Action and Reaction
For every action there is a reaction and for every reaction there is an action. So be it for home gardening and for nonviolence. We bring together waste, nitrogen and carbon, coffee grounds and wood chips, and the reaction is compost. Worms eat the compost and the results are castings. In a garden we plant a seed in the castings and a plant grows. The plant grows, dies and becomes waste and the cycle begins again.
In nonviolence we take action, like Martin Luther King and others did in Birmingham. The authorities react, like the police did with beatings and dogs and the world watches this unfold while King and others sit in jail. Change happens in this action and reaction.
When a garden is ignored it does not work. When nonviolent action is ignored it is not effective. The garden and nonviolence need reaction, be it positive or negative, to work.
With this simple law of nature, action and reaction, we learn that we must tend to a garden for it to grow and persistently pursue nonviolent action until there is a reaction.
Breaking this down to my own life, it means that I must continue to try in a home garden to Grow Renewable Affordable Food G.R.A.F. and I must in conscience pursue nonviolent action at Marquette University until there is a reaction.
The worst enemy of a garden and nonviolence is ignorance. When someone ignores a garden it dies and when the ‘powers that be’ ignore a nonviolent action it dies. A beautiful garden is hard to ignore and so is creative nonviolent action.
A debate does not ignore a controversial issue but is a nonviolent way to argue ideas and issues. Both sides in a debate get to present their side and both get a chance to react to the other’s position. I plan to try a debate forum on the Internet soon. I would like the wiki debate forum not to be another comment board or blog but a real opportunity to debate questions of the day. If anyone has a suggestion how to do this on a web side we would be very open to it. Write debate@nonviolentworm.org. with any thoughts and suggestions.
The www.nonviolentworm.org may be a small web site read by very few persons, but it is from the small and weak that sometimes the seeds of real change begin. For every action there is a reaction.
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