Narayan Desai Photo: Yann Forget
Milan Rai writes:
I met Narayan Desai, the Indian pacifist regarded by many as the last living link to Mohandas K Gandhi, at the War Resisters’ International Triennial in India in 2010 (PN 2518). That gathering was held at Gujarat University (Gujarat Vidyapith) in Ahmedabad in the state of Gujarat in India; Narayan was chancellor of the university from 2007 until late last year. Narayan led us all in a huge swirling dance to close…
I’m going to be 50 this year. What once seemed an impossibility will become a reality in July. In the next 10 years, I will experience the menopause, watch our children leave home, begin to feel the impact of ageing on my body. This is the decade which will force me to admit I am no longer young. Such life events always put me in a ruminating mood, and this week I’ve been thinking a lot about what turning 50 means for my activism.
In some ways things have changed very little since…
I first worked with Mike on Labour Briefing in the late 1980s. For those who don’t know, Briefing was – and still is – a magazine for socialist activists in the Labour Party that began life in the early 1980s, when it played a key role in the election of Ken Livingstone as the left-wing leader of the Greater London Council. By the late 1980s, those heady days seemed far behind us, following the catastrophic defeats of the movement under Thatcher’s government. Many at this time…
David Lane, lifelong pacifist and peace activist, died in September at the age of 80 after a long, and latterly very sad, struggle with Parkinson’s.
David met his wife, Nancy, when they were both members of PYAG (Pacifist Youth Action Group) and where they were also to meet Ian Dixon, currently chair of Housmans Bookshop and Peace News Trustees. David and Ian were both conscientious objectors and served as porters at The Royal Free Hospital in London from 1952-1955.
…
What comes into my mind if you say ‘activism and Valentines’? Russell Brand! I dunno.
Man, 20s, London area
Whoa! That’s a tricky one. I’ve never associated the two. People do activism out of the goodness of their hearts for the love of people, maybe?
I think that’s what it’s generally done for, activism, for the love of the planet and love of the people. Oh, hang on, my friend has got a good one. (See below.)
Man, 20s, Glasgow area
…
I think of an issue: the state of the world, for example. I expect myself, and I am expected, as a man, to analyse rationally and objectively, to present solid arguments, to take decisive steps, and above all not to get emotional. Actually I’m totally ignorant and confused and feel like crying about the mess the world is in. I can’t admit that I don’t know; I can’t cry because I’m a man.
Because I’m a man, I cannot admit when I’m sad, hurt or humiliated. I cannot be joyful, or give…
There is something hopeful about the rise of UKIP (UK Independence Party). Yes, it is a racist far-right party; yes, the mainstream parties have responded to its increasing strength by becoming more repressive and racist; and yes, it may win several seats in the general election in May 2015 – all frightening developments.
On the other hand, UKIP is part of a global anti-establishment phenomenon which in Europe is represented not only by far-right parties like Golden Dawn in Greece…
That just makes me think of... nearly everybody. You feel like activism isn’t something you choose to do, it’s somethig you have to do. You’re thinking of the outcome rather than clocking in and clocking out. So there’s no obvious place to stop or to end; so that’s when it can be easy to be overwhelmed. That happens quite often to people I know.
Where I live, it would be good to find ways to make it into a place where people can go to recover. I see that as one of the main reasons for…
In 1940, the Ministry of Information published a leaflet containing extracts from articles or statements by Dr CEM Joad, Bertrand Russell, Dr Maude Royden, and AA Milne, under the title ‘It’s different now’. The leaflet suggested that pacifists should abandon views they held previously and join the war effort.
Sir Arthur Eddington was one of the four equally prominent pacifists who explained in Peace News on Nov 8 1940, under the heading ‘It’s still the same’, why they had not…
Last year, my friend was thrown out of an eco-action gathering. I can still taste the anger I felt when I heard the news. The organisers were in their early 20s. My friend is retired and has been centrally involved in these gatherings (and in eco-defence) for nearly 20 years. My lips still set in a hard line and my jaw clenches as I think about it. I freely admit I jumped to several conclusions – I bet he behaved like an idiot. I bet they didn’t care who he was or what his history is. I bet…
Housed in the Quaker Library in London’s Euston Road, is a remarkable document. Measuring about five inches square, created from sheets of lavatory paper and bound in hessian taken from a mailbag, it consists of 100 pages of articles, jokes, poems, and even a spoof children’s page. Dated 18 December 1918, it is an edition of the Winchester Whisperer, one of the many tiny newspapers produced by imprisoned conscientious objectors, right under the noses of their prison warders.
…
As the centenary year of the outbreak of the First World War draws to a close, I feel an undeniable sense of relief. The seemingly-endless grainy images of soldiers climbing out of their trenches and charging across no man’s land to be slaughtered in the name of king and country, have dominated the TV screens of the Dis-United Kingdom for long enough.
I suspect, however, that the urge to resist war has been strengthened by this prolonged assault on our human solidarity. There is…
About 8,000 conscientious objectors were forced into the British army during the First World War, either into the non-combatant corps (NCC) or into combatant regiments. Most adopted a strategy of nonviolent resistance, refusing to put on uniforms, drill or obey any military orders. The army’s reaction varied: some commanding officers tried to reason with objectors; others reacted with verbal and physical abuse, using any means, however brutal, to try and force objectors to become soldiers.…
Have you ever been in this situation?
You’re in a grassroots, very-low budget campaigning group. You have a group website.
Then the person who set the website up – and who has been maintaining it – moves away, or they move onto another issue, or they withdraw from activism completely.
Suddenly, you find out no one knows what the passwords are, and you can’t actually use your own website. Or, if you do know what the passwords are, no one else in the group is…
I don’t think I cry in public that often: just cinemas and theatres, weddings and funerals. Not demos – demos are for anger, for demonstrating coherent, rational opposition, for keeping your wits about you and being prepared for action. But when I saw the orthodox Jewish anti-Zionist bloc at the Gaza demo in Leeds, my throat tightened and the tears started running down my face. A friend appeared and I held on to them for about five minutes, sobbing. An unexpected reaction.
At the time…
Roy Prockter, who died suddenly on 18 June, aged 64, from a heart attack, was a chartered accountant and an active Quaker, who made both his professional skills and his commitment to nonviolence available to a number of radical pacifist groups and organisations.
One of his main concerns was the compulsory deduction of taxes contributing towards maintaining armed forces and providing lethal weapons.
He became active in the Peace Tax Campaign (now Conscience – Taxes for…
Failure? I don’t like thinking about my failures. I don’t like thinking about when groups fail either, or movements. If I’m honest, I do enjoy thinking about failures by people I don’t like. It’s important that some people fail in what they try to do – certain people!
I’ve failed at a lot of things in activism, and some of them it was right that I didn’t succeed because I was trying to do something stupid or counter-productive. Something that was actually bad for the cause.
I…
Peace News had recently moved its main office out of London, as part of a strategy of changing the balance between its alternativist and ‘constructivist’ coverage on the one hand, and its involvement in more mainstream politics, on the other. Nevertheless, the paper found itself sucked into the defence of a group of activists – some closely connected with PN – who were facing the possibility of years in prison.
Six anti-militarists busted
Six pacifists were arrested in…
I’m writing this on the very eve of what a folkie of the ’60s, Nigel Denver, used to yearn for in song. He sang about the ‘Scottish Breakaway’ and maybe it’s come about or even came aboot.
During the Thatcher years, Westminster presided over what seemed an unstoppable diminution of the power of local authorities to control their own affairs. Instead central government took over to the extent that LAs seemed doomed to become collectively a powerless rump. How odd it is now to hear…
I was injured at a blockade once. My affinity group was at one of the gates of the base; I was in the support group, I wasn’t sitting on the ground. I tried to put myself between them and the police, a policeman grabbed my arm and he swung me away. I twisted my ankle, I rolled around a bit in pain. The first aid person said it was a sprain, gave me a bandage and painkillers. I hobbled off.
I was shocked, I suppose. It took quite a long time to get over, it took over a year to get…
