Nonviolence expert talks peace
The speaker suggested five misconceptions of modern violence.
Oct. 14, 2008
Barry Gan, director of the Center for Nonviolence at St. Bonaventure University in New York, presents his lecture, "Out of the Ashes of Violence: Violent Myths and Nonviolent Realities," on Monday night in Strickland Hall. The lecture, which discussed advantages of nonviolent justice, was sponsored by the MU Peace Studies Program.
Barry Gan, director of the Center for Nonviolence at St. Bonaventure University in New York, discussed various myths about violence at Strickland Hall on Monday night.
Gan's discussion, titled "Out of Ashes of Violence: Violent Myths and Nonviolent Realities," focused on the idea that all people are "molded by myth," that is, that people make assumptions, sometimes false, which govern and direct their behavior and that guide people's methods of addressing violence. Gan presented five myths: violence is primarily physical; there are good and bad people; violence is sometimes necessary to prevent violence; wrongdoers should be punished; and nonviolence doesn't work about violence.
"If the assumptions that we begin with are wrong," Gan said, "we never solve the problem."
Addressing the first myth, Gan argued that most violence is actually psychological and it is the most common type of violence.
"Psychological violence is something that takes place anytime violence occurs," Gan said. "Physical violence may or may not occur."
To introduce his second myth, Gan asked the audience whom they thought the better person: the outwardly dedicated family man who privately conducted abusive extramarital affairs or the man who used his fortune to support wounded soldiers in hospitals and show the wounded that he was taking care of their families.
"The name of the first man is Martin Luther King Jr.," Gan said. "The name of the second man is Osama bin Laden. There are people who do good things, and there are people who do bad things. All of us do a little bit of both."
Gan argued that even pre-emptive violence, the third myth, is not an effective strategy because several major presumptions are involved, for example, that the other side will not respond with violence.
Gan addressed the fourth myth by arguing that punishment, which aims to penalize, actually fails to address goals society wants to attain.
Gan noted that nonviolence allows a win-win situation, whereas violence creates a winner and a loser.
He added that tactical nonviolence is pre-occupied with winning but can fail. It also views people as a means to an end, he said.
Principled nonviolence, however, refuses to treat people as means to an end, and, Gan argued, it never fails because the goal is simply to be nonviolent.
Freshman Lauren Begley attended the event for a journalism class.
"The whole nonviolence thing is really interesting to me," she said. "It's something I can relate to, not just something required for class. I wanted to get something else out of it."
Professor Emeritus of Philosophy John Kultgen, who introduced Gan, knew him through their mutual involvement in Concerned Philosophers for Peace and said he invited Gan because he thought he would be a good speaker, relevant to MU's Peace Studies major and Kultgen's class, Philosophies of War and Peace.
Although Kultgen was disappointed in the number of people in attendance, he thought the event went fairly well.
"It's hard to sell complete nonviolence to the world," Kultgen said. "But I think it's a case that needs to be heard and is not heard."
Gan was pleased with the event and felt he spoke to the nature of nonviolence in a receptive manner.
"People often conflate peace with nonviolence, and I didn't speak to that tonight," Gan said. "Everybody wants peace, but the question is, 'How do you want to get it?' A lot of people are willing to get peace through violence. I'm not. And that's a large part of what I was trying to get across tonight
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