What Does It Mean To Be Anti-War?

It doesn’t feel right to talk about my regularly planned topics this month. With the ongoing horrific events coming out of Palestine, I wanted to think about and discuss my thoughts on war and what it means to be anti-war. Considering in a recent poll, readers requested more video content, I’ve recorded my thoughts as well as put them in written form. As always, I’d always love to hear your feedback and thoughts should you want to get in touch.

This is a modified transcript of the above video.

Hey everyone, I hope you're doing as well as you can be and thanks so much for reading. Today, I want to talk about the idea of war and what it means to be anti-war. As I write this on October 31st, 2023, of course there is the front and center conflict happening in Palestine along with the existing wars we already have going on. And, ever since I've known the true cost of war and learned more about the impacts and implications, I have considered myself anti-war. But, with all of this going on, I've been wondering: what does being anti-war actually mean to me?

I’ve thought about this in depth as well as gotten some feedback from others. Below you’ll find where I stand at the moment, but I imagine these will evolve over time. Here are eight areas that fall into my anti-war stance.

Treat All Life As Sacred

The first thing to me when it comes to being anti-war would be to treat human life as sacred. And that means all human life. That especially means civilians; innocent people who have no direct impact on a war or a conflict itself. This is paramount to me. With this comes the acknowledgment of life and loss equally. In the most recent conflict, I see the acknowledgement of one atrocity in one place in the loss of life Israelis on the attacks of October 7th, but not the acknowledgement of the now tens of thousands of mostly civilian lives lost on the Palestinian side. If we're going to acknowledge one, how can we not acknowledge the other? We’ve been programmed that it is ok for one side to be annihilated and not the other.

We need to honor and keep sacred human life, especially people that are innocent, that can't protect themselves, children, the elderly, the disabled. And it's just awful what we're seeing right now. It's happening before our eyes. And I hope as we go along, more people will speak out against this. And that's what I'm trying to do here and in other places.

There Is Nuance In Almost Every Situation

We’re often told that things are black and white when this is almost always not the case. There is nuance in almost every situation that we need to identify and acknowledge.

It is rarely one side good, the other evil. There is rarely one bad party in all of this. I think we need to consistently work to slow down, understand, and acknowledge that nuance exists, because it is almost never black and white. We are told to believe it is but we need to resist that notion.

Understand the Horrors and Lasting Effects of War

Next, in being anti-war, and especially for those calling for more war, I think we have to understand and really know the horrors war brings. If you’ve looked online, I’m sure you're seeing a lot of people cavalierly call for war and more destruction.

Here in the U.S., we don't often see the direct impact of war. But war has a long and deep impact. And I believe it has an impact across the globe, even if it doesn't directly touch us. For those that are in favor of war, do you understand the long-term costs, the effects of entire generations, upon entire countries? In thinking of Ukraine at the moment which has been devastated by bombs. It has been laid to waste. Entire generations of youth, tens of thousands of people have been lost. So many cheer on the need for this war to continue rather than consider some kind of diplomacy to end the destruction. Ukraine will take decades to rebuild its society and for what? Was this all worth it? I don’t think so.

We've been in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen. Can you speak to any true victories in these long, 20 years long, trillion dollar wars? Is there any actual victory? Are we actually safer? When you say you're going to annihilate a terrorist organization, can you really do that? Are we creating more allies or more enemies? I believe the latter. Increased violence and aggression breeds more of the same. Do you think a Palestinian child who is experiencing death and destruction is saved by countries that decide to band together to stop further bloodshed grows up with more hate? Conversely, what about the child who has had much of their family killed because nobody did anything to stop the ongoing bombing. Do you think that person's going to grow up wanting to be kind and wanting to be compassionate or or with hate and vengeance in their heart? Which one is better for the world and especially the child?

We unfortunately live in a consistent war mindset, and it trickles down in ways we can't directly comprehend. Look to our everyday society. We're warring with each other, we're using black and white thinking, we're looking at people as our enemy over simple disagreements.

I don't think people consider that when they think of war, but that does trickle down in that way. Whether it's thousands of miles away or not, this will affect us. It will affect us socially, it will affect us economically, and there's just so many ways that often people don't even comprehend when they cavalierly call for war.

Question What You Hear And Read

Next, I would say being anti-war means questioning what you hear, not being a mouthpiece. This is probably one of the harder ones in this list with misinformation the way it is these days. When you hear something, right, do we often look to verify this, but where things come

at us, we're emotional, and we turn around and we share that information, right? Most information from mainstream media, I consider to have a narrative, to tell us things, to put us in that black and white thinking, to say, hey, they're an enemy. We need to defeat that enemy, where again, there is nuance, and again, there is a narrative. There is a bias, and these entities want us to believe a certain thing. They're not trying to give us news, and the same goes across social media, and the same goes across the ability for content to just be fake to these days. But I think one of the biggest things here is not only kind of questioning what we hear,

but also interrupting our kind of information loop, where we receive something and we just turn around and maybe reshare it or believe it without kind of stopping and pausing and taking a moment to actually see how we feel about it. Not only that, doing the research and maybe trying to verify, but also sitting down and just taking a moment and feeling into how something affects you. And I think, yes, with our information age and things flying around so fast, it's hard to slow down and do those things, but I feel like we absolutely have to do that. We have to question the information we're getting. We have to try to validate it, and we have to really feel into how it affects us and see what we believe, not to believe something that's coming at us.

Know That War Is a Business

War is a business, and we are partially funding it. There is a revolving door of government officials moving from working to weapons manufacturers, to government roles that have direct influence on foreign affairs, and back.

And so an example that comes to mind right now that has been in my head a lot lately, the U.S. Secretary of Defense; his name is Lloyd Austin. He came into this position in the Biden administration. Where was he before that? He was at Raytheon, one of the world's biggest weapons manufacturers, making millions of dollars working in a senior role.

He we from Raytheon, one of the biggest weapons manufacturers, to a role in the United States that has a direct impact on war. So my question is, do you think this person cut all ties with Raytheon? Do you think they’re not talking to him, that he's not benefiting from this relationship in some way in overseeing war efforts? Do you think this person's trying to de-escalate situations or listening to Raytheon and just trying to decide where to send the next warheads? There are many examples of this.

When war can generate money and profits, there will always need to be war. These weapons manufacturers depend on war. It is their whole reason for existence in most cases.

We need to to call these things out. We need to try to build a world where money cannot be made off of war. People cannot be made rich from war. Our tax dollars are literally going into a war machine that is committing murder right now, in my opinion. And on top of that, people are getting rich through all this destruction.

Call For De-Escalation & Diplomacy

Next, I would add in the idea of leading with de-escalation. And this speaks to my previous point. When money can be made off of war, why would we ever lead with de-escalation and diplomacy? In so many cases, I think in most cases, there are opportunities for diplomacy, for trying to work something out, for instead of ramping things up, say, hey, let's cease fire, let's talk, and try to find a middle ground. And speaking of ceasefire, I do believe we need a ceasefire right now in Palestine, and I'm glad people are calling for that. But fighting for and leading with de-escalation.

You may not have seen this because it wouldn't be covered in the mainstream news, but in the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war, Russia came forward with a diplomatic offer in which they would pull out from Ukraine and specific areas as long as their borders were no longer encroached by NATO. The United States, I believe England and other European powers came in and fought to deny that offer. And here we are years later in war that has no end in sight. Corporations are making money and profiting of the carnage and continued destruction of Ukraine.

I believe our world would love very different if we led with de-escalation.

Return To Humanity

Lastly I return to our humanity. We need to get out of the one side is evil mindset. There is always nuance. There is always a narrative that others in power want us to believe, stripping us of opportunities for empathy. I am so surprised that some of the things I'm seeing online, where people are calling for war, destruction, and death of civilians that have families. We all have families. And just the simple idea of trying to look at our families and imagine them in a war zone. Imagine our families getting wiped out. Imagine having to decide whether your family should huddle in one room so you all die in a bomb strike, or separating in hopes that some of the family will survive. Imagine having to make that decision.

People are not even considering this. And it just, it's really saddening to me. I'm hoping the more people that speak out and the more people that bring these things to light might change a few people in the right direction. Put yourself in others' shoes. Just look at the people you love and imagine the worst things that are happening in other places happening to them. T

his is what I have for now. Again, I think this list might evolve over time. It might change, but I really wanted to think through what being anti-war means to me.

I would love your thoughts. Do you consider yourself anti-war? If no, with no judgment, I'd be curious why. I would genuinely appreciate to hear from you and hear why.

If yes, do you agree with my views? Do you have your own? Do you have anything you would add?

You can reach out to me on social media, via email if you like. And if you've made it this far, thanks so much for reading. I really appreciate that. And I will catch you again in the next one. Thanks again.