An exciting new cross-media project called Everyday Rebellion has launched its Advent Calender of Nonviolent Struggle, in which Srdja Popovic will offer a short tip for activists every day until Christmas.

The video above is about the role of humor in nonviolent action. Others address the importance of having numbers and an appealing vision for the future to success in nonviolent struggle, among many other topics. (To watch and share these tips as they are posted, follow the project’s YouTube channel.)

As we’ve mentioned many times before, Popovic was one of the leaders of Otpor, the nonviolent movement that brought down Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic in 2000, and now runs the Center for Applied Nonviolent Action and Strategies (CANVAS) in Belgrade.

To my surprise and delight, this month he was also named, along with several other important players in the Arab Spring, at the top (#1) of Foreign Policy’s Top 100 Global Thinkers list—beating out President Obama, who came in at #11. This would have been unthinkable last year and shows that nonviolence is finally starting to get its due among more mainstream foreign policy analysts and political scientists, although we still have a long way to go.

A couple weeks ago I met with Arash and Arman Riahi, the filmmakers behind Everyday Rebellion. They filmed a long conversation between Popovic, Andy Bichlbaum of the Yes Men and myself about the Occupy movement and activism more generally.

The following day, the film crew came over to our apartment and interviewed Bryan Farrell and I about this site for the documentary Everyday Rebellion, which is only one aspect of their ambitious project, and filmed a series of tips for activists that will debut in 2012. In an email interview, Arman Riahi described the project as a:

cinema and television documentary and a web platform about non-violent forms of protest and civil disobedience during the 21st century… seen not only through the current Arab and Iranian uprisings, but also through former successful and less successful revolts and new movements like Occupy Wall Street.

In addition to the documentary, Arman told me that Everyday Rebellion plans on developing an extensive website that will include, among many other things, personal stories about nonviolent resistance:

artistic works that have been or are banned… and interactive tools like an app with tips and tricks for the daily fight or educational games for younger audiences to learn in a playful way about different nonviolent methods.

For the Riahi brothers this is more than just another project. They were born in Iran and their family fled the country for Austria after the Islamic Revolution. “We feel it’s a necessity for us to use our craft to bring this project to life in order to support suppressed people,” Arman explains.

From our conversations with them, Everyday Rebellion looks to be an important resource for all of us, and we will continue to blog about the project as it develops over the coming months.

When a country is shaken by violence, most people expect it to react in kind with force. We’re certainly reminded of that now, as we in the US approach the tenth anniversaries, respectively, of the 9/11 attacks and the hot-on-the-heels launching of the War on Terror. So what about the most recent act of terrorism in the news—Anders Behring Breivik’s rampage in Norway?

I was struck by a comment left here at Waging Nonviolence the other day by Susanne Kromberg, who wrote, “I am a Norwegian who is vainly trying to get The New York Times to cover the passive resistance that has sprung up in Norway as Norwegians under good leadership decide to demonstrate that only love is powerful enough to overcome hatred.” I didn’t know Susanne personally, but I wrote to her and asked to hear more.

Susanne, it turns out, is a Quaker (and Quaker blogger) currently living in Seattle, where she’s a hospital chaplain. As a way of coping with the attacks on her home from far away, she explained to me, she has been collecting news of how people have been reacting to Breivik’s atrocities in Norway, much of which has been ignored in the US media. Instead, the focus of American journalists has been on how the country has supposedly “reignited” its immigration debate and has been “reassessing” its relatively measured policing policy—implying that things are moving in a bellicose direction. Yet, as Susanne wrote in a poignant letter to the New York Times Public Editor:

I have read more stories than I care to about “innocent”, “idyllic” and “naïve” Norway in the last week. What evidence is there to support that opinion?

My best guess is that any response that doesn’t involve increased security measures and weaponry seems naïve to [reporter Michael] Schwirtz. He appears not to recognize that people can be thoughtful as they choose another strategy to combat violence.

While Susanne hasn’t yet had time to collect all the evidence she’s been gathering into a single piece of writing, she has been continually posting it in Facebook status updates. In the spirit of our recent “Texting from Madison” series, I thought I’d share (selected, but uncensored and unaltered) some of her recent posts to give a sense of the courageously nonviolent responses to this attack mounted by her fellow Norwegians:

July 22

07:39 terrorism finds its way to Norway. apparent car bomb blew up outside prime minister’s office building damaging bottom three floors. PM is safe, no word yet on how many others dead or wounded. aauugh.

11:36 right now the mayor of oslo is saying we’re not going to allow fear to take a hold, because then we would have handed the victory to the terrorists.

11:38 prime minister now saying the same thing. violence will not frighten us and we will not allow anyone to try to intimidate us out of legal political activity

11:39 Muslim leaders in Norway swiftly condemned the attacks. “This is our homeland, this is my homeland; I condemn these attacks and the Islamic Council of Norway condemns these attacks, whoever is behind them,” said Mehtab Afsar, secretary general of the Islamic Council of Norway.

12:58 Norway made a conscious decision not to heighten the protection for politicians and other public figures after attacks elsewhere in Scandinavia. “We see it as a key political value in itself not to have that kind of militarized society,” says Iver Neumann, research fellow at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI).. “Whether we can still afford such an open society, is now up for debate.” Yes, Norway is at a fork in the road. I hope we don’t change much.

14:07 Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg: “Our answer is more democracy, more openness to show that we will not be stopped by this kind of violence. At the same time we shouldn’t be naive, we should understand that violence can attack our society – we’ve seen that today.”

July 23

18:54 on a per capita basis, Norway lost twice as many people as the USA did on 9/11, according to a story in The Atlantic.

July 24 

09:14 I have seen more grown men cry on Norwegian TV the last three days than in my entire life up to now. That includes the King of Norway and Prime Minister.

09:15 so grateful that they model the appropriate behavior: grief, not vengeance.

11:43 “On Monday the perpetrator of the horrific attack on innocent Norwegian citizens will be given the opportunity to explain his actions in an open court. He has written in his “manifesto” that he will use the courtroom as a propaganda tool… Close the doors to the hearing. He wants to have open doors so that the recording can then be shown on TV stations worldwide.” from the event “Steng doerene.”

15:39 “If one man can create that much hate, you can only imagine how much love we as a togetherness can create.” Stine Renate Håheim, survivor from Utoeya, in an interview on CNN

July 25

01:30 Wow. We learned today that Crown Princess Mette-Marit’s step-brother was one of those who was killed on Utøya (he worked as security officer and was among the first to be killed). It blows my mind that the Royal family, with the media’s help, chose not to reveal this information until today. I’m thinking they wanted to ensure that no victims be singled out as “special” lest it detract from national mourning.

July 26

16:09 Crown Prince Haakon and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jonas Gahr Støre at a mosque in Oslo to express their sadness that Muslims were erroneously blamed for the attacks on Friday. The imam confessed that he also made the same wrong assumption. The Lutheran bishop of Oslo, Ole Christian Kvarme also participated.

16:12 I should point out that they apologized on behalf of everyone who made that mistake – Norwegian authorities did not themselves entertain any theories despite media pressure to theorize.

22:00 All 7 political parties and their youth groups have been flooded with new members this past week – all of them, across the entire political spectrum in Norway.

22:33 A Facebook poll in Norway reveals that 80% oppose the death penalty. I wish I had comparison numbers, but my guess is that opposition to the death penalty has increased after events on 22.7.2011.

22:37 ‎10,000 Norwegians have joined a Facebook support group for the killer’s mother, acknowledging that she is suffering too, encouraging her to accept the love we offer.
next day at 07:49 Update: 38,000 have joined

23:44 I cried watching a video snippet of Norwegians gathered at the Islamic Mission Mosque in Oslo to remember the Norwegians who died last Friday. The imam and those interviewed talked about how proud they were to be Norwegian. Notice how many times I said “Norwegian”? The emphasis was on this shared identity.

July 27

20:09 The Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation has decided not to provide coverage of the upcoming Norwegian Rifle Championship (July 30 – August 6).

20:23 I am SOOO grateful to the Crown Prince, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Lutheran Bishop for going the World Islamic Mission Mosque for a memorial event yesterday!

July 28

08:40 Opponents of a multi-faith center at Stiklestad have dropped their objections.

08:45 Askøy Mayor Knut Hanselmann (The Progressive Party, the political party that opposes immigration to Norway) says the consequence of the terror attacks must be that Progressives stop claiming that immigration destroys Norwegian culture. Instead, they will focus on use of resources.

09:00 The Hacker group Anonymous is encouraging people to download Anders Behring Breivik’s manifesto, make playful editorial changes and publish the altered version. They hope that, in the end, no-one will know what the original manifesto said – and prevent ABB’s manifesto from becoming the permanent legacy he was hoping to create. (Dagbladet 28.7.2011) I confess to having mixed feelings about this proposal, but finally come down on the side of opposing making changes – that would be censorship and is not compatible with democracy.

19:08 I have been wondering what it is like for Norwegian soldiers bombing Libya and soldiering in Afghanistan to hear our Prime Minister and other Norwegians going crazy over how the only way to respond to violence is with love. Ahem.

23:01 Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg just said in an interview that one of the things that gives him joy now is that he sees people hugging each other everywhere he goes.

23:23 Life is beginning to return to a regular rythm in Norway (not “normal”). Just listened to a fascinating discussion on whether Norwegians would have chosen the route of love and civility in response to hatred if the killings had been done by a Muslim. The responses varied, but everyone agreed that we were lucky not to have been tested in that way.

July 29

13:23 There’s a facebook page in support of the Norwegian killer’s lawyer, commending him for serving the principles of democracy by ensuring his legal rights are honored: 46,000 supporters. Then there’s a facebook page for those who don’t think any lawyer should agree to represent the killer: 7 supporters.

July 30

07:17 Norway is bringing its F-16s home. No more bombing Libya. Apparently the decision was announced to the press on 7/22, before the killings, but it didn’t make it into the papers because everyone’s attention was on the killings. The reason given was “Mission accomplished” – Gaddafi’s ability to haarm the civilian population is dramatically reduced.

July 31

14:48 Secondly, [Verdens Gang] has been doing the “aren’t Norwegians wonderfully loving” coverage for 10 days. After 10 days, they do an “aren’t Norwegians bigots?” story. How about we do more nuanced writing all along, rather than alternating between worshiping and reviling people. No-one is all hero (not even Gandhi or MLK), no-one is all villain (not even ABB).

14:58 Despite the crisis in Norway last week, Norwegians sustained or may even have increased donations to relief agencies that support those who are starving in Somalia and elsewhere in the Horn of Africa.

18:51 Anders Behring Breivik’s father has said he wishes his son had committed suicide. His mother does not wish to see him. A facebook group has sprung up in support of the parents. It has 70,000 members.

19:45 Although some Norwegian Muslims were harrassed in Oslo last Friday (before everyone knew that the terrorist is a Norwegian), many Muslims now say that “ethnic Norwegians” are going out of their way to smile, acknowledge, engage, encourage.

20:05 Ole Jørgen Anfindsen, right wing blogger and Islam critic, says the anti-Muslim rhetoric that pre-dates 7/22 is now “unusable” and he acknowledges that the hard line that he and his colleagues took could contribute to “crazy people running amuck”.

20:11 Grocery store chain Coop has stopped selling violent computer games as a gesture of respect to those whose loved ones died on 7/22.

22:06 NRK tv reports on a poll showing that 26% have a more positive view of multiculturalism now, 9.3% more negative, 49.1% are unchanged. Researchers caution against reading too much into it, as many may just be trying to distance themselves from Ander Breivik’s actions.

August 4

07:20 Erna Solberg, leader of Hoeyre (Conservative, pro-Israel party) says attitudes towards Muslims in recent years are reminiscent of the ways Jews were treated in the 1930s.

07:25 I: Whenever Anders Behring Breivik’s picture appears on the front page of a newspaper, ordinary customers are increasingly turning the papers around in the displays, so his face is hidden. Journalists and editors are pleading with people not to do that, as they consider it a form of censorship.

II: But regular people don’t think ABB should be rewardedfor his acts by having his pictures everywhere, and they want survivors of the trauma to be free to enter public spaces without seeing the face of the killer.

This short video by Voice of America looks at “People Power: The Game of Civil Resistance,” a video game that has just been released by York-Zimmerman. The TV and film company, which has also produced several important documentaries on nonviolent action, including Bringing Down a Dictator, about Otpor and the student-led movement that brought Slobodan Milosevic down in 2000:

…hired [Optor leader Ivan] Marovic to help create video games – that show non-violent strategies to help remove oppressive governments.  The second, and most recent game is “People Power – The Game of Civil Resistance.”  It contains fictional scenarios in which the leader of a non-violent movement uses tactics such as street protests, strikes and boycotts.  Speaking from Belgrade, Serbia, Marovic said people who play the game are likely to be young and educated.

“The game allows you to see all the complexities of a political struggle, and to kind of focus on all the nuances, and all the details that are necessary, in order to make the right move,” he said.

When I attended the Fletcher Summer Institute last year I had the opportunity to try the game out before it hit the market and look forward to spending more time with it now that it’s finally out.

The game can only be downloaded online at peoplepowergame.com and is reasonably priced at $10.

And if you can’t afford that price and would like the game for educational purposes, you can contact the company and get a copy for free. Currently it’s only available in English, but it’ll soon be available in Arabic, Farsi, Russian and Spanish.

The game was released in June 2010 just in time for the FIFA World Cup in South Africa. Since its inception, it has been hailed by critics, fans and players as a masterly attempt to create new discourses and open doors around the contentious issues of gender violence, racial stereotyping and fair team play.

Endorsed by Cameroonian football star Samuel Eto’o, Breakaway is the first narrative-driven interactive online game of its kind and is currently being distributed free around the world via the internet and youth organizations.

[...]

Breakaway is premised on the ideal of ‘fair play’, and the player is forced to make choices based on a host of situations before he or she is allowed to advance in the game.

[...]

Less than six months after its release, Breakaway is making monumental progress. The game’s designers have already recorded over a thousand registered users from 95 different countries.

The game can be played for free here, so check it out and spread the word.

I was therefore taken aback—and pleasantly surprised—to have my credentials as a practitioner of non-violence called into question during a debate with the NRA’s Outreach Director in late February of this year.

The audience was not our typical group of American college students.  This time, our debate was occurring in front of a group of British high school students visiting Washington.  Specifically, these were 16-19 year-olds from Shrewsbury Sixth Form College and Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College in Darlington.

When the Q&A eventually began, their professor/chaperone stated outright that my opponent would likely be getting most of the questions, and encouraged the students to save some for me.  Still, I was caught quite off-guard when a young man stood up and asked me if I thought it was appropriate to shoot an intruder in my home.  It was clear from his tone that he did not think it was appropriate.

I told him that I’d likely never find out, because I do not keep a firearm in my home and would never consider doing so—particularly given the fact that my wife and I now have children.  That said, I added, I have no problem with another American citizen keeping a firearm in his/her home for self-defense and using it if absolutely necessary.  The NRA’s outreach director then chimed in and said he was happy to hear me say that.  He, of course, had zero problems with blowing a home intruder away.

Another young Brit who was sitting in the audience that day later summed up the students’ reaction in a blog:

We were surprised to hear that Ladd Everitt of [the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence] saw shooting intruders in his home as an acceptable option … I’m not unrealistic, and I know that people’s instincts are to protect themselves and their loved ones.  But when a weapon is introduced, the situation is more likely to become fatal—something [he] told us in [his] talk.  I think the worry for me personally was that people would become judge, jury and executioner in these situations.  While I agree that it is fair to protect yourself, I don’t agree that you can unnecessarily injure or kill someone.  This becomes a whole lot easier when guns are involved, and that is why we see groups like [his] as so important.

As I headed home after the debate that day, I felt a strange combination of emotions:  Disappointment in myself that I had somehow let these students down, and excitement (and even inspiration) regarding their attitudes toward nonviolence.  Being an American, I was stunned.  You see, here we embrace “justified violence” from sea to shining sea, whether it’s the guy in Georgia who wants to carry a loaded handgun into an airport or the Hollywood producer behind “Shoot ‘Em Up.”

I wondered why these British students embraced the principles of nonviolence so readily and confidently.  In all my years speaking to American students, I’d never seen anything like it.  Is it simply because—whatever their concerns about self-defense—they understand that the gun death rate is 30 times lower in their country than in the United States?  [I mean, let’s face it, if an armed society was a polite society, the U.S. wouldn’t have higher homicide and gun death rates than virtually every other industrialized democracy on the planet.]

Or is it something more?  Don’t these kids play the same video games, watch the same movies (think “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels”) and listen to the same music that our kids do?

I can’t claim that I’ve quite sorted it all out yet, but I will say that the experience filled me with a profound sense of hope that is still resonating with me now, months later.

I was reminded of his words a few weeks back.  I was sitting in my dining room, talking to my friend Jeremy and his family about my work at the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence.  We were discussing the gun lobby’s current campaign to allow individuals to carry loaded handguns in public spaces across America—churches, parks, schools, government buildings, child day care centers, metro transportation, airports, etc.—when Jeremy’s nine year-old son Colin piped in.

“There are people who think you can prevent violence with guns?” he asked.

“That’s right,” we told him.

“Cuckoo,” Colin replied, tracing rings around his ear with his finger.

I was pleasantly surprised.  It’s not that Colin isn’t a great kid; he is.  But he’s been obsessed with guns since he was a baby.  I distinctly remember a boy of two—denied toy guns by his parents—running around with a vacuum cleaner tube and “shooting” everything around him.  Now, a few years later, he’s graduated to air guns, water guns and violent video games like Commando 2.  This fascination with firearms that boys seemingly acquire upon exiting the womb is both awe-inspiring and disturbing.

So how does this young boy, who delights in shooting his guests with his Nerf N-Strike Maverick Blaster rifle, have the maturity to grasp the enormous danger that real guns represent to our society?  Why is he is able to embrace the thrill of violence in fantasy while rejecting it completely in reality?

Professor McCarthy says, “Peace is the result of love,” but cautions, “If love was easy, we’d all be good at it.”  He also warns, “If we don’t teach [our children] peace, someone else will teach them violence.”

I must have had my own good influences because, like Colin, I grew up with a gun obsession.  One of my prized possessions as a boy was a plastic M-60 rifle, complete with unfolding tripod.  My friends and I loved to get our toy guns out and play “war” around our elementary school.  I was also in the first generation of video gamers, and played all the shooters:  Postal, Castle Wolfenstein, Doom, Duke Nukem, Quake, Soldier of Fortune, you name it.  And movies?  Die Hard, Predator, Assault on Precinct 13—I loved all that stuff.

Yet I never had the desire to own any real firearms, or mimic the “protagonists” of these games/movies in real life.  I was a big fan of Marvel Comics growing up and it always struck me that Captain America never carried a gun—the bad guys he brought to justice did.  Today, as a husband and father, I have become a passionate advocate for nonviolence.

Professor McCarthy’s dream is to add comprehensive peace studies programs to the curriculum at the nation’s K-12 schools and colleges.  “Every member of Congress was in first grade someplace,” he says.  “Maybe if we taught them a little bit about Gandhi, Martin Luther King, the first day, we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in.”

That’s a goal that’s worth working for, but until it is realized, we should all endeavor to learn from kids like Colin.

As Mother Theresa once said, “So often people say that we should look to the elderly, learn from their wisdom, their many years.  I disagree.  I say we should look to the young: untarnished, without stereotypes implanted in their minds, no poison, no hatred in their hearts.  When we learn to see life through the eyes of a child, that is when we become truly wise.”

Amen.

Launched on the eve of Veteran’s Day last week, “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2,” the latest in “first-person shooter” video games, raked in an unbelievable $310 million in its first day on the market.

The game – already the subject of controversy over a scene where the player indiscriminately mows down innocent civilians in an airport that looks like LAX in Los Angeles – is supposed to be one of the most realistic war games yet. As Peter W. Singer describes it:

As part of a US special operations team, the player roams everywhere from Afghanistan to the Caucasus, winning hearts and minds with a mix of machine pistols and Predator drone strikes. The players also fight out in range of potential new conflict zones, from the rough urban favelas of Brazil to a simulated Russian invasion of Washington, D.C., and the Virginia suburbs (This is actually a major flaw in the game; any invasion force would clearly get stuck in traffic at the Interstate 95 Mixing Bowl).

Venezuela would be one of few countries to impose an all-out ban on the “manufacture, importation, distribution, sales and use of violent video games and bellicose toys.” The proposed law would give Venezuela’s consumer protection agency the discretion to define what products should be prohibited and impose fines as high as $128,000.

As the article goes on to explain, the government’s reasoning sounds downright Gandhian, and it goes much beyond a simple ban:

The Venezuelan bill would mandate crime prevention classes in public schools and force the media to “implement permanent campaigns” to warn against the dangers of violent games. Another provision requires the government “to promote the production, distribution, sales and use” of games that teach kids “respect for an adversary.”

The very next lines, however, makes one suspect that perhaps the Chavez administration might not be the best teacher of this lesson:

Some 2,000 people marched across Venezuela’s capital Saturday to protest what they call widespread persecution of Chavez’s opponents.

“It’s a bit ironic that supporters of Chavez, who persecutes his political opponents, want to teach our children the need for respect,” quipped Tomas Sanchez, an opposition lawmaker who broke ranks with Chavez.

While I don’t believe such outright censorship is necessarily the right approach, crime prevention classes (or, rather, conflict resolution classes, to take a more positive approach), which teach “respect for an adversary,” sound like a worthwhile option. Simply enacting a ban will likely fan a black market. Somehow minimizing the demand for such things, however, offers some hope.

Mixing a class like this with a violent suppression campaign can be a fraught proposition—witness the failure of D.A.R.E. anti-drug programs in the United States. The government became so fixated on drugs that students adopted that fixation and drug use didn’t decline for people who took those classes. Much better, of course, is to offer a range nonviolent alternatives, both to drugs and violence, including a more vibrant and demanding community life, employment, and positive role models. Perhaps most of all, though, the government needs to practice what it preaches.

Now, artist Zach Gage has created Lose/Lose, a simple arcade game that takes a small step toward changing that. When an object in the game gets destroyed, so does an actual file on your computer. Here’s his statement:

Lose/Lose is a video-game with real life consequences. Each alien in the game is created based on a random file on the players computer. If the player kills the alien, the file it is based on is deleted. If the players ship is destroyed, the application itself is deleted.

Although touching aliens will cause the player to lose the game, and killing aliens awards points, the aliens will never actually fire at the player. This calls into question the player’s mission, which is never explicitly stated, only hinted at through classic game mechanics. Is the player supposed to be an aggressor? Or merely an observer, traversing through a dangerous land?

Why do we assume that because we are given a weapon an awarded for using it, that doing so is right?

By way of exploring what it means to kill in a video-game, Lose/Lose broaches bigger questions. As technology grows, our understanding of it diminishes, yet, at the same time, it becomes increasingly important in our lives. At what point does our virtual data become as important to us as physical possessions? If we have reached that point already, what real objects do we value less than our data? What implications does trusting something so important to something we understand so poorly have?

Following Lose/Lose, maybe it’s time for a new rule: violent video games must have violent consequences. I cringe, though, at the thought that people would probably play them anyway, just as they continue to get into real fights.

At the very least, it is time for a real warning on video game packages. Not just the current system of labels which even seem to make a violent game look more enticing, but truly substantive warnings, as on cigarettes. The research exists to support it. Still, that’s pretty pedantic. Do grown-ups really need to be told that they shouldn’t fantasize for hours about going on killing sprees? We should know better.

(h/t Joel Dietz)

Correction: A previous version of this post stated that the game only deletes files internal to itself. Zach Gage wrote in to clarify that, indeed, the game can delete any file on a user’s computer.