“Which side are you on?”–Daily Metta

October 25:

“Avoidance of all relationship with the opposing power can never be a Satyagrahi’s object, but the transformation or purification of that relationship.”

–Gandhi (Harijan, April 29, 1939)

If the Syrian nonviolence movement could teach us one lesson about the dynamics of nonviolence it would be this principle that Gandhi lays out for us: Nonviolence is a question of relationships, so try never to alienate your so-called opponent. Recalling the Egyptian Tahrir Square revolution, where the military and police stepped down from their roles in defending the regime to join the people, well-known Syrian cartoon artist Hani Abbas created images depicting the regime’s soldiers as ordinary people who love simple things, such as the scent of a beautiful flower on the ground in front of their ranks. The message? You want freedom as much as we do. Join us — something they’re more likely to do when they feel that they are welcomed to come over and they won’t be stepping into a hornet’s nest.

This kind of conversion takes time. It won’t happen, say, in a flash at the front lines of a direct action when police are confronted with sensory overload as protesters start marching forward at them. It happens when nonviolence is allowed to run its full course: when protestors come forward, day in and day out, as we saw in the case of the Dharsana Salt Works in Gandhi’s day. It happens when the defenders of a violent regime are not depicted as the “bad guys” to hate, but as good guys who have been convinced–or trained (see Lt. Col.Dave Grossman’s work On Killing) to do things that they themselves know, on some level, are bad. The duty of the Satyagrahi is to show that person a higher form of courage, bravery, discipline and devotion; but it must be within the framework of a larger, strategic vision, that really tries to live up to the promotion of the well-being of everyone. It’s not you against me; it’s you and me against the problem.

Experiment in Nonviolence:

The next time you are tempted to share something on social media or in a conversation that sets up an “us” vs. “them” relationship, remind yourself that your opponent is a potential ally; consider how you can rephrase it as a “you and me against the problem” setup.