Tag Archives: peace

Remembrance Day

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I shared this in 2019. This and my “Two Wolves” post that I first shared 18 years ago today say more about this day than anything I can pretend to write now. I hope you get as much out of reading the following post and my Two Wolves post as I got out of writing them.

~ With gratitude for all those who sacrificed so that I didn’t have to.

In Remembrance 2019

Both of my grandfathers are Jewish and they escaped Europe before World War II. One left Poland with his parents, siblings, and his uncle’s family. The rest of the family stayed because they were in the sweater business and didn’t know what they would do in a warm destination in the Caribbean? For some of them, wiped out in the 2nd German invasion of Poland, the answer would have been ‘lived’.

My other grandfather was in the Ukrainian show cavalry, much like the Canadian Royal Mounted Police Musical Riders, but he was too short and would stand on his stirrups during inspections. One day a guest inspector had them dismount and he did not pass the inspection, so he was going to be sent to the regular army. He bribed a doctor to say he had a medical condition and escaped to Italy, then in an adventure that I’ll share another time, he found his way to British Guyana, where my father was born, then to Barbados where my parents met.

We moved to Toronto when I was 9. As a young teenager, I still knew very little of the war, but my grandparents knew people less lucky than they were, who did not escape Europe. I remember that we were at a party once and many of my grandparents friends were there, including some that still had their tattoos from concentration camps. We were in an apartment party room, with about 50 to 60 people and as was usually the case we had more food than we could possibly eat. When my family cooked for a gathering, at the end of the night it was rare for us to not be dividing up as much food left behind as was eaten! We had an abundance of food that night and so it was shocking for me to hear the following story the next day.

The party was in full swing and it was time for everyone to forgo the snack table and start eating dinner. My aunt was behind one of my grandparent’s friends, who was a holocaust survivor from one of the concentration camps. In front of him was another person in line. The person in front of him added some chicken wings from a platter of wings that was still almost full, and as this person looked for more food he held his plate slightly behind him. My aunt watched the holocaust survivor take some wings off of the person in front’s plate and place them onto his plate in one quick motion. It happened so quickly she had to think about what she actually saw. Then she also saw the almost full platter of wings still on the table, available for all to have.

It was still upsetting for my aunt, even as she retold this story the next day. I still remember the story over 35 years later. What did this holocaust survivor endure that, even in a time of overabundance, he had this urge to steal food from another’s plate? What was he re-living? What other ways did his past haunt him?

When I watch videos of veterans today, and hear stories of those who fought in wars, many say they wake up every day thinking of the friends they lost. When I went to the War Museum in Dieppe, France,  I heard video accounts of a massacre, that bore valuable lessons for the Western Allies before their D-Day attack. And when I visited the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, Israel, I truly began to understand the horror of man’s inhumanity against man. I wrote a post that reflected on this visit titled ‘Two Wolves‘ that I still re-read and share every Remembrance Day. From that post, I will leave you this quote, followed by the poem ‘In Flanders Fields’ by Canadian World War I doctor, John McCrae:

“There are parts of History we should not forget. After all, World War One was the ‘war to end all wars’… And so I am writing this on Remembrance Day for a reason. Whether it be concentration camps and the Holocaust or Hiroshima and Nagasaki or genocide in Russia, Rwanda, or East Timor… or any tragic historical event worth remembering… we choose to remember so that we do not repeat our mistakes. We must want and hope that things can be better. We must see lessons learned, not resentment and mistrust. The past will repeat itself if we do not see ‘joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith’… faith that tomorrow can be better than today.”

Take time to remember those that served, those that suffered, and those that were lost, so that we can have the freedom and liberties we have today.

—–

In Flanders fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
~ John McCrae, May 3rd, 1915

In Flanders Fields

Thank you to Roy Henry Vickers for sharing his Poppy design, used as the feature image for this post. 

Spaceship Earth

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First: Two perspectives from a trip to the moon, shared by Victor Glover and Christina Koch.

“I don’t have anything prepared. I think these observances are important, and as we are so far from Earth and looking back at the beauty of creation, I think for me, one of the really important personal perspectives that I have up here is I can really see Earth as one thing.

You guys are talking to us because we’re in a spaceship really far from Earth. But you’re on a spaceship called Earth that was created to give us a place to live in the universe.

Maybe the distance we are from you makes you think what we’re doing is special, but we’re the same distance from you. And I’m trying to tell you — just trust me — you are special.

In all of this emptiness — this is a whole bunch of nothing, this thing we call the universe — you have this oasis, this beautiful place that we get to exist together.

This is an opportunity for us to remember where we are, who we are, and that we are the same thing, and that we’ve got to get through this together.” 

~ Victor Glover

And;

“So when we saw tiny Earth, people asked our crew what impressions we had. And honestly, what struck me wasn’t necessarily just Earth. It was all the blackness around it.

Earth was just this lifeboat hanging undisturbingly in the universe.

I may have not learned — I know I haven’t learned — everything that this journey has yet to teach me. But there’s one new thing I know, and that is:

Planet Earth, you are a crew.”

~ Christina Koch (See the full speech where she is talking about what it means to be a crew.)

Next: This insightful perspective from physicist Brian Cox.

“There’s only one interesting question in philosophy. The interesting question is, what does it mean to live a finite, fragile life in an infinite, eternal universe? I think the answer is, paradoxically, whilst we are definitely physically insignificant, I’ve just said that the Earth is one planet, around one star, amongst 400 billion stars, in one galaxy amongst two trillion galaxies, in a small patch of the universe, right?

So we’re definitely small, you can’t argue with that, we’re just specks of dust. But if you think about what we are, we’re just collections of atoms. Our bodies were made in stars, right? So it’s all cooked over billions of years. And we’re in this pattern that can think, you have a means by which the universe understands and explores itself, which is us. And that sounds unlikely when you put it like that, that you can have a few things that were cooked in the hearts of stars, you stick them together in a pattern and suddenly it has some ideas and starts writing music.

There aren’t any other worlds where this happened, certainly in our galaxy. So it could be that this planet, notwithstanding its physical insignificance, is the only place where anything thinks.”

~ Brian Cox

We don’t often think of the significance of this tiny blue marble we live on. We don’t often ponder the idea that we are a single species cohabiting with other living organisms on an oasis in a sea of emptiness beyond our atmosphere. We don’t recognize that we are all connected, all crew, on a spaceship that is bigger than our political and cultural differences, bigger than the borders of our countries.

We are all crew on spaceship earth, our mother ship that supports us, and in turn we need to nurture and support her.

Intentionally disconnected

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Is it just me that has been intentionally disconnecting from the news and even social media around the war in the Middle East?

I truly understand my privilege in saying this, since I don’t have loved ones in jeopardy. And understand the desire of some people to know what’s going on because there are global ramifications. Yet I find myself unable to concern myself with the political posturing, the doublespeak, the justifications, and the outrage. I feel like I don’t have the mental capacity to either partially engage and feel insignificantly informed or to delve in and be fully informed… and ultimately powerless to do more than fill my brain with visions of destruction and violence.

Even though I usually choose to ignore the negativity of news, I still tend to keep myself updated on global issues and major news stories, but I’m struggling to engage right now. I find it too disheartening.

It makes me question the humanity of humans. That as a species we can construct such diametrically opposed ideologies; that we can live in societies that value greed over the welfare of the community; that we can choose leaders who do not care for the people that elected them into ‘service’… these are things I don’t understand. Or rather, things I don’t want to believe that humans could value more than peace, love, and kindness.

And so for now I lack the capacity to engage. It seems like a futile activity that will anger and upset me, with no gain. It is rare for me to actively choose to be uninformed, but right now is one of those times.

We are ONE

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One of my favourite ancient texts is the Tao Te Ching. In it ‘The Way’ cannot be named, because to name it is to separate it from itself, to identify a part rather than the whole.

Jesus said, “God’s kingdom is coming, but not in a way that you will be able to see with your eyes. People will not say, ‘Look, here it is!’ or, ‘There it is!’ because God’s kingdom is within you.”

Rumi said, “You are not a drop in the ocean, you are the entire ocean in a drop.”

The ancients understood the interconnectedness of everything.

I think the best metaphor for this is also the scientific equivalent… everything in the universe is a wave. Do you want to know something really interesting about a wave? Move deeper in, away from the turbulent shore of an ocean and watch a wave approaching you. The water doesn’t travel with the wave. The wave travels, but the water itself only ebbs and flows, rises and falls. The water molecules at the tip of a wave 30 feet away from you don’t reach you when the wave does, it essentially stays 30 feet away from you as the wave travels your way. The wave is ‘one’ with the ocean.

This interconnectedness is everywhere, and we are learning more and more about these connections. Some things we’ve known for a very long time because they are easily observable, like how women who live together will have their menstrual cycle synchronize. Some things are more recently discovered, like how trees will communicate and share food through mycelium, even across species to keep the forest strong. We are all connected. Life is all connected.

And yet humans fight over things that divide us. Things like borders, religion, politics, social status, and ideology. We choose not to see connections, but differences. We choose to ignore the messages in our ancient texts, and find reasons to ‘other’ those that are not like us.

We rather get lost in turbulence than recognize we are all part of the same ocean, all riding the ebb and flow of the same wave.

“Those who are right do not argue. Those who argue are not right.” ~Tao Te Ching

What will it take to recognize that we are all one… and that the arguing needs to stop?

Progress and stagnation

The invention of wheels made the movement of objects and ourselves so much easier. And they also assisted us in moving tools of war.

Machinery of mass production made life easier. And we also produce an over abundance of weapons that we use on both foreign and domestic lands.

The scientific method has led to innovations in fields like medicine. And we also make tools of mass destruction, with the soul purpose of maiming and killing each other.

We are innovative, technological, and creatively brilliant. And yet we are divided and we concoct global issues created by old religions, tribal lines, and broken ideologies.

Humanity chooses to be inhumane, and to develop propaganda to justify our actions. We do it for country, for money, for power, and for ideologies be they economic, political, or theological.

We have innovated. We have modernized. We have claimed to be civilized… but in the matters of being human we have stagnated. We have not evolved, we have merely advanced and innovated ways of perpetuating our barbaric tendencies.

Technology progresses. Humanity stagnates. History repeats.

Sharing voice in a democracy

I have a bit of renewed faith in humanity. I’ve always had it, but it shines a bit brighter today. I feared the worst, although I did not want to see it. And happily it did not come. Yesterday millions of people matched in the ‘No Kings’ and they were peaceful.

Peaceful protest is essential in a democracy. Violence begets violence. We need systems in place to allow voices to be heard and not harmed. We need avenues to share anger and upset that do not involve fists or weapons.

Yesterday proved that it’s possible. In the coming days we will determine if the peace remains and if the voices were heard. And I for one would like to remain optimistic.

I saw it coming…

On March 1st, I ended my blog post, ‘In Rome’s Shadow’, with this:

“The protests will start. The unrest will be violent. The response will escalate the violence. 

The worse part of this will be the lack of civility. Peaceful protest is part of democracy. Violent unrest and insurrection are weapons of tyranny. We aren’t going to see democracy and western principles prevail through force and violence. Instead we will just see a once vibrant nation that promised its people a dream and left it in the shadows of ruin.”

In that post I also said,

“I actually want to see the US survive and even thrive, because I think that democracy and world peace are likely both casualties of a fallen US ‘empire’.”

So as we head into the weekend with a cold war styled showboating military parade and a countrywide series of ‘No Kings’ protests, I’m hoping to see peaceful protests and an uneventful parade with no violence and no sensationalized reporting. But I fear the worst.

I fear that this might be the start of civil unrest like none ever seen south of our border before. As a Canadian, I want to see America thriving. I want the metaphorical tide to help lift up all ships. But I truly fear a titanic level sinking. I wonder though, is this democracy drowning, or is this a submerged democracy fighting to the surface?

We’ll see in the upcoming days.

Planned ‘No Kings’ protests

Be a Good Ancestor

Be a good Ancestor with your neighbors

Neighbors become friends

Friends become communities

Communities become nations

Nations become allies

~ Be a Good Ancestor by Leona Prince and Gabrielle Prince

It has become abundantly clear that an isolationist policy is not one that will work in the 21st century. The question now isn’t about if things will get better or worse, but rather how much worse? We have a global superpower that is going to destabilize world economies, and no neighbours or allies are going to come out unscathed.

I just have to wonder what future generations will think of this era? Who will the good ancestors be? And who will be typecast cast as the villain? While I think the answer is clear, if I go south of the border there would be close to a 50-50 split in responses to these questions. And the divide between the responses would be from people who would not be too neighbourly with one another.

Be a good ancestor with your neighbours. The premise is simple. The outcome unifying and peaceful. We could use a little children’s book philosophy about now.

New era

What’s happening now might be the biggest change in global politics that has ever happened outside of weapons of war being used. The shift in finance, the collapse of friendly trade, the forming of new trade alliances, and the political and economic alliances that are currently in the works could not have happened in the last 100 years without missiles or guns being fired.

Yet here we are. Empires fall. New superpowers emerge.

The question now is, can this happen while remaining a political and economic battle, and not one that requires force, might, death, and destruction?

I hope so. I want to believe so.

Ever since I read ‘The World is Flat’ about 20 years ago, I could see that the path forward was going to be about economic strength being based on countries focussing on their competitive advantages. I could see that protectionist policies, tariffs, and isolation would be the demise of even the greatest economies. And that the future powerhouses would be those that have natural resources that the entire world would need.

We are approaching a new era, and the countries that will prosper are the ones who recognize their strengths and are ready to negotiate the way they share those strengths with the rest of the world. Let’s hope we can have peace to go along with our prosperity. The looming question is, can we enter this new era without violence? Can we be a civilized race? Or are we just warring monkeys who happen to wear clothing and buy expensive accessories?

Appropriate Protest

I’ve written that we should have ‘Intolerance for bad faith actors’. And I’ve also written about ‘Free speech in a free society’. In both cases civil decisions are being made, so that we can live in a civil society.

It’s time to draw some pretty clear lines:

Creating a subversive anti-ad campaign against Tesla is an absolutely brilliant way to protest.

Vandalizing cars and dealerships is an embarrassment to the civil society we should be living in.

Holding a protest at a rally, and speaking out against someone you disagree with is the foundation of an open and free society. Shouting and throwing things at a speaker is immature and inappropriate behavior. Even if the person is spewing hate… in which case they should be dealt with legally, not with vigilante violence.

We need a society that allows disagreement. We need to be civil about how we protest. Because there is no civil society where violence and damaging property works one-way… only the way upset people think it should. Societies that tolerate inappropriate protest are inviting responses that are less and less civil. And nobody wins.