Edinburgh
had a strange American visitor to Scotland last summer — a former
tattoo artist who goes round schools and youth centres advising young
people (and their elders) that they should never say a negative word
about anyone on this planet. He has a mission to eliminate hate,
violence and prejudice throughout the world. World peace in our time is
possible, he insists, provided that enough people get the message that
love, acceptance and understanding is what their real selves want, and
then refuse to take in the ‘negative energy’ that hate and violence
create.
He reinforces his message with his fearsome appearance, tattooed all
over (including his face), enhanced by a prowling deliberate walk
suggesting traditional ideas of a caveman. He calls himself the Scary
Guy, and he thus acts out the great truth that you cannot judge people
by their appearance. But his appearance helps him greatly with rowdy
teenagers. He was remarkably successful in persuading some tough
characters in Edinburgh’s Youth Cafe to think seriously about the
motives that underlie aggressive behaviour.
~~~
But welcome though his mission is, some stubborn questions remain. Even
the kindliest of Friends may catch themselves having negative thoughts
about the present administration in Washington. Even so, I can just
about relate to a Scary Guyish feeling that they are sadly mistaken.
But does it make sense to suppose that this is how Palestinians
arbitrarily held up at a checkpoint can feel about the regime that
habitually imposes these hindrances on them? Perhaps not, and yet it is
precisely that fact of life that makes the Israel/Palestine conflict so
intractable, so apparently endless.
Even under this degree of stress, however, something more hopeful can
assert itself. In a recent article in The Independent, Jemima Khan
gives an account of Palestinian cultural centres where resistance takes
the form of dance, of drama, of art. Up on a hill above Jerusalem,
where there was once an Israeli army camp, there is now a Palestinian
theatre. Outside there is a lush garden and a children’s playground.
The Israeli authorities sometimes threaten to bulldoze the hall down,
and then Palestinians sleep in it overnight. It is called Phoenix).
Mohammed Jaradat, who runs an advocacy group for Palestinians, says
that at the Phoenix Centre children have something to live for and to
be proud of:
‘They will be able to find creative and positive solutions to the
struggle for peace and justice eventually, and with beauty and joy in
their lives they will be sure to find it.’
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