UNITED FOR PEACE

 

“I am constantly amazed by man's inhumanity to man.”
- Primo Levi, If This Is a Man. The Truce

Sitting outside drinking a coffee in front of the local hospital, people enjoying a drink with friends and workers taking time out, the thought that we are all free to do so suddenly comes into my head. Do we appreciate the hard-earned freedom of those who fought so hard, many losing their lives and dreams to allow us to have the right to realise our own? Simple actions like the increase in rage and overacting to comments made in everyday life may seem insignificant, but look how quickly situations can escalate out of control. Seemingly rational talks and reflection turn to decisive military action, loss of life and an uncertain future for entire populations in an instant. How can we regain peace when so much is at stake and compromising seems like backing down?

In a society built on democracy with the right to free thought and expression, what does it feel like when overnight those rights are stripped from you, your freedom of movement and thought are censured and access to the outside world significantly reduced? The pandemic brought with it temporary reinforcements and restrictions with the intent to save lives. How would we have reacted if even more restrictions with greater uncertainty than in early 2020 had been added? If going about everyday life were to become even more difficult as the days passed; sirens followed by bombs and shooting, fighting for everything, children and adults scattering under attack and hiding in the depths of the underground to save your family became your norm? What if every time you came up for air you risked finding spaces where your home and other buildings you knew once were, and you no longer knew how to provide for your family's basic needs? How would you keep perspective and seek peace?

It is so easy to lash out or to find a reason to justify hate rather than trying to go down the narrower road to reconciliation or mutual tolerance. When the 'we' gets hidden in a one-way street of bitterness and deep-rooted anger, we need to get the dialogue going and slow the action down to regain a sense of how to move forward. The art of listening with the intent to really understanding the other is the only way to start to construct the building blocks to make for a secure and long-lasting future.

The remaining survivors who lived through the Second World War are becoming significantly fewer, but we need to keep their words alive as of those from the First World War and other devastating events. If we do not share these accounts in our families, schools and within the community etc., we risk forgetting the very real dangers that such hatred and violent disregard for life and anything considered different can bring about. Even now, people continue with the most horrific holocaustic denial, refusing to accept that the Nazis killing of the Jews ever took place. This all seems so far away and yet look what is happening today. Even in the classroom, I have spoken to teachers who have received abuse from students, had their glasses smashed etc. and had to spend most of the class shouting to regain order and were then belittled by irate parents who defended their children's behaviour. Escalation is just a matter of seconds away.

Peace is defined in the Cambridge online dictionary as '(NO VIOLENCE) freedom from war and violence, especially when people live and work together happily without disagreements'. Such a bold and powerful statement that can seem overwhelming when considering where to start. How do we get to a world full of peace? It starts from the ground up: in our homes, our schools, our workplaces and through our interaction with people throughout the day. We need to consciously take action and make a decision daily to watch the words that come out of our mouths, how we treat those around us; where if we are not careful the roots of hatred are formed in our hearts and can become deep and twisted if we allow them to. How do we react to injustice around us? Do we ignore it, try to pretend it is not happening, or do we actually take a stand to defend the rights of others or our own? How would you feel on the receiving end? Our impassivity could partially be responsible with so many factors leading to an eventual explosion. We have to find our voices. Time is running out, we need to let peace into our lives, our hearts, our way of seeing things. When you react, react with the eyes of peace. We will only be successful if we will work united, share and continue to pass on the reality that hatred and emptiness bring. Take a stand to fill every gap you see with peace, don't leave it up to someone else as it may be too late.

The images of war stay with us forever, millions of people brutally forced to flee from the safety of their homes, the bodies of men, women and children sprawled on the ground, and innocent civilians and frontline soldiers fighting with everything they have got to save their land and freedom, desperately protecting their families and homes. Young people creating hand bombs to wield at tanks and the fighting gets more ferocious, bloody and determined. We need to ask ourselves very carefully and this is valid for enough of anything in everyday life; when will there be enough, enough LIFE CUT SHORT, enough WEALTH, enough HUNGER, enough GREED, enough INHUMANITY, enough HATRED, enough TEARS, enough BLOOD SHED, enough JUSTIFICATION, enough EMPTINESS, to just stop SILENCE. REWIND.STOP. PLAY...enough KINDNESS...enough HELP...enough LAUGHTER OF CHILDREN...enough PATIENCE... enough CULTURE, enough HUMILITY, enough COURAGE, enough MERCY, enough UNDERSTANDING, enough EMPATHY, enough HOPE, enough LOVE, enough TOGETHER, enough.

"You who live safe

In your warm houses,

You who find warm food

And friendly faces when you return home.

Consider if this is a man

Who works in the mud,

Who knows no peace,

Who fights for a crust of bread,

Who dies by a yes or a no.

Consider if this is a woman

Without hair, without name,

Without the strength to remember,

Empty are her eyes, cold her womb,

Like a frog in winter.

Never forget that this has happened.

Remember these words,

Engrave them in your hearts,

When at home or in the street,

When lying down, when getting up.

Repeat them to your children.

Or may your houses be destroyed,

May illness strike you down,

May your offspring turn their faces from you"

-Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz