So, What Are We Doing Now?

 

We would like to extend that thank you to our returning members. It’s comforting to spend time with those who know they can give their voice and provide their opinions on any number of issues, without fear of backlash. In the process, we’ve all come to know more about each other with every meeting—your way of thinking, your philosophies, your experiences, all of these come across in every discussion, and this is the kind of comfort and security we want all of our new members to take part in.

We began this semester with a discussion on identity. Describing ourselves, our morals, ideals, fears, and personalities can be challenging, especially since we might not have all of the answers yet. It can also be transformative—empowering, even—to recognize parts of yourself that you shied away from, or even denied. That’s the point of getting to know oneself. The peace brought on by personal acknowledgment is one only achievable through such declarations. We learned that we may find ourselves possessing more than one identity, not to fool any one person or group, but to protect ourselves. Sometimes these identities can be managed; sometimes we don’t want them managed, but we maintain them anyway due to circumstances beyond our control. Whatever the reason, we’re never far from someone who can offer a few kind words or well-timed wisdom. Or from someone who just wants to sit with us and talk about something else. We’re never far from someone who makes us feel like we belong.

We then covered the topic of mass shootings and gun violence, in particular. In the wake of the Oregon shooting at Umpqua Community College, we were reminded of the strange phenomenon that never makes us more aware of where we are: a college campus. We tackled gun culture in this country, questioned what is unique about America that allows for this type of crime to continue. We discussed respect, and the lack thereof, for firearms; media culture and desensitization; absent or anemic modes of personal expression that perpetuate loneliness, misunderstandings, and ultimately hate. By the end of the night we had brought in Europe, and by that extension socialism, the problems of capitalism, mental health, media framing, upbringing, education, building our interpersonal relationships, individual psychology, community relations, Israel, and culture. All that from a discussion about gun violence.

Our discussion on feminism was not without scrutiny for the term. We questioned its feasibility if its goal for equality would ever be achieved. We wondered if, perhaps, its identity had gotten too muddled, not by those who did not know what it meant, but by its advocates whose goals were not uniform or clear. We touched on group dynamics and the in-fighting that continuously works against the goals of feminism. There might be a flaw in its language, in the roots of its language; therefore, a better definition or goal might actually require a completely different word. Can feminism stand by itself, on its own merits, or does it always have to stand in relation to men? Is this a bad thing?

Finally, we discussed how each of us handles attacks on our beliefs. These attacks could be confrontational, physically so, or they could happen by way of reading an article or story. Sooner or later, one or all of our beliefs are bound to be disrupted in some way, forcing a re-evaluation of some sort. Maybe even adoption. Or, we could just as easily reject that which doesn’t conform or belong to our established line of thinking. We discussed this idea of lines of thinking, and how we might turn what is an offensive conversation into one of learning. The behavior of others will affect us, some more than others, but who really has the right to denounce the other? Aside from these more introspective thoughts, there are tangible, biological reactions: we might get loud, or our faces might get hot; we could find ourselves easily upset, maybe even have difficulty breathing. There’s an element of conditioning that alleviates these reactions, but sometimes these agitations work in our favor. They inform us that something we believe very strongly in has been attacked, maybe even insulted, and we’re ready to take our high-temper, shaking selves to defend it.

If you managed to read through all of that, thank you. Hopefully, something in there interested you. And if you have yet to be able to attend a meeting, hopefully, something in there is nudging you towards that direction. Our next topic will be on happiness. Wars make the news. So do deaths and tragedies. International trade deals and political scandals command the attention of viewers and critics alike. But we rarely, if ever, talk about happiness at length, despite the fact that everything—absolutely everything—is motivated by it, in some way. That’s what we want to talk about next.

Post-conference update

A Look to the Future

The conference is over and was a fantastic success. It was good to see so many people come out and to get so much support. It’s easy to forget that Agora is not even 2 years old and yet we’ve left such a large ripple with so many accomplishments, and more to come. We are privileged to have had such impressive speakers share their time and knowledge.

A huge shout out to all of the people and organizations that put in hard work, whether they were involved in the conception, outreach, or organizing the event itself. A special note of recognition to the conference team Chelsie Kuhn Amber Bergeron Elana Sokol and Tori Winterbotham for their hard work all semester.

While the conference itself is over, that message of students organizing and causing real change is growing. That is what Agora stands for ( among many other things) and while students have drive and passion it will only get stronger! We look forward to seeing new topics discussed, new initiatives taken, and a community growing stronger.

Lastly, stay tuned for follow ups with the conference! Our very own Bruno Ortega will be writing a piece about the conferences’ discussion and we will be opening a forum for continued discussion and new initiatives to grow!

It has been a privilege to work with everyone involved and to see all the new faces.

-Dylan

Students Host Egyptian Activist Maikel Nabil

On February 9, Agora had the honor of hosting Egyptian activist Maikel Nabil. Maikel spoke and answered questions about the Egyptian revolution, his experiences in activism, and how to effectively start a movement with limited resources.

Maikel founded the No Compulsory Military Service Movement in Egypt, and was the first conscientious objector to military service in his country. For years, he has blogged about criminal abuses by police and security forces, and spoke out for the human rights and free speech of all people. He has been jailed numerous times, and remained steadfast in his beliefs despite inhuman treatment and conditions, refusing to apologize to the military in exchange for early release.

By constantly drawing attention to abuses that take place and giving a voice to those that are voiceless, Maikel raises the profile of human rights issues and forces those abusing their power to address them. Hearing his personal experiences—and his resilience—was incredibly inspiring for me and the other the members of Agora.

Maikel also gave some advice for how to start and grow a movement. First, he said, the activist group must decide upon what their mission, goal, or grievance is. Second, they must determine the scale they wish to work on; for example, the Washington, D.C. metro area, or the United States. Next, the group must research other organizations inside the given scale that share their goals, and reach out to them to form partnerships. Maikel noted that activists should be open to working with organizations with whom they have considerable differences; it is necessary to find common ground with regards to issues and beliefs and work within that space.

We at Agora are incredibly thankful to Maikel Nabil for sharing with us his experiences, his insights, and his advice. We wish him the best of luck in his future endeavors, and hope to have more excellent guest speakers in the future. Stay tuned!

More on Maikel Nabil can be found here, at his website: www.MaikelNabil.com

Written by Brian Garrett-Glasser

Dedication to the Elected Future

Following last week’s Celebration of Values and last night’s elections, the departing founders figured it was finally time to publish the principles that were so fundamental to Agora’s infancy and successful maturation over the past year. We hope they are recognized and honored by Agora’s elected future.

“To perceive education, not as a transitory experience, not as attainable and finite expertise, not as routine, but as life itself, then, will humans hold the power for the eternal preservation of freedom, happiness, liberty, and liberate themselves through steadfast possibility. Conversely, we, the founders & Archons, have set in motion a creative and intellectual enterprise, in order to mold our skills and talents with our passions and desires, and to synthesize them all with what the world needs. To this purpose we have attributed the pursuit of Wisdom, the Autonomy of learning, and the furtherance of Practice from which we derive our existence on the campus of George Mason University and place in history.

Too often students are halfhearted about their education; moreover, we ascribe to supplant apathetic lethargy with vibrancy, passion, and a lust for Wisdom and its rewards. The internal engine inherent in humans, powered by curiosity and wonder, to learn more about ourselves, our planetary domain and beyond, all to more effectively govern ourselves, is the hope that we can eventually live honest, peaceful, and more fulfilling lives.

This may prove daunting, and will undoubtedly be the first of its kind at George Mason University. We: students, Patriots, dreamers, Archons, founding members do not, in any capacity, intend for this to be an inclusive endeavor. Humans do not learn alone; we learn from each other. Education is a widely a shared experience, a social enterprise, a collaborative adventure, as will this.

Wisdom has borne with it the intellectual progress and success of all those who have chased it throughout history. To be wise, sagacious, and shrewd is of the highest calling, transcending bare knowledge and book smarts. Wisdom is the exhaust emitted by a lifetime of running our internal engines, a lifetime of learning, a lifetime of questioning in preference to living in darkness, and a lifetime of apprenticeship to the world. It is by consensus that we deem knowledge, and its critical and creative interpretation, the only true source of everlasting power – power for improved governance and eventually the lack thereof. To seek Wisdom is to believe that intelligent dissent is preferable to passive concurrence, that the world we occupy at present can be improved, that the world before us was designed by our brethren no different than us, to possess the willingness and bravery to spar with the big questions which underpin and support everything. To engage with these questions is to engage with life itself. To pursue Wisdom is to reconcile with the uncertain, the whole, the everything.

Autonomy of learning is the “why,” the crux of our existence as an extension of the classroom, a crossing of educational frontiers, and a bridge for educational disciplines. Our space will not only continue the discussions from the classroom but teach ourselves, how we want, and for reasons only we understand. We want to individualize learning while recognizing the formal classroom as the current model for education; one must know what to look for, and know how to parse through ignorance if one wishes to attain Wisdom.

Let it be known, this is an extracurricular project for students, by students from the progressive trans-disciplinary field of Conflict Analysis & Resolution. Through our time in the program we have come to understand the trans-disciplinary complexity of the modern world, the limited scope of the human mind, the abstract threats of the future, the screams for trans-national collaboration, and the unfortunate narrowness of disciplines. We are passionate about our subject matter; we want to see it grow in sync with ourselves. We cannot let our education simply occur; the time to grab it, shape it, tear at it, challenge it, breathe life into it, and make demands was yesterday.

Practice is our theory of change, our action piece. As progressive thinkers and potential change agents, we recognize that we live in a world with clear inconsistencies, obvious problems, and ineffective solutions, but also recognize the communities dedicated to building peace across the globe. We are restless; we want to act; we don’t want to stop at talking nor writing, we want rev our internal engines towards affecting change; by trade we are “doers.” Creating this space is, in itself, practice in motion, fueled by the internal engine of the pursuit of Wisdom and borne by the freedom of autonomous learning. Our space will feed and support reflective practice, collaborative practice, intellectual practice, and integrative practice.

We, are Agora – not a thing or place, but the belief that the greatest of all causes: ‘good will amongst men and peace on earth’ – a world devoid of violent conflict and injustice for many, plump in positive peace that encourages the happiness and freedom of all others is attainable through higher learning and investigation into our less bestial human qualities: diversity, connection, imagination, empathy and their application in society. It is on these principles that we shall stand and scream at the world, rest our heads when we are tired, and call upon for renewed faith. Agora is both our vision of the future and how we get there.

Great spirits transcend thinking; they live in idyllic fantasies of the future and inevitably lose themselves to idealism. Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds but often find themselves with the world in a better place. Idealism is the wellspring for hope; if it were a truism that differences are diametrically inharmonious, the dark void in the human condition cleaved by the absence of hope for improvement, would kill us all.”

A Celebration of Values

 

“Let us consider the way in which we spend our lives,”

opens American author Henry David Thoreau’s transcendental essay Life Without Principle. Principle is a funny word, possessing both foundational and ethical connotations. What does it mean to be a ‘man/woman of principle?’ Every major belief system, school of thought, ideology, organization, and state rests on a set of principles, from which each derives its ‘self,’ its ‘identity.’ Our School of Conflict Analysis & Resolution at George Mason University is committed to a unique set of principles and,

“has anchored itself, theoretically and practically, on applied ethics, a normative value framework that far surpasses, in complexity, the traditional ethical framework of ‘neutrality.’ At S-CAR, we use ‘reflective practice’ as the method by which we grow as human beings and as theorists, researchers, and practitioners; it refers to the process by which persons learn, with others, from reflection on their experience.”

Reflective practice is transcendental in essence, in that reflectivity calls upon the peculiar faculty of all humans to peer into ourselves, downwards to new and alarming depths. It is the notion that architects cannot forge a house from top to bottom, but require the blueprints for a powerful foundation that can weather the most malicious of storms.

In a very busy and loud world, Agora’s members found themselves in a quiet room, either imagining for the first time or re-imagining ourselves as future conflict resolvers, activists, and practitioners. As we join the linage of conflict resolvers, we know that each generation must marshal their own innovations. The session began with an judgement-free, uninterrupted free-write of values and principles onto what began to look like a beautiful wall of graffiti.

Afterwards each member was allowed to contextualize and color in what this particular value/principle meant to them and why – a particularly tender and rich exercise. Spontaneous conversation organized around principles and their context, personal metaphors and their underlying meanings, and eventually to the ‘why’ we want to resolve conflict despite it’s potential for darkness.

This is the crux of Life Without Principle and Agora’s delightful ‘Celebration of Values’ – reinforcing the importance of the conscious inner voyage, authentic and to each his own, to define a set of principles on which we shall stand and scream at the world, rest our heads when we are tired, and call upon for renewed faith. Thoreau decrees,

“We select granite for the underpinning of our houses and barns; we build fences of stone; but we do not ourselves rest on an underpinning of gigantic truth, the lowest primitive rock. Our sills are rotten.”

The big questions are called to arms when worlds collide those devoid of ultimate truth and differ seemingly from person to person. They are sometimes, unfortunately, our way into conflict, but are always our way out. As an aside, these principles are also the gems we are trying to locate as mediators, found at uncertain depths, and only with a special set of tools – those of the conflict practitioner. Nonetheless, this feat goes far beyond the half-hearted introspection and the trite spirituality that plagues social media conversations whose sole pursuit is that of increased popularity and correspondence, into an endless conversation with truth itself.

Many thanks for participating.

Til next Monday.

 

 

Dr. Alexis Lyras and International Week

Symposium on Olympism in Action to celebrate the inauguration of its first International Day for Development and Peace.

Agora is pleased to announce its first guest speaker in the Open Agora meeting on Monday night. Dr. Alexis Lyras from Georgetown University and Agora from George Mason University’s Conflict Analysis and Resolution program had an enlightening and insightful Symposium to celebrate the inauguration of the 1st International Day for Development and Peace.

The symposium began with Dr. Lyras providing some foundations about Olympism, sport for peace and development, and explained the rationale behind the revival of the Modern Olympic Games in Athens on April 6, 1896. The discussion was also focused on the Modern Olympic Games on the conditions under which the Olympic spirit can be used as a tool to promote ideals on internationalism, globalization, peacebuilding and cross-cultural dialogue. During our meeting we also celebrated George Mason’s International Week with delicious cuisine from around the world and a discussion on internationalism, globalization, Olympism, and conflict resolution. We were honored to have Dr. Alexis Lyras, Generations for Peace Fellow at Georgetown University, to discuss conflict resolution in a framework of Olympism and sports integration to peace building. It was a monumental occasion where we created bridges between the George Mason University and Georgetown University’s perspective Conflict Analysis and Resolution programs.

Dr. Lyras currently holds the Generations for Peace Fellowship at the Conflict Resolution, Georgetown University and serve as a special advisor by the International Olympic Academy on Olympism, peace building and international Development. Agora, and the George Mason students would like thank Dr. Lyras for the inspiring and engaging discussion and renewed our commitment Dr. Lyras encouraged the members of Agora to pursue their vision- and connect their passion with a social cause and conflict or social cause that speaks to their hearts. The symposium emphasized the importance of merging personal vision and concluded with Nelson Mandela’s quote:

“Vision without action is just a dream, action without vision just passes the time, and vision with action can change the world.”

 

Agora looks forward to future event between George Mason and Georgetown’s conflict programs as well as experts joining our discussions in the future.

The Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted

 by Pablo Ramirez

“Call me if you know anything else,” I remember asking my father as I walked by Southside frantically refreshing my Twitter feed. He answered back in a reassuring tone that told me I shouldn’t worry, that this apparent protest in Venezuela was probably nothing.

How wrong we would all be. Just a few minutes ago, while scrolling through my Twitter feed, I noticed an unusual influx of tweets coming from my friends in Venezuela. I had lived in the country from 2001 to 2009 and hadn’t been keeping up with the news over the past few months. They seemed to be mentioning some protest, and that pro-government forces were attacking them. I immediately opened up El Universal, a major Venezuelan newspaper, and saw nothing. Surely if such a reputable news source had said nothing then the claims by my friends were probably just what my father had insinuated: nothing to worry about, or just a case of the boy who cried wolf.

To my surprise, that was not the case. During the day, more tweets emerged with confusing information, but the news outlets remained silent. And in these past weeks, communication has only worsened.

On February 12^th, the protests in Caracas took a deadly turn as three people were killed after a peaceful protest the same day I called my father. In the coming days, the protests grew in size as students and members of the opposition group Table for Democratic Unity (MUD) called for an increased peaceful presence in the street in order to demand a change in the government, answers for the three dead, and even more recently as a result of the protests, to demand that the jailed protesters be freed. In a response, President Nicolás Maduro has orchestrated a country-wide media blackout; Colombian news agency NTN24 which was reporting from within the nation was removed by authorities, and the president issued a threat to not allow CNN en Español to report in the country only to later recant the threat. Because of this, most of the news and communications available has come through Twitter and other social media sources.

Last week Agora held an open discussion on freedom of speech, and immediately after the discussion I felt compelled to write about my perspective on the Venezuelan crisis, not only as someone who has been constantly interacted with the crisis through Twitter, but as someone who has been fascinated by how Twitter has shaped the message and course of the protests, as well as with what this can mean in escalatory conflict. Two recent examples are the social media trends at the height of the Arab Spring or even more recently in Ukraine.

As the protests developed after the events of 12F (February 12^th), I was in the dark as to what was going on. The vast majority of tweets that my friends sent out either read as confusing announcements of where the next rally would be held, frantic tweets in all caps about what sections of the city were hearing gunshots or noticing anti-protest tanks, or charged rhetoric calling for either violence or peace. In this regard, the lack of any news outlets proved how powerful a media blackout, even with Twitter, could be. I was thousands of miles away, and the only updates I was receiving were 140 character quibbles that I couldn’t confirm or prove as fact or deny as fiction. The people soon found ways around this. During the third night of protests, for example, many of my friends began retweeting a link to a livefeed that someone had set up on Ustream. With the link I was able to watch a blurry camera feed of Caracas, listening to shots and insults in Spanish. During the rallies, people began to take pictures of the protests, accompanied with descriptions of the scene and a time stamp to prove that the picture was real. Another friend retweeted an article on how to protect oneself from many methods that anti-riot police might use. I was able to see this all developing live. In the context of Venezuela and other movements, it is not hard to see how the Twittersphere played a role, however large or minor.

To hear about the Arab Spring and how social media helped it become so pervasive was great; to see your Twitter feed evolving alongside a social movement in real time is a treat.

Not to be overlooked is the fact that Twitter also affected the rhetoric and overall message coming out of Venezuela. Many users were able to share pictures showing ‘colectivos’ and members of the National Guard violently attacking unarmed student protestors, for example, allowing for the opposition to raise awareness of the human rights violations currently being committed by Maduro’s government. After the Venezuelan government issued an arrest warrant for opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez, he gave himself in and many Twitter users actively began sending out messages echoing Lopez’s calls for peace and nonviolence. A fascinating perspective of Twitter’s involvement during Lopez’s arrest when we look at the pictures taken and retweeted of him. I began to notice that, visually, many of these images framed Lopez as a quasi Christ-like figure; in the images below you can see he is either being kissed by women as he is being taken away, or adopting a crucifix-like pose while being taken away. In a predominantly Catholic country where not only is the religion a big part of the culture, but both Chavez and Maduro regularly refer to and use religious imagery rhetorically, this framing of Lopez’s arrest matters and shows how powerful Twitter and social media can be. In another example I noticed the fragmented reality of the rhetoric via Twitter, when a friend retweeted another picture (see below also), comparing Nazi Germany to Venezuela today. Considering that one of the labels Maduro has used to refer to the protestors is ‘fascists,’ it is very interesting that some sectors of the opposition would also decide to engage in such extreme rhetoric, especially when some sectors of the opposition have now turned to more violent means of protesting and retaliating at pro-government forces.

To say that social media has influence in many social movements is a fact we can all agree on; to see it happening in real time in front of you is an entirely different experience. It is scary and fascinating to know how powerful something like Twitter can be, and so when dealing with social protests and revolutions, or freedom of speech and the limitations placed on it, it is crucial to keep in mind how much social media can circumnavigate limitations while also fragment reality. In Agora’s last discussion we spoke about how, “Every perspective has merit. Every reader has an obligation.” I couldn’t agree more.

“Every perspective has merit. Every reader has an obligation.”

Agora held its first open forum/open floor event last Monday. And how refreshing and wonderful it was to be a part of such a lively conversation! Kick-starting a semester long sequence of conversations, the students, members, and pioneers of Agora gathered to discuss freedom of speech and political correctness and the future of Agora’s news and publication opportunities and journalistic role on campus and throughout the broader community. Under the microscope was a recent story involving a Rutgers student on the school newspaper’s editorial staff; an example of a potentially challenging situation that any student journalist or student-run organization could face. Students sat down in an attempt to understand the situation and their positionality as students amidst a hazy universe of right and wrong.

In the case of the Rutgers student, she received strong criticism and pressure, journalistic and structural, for her work and voice as a newspaper editor from affiliated organizations and the newspapers’ Board of Trustees further inhibited her ability to edit freely. Conversations emerged surrounding the ethical dilemma student & professional journalists have writing about contentious issues, issues Conflict Resolution majors know all too well. Hands flew up, and comments shot around the room regarding a universal set of journalistic values and do these exist? Can a universal set of values transcend culture? Where does courage belong in this hierarchy of values? What are your responsibilities as a journalist and social justice advocate/activist?

So, Ethics: How will we address both and any perspectives on an issue? Is that our job? Will certain opinions be censored? What are the broader goals of an organization tethered to the School for Conflict Analysis & Resolution and more broadly representing the SCAR community? All thoughts worthy of consideration and rumination.

The conversation then exploded out, quite naturally, to the wider news/broadcasting conglomerate and the 24-hour news cycle. With the unrelenting battery of news stories it can be rather difficult to stay knowledgeable and literate on all global events and developments. The line between humane and sensational rhetoric was drawn with many students addressing being politically correct for the mere sake of political correctness. Is that just dry neutrality? Does it detract from the story? Or does a bold unfiltered spilling of the facts allow for a more effective and realistic story? Do readers, listeners, and consumers also have an obligation to discern between ‘real’ news and entertainment?

Every perspective has merit. Every reader has an obligation. Students concluded it is just as much as it is the journalist’s obligation to produce a worthwhile and accurate story, as it is the reader’s requirement that he/she engage critically with the material. Writing of any kind is a method of ‘checking’ those who represent us, of describing, of informing, of engaging with society, and should be received seriously. Mentioned in the article as well as in the ensuing conversations, was the reminder that stifling this discourse, this ‘checking,’ can “cripple free speech and critical thought,” but also undermines the real, very serious, and painful experiences of groups that may rightly deserve condemnation, but should certainly receive illumination.

All media, beyond journalism, students agreed provides a relative account or reflection of public life with university campuses specifically considered to be “microcosms of society as a whole,” placing importance on the discourse of the student-body publications and their observations. Moreover, it is a journalist’s role to accurately depict and report on pertinent stories with freedom and responsibility. Not left out of the conversations was the student journalist’s unique relationship with their host University. Universities, state and private, do have control over what students are allowed to publish and disseminate. George Mason University’s free speech circle in front of the clock tower does not include an organization’s freedom to publish whatever content they please, particularly content harmful and distasteful to a certain group of which the University is liable.

But it was never any intention of Agora’s to do harm. Agora derived its name from the central ‘gathering place’ (s) of ancient Greece. And by implication, our 21^st century version builds on over 2,000 years of progress and attempts to become the political, spiritual, intellectual, artistic, dialogical, and analytical center of campus. The tenets of a space like this become Breathe. Listen. Think. Reflect. Develop. Where student’s attitudes are examined as are the students themselves. The question was raised: Is anything beyond criticism? The consensus was no. But it was in the unanimous agreement of the students that there is a place, time, and style of undue importance. So that constructive conversation, transformative potential, and truth are consecrated and enthroned in the most profound sense.

What a surreal conversation, truly. A warm thanks to all those who participated. We look forward to many more.

http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/16451/an-inside-look-at-the-fight-for-freedom-of-speech-

Agora’s Second Gathering!

Thanks to everyone who continues to attend the preliminary and foundational meetings of SCAR’s Agora! It truly is beautiful to be apart of something that was only a thought a few short months ago materialize and begin to discover a feel and flow, a shape, and direction(s). The project was founded on uncertainty, intentionally waiting for the growing membership to take the reins and determine its pace and scope. Agora will forever be indebted to these many inspiring pioneers who have decided to embrace Agora’s vision and help inaugurate the project throughout and within the George Mason University campus and peacebuilding community.

To those who have brought their whole hearts to Agora, we wholeheartedly thank you in return.