abroad. (Congress also has power over military action in the "homeland" setting: "[Clause 15] To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions.")

Under Article I, Section 8, of the US Constitution, the Congress shall have Power...:

* [Clause 10] To define and punish Piracies and Felonies committed on the high Seas, and Offences against the Law of Nations;

* [Clause 11] To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water;

I would assert that today the public understands the "to declare war" part - if that. The rest is obscure to almost everyone, and murky at best.

And so, in the murk, we plod along. The president conducts foreign policy; the Senate ratifies treaties; the US conforms (or not) with international law and collaborates (or not) within international bodies of which it is a member; the media vets the nuances of the US approach within selected arenas; and the citizenry (principally) twists in the wind.

If we seriously intend to hasten our arrival at a world beyond war . . . we need something better.

Shouldn't the US Constitution affirmatively (and clearly) articulate processes for entering into a range of possible actions in the international arena? For instance:

* participate in negotiations

* enter into / support multilateral conventions that provide for conflict resolution

* withdraw aid/funding

* contribute peacekeepers (personnel, funding, other support)

* impose economic sanctions ("economic war")

* declare war

As we process through the options, greater and greater levels of participation would be required. Participating in negotiations is currently within the authority of the executive branch. Perhaps the opposite extreme -- a declaration of war, in absence of a direct attack on the homeland -- should require a plebiscite? The intermediate options could require ascending amounts of formal vetting and deliberation.

This is not necessarily the best list; the process by which large numbers of people participate in coming up with the best list will be, itself, a valuable first step.

Of equal importance is what is omitted from the list. On the one hand, I would suggest, our governments should de-emphasize expressions of support or censure. Of much greater importance will be the ability of civil society to mobilize itself around such expressions from the people. On the other hand, we recognize that supplying weapons is just a subset of declaring war. Finally, once we have taken the step to support multilateral conventions that provide for conflict resolution (the NPT and the IAEA, for instance), the emphasis should be on honoring our promises and recognizing the authority granted thereunder, rather than actively trying to influence the direction of the related activities.

(And in the course of doing so, let us focus on moving toward processes that can be seen to be equally legitimate no matter what country carries them out -- i.e. learn to comprehend and then transition away from American exceptionalism. What we're talking about is a worldwide transition.)

A simple way to test what I am proposing: consider it in light of the widely-read book by Samantha Power, "A Problem from Hell": America and the Age of Genocide. To the best of my understanding, this book has come to stand for the proposition that it is unacceptable to stand idly by when armed conflict creates a humanitarian crisis, and that military force is a legitimate response to such situations.

In my view, "A Problem from Hell" succeeded in unsettling people, but failed to interest people in truly participating in choosing from among possible solutions when the next crisis arose.

So the question is: accepting that there are "problems from hell," does process like the one above, or one like it -- involving a ladder of options -- create a better framework for deciding about communal action?


Related posts

US Army Capt. Nathan Michael Smith has sued the commander-in-chief, President Obama, for ordering war in violation of the US Constitution. Therein lie 5 lessons . . . .

(See Confronting Permawar: 5 Lessons from Captain Smith)








"Humanitarian intervention" -- the great pretext for US intervention in Africa. Glenn Greenwald gave an outstanding talk in Chicago in May, 2012, in which he warned against humanitarian interventions: "The US -- no, everybody -- always says the reason for military intervention is 'humanitarian.'  . . . "

(See Greenwald Was Right: "Humanitarian" War in Syria? It's Just More War)





It's way too easy to launch U.S. missiles. (Maybe if it were a little more costly, challenging, or painful to carry out these attacks, they would at least require someone to give an explanation that makes sense first.)

(See AMERICANS: Happy As Long As They're Blowing Something Up )

Crime Without Remorse: A USA Specialty

Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment is about an individual student in 19th century Russia who murders an old woman. But it also tells the story of the USA . . . .

Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment

I sat at an antiracism training sponsored by the ELCA Sierra Pacific Synod last week. One of the participants said, "Our country - we adopt the attitude that nothing we do is ever wrong." I thought it was a simple, elegant explanation of what is meant by "American exceptionalism." It certainly resonated with me, as I have been thinking about the question, "What is it that we as Christians need to face up to in this country? at the most fundamental level?"

I've been reading Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment again. This time I'm enjoying reading it in an old paperback edition -- the same one that was around our house when I was growing up. Every time I read it I'm struck by layers of meaning that I can't remember noticing before. 

As I began reading, I recalled that a few years ago Edward Snowden was given a copy of Crime and Punishment by his Russian lawyer. At the time I suggested the attorney was using the book to subtly raise the question, "Where are the real crimes that we should be focusing on?"

I noticed three things as I read Crime and Punishment this time:

Jacques-Louis David,
The Emperor Napoleon in His Study
at the Tuileries (Art Institute Chicago)

(1) It's about politics. I had never before taken seriously the importance of Napoleon as a model for the kind of actor on the world stage who is "entitled" to bring about suffering, because it is offset by his great accomplishments. Perhaps to us readers today, Napoleon is a caricature; but at the time the novel was written, he had transformed society, and people who wanted to do things in the world pondered his example very seriously. (Consider: who are the "big players" that people look up to today?)

(2) It's about relativism. The murder committed by the book's protagonist is about as horrible as you could imagine. The book relentlessly zeroes in on him and his physical, emotional, and moral state. And yet . . . . I was struck by this statement, a kind of throwaway line from another character in the book: "It's as well that you only killed the old woman. If you'd invented another theory you might perhaps have done something a thousand times more hideous." (Bantam paperback, p. 396) (Consider: what are the theories we use to justify suffering by other people at our hands today?)

(3) It's about our resistance to remorse. Up until the very last pages, the protagonist is unable to simply say, "I was wrong." (Consider: why can't we admit we were wrong? what are we afraid might happen?)

I wonder: what would happen if students were encouraged to read this book and given the following guidance:  "Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment is about an individual student in 19th century Russia who murders an old woman. But it also tells the story of the USA . . . . " ? ? ?


Related posts

With drones, people become just dots. "Bugs." People who no longer count as people . . . .

(See Drone Victims: Just Dots? Just Dirt? )











Now that it is available online, every American should read the Justice Department memo approving the targeted killing of Anwar Al-Awlaki. Let's face it: the Obama administration and the rest of the U.S. government know that they have a big problem: they want to go to war against anyone they suspect is an enemy -- and skip the rule of law. They wish that a miracle could happen and everyone would just let them do it.

(See A Layman Reads Obama's "Targeted Killing" Memo )

A big Hollywood production of Ender's Game is scheduled for release on November 1. It's a perfect opportunity for us to ask: Are we happy seeing our schools turned into "Battle Schools"?

(See "Ender's Game" and the Militarization of Youth: Can We Talk About This? )




"Once the boat went to full pressure, there was really no other option."

(See In Whose Machine Will YOU Be a Cog? )








Svetlana Geier, translator of Dostoevsky's "elephants" (The Brothers Karamazov, Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, The Devils, and Raw Youth) into German.

(See Would You Buy an Elephant from This Woman?)

Independence Day - from GUNS!

How we might declare #IndependenceDay from #guns?
(Please retweet and like on Twitter to spread the word!)

For several years running, I've used the occasion of Independence Day to invite people to think about what we really want to get free of -- today, in the 21st century -- as we celebrate July 4th.

This year, it seems obvious that what's on everyone's minds is guns. (See ORLANDO SHOOTINGS: Start with the obvious (guns))

The Fourth of July is a good opportunity to consider: when so much of our national mythology is about armed conflict, how is it possible to talk seriously about nonviolence and peace?

So here's something to think about this year as we ooh and ahh over the fireworks: how would we celebrate if we really valued something other than the sound of gunfire?

(Here's a little background music as you think about that -- "Lay Down Your Guns" performed by Queen Makedah:

Related posts

All the good intentions in the world won't get the job done unless we are organized. To reach our gun safety and gun control goals, we need skilled coordination to help us.

(See Stopping Gun Violence: Time to get effective .... )












Joe Scarry: @SenRandPaul How about a bill to protect lives of non-Americans from the government's unwarranted murder by drones?

(See Tuesday July 3: Independence from Drones )










The patriotic thing to do on Independence Day is to start a conversation about something really important to our country (and the world), like stopping war and militarism.

(See Independence Day - from WAR and VIOLENCE! )

SDG 15 and Peace: "We are but one thread ... "

The connection of peace/war and SDG 15 (Life on Land)? Think US history -- especially the decimation of the buffalo and the Native American genocide.

The UN International Day for Peace 2016 has been tied to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Life on Land is goal #15.

You can certainly see the truth about a country's attitude toward people by watching how it treats other forms of life on the land.


National mammal

Just weeks ago, the American Bison was named the US "national mammal" -- a reminder of the inexplicable slaughter of that animal in the American West at the end of the 19th century, and of that slaughter to genocide carried out on Native Americans.  It took me less than a minute to reference this quote from Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West by Dee Brown:

Of the 3,700,000 buffalo destroyed from 1872 through 1874, only 150,000 were killed by Indians. When a group of concerned Texans asked General Sheridan  if something should not be done to stop the white hunters' wholesale slaughter, he replied: "Let them kill, skin, and sell until the buffalo is exterminated, as it is the only way to bring lasting peace and allow civilization to advance." (p, 254, in Chapter 11, "The War to Save the Buffalo")

The decimation of the buffalo, like the decimation of the native people, was a decades-long process. More information is in the Wikipedia article on bison hunting.

"Slaughtered for a Pastime"
"Shall the Buffalo Go? Reminiscences of an Old Buffalo Hunter"
Frank Leslie's Popular Monthly, Vol. XV, May 1883, New York,
Original vintage wood engraving, 1883. 11.1 x 15.9 cm
(Source: thegallerii.com )

I have always carried with me the memory of a painting of the hunters shooting buffalo from a passing train. Searching for it led me to the image above. Please take a moment to look at the many beautiful images of buffalo on the website of thegallerii.com. )


If looks could kill . . . 

When I was a teenager, back in the 1970s, I was a huge Beatles fan and would spend hours at the piano and guitar playing through all of their songs -- often just starting at the front of the book ("Act Naturally") and going straight through to the end ("You've Really Got a Hold on Me"). So, of course, when I got to the C's I would play "The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill." Even as I was playing, I would be thinking, "What kind of a song is this? It's not a love song . . . it's not a rock 'n' roll song . . . it's not psychedelic . . . I think it's a satire but . . . what's the point?"

The children asked him if to kill was not a sin
"Not when he looked so fierce", his mummy butted in
If looks could kill it would have been us instead of him
All the children sing . . .

I didn't quite know what it was saying at the time, but it has stayed with me.

Over the years I've realized that the most perceptive observers of a culture tend to be outsiders, and sometimes the only way insiders can hear the truth is to sit with it for a few years -- or decades. The Beatles were perfectly positioned to help with that. "If looks could kill it would have been us instead of him" is sort of the US explanation for everything it does in the world.


The last word . . .

"Humankind has not woven the web of life.
We are but one thread within it . . . . "
(Please share this message.)

More and more, people are looking to the wisdom of indigenous people to give us strength as we confront the climate crisis and other problems. Apt words come from Chief Seattle:

Humankind has not woven the web of life.
We are but one thread within it.
Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves.
All things are bound together.
All things connect.

I guess this is another of those truths that is hard to hear, and takes years to sink in.


Where else in the world do we see this connection between the presence or lack of respect for other forms of life in the land, and justice and peace for people?


Related posts

It will benefit us antiwar activists in the US to attend to and reflect upon the importance of these Sustainable Development Goals to achieving the goal of ending war.

(See PEACE DAY 2016: What comes first? Demilitarization? or Development?)












"We need to first acknowledge the genocidal origins of OUR nation’s history of ethnic cleansing and occupation."

(See Native American Rights: Acknowledge the Occupation)














In much of the 20th century, conflict and war centered on oil resources and the Middle East. Will the 21st century see conflict and war center on fisheries, particularly in the Pacific?

(See Pacific Fisheries' Futile Conflict: How about sharing?)

ORLANDO SHOOTINGS: Start with the obvious (guns)

People will engage in non-stop probing of the ideology and prejudice involved in the Orlando shootings. But the place to start is harm reduction: control the guns!

The shootings in Orlando: someone described it to me yesterday as a "perfect storm," combining:

* guns

* ideology and prejudice

* mental illness

Let's break it down.


(1) Mental Illness - Let's be clear: anyone who commits an act like this is mentally ill.

There will always be people suffering from mental illness. That's the X factor in this whole discussion. So as we consider the other factors, and we consider how those factors might be controlled, we need to keep coming back to the question, "Does trying to manage this factor seem like a reasonable approach to trying to head off the possible tragedy involving someone suffering from mental illness?"

(2) Guns - Take the guns out of the picture and what happens?

If you begin from the proposition that the violence in Orlando emanated from a troubled mind, and that, ultimately, we simply can't see into everyone's mind . . . then if you're really interested in effective harm reduction, the solution is a drastic reduction/elimination of the instruments of harm -- the guns.

(3) Ideology/Prejudice - This is the thing people will talk about ad nauseum in the days ahead -- and it also happens to be the thing that is the most complex and intractable, and the least likely to bring us to a changed situation any time soon.

The gunman in Orlando was subjected to the same swirl of ideas and prejudices that all the rest of us are all the time. What's different is that his mental state translated them into this particular atrocity (together with the necessary instrument -- the gun). No one really understands how that particular translation happened.

There will be a lot of focus on his association with ISIS. But to be precise, the diverse ideas and prejudices that need to be accounted for include islamophobia, prejudice against LGBTQ people, racism, the US culture of power and violence, and much more.

Make no mistake: I think we need a solution to ideology and prejudice - a spiritual awakening.

But let's start with harm reduction. Get the guns out off the streets.


Related posts

All the good intentions in the world won't get the job done unless we are organized. To reach our gun safety and gun control goals, we need skilled coordination to help us.

(See Stopping Gun Violence: Time to get effective .... )












A virus is able to be so successful precisely because it (most of the time) doesn't kill its host. I can't help thinking that we simply are not being intelligent about how to respond to violence. How might recognizing the "viral" nature of violence help us to respond to it more intelligently?

(See Violence: Taking Over Like a Virus)







We are allowed to know all about these killings, provided we're prepared to believe the statements of a person we can't confirm exists about a program which is not acknowledged to be happening. We are living in a nightmare that makes Philip K. Dick's dystopias look cozy in comparison.

(See Drones and Zero Accountability Government)

Stopping Gun Violence: Time to get effective ....

If people really want to put a stop to gun violence, they'll need to do the unthinkable: learn from the National Rifle Association (NRA).

"Sha’Quille Kornegay shot herself with
a 9-millimeter handgun she found while
staying at her father’s house."
(Photo: Haven Parrish, Jr.)

I was struck by the coincidence of the obituary of the creator of the famous sculpture of a gun with a knotted barrel (Carl Frederik Reutersward, below), with a heartbreaking story on toddlers dying in gun accidents.

Now today I see that George Zimmerman is making headlines auctioning off the gun he used to murder Trayvon Martin.

The US is a country addicted to violence; violence defines our domestic lives and our foreign affairs. Certainly the long-term solution that is needed is a wholesale turn to nonviolence. (See Campaign Nonviolence.)

A medium term solution lies, in my opinion, in the public health approach of groups such as Cure Violence: to try to get more and more people to stop and think in between the urge to violence and the actual act of violence.

Carl Fredrik Reutersward and "Non-Violence" sculpture

The short term solution, though, is clearly gun safety and gun control. The best advice I've heard on how to get to a solution in the short term came from Capitol Hill.

It was spring, 2014, and I had gone to the Hart Senate Office Building together with six other faith activists to meet with our senators' and representatives' staff. The issue we were there to talk about was gun safety and gun control, and the meetings were to give thanks where thanks were due, and also to urge greater efforts in the days ahead.

In one office, we said, "We know the Senator is consistently with us on gun safety and gun control. Thank you for that. Now tell us: what will it take for him to build more support for gun control with others in Congress."

"The best thing you could possibly do," said the staffer, "is realize how effective the NRA is at getting constituents to send targeted communications to their elected representatives. They focus on the right piece of legislation at the exactly the right moment, and they make sure large numbers of constituents are communicating directly with their representatives and senators with clear messages."

"Your hearts are in the right place," he added. "But you have to be more effective than the NRA."

I realized then and there that all the good intentions in the world won't get the job done unless we are organized. To reach our gun safety and gun control goals, we need skilled coordination to help us:

* focus on the right legislation
* act at the right time
* mobilize constituents
* communicate clearly and convincingly

To be effective at stopping gun violence, find an effective group and commit your time, energy, skills, and money. One place to start is Everytown for Gun Safety.


Related posts

A virus is able to be so successful precisely because it (most of the time) doesn't kill its host. I can't help thinking that we simply are not being intelligent about how to respond to violence.   How might recognizing the "viral" nature of violence help us to respond to it more intelligently?

(See Violence: Taking Over Like a Virus)







The United States is like that alcoholic family member, for whom every circumstance is an excuse to hit the bottle. Except, with the US, the bottle is violence.

(See It's Time for the United States to Stop Hitting the Bottle)






There are some people, at least, who see a very clear connection between violence on the streets of cities like Chicago and violence carried out by the U.S. military, the CIA, and other U.S. government agencies around the world.

(See Time for Ceasefire? Barack Obama and Speaking About Violence )




There are all kinds of efforts to change the way policing is done in Chicago, and how it gets managed. These efforts mirror those being made in cities nationwide. I support those efforts, and am committed to working on them until we accomplish sweeping change. But sweeping change will take time . . . .

(See Disarm the CPD)






It's way too easy to launch U.S. missiles. (Maybe if it were a little more costly, challenging, or painful to carry out these attacks, they would at least require someone to give an explanation that makes sense first.)

(See AMERICANS: Happy As Long As They're Blowing Something Up )

"So they formed the St. Patrick's Battalion, and fought on the Mexican side"

A week ago, I was writing about how Maya Lin separated the grief for dead soldiers from the valorizing of war in creating the  Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

Today is St. Patrick's Day, so -- as I always do on this day -- I listened to David Rovics' song "St. Patrick's Battalion." It tells the story of Irish-American soldiers in the U.S. Army during the Mexican–American War of 1846–8 who realized they were fighting for the wrong side, and formed the St. Patrick's Battalion to fight in defense of the Mexicans.

St. Patrick's Battalion members.  (More at MickeyZSays blog.)

I love this song. I especially love the part that describes how the soldiers arrived at the front and "realized the mistake they had made."

I also love the way it ties together the oppression of English occupation that the Irish were fleeing and the oppression of US conquest in which they found themselves embroiled.

Being of Irish descent, I love the way it describes as valiant my ancestors who were more often considered riff-raff.

I love the window it provides into US history -- real US history, a part of US history that is so vital to understanding issues in the headlines today.

I love the fact that it expresses solidarity with the victims of US imperialism.

However . . .

I don't love the valorization of violence.

How are we to remember people who acted with courage in the situation in which they found themselves, without getting carried away with thinking every aspect of their response should be emulated?

How are we to confront violence without resorting to even greater violence of our own?

Enjoy "St. Patrick's Battalion" and ponder . . . .


Related posts

The memorial designed by Maya Lin did something that hadn't occurred to anyone before: separate the grief for dead soldiers from the valorizing of war.

(See Maya Lin: Separating Grief from Glory)














It will take me multiple posts to spell out everything that I feel needs to be said about the Ayotzinapa 43.  People in the US need to work to change their own attitude about Mexico, and about the culpability or all of us here in the US in the wrongs that are being done down there. The Ayotzinapa 43 were persecuted for saying "the future can be different." It's time for us to take up their cry.

(See Ayotzinapa43: US People Need an Attitude Adjustment )

Violence or nonviolence? If you're interested in radical change, look at the hard facts on what's worked worldwide.

(See Chenoweth on Why Nonviolence Gets Results (The "Cliff's Notes" Version))

Anyone who has had to write a speech knows that the hardest part is to land on the main idea. Once you've got that right, the rest practically writes itself.

(See "The way to respond to ISIS is not through violence." )

Selected Scarry Thoughts

I'm currently living in Berkeley, CA. Below are some of the issues I'm working on.

Anyone who has had to write a speech knows that the hardest part is to land on the main idea. Once you've got that right, the rest practically writes itself.

(See "The way to respond to ISIS is not through violence." )

What I'm feeling particularly energized about is the potential for thousands of people who have decided that we can really say no to ALL war to become active participants in spreading this good news.

(See News Worth Spreading: "There IS An Alternative to War!" )





There is an eerie similarity between events in the book Paul Revere's Ride and events in our world today. I'm thinking particularly of how a network of mass resistance springs into action.

(See American Rebellion: Just Think What They Would've Done with Twitter!)












One thing that is clear to me is that the way community forms on Twitter bears the closest resemblance to the characteristics of community formation that we, as activists, need to work with from now on.

(See Twitter Community for Activism: What Do We Understand?)



"Could it possibly be that we're not supposed to try to hang onto people? Is is possible that we're supposed to prepare people, and then let them go?" 

(See What I Learned in Church (7 Habits) )













The panopticon was a prison design that reversed the old paradigm, in which prisoners were stored away, "out of sight, out of mind," and instead arrayed them in a way in which they could be observed as efficiently as possible by the fewest number of managers.

(See Drones, 1984, and Foucault's Panopticon)

The biggest idea coming out of the 2013 Drone Summit? We will only deal successfully with the crimes being committed using drones when we understand them as part of the much larger war against communities of color . . . .

(See Drone Gaze, Drone Injury: The War on Communities of Color )

I believe Easter is God's gift to humanity of victory over death, hopelessness and frailty, and I believe that God is alive and in our midst. The witness of the Guantanamo lawyers has confirmed me in those beliefs.

(See Easter Victory: The Guantanamo Lawyers )






So as I watched Ziggy for the first time last night, I asked myself, "What is it? What is it? What is the frisson that one feels? It's part charisma, part sexuality, partly the thrill of gender-bending, partly adolescent rebellion . . . . But what is it that Ziggy did (and does) for so many people?" (It can't be a single thing, can it?)

(See "You're NOT alone!" (Ziggy the Subversive) )

Faced with chorus of voices saying, "Isn't it time for you to tone it down? Can't you be more reasonable? What is it you want, anyway?" Jesus kept right on doing what he was doing. And that was a sign to us about how to live our lives . . . .

(See WWJD? Occupy! )







This past fall, a friend said to me, "It's good that you came to the demonstration; it would be even better if you brought a sign!" That was the start of something I've enjoyed a lot. And a lot of those signs have found their way into my blog posts.

(See Scarry Signs )






How might an uprising against inequality and dismantling the military-industrial complex dovetail?

(See WHERE'S MINE? Inequality in the US and the Military-Industrial Complex )

More than anyone else, the beneficiaries of permawar are the politicians who thrive on the power to make and control wars. The number one prime beneficiary is the President, as well as presidential aspirants. But it doesn't end there . . . .

(See J'ACCUSE: The Beneficiaries of Permawar )




 

I don't think Alanna and I ever talked about what it must be like to be trying to escape a shower of sparks and hot ash. But she seemed to know that the sparks and hot ash are too important a part of the picture to be left out.


(See The Children Are Waiting )

I'm marveling at the adjacency of a piece of public art -- one with a very clear message about the risk of human ambition and self-absorption and heedlessness -- to the center of political power in the city of Chicago.

(See NUCLEAR WEAPONS: Who will bring us down to earth? )

Hibakusha is a word that has traditionally been used to refer to people affected by the nuclear blasts in Hiroshima and Nagaski.  It is now being broadened to recognize the many additional victims of acute affects of nuclear radiation (including fallout from tests and radioactivity from mining and processing). In fact, we are all subject to the impact and threat of nuclear radiation spread indiscriminately by nations and corporations.

(See HIROSHIMA: What does it mean to say, "We are ALL 'hibakusha'?")






Before there was the NATO5 -- or the NATO3 -- there was NATOin5. People tweeted their summaries of NATO in just 5 words (hashtag: #NATOin5). It all started with an interview between Eric Zorn and Andy Thayer about NATO ....

(See #NATOin5)

At the end of the first day of the 2012 CODEPINK drone conference, I came to a realization: the fundamental problem that we had all gathered to address is that drones render killing 100% invisible. And as long as the killing is invisible, we lose the most powerful tool we have for fighting the killing: the disgust and outrage of the general public.

(See Make Drone Killing 100% VISIBLE!)

Cook County Jail is the perfect example of the nationwide injustice that Michelle Alexander described in her groundbreaking book, The New Jim Crow: mass incarceration, focused principally one people of color, in which "crimes" (often related to drug possession or other low-level offenses) become the mechanism for entrapping people in a cycle of incarceration that is brutalizing and often begins a downward spiral of lifetime discrimination.

(See Free Them All )

 Years later, during the time I was busily traveling to China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, and many other places, I had occasion one day to flip open my (real) passport, and all the extension pages, filled with visa stamps, cascaded out. The memory of Expo 67 and my "globetrotting" came rushing back to me . . .

(See O Canada! (We'll always have "Expo" . . . . ))

Ever since I went there to study Chinese as a junior in college, I've considered Taiwan my "second home."


(See Taipei c. 1979 )





 


What people in Asia (and others) have seen for the past century is that something is happening in the Pacific, and it's being driven in part by advances in naval (and, subsequently, aviation and electronics) technology, and in part by powerful nations (principally, but not limited to, the U.S.) proximate to the area.

(See The Imperialized Pacific: What We Need to Understand)

Oil companies are valued by the market based on their reserves. The problem with this approach is that the total reserves claimed by the oil companies is FIVE TIMES what can possibly be burned without driving up the temperature of the atmosphere up by a catastrophic amount and, as McKibben puts it, "breaking the planet." How can the value of oil companies be a function of reserves that can never be used?

(See The REALLY Big Short: The Jig is Up with Oil Companies)





 

Eventually, in large part due to Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin, the United States was converted from a country in which a small number of people thought slavery needed to be ended into a country determined to act to end slavery. This literary work took the movement wide, and it took it deep.

Why is a novel an important tool for creative resistance?


(See Creative Resistance 101: Uncle Tom's Cabin )


 


A campaign exists to bring about a democratically-elected Civilian Police Accountability Council (CPAC) in Chicago. The campaign would involve the people in electing the watchers of the police, and put the ultimate control of (and responsibility for) the police in the hands of the citizens of Chicago.

(See Does a Civilian Police Accountability Council (CPAC) need to be part of a "new plan of Chicago"? )
 

When Chicagoans fully succeed in fully connecting the dots -- especially to the crimes being committed in their name with their tax dollars and the weapons produced by their favored corporate citizen, Boeing -- I think there will be some new and different phone calls taking place . . .

(See What's New in Chicago: Connecting the Dots - US Aid, Boeing Weapons, Gaza Massacre, Chicago Complicity )








Steven Salaita has forced us to speak quite openly about three rather distinct things that get treated (incorrectly) as if they were the same thing: the state of Israel (and whether you criticize it or support it); the ideology of Zionism (and whether you criticize it or support it); and the religion of Judaism (and whether or not you share in its values and beliefs).

(See "What good is a tweet?" (The Packing and Unpacking of Meaning and the Steven Salaita Case) )

For the members of this congregation,

who will continue gathering as a people of God in a new place,
that today will mark not only the end of an era
but also the beginning of new opportunities for worship and service.

(See A Prayer for St. Luke's (Annotated and Illustrated) )