Category Archives: Royal Book of the Week

Royal Book of the Week, Social Justice, Things We Love

TWL: Libraries

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TWL: Things We LoveLibraries are the most American of institutions: community-based, democratic, pull-yourself-up by- your-own-bootstraps gathering places. Libraries were kicked off in this country by the most American of our founders: the self-made , earthy, inventor-scientist polymath Ben Franklin.

Libraries are about community.  They are a barn-raising or quilting bee for the mind, especially the young mind.  Everyone pools their resources so we can all have more than anyone of us could individually have access to when we need it.  and when we don’t need it, we leave it their for someone else to use.  Libraries are the well in the town square, where all can draw water and all have a stake in keeping them available.  Continue reading TWL: Libraries →

antiwar, Nonviolence, Peace, Royal Book of the Week

Erasmus the Pacifist| War Is A Crime .org

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One of our goals on this site is to catalog the hidden history of pacifists.  This article does so beautifully.

The Genius of Erasmus | War Is A Crime .org.

Cover of "The Complaint of Peace"

Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, who lived from October 27, 1466, to July 12, 1536, faced censorship in his day, and has never been as popular among the rich and powerful as has his contemporary Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli. But at a distance of half a millennium, we ought to be able to judge work on its merit — and we ought to have regular celebrations of Erasmus around the world.  Some of his ideas are catching on.  His name is familiar in Europe as that of the EU’s student exchange program, named in his honor.  We ought perhaps to wonder what oddball ideas these days might catch on in the 2500s — if humanity is around then.

In 1517, Erasmus wrote The Complaint of Peace, in which Peace, speaking in the first-person, complains about how humanity treats her. She claims to offer “the source of all human blessings” and to be scorned by people who “go in quest of evils infinite in number.”

Read the rest of the article.

Related articles  Continue reading Erasmus the Pacifist| War Is A Crime .org →
antiwar, Nonviolence, Peace, Royal Book of the Week

Nobel Laureates: End Afghan War

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The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of PeaceThe final chapter in The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of Peace is the  2001 International Appeal of Nobel Prize Laureates, Poets, Philosophers, Intellectuals and Human Rights Defenders for an Immediate End to the War against Afghanistan. This appeal ends the final section of the book: Post-Vietnam to the Present (1975- ) .

The appeal succinctly reiterates the points made in the last two essays.  The invasion of Afghanistan fails on two accounts.  It did not bring the perpetrators of 9/11 to justice.  It is increasing the future likelihood of terrorism against the US.

Since the Appeal is short, and a public document, I have reproduced it below:   Continue reading Nobel Laureates: End Afghan War →

environment, Fashion, Food, Holiday, Music, Nonviolence, Nonviolent Communication, Occupy Wall Street, PAXi, Peace, Royal Book of the Week, Royal Fashion, Royal Tour

TWL: Things We Love

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I know it's not Valentine yet but I'm full of ... Happy Valentine’s Day!

The idea of this site is to help bring a little more love into the world. We have been working to create a community space to share the way to a more peaceful life. Our definition of a peaceful life encompasses all areas of our lives.

Since the early days of this site we have been focusing on what it means to be a pacifist, and we will continue to do so.  We have also touched on what a shareable economy means; peaceful music and books; how a CSA works; and why vintage jewelry is better than new.

TWL will focus us on exploring what more of what peace means in the  rest of our lives, such as what it means to freecycle; to be a vegetarian; a locavore; a community member; to use nonviolent communication; and to clean with vinegar.  And more.   But first,

We want to hear from you!

What brings peace into your life?

What can you share from your journey?

Please use the comments section to share.

Continue reading TWL: Things We Love →

antiwar, Nonviolence, Royal Book of the Week, Royal Song of The Day

Wise: War is Naive

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The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of PeaceThe Tim Wise 2001 essay Who’s Being Naive? War-Time Realism Through the Looking Glass is the penultimate chapter in The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of Peace. This essay continues the Post-Vietnam to the Present (1975- ) section of the book.  Wise is an anti-racism educator and author.

His essay complements the previous Arundhati Roy essay War is Peace.  While Roy upholds the polite –but firm– criticism of a foreigner, Wise bluntly takes his fellow Americans to task for the Afghan War.  As someone who forces Whites to face up to their own privilege in US society,  Wise is at ease in ripping apart pro-war arguments in kitchen table language.

The criticism put forth by Roy and Wise reinforce each other by coming to the same conclusions from both external and internal vantage points.  Both 2001 essays were written when the Afghan invasion was fresh, and they have proved to be prescient as the Afghan War has dragged on for a dozen years.  Reminds me of the just departed Pete Seeger masterpiece,  Waist Deep in the Big Muddy. Continue reading Wise: War is Naive →

antiwar, Nonviolence, Peace, Royal Book of the Week

Roy: Afghan War based on DoubleSpeak

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The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of PeaceThe Arundhati Roy excerpt War is Peace is from her .from ‘s 2002 book Power Politics.  It form the twenty-second chapter in The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of Peace. This essay continues the Post-Vietnam to the Present (1975-  ) section of the book.  Roy is an activist and Man Booker Prize winning author. Though, the preceding essays in this book all deal with timeless themes in supporting pacifism, this essay, which centers on the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, is the first essay in the book to feel that it is based on contemporary world politics.

Roy starts the essay with the gamification {the process of turning war into a video game] of the October 7, 2001 US-led attack on Afghanistan. The attack was done without seeking UN approval or even under color of international law.  Inverting the expected criticism against her comments, Roy makes clear that she does not take the side of any entity that chooses violence:  Continue reading Roy: Afghan War based on DoubleSpeak →

antiwar, Nonviolence, Occupy Wall Street, Peace, Royal Book of the Week, Social Justice

Pauling & Ikeda’s False Dilemma of Absolute Pacifism

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The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of PeaceThe second excerpt in The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of Peace.from Linus Pauling & Daisaku Ikeda‘s 1992 book A Lifelong Quest for Peace forms the books twenty-first chapter. This dialogue continues the Post-Vietnam to the Present (1975-  ) section of the book.  In previous essay titled Immorality of War: Pauling & Ikeda, I discuss their credentials including Pauling’s Nobel Prizes both in Chemistry and Peace, along with Ikeda’s 1983  United Nations Peace Award.

This 3 1/2 page conversation does not make a cogent argument against absolute pacifism.  Both speakers make the obligatory reference to Hitler; discuss the difficulties of being a pacifist in a non-pacifist world; and determine that unsurprisingly that Einstein was not an absolute pacifist.  Paradoxically in an essay that argues against pacifism, they conclude with a discussion of how Japan has advanced quicker in economic and individual health due its not diverting national resources into a military economy.

The Hitler argument is that pacifism would be useless against the Nazis.  It is usually raised by those who are fearful of the concept of pacifism. I would not expect this argument from these authors or to be promoted by the editors of this collection.  Continue reading Pauling & Ikeda’s False Dilemma of Absolute Pacifism →