The title of his lecture is Fear and Insecurity as A Cause of Conflict. His talk will explore the idea that the truth is often the first casualty of armed conflict. When we enter the environment of war, do the facts of the causes behind conflicts and the events during it pass through a filter that extracts anything that would be critical of “our side” and paint everything done by the “other side” as vile, evil, and cruel? It is the phenomena of nationalistic fear and insecurity that can feed and sustain a culture of violence that will be examined.

Dr. Douglas Becker’s expertise covers a wide range of topics including the prosecution of war crimes, the United Nations and conflict resolution, international law, US foreign policy, and US diplomatic history. His major publications include The Bush Administration’s Campaign Against the International Criminal Court; A Bird in the Bush; The Encyclopedia of the United Nations; Justice Knows No Boundaries; and Appeasement and Information Gathering: The Brazilian Diplomatic Hostage Crisis of 1969-70. Professor Becker is also in the process of writing a book called Confronting International Justice: The United States and International Criminal Court.

“On the journey to establish and sustain a culture of peace, education that declaws the propaganda of fear and insecurity that dehumanizes and divides people in the global community is crucial.” says series organizer Ian McIlraith. “Only when we can start to talk about ‘us’ as including all of humanity will we truly be at peace.”

Professor Becker will give his talk at the SGI-USA Culture of Peace Resource Center (606 Wilshire Blvd.). The complete listing of lectures can be found at www.sgi-usa.org. Seating is limited. For guaranteed admission to Culture of Peace Distinguished Speaker Series lectures, tickets may be reserved through e-mail at peacelectures@sgi-usa.org. Please include your name, phone number, selected lecture and the number of tickets you would like to reserve. Each ticket admits two people. A confirmation e-mail will be returned to verify the reservation. Reserved tickets may be picked up at the will-call table one hour before the start of the lecture. All lectures are free and open to the public.

Unless you haven’t watched TV or picked up a newspaper, you’ve seen the atrocities going on in Burma, or what the US Government recognizes as Myanmar. The short of it is that the people of Burma have long struggled against the single party police rule of the country. Human rights abuses are known to be widespread in the country and over the last couple of weeks there has been a peaceful uprising lead by the Buddhist monks of the country who want democratic rule. Protests have been marred by violence and the deaths of many Buddhist monks. We stand along with many others to support a peaceful resolution to the conflict and urge you to do the same. Sign the petition on Avaaz.org, attend a rally this weekend (listed below the petition), join the Facebook group and by all means let your support be known. We, as human beings, cannot allow this violence to continue!

UPDATE: Wired is now running an article about the massive mobilization on Facebook.

New York-basd artist Jennifer Daniel is an incredible artist/illustrator. Using her incredible talent, she’s able to express herself in politically-charged, and sometimes humorous way that immediately appealed to me. Just wanted to let you know.

The City of New York has a great campaign to educate the public about the small things they can do to reach Mayor Bloomberg’s goal of reducing the city’s emissions by 30% by 2030. It’s an aggressive campaign to make NYC the greenest city in America.

The California Center for Public Health Advocacy has a petition online urging Governor Schwarzenegger to sign SB 120 and require nutritional labeling on menus. I think it’s not only important to consumers to know what their eating and the nutritional value thereof, but it’s also a logical first step to help fight obesity in this country.

Our good friend Kelley is aiming to donate 100 pair of glasses by the end of the month to Unite For Sight and we want to help her out. Some staggering statistics to consider:

Over 1 billion people in developing countries need eyeglasses but cannot afford them. Over 4 million pairs of eyeglasses are thrown away each year in North America. 25% of the global population needs eyeglasses. 50% of children in institutions for the blind in Africa would be able to read normal or large print if they had eyeglasses. The price for glasses in Benin and other African countries can exceed three months’ average salary.

If you have old eyeglasses (prescription or not) or sunglasses, please leave a comment and we will send you Kelley’s address so you can get them to her. Be sure to fill in your email address, which won’t be published on the site, to make sure we can contact you.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention something about helping people out in our own country as well. There are many people living in the US, many of them in our fine state of California, that are in need of eyeglasses as well.

Goodwill, LensCrafters and Lions Club all have drop boxes, which is probably the easiest way to donate. You can also send your glasses in a padded envelope to:

New Eyes for the Needy
549 Millburn Avenue
P.O. Box 332
Short Hills, NJ 07078

In the last several months I’ve stopped using MySpace for various reasons, not the least of which was the layout and almost daily periods of unresponsiveness. Then there’s the ads, spam and a bunch of other things. But the bottom line is that I don’t feel like I can get involved and do anything on MySpace. It’s just not fun anymore and I don’t care enough. Facebook has its faults, but for the most part it’s pleasure to use and I find myself on it at least a couple of times per day. There’s an undeniable buzz of activity happening on Facebook. It feels like a community of activists, or at least a community of people who want to do something besides hook up and pimp their band.

As we get closer to the elections it will be interesting to see how the campaigns use social networks, but more interesting will be how the users respond to what the campaigns are doing and the conversation that will undoubtedly take place online, in the open.

As an aside, the Action For Everyone cause has 257 members and has raised $25 for the Pew Charitable Trusts. Join us, won’t you?

I’ve been seeing more and more individuals starting site like Real World Green. There’s definitely a lot more attention being paid to the environment and how what we do (and don’t do) can make a difference. I think the new approach and evolution of the environmental movement is a good thing. 5 or 10 years ago caring about the environment was left to the tree huggers. The movement was in desperate need of an overhaul, which I think is still happening. Guys like Adam Werbach have the right idea and are working hard to change the movement and how people think about sustainability.