DrTomHastings

We have the right to live without war. Most Americans have not known war in their communities so I expect we will not be the first to insist on this, but humankind is poised to ban war. It should be a basic human right and most Americans take it for granted, it seems to me.

So far, so good! Certainly a lot better than the violent thing worked out for the US government when it invaded (fill in the blank).

I've been in many jails, coast-to-coast, and in three prisons, all for nonviolent opposition to militarism. The felonies that landed me (as expected) in prison were both in the Plowshares movement, that is, I used handtools to dismantle a weapon (in my case a component of a nuclear arsenal command facility).

I feel like if Malcolm had lived he would have tweaked it to "by any nonviolent means necessary." While Malcolm was a great orator and organizer, let's remember that he was not a part of the Civil Rights movement and he neither sought nor got public policy change toward more rights and gains for African Americans. That was only achieved b nonviolence.

I love the various movements that use humor and singing and eating together a lot more than stone-faced anger or whining or rage. One of my all-time favorite lines is the Burmese monk who said (about the brutal generals in charge who were trying to spruce up their image by constructing some new Buddhist shrines), "No matter how many pagodas the generals build, they are still coming back as rats."