Category: peace, conflict, war

The Origin of Evil

5 May 2023
apocalypsearms, guns, weaponsdeath, mortality, the deadethicsfood, meals, eatingmetaphor, symbolpassagepeace, conflict, warritual, festivaltheoryworldview, ontology
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Long, long ago the first animal ate the second animal. Then the first animal became food for the third animal. All animals hungered, hunted, ate, and became food for other animals. The world was an epic food orgy—a bone-crushing, blood-drinking drama unburdened with self-consciousness or guilt. Over eons and eons animals evolved into primates, then…

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Disarming Boys

24 September 2019
arms, guns, weaponscreative nonfictionessays, articlesethicsfamilypeace, conflict, war
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Originally published in The Canopy Review 01 (2019): 10-26. Excerpts read at the Langston Hughes House, Harlem, September 23, 2019. World War II rages as my parents rivet B-24 bombers at Consolidated Aircraft. Home from the graveyard shift, Dad’s teaching me to box. Knees knocked, I’m punching back. Later, he’s equipped me with a toy…

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Reimagining guns

31 January 2019
arms, guns, weaponsart, artistsimagination, creativitypeace, conflict, warreligion, spiritualitysculpturevideo & audioviolence
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Partnering with Irian Fast-Sittler, a blacksmith, to transform a shotgun into a rosebush, Ron Grimes makes a case for reimagining weapons by using popular images to show that the current wave of gun violence is both a religious and imaginative crisis. For a shorter version, focused on the blacksmithing-artistic process, see “MaidenForge.”

MaidenForge

24 January 2019
blacksmithingpeace, conflict, warvideo & audioviolence

An interpretation of Bryn’s soundtrack for “MaidenForge” by Cailleah Scott-Grimes: It’s worth comparing “MaidenForge” to “Thak Sword Forging,” both made in Floradale’s blacksmith shop. Then try an experiment. Don’t watch the video. Just listen to the two musical scores. Then put into words your feelings about each piece of music. An interpretation of Bryn’s soundtrack

Disarming?

16 June 2018
peace, conflict, warvideo & audio

I’ve written “Disarming Boys,” an essay to be published in 2019. It’s a story about growing up with guns, then giving them up. While doing research on boys, girls, gender, and violence I ran across two videos. View them back to back, and a provocative discussion emerges: In “Interview with a Toddler,” La Guardia Cross,…

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Holocaust remembrance

29 January 2018
death, mortality, the deadessays, articlesethnicity, racism, multiculturalismfunerals, cemeteriesjusticepeace, conflict, wartruth

  Remembrance is supposed to be good for a community, but much depends how those who remember actually remember. The Daily Beast reports on Mike Pence’s way of remembering the Holocaust: “Many Jews have pointed out that Pence, who is an evangelical Christian, imposes a Christian narrative on the Holocaust, comparing victims of the Holocaust to Jesus. His tweet…

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The day the clock stopped

11 November 2017
death, mortality, the deadethnicity, racism, multiculturalismpeace, conflict, warritual, festivalvideo & audio

Norwegians sometimes refer to July 22, 2011, as their “9/11,” the day their perceptions were changed forever by an act of violence. An assassin exploded a car bomb beneath a government building in Oslo, then ferried to Utoya island, where he hunted down and shot Labour Party youth attending a summer camp. In the end,…

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How shall we commemorate lives unjustly cut short?

7 November 2017
death, mortality, the deadjusticepeace, conflict, warvideo & audio

When you have the time and freedom to circle the deep, that’s glorious. When you don’t have either the time or the freedom–when you’re draped over the edge by another hand–that’s dreadful. When someone else cuts your life short by lynching, angry questions burn the air. The Equal Justice Initiative is building the National Memorial…

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