peace education

I had the privilige of watching Gandhi, a movie on Gandhi's pursuit of independance for India, one accomplished non-violently. The first thing that I was struck with, was that I had never learned anything about Gandhi before this. Never in my elementary, junior high or high school years did any history teacher (or any teacher) teach my class about Gandhi. Worse, never did any teacher introduce me to the non-violent peace movement. Now, this was years ago and I could guess that students might learn these things now, but as I thought this, I asked my niece if she learned anything about these topics and she said no. Not surprising. This is such an important part of our history, something we should know and study in depth. How can we ignore this topic for our children--they are the ones who can make the changes.

Why is it that nonviolent resistance, which is obviously so powerful, does not have the voice it should? I remember when I was young, there was a girl around my age who gave a peace talk that was reported in my news. I remember thinking how important it was that she did that. But in short time it was no longer a news-worthy event, and I heard nothing more of it. We did not talk about it at school, nor at home, though I often thought of what that young lady did. If I was inspired by her, who else was inspired? How many other children, if given the chance, would have learned more about peace, would have wanted to learn more about non-resistance? What if our children were exposed to more of this? What would they do with it? What if peace education were in the curriculum? What if our heroes were non-resistant activists? What if our children were encouraged to play peace-making instead of war-making? What if our stories were made up of these?

I can guess why this type of education does not go on--I am sure that it does not support a government that needs new recruits, support for war and of course money for war. But, oh, how discouraging that is, that our government does not have the foresight or the courage to undertake a new kind of education that could change us, not without sacrifice, but that would change us for the better nonetheless. I think about Gandhi and the people who followed him. The movie portrayed a people constantly on the verge of violence, a peace that relied on the leadership of one man, a precarious peace that threatened to erupt into violence at any moment. Imagine a country with a generation that has been taught, at least, the possibility of non-violence, following a leader like Gandhi.