The Gandhi-King Community

For Global Peace with Social Justice in a Sustainable Environment

This short article is about a possible social vision.
The vision is that different people can live together in a dynamic social harmony.
I think and believe that each and every one of us has the right to live their private life as they want, as long as they don’t harm others.
Each and every one of us can imagine how they would feel if something they enjoy doing (and doesn’t harm others) was forbidden. Imagine that for a moment.
This is the beginning (but not the end) of building a society that would be nice and fun to live in. To build such society we need to find the dynamic balance between equal opportunities and recognizing (and excepting) the different (in abilities and wills) between people.
This will allow the difference between people to co-exist without causing conflicts and will allow us to make some social reforms that are much needed.
I think that the more we are aware to ourselves and the surround us, the more we realize that many of the things that bother us are caused by us and by our actions and what we allow others (sometimes by our silence) to do. This is the reason that I believe that we can change (and even better - improve) the things that bother us.
Instead of just being afraid from changes, we better check if the fear is good and keeps us from making mistakes, or the fear is bad and comes from a fixed frame of mind.
In addition, in order to allow the changes to take place, we need to work in many levels, beginning from the individual action (and the group) and all the way to the public arena and the political sphere.
If we’ll decide that we want to deal with the causes of the problems (and not just with the results) and we’ll thinks of the consequences of the different ways to take action, we’ll be able to make the improvements.
In order to achieve social harmony we have to protect the individual from majority tyranny and we also have to protect society from dangerous individuals and groups.
The discourse between the different people and groups should be based on real information, tolerance and respect for the other as well as for ourselves.
If we’ll know, as a society and as individuals, to evaluate others according to what they say and do, we can set the foundation for basic equality. By basic equality I mean an equality that is not affected by political and social opinions, beliefs and religion, gender, nationality, ethnic group, etc. (each of us can think of other factors that can create unjustified discrimination and bias). However, it is very important to me in this point to emphasize that I’m not trying to describe an ideal society, because I don’t believe in that. I think that the different utopian societies are not possible in real life, because they show a static society when life in real is dynamic with constant changes.
In addition, I’m not looking for a society in which all people are the same, because I think that no two people are the same.
I think that we can take from each culture the good parts and this way each of us can keep their heritage. This will give us the opportunity to combine the different cultures together, where possible. This way we can also find the balance between the different beliefs in our society.
In addition, I’m not suggesting that we can (or should) agree on everything all the time, but simply trying to say that in many cases it is possible, if we really want to give it a chance. I don’t think that a collision between societies (cultures, or civilizations…) is the only possible future, because in the end it all comes down to people. In many areas even I predict collisions, but I think that we can minimize their affect if we’ll be responsible even when we fight for our rights, opinions and beliefs.
The way we chose to take our actions is very important because when we choose only the violence way we create the feeling that only violence matters and we also create a legacy and atmosphere of violence.
We can reduce the level of violence if we look at every event with proportions, truth and morality. Maybe it won’t be easy, but it’s possible and depends also on each and every one of us and the way we choose to live our life.
Instead of just grouching, lets try to improve the things that bother us.

Thank you for reading, Asaf.

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Comment by Auldridge Chibbwalu on February 4, 2011 at 10:21am
Great article, we really need it and people share realize how interdependent we are, and use everything within the power to do something for their private and public lives... All the best Asaf that is great continue inspiring us with such postive thinking articles
Comment by Ashni Mohnot on December 11, 2009 at 3:01pm
Nice post, Asaf. Thanks for taking the time to write out and share your thoughts with members of this community!
Comment by Aunty Kamala on September 8, 2009 at 9:53am
Interdependence is such a thing...is there really private life?
Aunty Kamala

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