Essay on Nonviolence #1, We All Have a Choice

"It's about how we treat each other and care for one another." ~ John DeStefano, Mayor of New Haven. I was listening to an interview of the mayor today and this quote stuck out.

What he’s talking about is kindness and compassion. We all have a choice to solve problems without violence. Nonviolence might seem like it's for those hippies and liberals who lack the courage to defend themselves properly, but it takes more courage to choose nonviolenence over violence because hate and violence are easy. Hate and violence are quick. Hate and violence breed more hate and violence. I do not want to live in that kind of world.

I grew up in a home punctuated with violence and was bullied in high school. Recently, three days in a row, three separate angry, white men threatened to ram me with their vehicles while I was commuting home from work on my bicycle. I had the right of way but, of course, they would have won. They are encased in 6,000lbs of steel and I am essentially naked, a skid mark waiting to happen. As a bearded, liberal, Portlander on a bicycle I am a focus of right-wing hate-radio and stand guilty as charged of trying to make the world a better place. But, they are cowards and bullies. They are spineless. They don’t have the guts to face me man to man.

I understand why these men are angry, why they want to run over bicycle-riding hippies. There's nothing "...more dangerous in the U.S.A. than an unemployed white man," says Leslie Marmon Silko in her essay In the Combat Zone. As a carpenter I have not had well paying, long-term employment in four years. We are a month late on the rent and three months behind on everything else. I feel powerless and gutted and I am pissed about it.

I also do not like bullies and these encounters made me very angry, made me want to carry a handgun to protect myself. I can handle myself in a fight and I grew up on a farm with guns. Fist or gun, I am very accurate. These men threatened me with a deadly weapon and I have right to defend myself. Imagine that, a bicyclist packing heat. The power of this vision was intoxicating.

After the last encounter, I chased that coward through Portland. I could have confronted him when he stopped at a light, but I stopped short. I wondered what it would actually accomplish. It would have felt very good to drag that person out of his car and beat him, mash his face until it looked like expired hamburger. He had threatened to kill me. In my rage he would either be hurt very badly, or I would get hurt as he defended himself. I was faced with a choice. I decided, right then and there, to strengthen my resolve AGAINST violence as a solution.

The day after I made my decision, children were brutally massacred in New Haven. This atrocity makes me sick to my stomach. It also made me harden my resolve against violence as a solution. It also made me want to speak out, voicing my private stance on nonviolence.

Nonviolence may feel like it costs more and takes longer, but the payoffs, economically and socially, are complete, permanent and stable. When people choose nonviolence they use compassion instead of violence, taking the time to see each other as fellow humans. Most importantly, nonviolence as a choice allows everybody to reach their full potential because they aren’t crippled by fear or hatred and they stay alive and make good decisions. As citizens, we have a duty that goes beyond our clan, immediate family or party affiliation - we have a duty to all Americans and the world.

I am not interested in the gun debate (I own two). It is a time suck, a black hole created by people who use fear to generate profit and power. I’m interested in a cultural shift in thought. That shift means solving problems through compassion, dialogue and nonviolence. It means seeing our similarities, not our differences.

It means that each person needs to decide against hate and violence, decide against feeding on fear. It means we need to educate our children (I’m including political leaders in this category) to use compassion and kindness. Whether we feel like it or not, we all have more power than we know. We have the power to choose nonviolence.