American society is terribly polarized. People of good will need to practice nonviolence and solve our nation’s problems. I compiled many quotations that are excellent resources to help us do that. Please see this document: QUOTATIONS from many persons about de-polarizing and using nonviolence to solve problems
The December 2018 episode of “Glen’s Parallax Perspectives” TV program is PART 2 (following up on the November episode) of the topic, “Choose a Better Worldview to Build a Better World.” The November program focused especially on problems with worldview that has been dominating the U.S., and the December program focuses more on solutions and how to achieve them. Cable TV subscribers in Thurston County WA can watch the December program on TCTV channel 22 three times a week all month long: every Monday at 1:30 pm, every Wednesday at 5:00 pm, and every Thursday at 9:00 pm. Links for […]
Gene Sharp was perhaps the world’s greatest researcher about the power of NONVIOLENCE in protecting populations from invaders, dictators and oppressors. I have enjoyed — and learned much from — reading the books he wrote since the 1970s. For more than half a century, Gene Sharp has researched and written about nonviolence and how to use it effectively. I recommend the publications available at his website, the Albert Einstein Institution, www.aeinstein.org. Many of them can be downloaded for free. When I conduct workshops about the power and practicality of nonviolence, I include insights from Gene Sharp’s thinking. I encourage people […]
Sign up NOW for this informative, inspiring, practical series of 6 workshops! Glen Anderson will facilitate them from 6:30 to 8:30 pm on 6 Tuesdays from March 3 to April 7 in Olympia. Sign up NOW for a series of 6 exciting, practical workshops to help you organize more effectively for the climate. Thurston Climate Action Team (TCAT) is sponsoring this series, and these workshops are open to EVERYONE who wants to protect the climate. Glen designed these workshops to inform, inspire and empower EVERYONE, regardless of how much experience you already have. Novices will learn and empower themselves, and […]
Joan Baez said this: “What Gandhi said was, ‘Let’s take this extraordinary idea and organize it.’ It hadn’t been organized on a massive scale before. He proved that a moral argument is really enough. In fact, only when people are morally steeped in nonviolence to their own satisfaction—that what they believe is correct, when that’s what they’ll do until death—that’s really the only time nonviolence holds. As a tactic, nonviolence will wear out if you don’t really have a moral and spiritual foundation to it.”
Many of my friends urged me to watch this powerfully inspiring short video. Finally I watched it. Now I’m sharing it with you and hope it will “go viral.” https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/04/17/we-can-be-whatever-we-have-courage-see-new-video-aoc-envisions-greennewdeal-future The Green New Deal would protect our nation far more effectively than militarism does. The Green New Deal is a proactive way to deal realistically with the serious threats of climate disruption, unemployment, deteriorating infrastructure, depressed local communities, etc. We should slash the Pentagon budget and generously fund the Green New Deal. The Green New Deal has great power to inspire, educate, motivate, and employ many young people along with […]
Gandhi’s Soul Force Vows (Re-envisioned by Mel White) Published on page 13 of the July-August 1998 issue of Fellowship Magazine, published by the Fellowship of Reconciliation www.forusa.org 1. Vow to Truth I promise to seek the truth, to live by the truth, and to confront untruth wherever I find it. 2. Vow to Love (Nonviolence) I promise to reject violence (physical violence, spiritual violence, psychological violence) and to use only the methods of nonviolence in my search for truth and my confrontation with untruth. 3. Vow to Absorb Suffering I promise to take on myself without complaint any suffering that […]
Our nation and world are in a horrible mess. The December 2018 episode of “Glen’s Parallax Perspectives” TV series examines how to solve the problems. A person or an entire society has a “worldview” — a way of seeing reality — that strongly directs their behavior and public policy. The worldview that currently dominates the U.S. government and society has caused escalating greed, corruption, cruelty, oppression, war, and other bad things. Instead, we need to replace that worldview with its opposite — a worldview that is humane, compassionate, peaceful, fair to everyone, and environmentally sustainable. An unjust society seeks to […]
Thomas Merton, the pacifist philosopher, theologian and mystic, wrote this (probably during the 1960s): “The real focus of American violence is in the very culture itself, its mass media, its extreme individualism and competitiveness, its inflated myths of virility and toughness, and its overwhelming preoccupation with the power of nuclear, chemical, bacteriological, and psychological overkill. If we live in what is essentially a culture of overkill, how can we be surprised at finding violence in it? Can we get to the root of the trouble? In my opinion, the best way to do it would have been the classic way […]
Please see this savvy, well organized 13-page essay at this link: A Solid Case for Nonviolence as Ethical, Practical and Powerful
In slightly more than three pages, the article at this link provides wisdom, compassion, insights, and encouragement to fix our society’s problems. I believe you will find that reading this is a good use of your time. Here is the link: Profound Nonviolence for a Truly Just Society
The general public — and also many people in progressive movements for peace and social/economic justice — do not understand nonviolence adequately. People could make much more progress in working for issues we care about if we understood nonviolence more thoroughly and if we grounded ourselves more profoundly in it. The January 2018 episode of Glen Anderson’s TV series “Glen’s Parallax Perspectives” helps people understand nonviolence more richly and encourages them to practice it more effectively. Watch the video at this link: “Nonviolence Is Ethical, Practical, Powerful.” Read a transcript at this link: 2018.01 Program Summary — Nonviolence After I […]
It’s typical to assume that danger requires a “fight or flight” response: Either use violence or run away. When applied to foreign policy this leads us to rely on militarism and war. Domestically we end up with people arming themselves, passing “stand your ground” gun laws, and getting into fights. Movies and much of popular culture (and our foreign policy) rely upon “the Myth of Redemptive Violence,” the notion that prob-lems can be solved only by an ultimate confrontation in which the “good” person uses violence to triumph over the “evil” one. Movies show this as a shootout on a […]
To watch this interview, click HERE. To read a summary more thorough than the brief summary below, click Program Description — March 2014 The Olympia Fellowship of Reconciliation’s March 2014 TV program “connects the dots” between three serious issues: nuclear weapons, nuclear power, and the climate crisis. The program also explores how human beings deal with – or avoid dealing with – these serious issues. Bernie Meyer is our guest for this hour because he deals with substantive issues in fresh ways, and with wisdom and with profound humanity. The specific context for this month’s program is that Bernie had […]
The Olympia Fellowship of Reconciliation’s October 2015 TV program celebrates highlights about the FOR’s 100 years of accomplishments in the United States. The national FOR has accomplished much, but usually has been too modest about promoting itself. The FOR works well with other organizations and wants to accomplish good work, regardless of who gets the credit for doing it. As a result, although the FOR is not very well known, it has actually accomplished quite a lot during the past 100 years. This TV program highlights only a few of the fascinating pieces of the past 100 years, but we […]
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