The PeacePage
THIS IS A COMPLEX WORLD. It is and it has always been convenient to believe that there is only the pattern of good and evil, or black and white, or enemy and ally to explain this world - accepting the assumption that the own position as a matter of course is the good, right and morally superior view. The ability to understand other societies, religions and cultures, or even people in other social circumstances apart from our own requires a profound knowledge of languages, social, political and cultural history, and the current circumstances of "alien" societies.
THIS knowledge is achievable only with a high level of education or personal intercultural experiences for all who take part in decision making processes: citizens, voters, lawmakers, and political opinion leaders. Democracy will fail without well educated voters and officeholders. It is not just coincidental that many founding fathers of modern democracy - such as Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin - have been devoted to and caring so much on education.
BEING as naive to assume that there is a general will for a peaceful future, what can be done to reach this goal?
INSTEAD of bombing those who we do not understand it might be worth to try to learn more about each other - that means in common terms to listen to each other, and that means specifically to pay a greater attention to education. Why shouldn't we try to spend more money on education than on the military budget?
IMAGINE how many schools could be built and how many teachers could be paid in the US, in China, in Gaza, in Egypt or elsewhere from the costs of one Tomahawk Cruise Missile ( $ 1.000.000 ) or of one stealth bomber ( $ 2.100.000.000 ) ?
EDUCATION is the basis for reasonable decision making but it also foregoes economic growth and the development of a civil society where people can follow their live plans, having a family and watching their children growing up. People who have some perspectives and responsibility in life - a family, a profession, artistic talents, sports etc. - might not give up their life in order to spread terror among other civilians. And others might have a greater insight on the long lasting consequences of their political decisions.
WHY CAN'T WE JUST GO ON like in the 20th century, the "good" fighting the "evil", having some disastrous wars and so on... The answer is very simple: there are BIG GLOBAL PROBLEMS ahead. The first years of this 21st century have already passed, and it is out of question that humanity will be confronted with some severe global challenges in the upcoming decades. Global means that the consequences will affect everyone on this planet, and that a solution or dilution of these crises can be found only in agreement with the whole global community.
MASTERING the problem of the ozone hole by globally banning the CFCs in the 1980s shows that pragmatic action is possible if there is some agreement on basic scientific facts. Some examples: The climate crisis will cause that the sea level will rise several meters - nobody needs to take care on New Orleans and many other coastal regions, then.
IT is for sure that we will have more extreme weather conditions such as record like hot summers, hurricans, tornados, flooding. Deserts will continue to spread and deforested areas in Southern America, Asia and Africa will worsen this problem. Additionally there is no doubt that the era when energy supply was based on fossil recourses (oil, gas, coal, and uranium) will end in the 21st century.
THESE (self made) problems are no peanuts - they are threatening the very existence of the human race. We will need some smart ideas, some very sophisticated solutions to handle these upcoming challenges!
THUS, as far as we live in democracies we can choose to waste our enegery in the next decades in the military battle for the last resources on this planet (which won't solve any of our problems) or to go into a huddle, find some political agreement and some scientific means to handle the climate and energy crisis.
If you like to support these ideas you can sign the
that simply asks for spending more money on education than on military purposes.
HOWEVER, if you are in need of more hard facts on the whole matter you are free to read the following statistics that show the military expenses of a selection of 15 countries. These statistics shall not demonstrate whether a country is more or less "dangerous" to others - to estimate the actual military power other aspects such as the availability of nuclear bombs or number of troops were requiered to be taken into account. Here, a civilian perspective shall be chosen - that are our taxes which are spend on the military budget - the statistics may provoke two questions:
1. Do we really believe to make the world more peaceful in spending as much money on the military?
2. Aren't there any better issues on which we could spend our taxes - such as free education, healthcare, infrastructure, supporting unstable countries in developing a civilian society?
How much money is spend on the military?
Or, maybe you are looking for some good arguments regarding questions of war, peace, politics, education, ethics? Here are some sophisticated thoughts which might inspire you to think about these issues (all quotes can be found on Brainyquote).
On War & Peace
AN eye for eye only ends up making the whole world blind.
Mahatma Gandhi, Indian Statesman
Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that we must love our enemies – or else? The chain reaction of evil – hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars – must be broken, or else we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
ALL the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting.
George Orwell, British author and journalist
IT is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it; consequently, the defenders of every kind of regime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using the word if it were tied down to any one meaning.
George Orwell, British author and journalist
EVERY war when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac.
George Orwell, British author and journalist
I just want you to know that, when we talk about war, we're really talking about peace.
George W. Bush, 43rd US President
A democracy which makes or even effectively prepares for modern, scientific war must necessarily cease to be democratic. No country can be really well prepared for modern war unless it is governed by a tyrant, at the head of a highly trained and perfectly obedient bureaucracy.
Aldous Huxley, British author
WHAT is absurd and monstrous about war is that men who have no personal quarrel should be trained to murder one another in cold blood.
Aldous Huxley, British author
I don't believe in killing whatever the reason!
John Lennon, British Musician
I am prepared to die, but there is no cause for which I am prepared to kill.
Mahatma Gandhi, Indian Statesman
WAR is the greatest plague that can affect humanity; it destroys religion, it destroys states, it destroys families. Any scourge is preferable to it.
Martin Luther, German Theologian
A time will come when a politician who has willfully made war and promoted international dissension will be as sure of the dock and much surer of the noose than a private homicide. It is not reasonable that those who gamble with men's lives should not stake their own.
H. G. Wells, British author
ENOUGH of blood and tears. Enough!
Yitzhak Rabin, Israeli Statesman, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
WAR is not an adventure. It is a disease. It is like typhus.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery, French author
AS much as I converse with sages and heroes, they have very little of my love and admiration. I long for rural and domestic scene, for the warbling of birds and the prattling of my children.
John Adams, 2nd US President
WAR is not the quintessential emergency in which man has to prove himself, as my generation learned at its school desks in the days of the Kaiser; rather, peace is the emergency in which we all have to prove ourselves.
Gustav Heinemann, 3rd German President
WAR will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today.
John F. Kennedy, 35th US President
NO one is to be called an enemy, all are your benefactors, and no one does you harm. You have no enemy except yourselves.
St. Francis of Assisi, Christian Theologian
EITHER war is obsolete, or men are.
R. Buckminster Fuller, US American activist
MANKIND must put an end to war before war puts an end to mankind.
John F. Kennedy, 35th US President
WAR involves in its progress such a train of unforeseen and unsupposed circumstances that no human wisdom can calculate the end. It has but one thing certain, and that is to increase taxes.
Thomas Paine, a founding father of the US
MORE than an end to war, we want an end to the beginning of all wars - yes, an end to this brutal, inhuman and thoroughly impractical method of settling the differences between governments.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd US President
WAR is only a cowardly escape from the problems of peace.
Thomas Mann, German author, Nobel Laureate in Literature
FORCE always attracts men of low morality.
Albert Einstein, Physicist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics
THE main goal of the future is to stop violence. The world is addicted to it.
Bill Cosby, US American actor
WAR against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think they are going to profit from it.
George Orwell, British author and journalist
ALL wars are follies, very expensive and very mischievous ones.
Benjamin Franklin, a Founding Father of the United States
WARS are not paid for in wartime, the bill comes later.
Benjamin Franklin, a Founding Father of the United States
I am not only a pacifist but a militant pacifist. I am willing to fight for peace. Nothing will end war unless the people themselves refuse to go to war.
Albert Einstein, Physicist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics
IT is not enough to say we must not wage war. It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
LET both sides seek to invoke the wonders of science instead of its terrors. Together let us explore the stars, conquer the deserts, eradicate disease, tap the ocean depths, and encourage the arts and commerce.
John F. Kennedy, 35th US President
WE prefer world law in the age of self-determination to world war in the age of mass extermination.
John F. Kennedy, 35th US President
THE right to swing my fist ends where the other man's nose begins.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., US American author
I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.
Mahatma Gandhi, Indian Statesman
NEVER do anything against conscience even if the state demands it.
Albert Einstein, Physicist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics
PEACE cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding.
Albert Einstein, Physicist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics
ANGER and intolerance are the enemies of correct understanding.
Mahatma Gandhi, Indian Statesman
YOU don't make peace with friends. You make it with very unsavory enemies.
Yitzhak Rabin, Israeli Statesman
I destroy my enemies when I make them my friends.
Abraham Lincoln, 16th US President
AT the center of non-violence stands the principle of love.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
LOVE and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive.
Dalai Lama, Buddhist leader, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
ALL we are saying is give peace a chance. If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there'd be peace.
John Lennon, British Musician
IF someone thinks that love and peace is a cliche that must have been left behind in the Sixties, that's his problem. Love and peace are eternal.
John Lennon, British Musician
IMAGINE all the people living life in peace. You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you'll join us, and the world will be as one.
John Lennon, British Musician
On Politics & the World
RARELY do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
POWER always thinks... that it is doing God's service when it is violating all his laws.
John Adams, 2nd US President
FEAR is the foundation of most governments.
John Adams, 2nd US President
THE impressive American liberality toward foreigners, the charm, seemed to have given way to a slight mistrust.
Jürgen Habermas, German sociologist
ANY society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.
Benjamin Franklin, a Founding Father of the United States
LIBERTY has never come from Government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of it. The history of liberty is a history of limitations of governmental power, not the increase of it.
Woodrow Wilson, 28th US President, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
AMERICA will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.
Abraham Lincoln, 16th US President
OUR safety, our liberty, depends upon preserving the Constitution of the United States as our fathers made it inviolate. The people of the United States are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution.
Abraham Lincoln, 16th US President
LET us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and senators and congressmen and government officials, but the voters of this country.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd US President
FOR diplomacy to be effective, words must be credible – and no one can now doubt the word of America.
George W. Bush, 43rd US President
INTEGRITY is the lifeblood of democracy. Deceit is a poison in its veins.
Edward Kennedy, US politician
FACTS do not cease to exist because they are ignored.
Aldous Huxley, British author
I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts.
Abraham Lincoln, 16th US President
ABUSE of words has been the great instrument of sophistry and chicanery, of party, faction, and division of society.
John Adams, 2nd US President
BUT if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.
George Orwell, British author and journalist
MISTAKES, scandals, and failures no longer signal catastrophe. The crucial thing is that they be made credible, and that the public be made aware of the efforts being expended in that direction. The "marketing" immunity of governments is similar to that of the major brands of washing powder.
Jean Baudrillard, French philosopher
FREEDOM is always the freedom of dissenters.
Rosa Luxemburg, German socialist
THE Constitution does not just protect those whose views we share; it also protects those with whose views we disagree.
Edward Kennedy, US politician
HE that would make his own liberty secure, must guard even his enemy from opposition; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach himself.
Thomas Paine, a founding father of the US
THUS, the controversy about the Moral Majority arises not only from its views, but from its name – which, in the minds of many, seems to imply that only one set of public policies is moral and only one majority can possibly be right.
Edward Kennedy, US politician
ANY time you got the Pope and the Dixie Chicks against you, your time is up.
Michael Moore, US film maker
OUR society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we're being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I'm liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That's what's insane about it.
John Lennon, British musician
INJUSTICE anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
THE liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it comes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism - ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or any controlling private power.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd US President
IF there are men in this country big enough to own the government of the United States, they are going to own it.
Woodrow Wilson, 28th US President, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
AMERICA was not built on fear. America was built on courage, on imagination and an unbeatable determination to do the job at hand.
Harry S. Truman, 33rd US President
THERE is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured with what is right in America.
Bill Clinton, 42nd US President
On Education & Understanding
Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people.
John Adams, 2nd US President
When men yield up the privilege of thinking, the last shadow of liberty quits the horizon.
Thomas Paine, a founding father of the US
Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
Single-mindedness is all very well in cows or baboons; in an animal claiming to belong to the same species as Shakespeare it is simply disgraceful.
Aldous Huxley, British author
Most ignorance is vincible ignorance. We don't know because we don't want to know.
Aldous Huxley, British author
He who learns but does not think, is lost! He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.
Confucius, Chinese philosopher
No matter how busy you may think you are, you must find time for reading, or surrender yourself to self-chosen ignorance.
Confucius, Chinese philosopher
By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest.
Confucius, Chinese philosopher
Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.
Douglas Adams, British author
To be wronged is nothing unless you continue to remember it.
Confucius, Chinese philosopher
That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history.
Aldous Huxley, British author
A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
I worry that, especially as the Millennium edges nearer, pseudo-science and superstition will seem year by year more tempting, the siren song of unreason more sonorous and attractive.
Carl Sagan, US scientist
Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
Humanity is acquiring all the right technology for all the wrong reasons.
R. Buckminster Fuller, US American activist
Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means for going backwards.
Aldous Huxley, British author
We drive into the future using only our rearview mirror.
Marshall McLuhan, Canadian media philosopher
Education is a social process. Education is growth. Education is, not a preparation for life; education is life itself.
John Dewey, US philosopher
A child miseducated is a child lost.
John F. Kennedy, 35th US President
When we make college more affordable, we make the American dream more achievable.
Bill Clinton, 42nd US President
If we are to teach real peace in this world, and if we are to carry on a real war against war, we shall have to begin with the children.
Mahatma Gandhi, Indian Statesman
We must teach our children to resolve their conflicts with words, not weapons.
Bill Clinton, 42nd US President
If civilization is to survive, we must cultivate the science of human relationships - the ability of all peoples, of all kinds, to live together, in the same world at peace.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd US President
To travel is to discover that everyone is wrong about other countries.
Aldous Huxley, British author
On Ethics & Life
A man is ethical only when life, as such, is sacred to him, that of plants and animals as that of his fellow men, and when he devotes himself helpfully to all life that is in need of help.
Albert Schweitzer, German physician, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
Do something wonderful, people may imitate it.
Albert Schweitzer, German physician, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
I have always held firmly to the thought that each one of us can do a little to bring some portion of misery to an end.
Albert Schweitzer, German physician, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
No one is useless in this world who lightens the burden of it to anyone else.
Charles Dickens, British author
Whoever is spared personal pain must feel himself called to help in diminishing the pain of others. We must all carry our share of the misery which lies upon the world.
Albert Schweitzer, German physician, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
A superior man is modest in his speech, but exceeds in his actions.
Confucius, Chinese philosopher
Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change.
Confucius, Chinese philosopher
A loving heart is the truest wisdom.
Confucius, Chinese philosopher
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
Kindness in words creates confidence. Kindness in thinking creates profoundness. Kindness in giving creates love.
Lao Tzu, Chinese philosopher
Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power.
Lao Tzu, Chinese philosopher
One World & Environment
The World is my country, all mankind are my brethren, and to do good is my religion.
Thomas Paine, a founding father of the US
A nation that destroys it's soils destroys itself. Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd US President
I do think this next century, hopefully, will be about a more global view. Where you don't just think, yes my country is doing well, but you think about the world at large.
Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft
There are no passengers on spaceship earth. We are all crew.
Marshall McLuhan, Canadian media philosopher
We may have all come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now.
Martin Luther King, Jr., US-American civil rights activist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Peace
Is the rich world aware of how four billion of the six billion live? If we were aware, we would want to help out, we'd want to get involved.
Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft
I really wonder what gives us the right to wreck this poor planet of ours.
Kurt Vonnegut, US author
As we realise that more and more things have global impact, I think we're going to get people increasingly wanting to get away from a purely national interest.
Peter Singer, US philosopher
The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don't do anything about it.
Albert Einstein, Physicist, Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics
THINK ABOUT IT!
If you like to support these ideas you can sign the
that simply asks for spending more money on education than on military purposes.
This site is launched to make you know and think about some challenges of our present time. I am a citizen like you, there is no special affiliation to a political or religious party. I simply believe that we can and have to do better global and national politics involving more people in political decision making, guided by their expierences, knowledge and substantial education.
Dr. Oliver Krüger, Princeton (USA)