Six principles of nonviolence (Happy MLK Jr. Day)

A day late but here we go anyway!  Last weekend I went to volunteer training for the Women’s March On Austin scheduled for this Saturday.  I was planning on blogging about biology today, but talking about what we went over in training seems more timely.  The Austin march is one of 616 sister marches around the world planned to coincide with the one in Washington, D.C. (so there might be one near you!)  Here’s an excerpt from the mission statement of the women’s march on Washington, emphasis added:

In the spirit of democracy and honoring the champions of human rights, dignity, and justice who have come before us, we join in diversity to show our presence in numbers too great to ignore. The Women’s March on Washington will send a bold message to our new government on their first day in office, and to the world that women’s rights are human rights. We stand together, recognizing that defending the most marginalized among us is defending all of us.

I was really impressed and inspired by the event coordinators- the person who trained us in nonviolent protest has been involved with protests and activism since she was 8 (Austin native) and read this excerpt aloud, stressing the end: that we need to support all marginalized groups to move forward, instead of looking only at cis, heterosexual white women (a.k.a. “white feminism”– that was a link to an article by an academic; this is a link to a HuffPo video explaining the term).

Next we went through practical things about how to march safely (link arms, use a buddy, if something happens decide as a group to stay and sit down, linked or go away very quickly, report anything suspicious to block marshalls), volunteer jobs (I’m at the check-in table!), and then the six principles of nonviolent protest.  She was careful to say that these have been used for a long time by not just MLK, Jr. (examples: suffragists, Gandhi) but he happened to write them down in a way that’s very nice for teaching activism to new people.  So here they are (in bold), plus some thoughts

1. Nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people.  Often not fighting back requires bravery.  You can be nonviolent and still be aggressive, just not physically aggressive.
2. Nonviolence seeks to win friendship and understanding. The goal here is to make a community, to win over the people who are against you.  A good way to not do it: tell people “you’re wrong!”  A good way to start to do it: listen.  Also, make eye contact.  Be a human and show people that you are a human and you recognize their humanity as well.
3. Attack forces of evil, not people doing evil.  This was when our presenter reiterated that this is not an Anti-Trump march, but a pro-women, pro-LGBTQ, pro-immigrant, pro-marginalized people march.  “Trump is a symptom, not the disease.  We want to defeat the disease.”
4. Accept suffering without retaliation.  This is basically, don’t fight back.  When people see you suffering an injustice, you’ve communicated to them that this matters, and hopefully they extrapolate that you matter.
5. Nonviolence chooses love instead of hate.  Another way that people put this is to avoid internal violence as well as external violence.  Come at this with love and hope for reconciliation in your heart instead of hatred and hope for retribution.  Keep up morale in a positive manner, not a negative manner.
6. The universe is on the side of justice.  Believe this.  A volunteer said that this was the easiest principle to keep up, and another said #2 is the hardest- she wants to snap back instead of listen.

I got a little teary at the end of the nonviolence training, when we practiced chanting “HEAR OUR VOICE.”  I’m not a big crowds person so being in the middle of a room of such positive energy and solidarity really affected me.

Here’s a video of a training that happened later that day (not for volunteers), which starts with 20 minutes of Q&A and then an hour of Simone going through these principles etc.  She’s really good:

So if you’re in or near one of the cities with a sister march, consider heading over there this weekend and checking it out!  Ours will have some awesome speakers and music after (Wendy Davis!  Lizzie Velasquez!  More!) and should be really cool.  I am also not actually planning on marching the 1.5 miles in 80 degree heat with 22,000 other people (definitely a recipe for very pregnant me fainting), but I’ll be there beforehand so if you’re around come say hi!

Tags: feminism, fun