Yesterday in school, a teacher based from the City of Vancouver, Canada conducted the second hour of class with us. It wasn’t really related to any of our subjects especially Physics, which we were supposed to have during the second class. Instead, we talked about something else, something which is closely related to Values, something that is not quiet present on earth right now, and that is peace.

She gave us this statement to ponder our thoughts about:

The use of violence is justified in order to bring about peace.

She then gave us a few minutes to choose a position we’ll be going to defend, either strongly agreeing to the statement, agree, disagree or strongly disagree to the given statement above. I choose to disagree only for some reason that I will explain below. One thing that has struck me during the discussion was the opinion of my other classmates who choose to go the violent way, where there have even been a couple of people strongly agreeing to the use of violence in order to gain peace.

But does the use of violence really brings peace? Or not? That’s what I’ll gonna tackle here, with you.

First, I’d like to narrate to you what my other classmates idea is about the statement. Especially those who answered agree and strongly agree. They see the use of violence as inevitable, according to them war cannot be avoided and it’s happening everywhere on earth. If the other position who is aiming for peace, they will end up death or go to their weapons and fight instead. So, there’s really no other way to go.

While at the other hand, I believe (and as well as the teacher and a minority of the class) that if there’s the will then of course, there’s a way. There are many hundreds of options to choose from on how to stop a fight. It’s just that both parties need to agree on something and stop the fight. In some cases there might be one party that does not want to play along which often happens to be the violent one, what should the other side do? Reach to their guns or what?

There’s always another way out of everything, it’s just that there is a need of a third party to get a certain problem solved. But how do problems often evolve into a war?

The teacher during that hour asked two of my classmates to go to the front and do a little role play, where the scenario was the following given: The boy (Jonathan) should act like he a rubrics cube of the girl (Imee) and then ask sorry. She just let the two play along the way the want and to her surprise the issue has been immediately resolved. Which in real life ain’t be the cast in most occasions.

She then asked the two to role play as if they are mad at each other and start insulting each other (which makes the problem grow) and eventually contact their respective friends and gossip to them what has happened (which makes it an even bigger problem now). After a few moments when both parties choose their friends, she explained. “This is what is happening to some countries. Small issues become bigger ones, just because people take stands and hit each other personally instead of reconciling to each other, it often outbreaks a war between nations or even within a country just like what is happening here in Mindanao.”

In times like this there is often the need of a third party which guides them through the process of reconciling and bring about peace. It can take some years and yes, it’s not that easy to do. You may thing that the war was over here in Mindanao for a couple of years, but now it is starting again. This conflict process takes a long long time and the participation of both sides.

But what is peace anyway? Others see peace as love and harmony, the presence of trust and unity between people. While others see peace in a way of being comfortable with the people around you and not feeling any hatred towards each other at all. What do I think about peace?

Well, all of our statements given during the discussion have been pretty much similar, but I decided not to have that long statement go with me but went for a shorter, straight one. Which goes:

Peace is present in the absence of violence.

What do you think about peace? What is your view on the happenings here in Mindanao? Any idea how we could achieve peace in our own country? In the world? Elsewhere? Feel free to comment and share your ideas, or write a post which is even much better and appreciated to continue the discussion about peace with your friends and readers.

We’ll be tagging a few bloggers for this one: Ayei * Gel * Patrik * Jojo * Hikari * Iway * Ann *

If you are not on the tag list, feel free to post your opinion about it in a comment here or as a blog post, we will include you in our follow up article. Also, feel free to tag other people.