One part is unequivocally naming the true Himsa, the true violence – that of the state, that of the systemic oppression of minorities.
By now, the world has heard the recording of George Floyd pleading, “I can’t breathe… Mama, I love you” as a white police officer, Derek Chauvin, held his knee down on the 46-year-old African American man’s neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds. Since this killing, cities and towns all across America have erupted in mostly peaceful protests. These protests are the most widespread and serious the nation has experienced since the aftermath of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr in 1968.
I am moved to write this piece because rather than focus on the explicit violence of Floyd’s killing and the undeniable violence of the US police, spraying the protesters with pepper spray, tear gas and rubber bullets, the media and so many conversations on social media, are characterising the protesters as violent. While it is true that there has been looting and property damage, and also some violence on the part of protesters – which is wrong and unfortunate – the majority of protesters have been remarkably peaceful.
I am a human rights activist. I bring social justice issues into my Hindu community spaces, and bring a progressive and inclusive Hindu voice and presence to the struggles of our time. As such, I tend to claim “ahimsa” – non-violence – as one of my ideals. Ahimsa, to me, is always gentleness of thought, word and deed; a willingness to seek connection and resolution rather than conflict, an openness to engage in dialogue.
There is the line in the Upanishads, “Atithi Devo Bhava.” Be one for whom the guest (one you do not know) is god. To truly achieve this, to truly see the divine in a rapist or a murderer, someone filled with hate: for me, this has always been the lofty aspiration of ahimsa.
Today, I am challenging myself to think through what “ahimsa” is in the face of tyranny and state-sponsored murder. Am I capable of seeing the divine in Officer Derek Chauvin or the Hindu mobs that lynched Muslims in India while chanting “Jai Shri Ram,” or those who killed a 12-year-old Dalit girl in Nepal last week and left her hanging from a tree? Am I capable of seeing the divine in the heads of state of the two countries I call home? And since I cannot, what is ahimsa for me?
I went through a training in non-violent resistance organised by the Poor People’s Campaign a few years ago. We were divided into activists and police. I was an activist. As the police came to arrest us, we knelt down, linked arms and sang. We sang even as our human chain was forced apart and we were dragged away by the police.
Ain’t gonna let nobody turn me ‘round,Turn me round, turn me ‘round. Ain’t gonna let nobody, turn me ‘round. I’m gonna keep on a walkin’, keep on a talkin’,Marching up to freedom land.
The Poor People’s Campaign was launched by Martin Luther King Jr. months before he was assassinated. Today’s Poor People’s Campaign is a continuation of King’s legacy. It is a fusion movement prioritising the three interconnected pillars of the original Poor People’s Campaign – systemic racism, poverty, the war economy -– along with the fourth pillar of ecological devastation.
Just as King, inspired by, among others, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in India, advocated nonviolent resistance as the path to justice for all, the Poor People’s campaign includes as one of its fundamental principles, “The Campaign and all its Participants and Endorsers embrace nonviolence. Violent tactics or actions will not be tolerated.”
Six days after the lynching of George Floyd, Poor Peoples Campaign co-chair William Barber gave a Sunday sermon. In it, he did not address the violence on the part of protesters, at least not directly. Instead, he affirmed the moral disruption represented by the massive protests.
