On the eve of new year its time to reflect on what has been, and then keep the lessons of the past close during the coming year.
It has been a tumultuous year of highs and lows for me personally, but if I were to single out one global ‘event’ that has made me think deeply about our world (which is hard as there have been many) it must be the assault on Gaza.
I have friends in both Israel and Palestine, and I found it personally heartbreaking to witness the suffering of people in Gaza, and which continues still. I live in relative safety, far away from the lived reality of this horror, so what I feel and experience cannot compare to those who are there. I also found it heartwarming to hear and see the outpouring of support for the human beings – every man, woman, and child – who have been impacted by the deaths of family and friends, loss of their homes and livelihoods and the continual stigmatization of a whole population. Support from people all over the world, including Israeli people who are also wrongly stigmatized as being all the same. Such assumptions and generalisations couldn’t be further from reality.
We really have to learn at some stage that the world is not reducible to a collection of ‘countries’ ‘races’ ‘groups’ ‘peoples’ – no one should be ever be reduced to the status of ‘reasonable collateral damage’ or dismissed as being ‘all the same’.
The world is made up of wonderfully diverse individuals who each have the same and equal rights to live in freedom from persecution, poverty and discrimination.
This includes the people of Gaza.
This includes the people of Israel.
And of Syria, Ukraine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Sudan, DRC, and all others who live under the shadow of violence.
It includes those who seek shelter and care as refugees, such as those currently in the detention centres of Australia.
It includes those who continue to suffer from the impacts of colonialism, capitalist greed and wanton destruction in the name of development.
It includes the families of (and the) people held in prisons for no good reason such as Peter Greste imprisoned in Egypt for doing his job as a journalist, and Rozita Vasseghi who remains yet another year imprisoned in Iran for her religion.
It includes women and girls who should never be objects of assault via domestic violence, female genital mutilation, oppression or used as weapons of war.
It includes men who are subject to ridicule and harm for not adhering to social norms of masculinity.
It includes people who are persecuted or discriminated against because of their gender, sexual orientation or physical/mental/emotional capacity.
And so very many more who suffer for who they are, what they look like, how they think, where they were born, or what they believe.
We need to become less obsessed with power and control, and more with compassion and love.
We need to learn from the many peaceful nonviolent protests of 2014 that life matters and violence is not and never has been the answer to our challenges be they international disputes or personal angst.
We should learn by now that war/violence solves nothing and no one wins.
That thoughtfulness, caring, forgiveness, equality and acceptance lead to more productive outcomes than destruction and hate.
We need to think more, speak out more, worry less and never turn away from a challenge.
We need more than anything to learn how to retain our belief and hope in a better more peaceful future, and then act to bring it about wherever we can.
2015 can be the best yet.
It’s up to us.
purplescones 