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SGI News: Global activities for peace, education and culture

Youth Nonviolence Conference

photo Making a point in the closing plenary session  [Hiro Sakurai]

To commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. Day, the fifth Annual Youth Nonviolence Conference was held on January 21 at the SGI-USA Culture Center in New York, on the theme "Human Security Is (Not) Da Bomb! A New Global Vision."

The event was co-organized by The Temple of Understanding, SGI-USA and Groundwork, Inc., and attracted 160 participants from all over New York City. The day consisted of a plenary session, performances and workshops.

The plenary session featured two speakers, Kathleen Sullivan, disarmament education consultant to the UN, and Gyude Moore, a former refugee from Liberia who is now a graduate student at Georgetown University. Dr. Sullivan spoke of the need for a true revolution in value, from being things-oriented to person-oriented. She also stressed the need to redirect government spending from the military budget to education, health, etc. Mr. Moore pointed out that the more is spent on military expenses, the less secure the world becomes. He also reminded the youth participants that sometimes it is necessary to be unrealistic in order to bring about change. Youth should not accept the unjust principles of society.

A number of group workshops were held throughout the day. These included ones on the nonviolent principles of Martin Luther King Jr., the SGI-USA "Victory Over Violence" (VOV) program and youth and nuclear disarmament.

The VOV workshop focused on the fact that active violence such as war or violence starts from individual passive violence such as hatred and negative emotion, and that if we keep silent and overlook violence around ourselves, this is also a type of passive violence. In the disarmament workshop, aimed at enabling participants to take joy in finding their power to constructively respond to nuclear proliferation, there was discussion on the important role creativity plays in achieving peace.

Participants commented that they were happy to know that others shared the same belief in peace and that Martin Luther King Jr. Day is not a day-off to take a rest, but a day-on to work for peace and nonviolence.

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