Medicine for the Culture of War

The desperation to "fight" for peace contains the assumption that it must be difficult to overcome tremendous obstacles, that some superhuman, extraordinary effort is required of us. Is that really true?

Drop in for one or seven days of online conversation about effective peacebuilding.

9 - 9:40 AM PDT, Sept. 21 - 27, 2024

No Fee

To register, contact David via form in sidebar >>> 

for zoom link and more information.

Please log in early, for any or all of the six days of sharing about our personal response to the culture of war.  The first item each day will be a short orientation to the topic and highlights of prior group sharing. We will then present a specific question and review ways to share effectively and safely before breaking into small groups. Before closing, exciting ideas and feelings will have time to circulate.  

This conference is an offering of David Hazen, an 80-years-young decorated veteran peace activist and recovering violent person who offers a novel, positive reframing of the peacebuilders task:

“My personal discovery is that the relaxation of effort is the first order of business, that changing our focus from "doing" to "being" has mind-blowing consequences. For example, peacebuilding sometimes requires that we be the peace, but being peace always compels us to do the peacebuilding.”

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Using a community learning model, we will share our personal thoughts in small breakout groups about questions such as these:

• What is the Culture of War? 
• How much are we deeply entangled within it?  
• What is the role of the individual in the transition from a culture of war to a culture of peace? 
• What does it mean to "win without fighting?"
• Violence has long been recognized as a public health problem of epidemic proportions. Is it useful to define military violence as an addictive behavioral disease? 
• What is the medicine, the treatment, for this addiction? When is the best time for treatment?
• How would strategies for peacebuilding change if acts of military violence were defined as a contagious, psychogenic behavioral illness called Violence Dependency or Domination Disorder? 

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Consider this hypothesis of

Violence Dependency: 

Violence Dependency (domination disorder) is the compulsively repeated alteration of brain chemistry through stress in order to produce temporary relief from frustration, grief, or pain quickly without changing the thoughts or behavior that cause these negative feelings. 

Violence dependency is a treatable disease that can be held in remission through a basic lifestyle change.