the future of peace (pt. 1)

I picked up a book i bought a couple weeks ago called 'the future of peace.' The tagline is 'on the front lines with the world's great peacemakers.' The author goes around the world talking to prominent visionaries fighting for peace in our relatively unpeaceful world.

Today i read about Aung San Suu Kyi, the daughter of a Burmese government official deemed by some as "the father of Burmese independence." I learned a bit about the history of burma and it's pattern of violence necessitating political change from it's foundation up until it's current totalitarian government. In 1988, as inflation, corruption, and failed policies caused the standard of living to plummet, a growing unrest among the Burmese people eventually led to General Ne Win, the dictator, stunning the country by announcing his resignation and calling for an open referendum on the future form of government.

When top officials denied Ne Win's request, the unrest among the population grew even greater as millions of people protested peacefully in nearly every city and town in the country, demanding that the authoritarian regime step aside and hand power over to a civilian government. The military chose to launch a campaign against the pro-democracy movement and in turn shot and killed thousands of peaceful protesters and injured hundreds more.

After studying at Oxford and marrying a professor, Suu Kyi went on to work at the United Nations. When she heard about the massacre above, she went to Rangoon and addressed half a million people. She said, "I could not, as my father's daughter, remain indifferent to all that was going on. This national crisis could in fact be called the second struggle for national independence." With that, she became the leader of the pro-democracy movement.

Suu Kyi has given over a hundred speeches around the country, advocating a peaceful transition to a democratic state. In 1989 Suu Kyi was nearly killed when an officer ordered his troops to gun her down, an event that served as the basis for the scene in "Beyond Rangoon." In May 1990, the National League for Democracy, headed by Suu Kyi won a landslide victory over the military in open elections despite the military placing Suu Kyi under house arrest. The government, however, disqualified, detained, arrested, or drove into exile the successful candidates. Though Suu Kyi was offered the right to leave the country, she refused and chose to stay under house arrest. She was released in 1995, placed under house arrest again in 2000 and "released" in 2002.

Reading about this woman's peaceful and honorable struggle to bring rights to the people of Burma really puts things into perspective. What I appreciated even more, were some of the words she had to say during this author's interview with her.

On the relationship of meditation and peace: "Meditation is a form of cultivating inner strength, and inner strength means inner peace. If you acquire inner strength that means that you are in apostition to be able to face the troubles of the external world. And in that way, you can create your own sense of security, which comes from your inner strength. So, therefore, you are creating your own peace, as it were.

On the power of nonviolence: "The power of nonviolence is not easy to develop, and I think that Mahatma Gandhi would be the first person to have admitted that. He didn't say that nonviolence was easy. I think he made the point that nonviolence is not for cowards. Nonviolence requires strength, requires courage. The power of nonviolence, if it is disciplined and systematic and if it can be organized as a mass movement, of course can be extremely powerful."

On her act of walking towards gunpoint: "Now, as for my walking toward the guns...it's...it's...i sometimes think that the whole thing has been exaggerated a bit. They were sitting there, pointing their guns, and one didn't really have much choice. You either kept wlaking or you retreated. And if you're not prepared to retreat, you just keep walking. That's all."

On the struggle for peace: "There has to be a united determination to persevere in the struggle, to make sacrifices in the name of enduring truths, to resist the corrupting influences of desire, ill will, ignorance, and fear."


...next I get to read about the Dalai Lama