Caitlin: Hi, everyone, and welcome to our second lecture
here in module five.
Today, we are talking all about non-violent resistance,
peaceful protesting,
and examples of each from our international community.
Before we get started, I just wanted to emphasize
that this lecture is not similar to our previous lectures
in the sense that material in this lecture
is not reflective of our course text.
Up until this point,
I've decided to use our lecture space as a moment for me
to highlight the most important parts of our text
to build upon our learning
and reaching our learning objectives.
But I did feel that the material
in this lecture was absolutely critical
to any public health advocacy based course.
In the title of this lecture, we go over two very big terms.
The first is non-violent resistance,
and the next is peaceful protesting.
A great definition of non-violent resistance
was said by Martin Luther King Jr.
He said that non-violent resistance
and true non-violent resistance
is not unrealistic submission to evil power.
It is rather a courageous confrontation of evil
by the power of love, in the faith that is better
to be in the recipient of violence than the inflicter of it,
since the latter only multiplies the existence
of violence and bitterness in the universe,
while the former may develop a sense
of shame in the opponent,
and thereby bring about a transformation
and change of heart.
Next, peaceful protesting.
This would be protesting that is expressing our voices
and opinions in a way that is not violence
and in accordance with laws, policies,
constitutional rights, and ordinances.
Non-peaceful protesting would be the exact opposite, right?
So that would be acts of violence
and protesting in a way that is not in accordance
with laws, policies, constitutional rights, or ordinances.
When we're talking about non-violent resistance
and peaceful protesting,
I'm sure that many individuals come to mind,
and some of those individuals may be on this slide.
I have here Martin Luther King Jr.,
Gandhi, and Greta Thunberg.
I would argue that these three champions
of non-violent resistance and protestors
can be labeled as activists,
but I would also categorize them under advocacy.
And there's a distinction between activism
and advocacy work.
While they're very similar in terms of having a similar goal
of an intended positive change or outcome
and working towards health equity,
there are some distinctions.
We can view an activist as a person
who is looking to make a change in their society,
whether that be a political change,
social change, or reform,
and that's usually by garnering attention for the cause.
How I like to view advocacy work is applied activism,
where we are, yes, garnering attention
in support to an issue or a public health problem,
but we also are supporting that with intentions
to make a change through use of a campaign or a plan
for policy reform and overall change.
Quickly, I'm just going to give a brief summary
of these three individuals.
For anyone who wants to learn more,
I highly encourage you to do some research on your own.
I just wanted to provide
a little bit of foundation and basis,
as we will be discussing Martin Luther King Jr.,
Gandhi, and Greta later in this lecture.
First, I'm gonna quickly talk about Martin Luther King Jr.
Born in 1929, I would consider
Noble Peace Prize winner Martin Luther King Jr.
to be one of the most powerful activists
and advocates for civil rights for people of color
and for dismantling racial inequality.
Not only was Martin Luther King Jr. a activist for change
but a true advocate for civil rights,
and so much of his work, such as the March on Washington,
has led to the inception
of many different legislative changes
that have changed and continue to change
the lives of millions.
I would be very remiss not to mention Gandhi
in a notable champions of non-violent resistance lecture.
Gandhi has been an inspiration
for billions across the world
for his acts of civil disobedience and peaceful protesting.
When you think of non-violent resistance,
I would venture to guess that Gandhi came to mind.
Best known for his work in social
and political reform in India,
Gandhi serves as a great recognition
of the power of non-violence resistance.
Lastly, I'm going to go to our current generation
and talk a little bit about Greta Thunberg,
an international environmental activist.
I first heard about Greta when I was in high school
when there was a news article about a Swedish girl
who was protesting going to school
until Swedish Parliament made a change
to address climate change.
Since then, Greta has become an icon
in environmental activism and continues to petition
and boycott school until some areas
of Swedish Parliament address climate change.
She's worked with countless international agencies
pleading for climate change attention
and has also been at the front
of many different peaceful protests
to advocate for climate change control.
I will highlight that I was very eager and very adamant
on having Greta be a guest speaker for this course,
but unfortunately, I was very like-minded
to thousands of other persons who reached out,
and I will say this is a personal goal of mine
to eventually be able to talk to Greta Thunberg
and share some of her thoughts and ideas with this class.
Given the sake of time,
I cannot go into detail for all of these examples,
but I did wanna highlight a few famous examples
of non-violent resistance and peaceful protesting
leading to change.
The first would be the Salt March led by Gandhi.
In the 1930s, India was under British control,
and this manifests in many different capacities,
including salt consumption and salt trade.
Back in the '30s in India,
Indians were not allowed to purchase salt from each other.
They had to go to Great Britain trading companies.
Because of this, Gandhi decided that his march
and his act of civil disobedience would be around salt.
So for over 200 miles,
Gandhi and dozens of followers traveled to the coast,
where their intention was to act in civil disobedience,
and themselves as Indian citizens
would be producing the salt.
However, police were involved, Gandhi was arrested,
but their act of this protest and march for over 200 miles
led to Gandhi becoming a huge figure in political change
and eventually the independence of India from Britain.
Next, I wanna talk about the Black Lives Matter movement.
Black Lives Matter movement started back in 2013
after the murder of Trayvon Martin
and the acquittal of his murderer.
Since then, they have gone international with protests
for the dismantling of racial inequality and systemic racism
and promoting a better life for black individuals
throughout different communities in the United States
and extending internationally.
Black Lives Matter has become a true pillar
of an example of effective advocacy and activism
in the sense that their foundation works for policy change
in addition to providing an outlet for peaceful protesting.
This week, you'll notice I had sent out an email
in regards to Black Lives Matter
in a very powerful New York Times article
that highlighted how the Black Lives Matter campaign
has been absorbed by the US population
and how that has led to thousands of protests
and hundreds of thousands of individuals
partaking in these protests,
leading to different changes in communities.
Another really famous example
is the March on Washington in 1963
led by Martin Luther King Jr.
This is the gathering of over a hundred thousand persons
working to dismantle racial inequality
back in the civil rights movement in the '60s.
This is where Martin Luther King Jr.
delivered his famous I Have a Dream speech
that we probably all learned about
in primary and middle school.
This was a really big turning point in the United States
in terms of the civil rights movement
and has led to legislative changes
that have allowed for a continuation of racial equality
and again changing the lives of millions
and setting the foundation for thousands
of other activism and advocacy work
to continue to dismantle racial inequality
and systemic racism here in the United States.
Another really great example
of non-violent resistance and peaceful protesting
for human rights and political freedom
is the Tiananmen Square protest back in China.
I would highly encourage individuals
to learn more about this,
as this was a really big turning point
in international resistance and peaceful protesting.
Although, the end of this protest was very sad.
Another really interesting example
of non-violent resistance and peaceful protesting
that I would encourage everyone
to do a little bit more research on
would be the occupation of Alcatraz.
This was where close to a hundred indigenous tribal members
occupied the island of Alcatraz
to protest the use of US government on indigenous lands.
While this was not a 100% effective,
this was the inception point
to hundreds of different campaigns
and activist movements and advocacy work
to protect indigenous lands from US government use.
This is a really relevant and important act of advocacy
and non-violent resistance.
And again, I highly encourage curious minds
to learn a little bit more about this piece of history
that is not always talked about.
Lastly, I wanted to take a moment to talk
about a current act of non-violent resistance
and peaceful protesting,
and that is the 2017 to current women rights marches
and protests that are going on throughout the United States.
After the overturn of Roe v. Wade,
we have seen an uptick
in reproductive autonomy rights protests
going throughout the entire United States.
This is something that is a really big issue
in public health and public health policy right now
and something that I anticipate many of you will touch upon
in your campaign for advocacy change.
And this concludes this lecture in module five.
I just wanted to take a moment
to provide some real-life application
to the principles in this lecture
in terms of non-violent resistance and peaceful protesting
and how that pertains to this course.
These demonstrations
and the demonstrations from slides 5 to 10
all were the foundation for many different policy changes,
policy reform, and current changes to our legislator.
If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out.
As I mentioned earlier,
I just provided a brief overview of these examples,
and I very much encourage all of you
to take some time independently
to learn more about each of these acts of activism,
to learn more and really broaden your horizons
in terms of issues in public health
that may not be in your scope
but are still very important and relevant
to achieving health equity for our communities.