“How Do You Stand For PEACE in A World Filled With Chaos?”

In the July issue it becomes pretty clear how I feel about the politics of the day and the challenge to be a Buddhist during the Trump administration.

   “How Do You Stand For PEACE in A World Filled With Chaos?”                                                                       

by Kevin D’Arcy

What is it about 2018?  I have tried to distract myself from my personal grief with some good old fashioned mind numbing television. Unfortunately there is not a single fictional drama that can compete with the real life drama unfolding everyday in the news!

I literally feel the fatigue of the endless lies, deception and outright hostility pouring out of the White House. 

As the first American in my family, I am the proud son of South American immigrants! For this and so many other reasons my heart broke for the US Government sanctioned child abuse originating at our southern border. This is not hyperbole on my part.  Mental health professionals around the world are stating that separating children from their parents, as the Trump administration is doing, is nothing short of child abuse that may do irreparable harm to these poor children.   

   

I don’t recognize the country I am living in.  In many ways, I see the need, more than ever, for the September 23^rd Lion’s of Justice Festival. We need to provide an alternative for our youth to all the anger and hatred boiling over in our country. While I am committed to doing my part for 50K, I am well over the age of 39 so I need to do more than reach out to youth. I needed to not just chant for the happiness and safe return of the separated children to their parents. I needed to chant “Si Se Puede” in the streets of Los Angeles with other fellow Los Angelenos who felt the need to do something on the June 30^th nationwide day of protests. 

I understand now what others have been saying that it is not enough just to chant for things, you also have to take action!  I reached out to my friends and former co-workers in the labor movement and found out about the coalition of activist organizations and religious groups gathering for a rally at Los Angeles City Hall.

I skipped Men’s Division Saturday morning toso and hopped on the Redline Metro to the Civic Center station with thousands of others carrying home-made picket signs protesting ALL of the issues raging in our country today.  I was completely by myself in a crowd of strangers but felt like I was a part of something GREATER than myself.  I am normally a behind the scenes kind of guy. I am not “Mr. Protester’ but the sheer inhumanity of separating brown babies from their families was hitting too close to home for me to sit on my couch and stay silent on the subject.

From 11am to 2 pm, I listened to John Legend sing to the crowd; I was uplifted by Kamala Harris’ speech and inspired by the words of Maxine Waters. Laverne Cox, Laura Dern, Gavin Newsom and the incomparable CHER reminded me that we are all in this together.  I learned that standing for PEACE is not a passive activity. Peaceful protests takes on many forms from marching on city hall or the nation’s capitol, to calling your political representatives, to getting out and VOTING in November 2018. 

   

I have spent so much of June 30^th reflecting on not only how crazy things are in this country and in this world right now, but on how important it is to take a stand and do something to make your voice be heard and perhaps in some small way make the world a better place. 

As this  4^th of July approaches, I choose to celebrate being the son of immigrants and reflect on the freedom I have as a Gay, Buddhist, American born male and never take the freedom I have for granted.Δ