Kingian Nonviolence Principle 1 (November 2025)
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Speaker 2:She was white haired when I met her, a little bit bent over. Know thyself, she told me, and to thine own self be true. But I didn't have to know her long to learn the simple lesson that she'd become the self she was wearing other folks' shoes. She taught them in their schools, healed them in their clinics, fed them bread when they were hungry, water when they was dry. She'd laugh when they were happy, cried when they were crying, lived right with them in their living, and died a little when they died.
Speaker 2:She'd seen the world when she was young with Dickens, Twain, and Shakespeare, Steinbeck, Marx, and Chekhov, and Dostoyevsky too. She'd picketed and slept in cells, mourned the dead, loved them well, soiled her hands with the stuff of life wearing other folks' shoes.
Speaker 3:Well, it's other folks' shoes, but it's other folks' shoes.
Speaker 2:It's walking in their moccasins of mine. Maybe too, It's knowing yourself, forgetting yourself, seeing what yourself would do if you walked around this world a while and other folks should. She said, when I draw a tree, you know, or write a poem about it, I become that tree a while, else I can't get it right. I lose myself, forget myself, no oneness with that other, like walking in the deep forest on the darkest stillest night. When I'm with another, a woman, man, or child, I try to really listen right through the words for truth.
Speaker 2:Kind you know when narrow it as it blinks back a tear. The kind you know when you feel the pinch
Speaker 3:of other folks shoes. Well, it's other folks shoes. It's other folks shoes.
Speaker 2:Just walking in there moccasin' a mile, maybe two. It's knowing yourself, forgetting yourself, seeing what yourself would do if you walked around this world while in other folks shoes. She's dead now. Been dead a while. I'm still left here living.
Speaker 2:But every time I think of her, I know just what to do. Yeah. I'll get down and feel depressed, then I'll see her smiling. Know it's time I spent some time wearing
Speaker 3:other folks' shoes. It's other folks' shoes. It's other folks' shoes.
Speaker 2:It's walking in their moccasins of mine, maybe two. It's knowing yourself, forgetting yourself, seeing what yourself would do. If you walked around this world a while
Speaker 3:and other folks should. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Walk around the world a while and other folks should. Try walking around this world a while other folks shoes
Speaker 3:other folks shoes.
Speaker 1:Thank you Jim Crosby. You are listening to nonviolent Austin radio hour. I am your co host, Stacey Fraser. I am joined by brother Robert Tyrone Lily and our musical muse, Jim Crosby, who you just heard. And we're glad to be here today.
Speaker 1:You know? We're gonna be unpacking and telling some stories and dialoguing about principle one, doctor Martin Luther King Junior's first principle of Kingian nonviolence, which is nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people.
Speaker 4:So
Speaker 1:I look forward to spending time with that. It's the first principle of six. It is the framework in which we set about hosting and and framing this show. And I really appreciate, brother Rob recently in our planning, meeting inviting us to come back to a framework. And so thank you for that brother Rob.
Speaker 4:You're more than welcome.
Speaker 1:How are doing today?
Speaker 4:I am great. I am delightfully proactive in asserting myself in this world in spite of all of the misfortune and unfortunate realities that surround us. I've gotta find ways to continue to ground myself in in my identity and in my peace. And that's not easy, but it is not impossible either. It's a matter of fact, it's a necessity, even more so in this moment.
Speaker 4:And so I am here present, and I'm prepared to give my full and all to this conversation. And so thank you all for joining me as well.
Speaker 1:Thank you. How are you doing today, brother Jim?
Speaker 2:I'm good. It's been a productive day so far, and I'm excited about this conversation too. Yeah. It's a great place to start. I agree.
Speaker 4:I agree.
Speaker 1:Yeah. You know, it's timely today for me to have this conversation because non violence is a way of life. That's part of the the wording of principle one. And you know, life I I'm humaning. I'm a human being and I've got a full plate and and I've made a commitment to living this non violent life.
Speaker 1:Part of principle one is it is active, not passive. And you being here on the air with you today is a an active choice, right, that I'm making to be here to have this conversation and, you know, there are moments, right? And I haven't met a non violentist, which I learned that word this past week. Non violentist, thank you, Gina St. David.
Speaker 2:I was gonna accuse you of making it up.
Speaker 1:Author of The Non violent Brain, actually, Gina didn't make it up either, but she referenced it in her book. And you're gonna you're gonna hear her join us in upcoming shows to talk about that book. But as a nonviolentist, we're all practicing this. I haven't met someone who's perfected it because that doesn't exist.
Speaker 4:I think I think it would be good if we could start off by explaining to our audience what is non violence. Before it becomes a way of life, I think we have to entertain the idea, at least for me, that was important. Mhmm. I had to I had to contrast it with something that I understood to be one thing. But what is this thing called nonviolence?
Speaker 4:Mhmm. So I'd like for one of you or both of you to weigh in on defining it for our audience because I think ultimately people I think the prevailing misconception is that it is a form of of abuse that you would tolerate, that is a form of weakness. And and and as as Stace has already indicated, it is not passivity. But the prevailing idea is that it is something that is a degrading of yourself to the detriment of your own rights and your own dignity toward from an aggressor. Right?
Speaker 4:But what is it? Let us let us define that.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And I invite you to also co define it with us, brother Rob, because you you know, we all went to Selma together. And my my teaching home and my teachers, Doc Lafayette and Ainka Jackson, Sanders and Selma Center goes through a whole module in level one of Kingian nonviolence to define nonviolence. And the way that I learn and teach it is a framing of nonviolence as a term I think is somewhat problematic because it's the absence of, and the framing is from a deficit, but it actually is the best we've got in this moment as far as I understand it. And it's the absence of being complacent.
Speaker 1:It's the absence of doing nothing. So even though it sounds like weak weakness if one has not studied it, it's actually quite the opposite. It takes far more force of spirit and resolve and conviction and training to be nonviolent.
Speaker 2:Which is why, Gandhi came up with that term Sat Chakraha or truth force or, yeah, spiritual force and power, love force. I was gonna say my working definition these days of late has been love in action. You know, just this idea that, that it is active, that as, you know, appropriately, the first principle emphasized it demands courage. And so Gandhi sent call sometimes called it the nonviolence of the strong. And he said, you know, if it's if it's between that and cowardice, or if it's between, cowardice and reacting in violence, he'd go for reacting in violence.
Speaker 2:You know? So you've got cowardice on the one end, and that's the nonviolence of the weak. And he's got, you know, a, violence, for example, physical violence and self defense. You know? And then on the far end, once you've transcended both of those, is the non violence of the strong that demands this courage.
Speaker 2:So yeah.
Speaker 4:I think one of the ways that I would characterize it for the audience that's listening today, and thank you both for your depictions of the things that we've learned at our training. A nine day training that we were fortunate to be a part of in Selma, Alabama. Got a chance to sit at the feet of icons and heroes of this movement, a long legacy of resistance to tyranny. And so I remember sitting in a training with Pace Bene, and one of the ways that they characterized nonviolence and if you would, audience, picture me holding up both my hands, but only in this instance, one hand is facing outward. It's my right hand.
Speaker 4:And the other hand is facing downward. Right? And it's held up. And so the hand that is facing outward, I'm saying stop. I'm telling my oppressor to stop what you're doing.
Speaker 4:I am with my hand stopping him from doing what he is doing to harm me. But then there's another hand that is out, and it's the hand that is stretched out, and it is lifted up, raised towards the sky, but it's almost inviting the other person to put their hand in my hand. And what I'm saying with this hand is that I'm inviting you to be with me in my humanity. I'm inviting you to be a part of this grace called life. Let's let's let's enjoy it together, but we cannot do that if you continue to practice ways that are harmful towards me.
Speaker 4:And so my responsibility towards your humanity is to hold my hand up and say, stop. Stop the harmful things you're doing because you're not making the world better in this way. You're, in fact, destroying it, polluting it, corrupting it, desecrating it, defiling it. And so, with this other hand, I'm saying to you, I I recognize your evils, but I still see in you something worth holding onto. I'm still seeing in you something worth inviting to be a part of my journey in life.
Speaker 4:And so I hold that hand out saying to you, come. And, that is the choice that you have to make. And, my choice is to not allow you, as best I'm able to prevent that from being the case in nonviolence and in love, from continuing to harm and defile and pollute or destroy or or desecrate this world and my life that is a part of this world.
Speaker 1:Beautiful. And another way of that same concept is hand out, as you say, hand extended in love of the respect of the human, and then fist up to the oppressive systems, beliefs, behaviors, and policies. That's what we're fighting against. That's where the the fight, the struggle is, is not towards another person. It's towards those systems policies beliefs behaviors.
Speaker 2:And that's where the courage has to come in just the, you know, when you see the powers that be and the power of them and you're calling out the injustice, You know, and so that hand that's raised either saying stop or saying, you know, we've got this power. We're reuniting in power. See, she's saying we oppose injustice as ensconced as it may seem at this time. You know? So And
Speaker 1:so there's nothing passive about that. There's nothing passive about having both hands available, hand and heart. There's nothing weak or passive in what we're describing.
Speaker 4:I think it's important for me to insert a scripture at this point. And it comes from Ephesians six twelve. And we draw on spiritual concepts. Right? And so this is not necessarily a religious expression, but it is a spiritual reaction or spiritual response that we're evoking with this this philosophy.
Speaker 4:And this Ephesians six twelve, which is a part of the inspiration for this hand out, hand up. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. And if we can remember that we're wrestling against principalities and principles and the idea that human life can be graded or degraded or, you know, given some hierarchy. Those are the things that we wrestle against. And and and I think it takes far more, as my my colleague and friend said, Stacy said, it takes, I think, a deeper level of human resolve to gather the will to go out and search out these ideas.
Speaker 4:You know, it's it's my my physical force is elemental. Right? It doesn't take much genius or intellect to rear my hand back and to strike. But what does take courage, I think, is to rear my heart back and not strike. And to reflect on what it is that I'm perplexed by in the world that I'm surrounded by.
Speaker 4:And there are many things that have perplexed me. And I'll just say this from as a personal way of making this important and grounding it in my own identity. And opinions that I share are purely mine, and they don't reflect any organizational group that I'm associated with. Because we all have to work out our own faith in fear and trepidation. And for me, what that looked like was growing up in New York City, growing up in California, I saw in my community what it looks like to be governed by violence.
Speaker 4:I saw that. I saw when might was right. I saw when there was an eye for an eye. That was the order of the day. And when I tell you that it was a terrifying reality to have to live under as a child or as a young adult, And at some point, I embraced it myself.
Speaker 4:But in you know, as I matured and I became actually, 1992 was the beginning of a turnaround for me. I was in federal prison. And if you know anything about 1992, we had the LA rebellion, the LA uprising after Rodney King and that verdict. And we'll be talking about another verdict today. In the prison unit, there was a gang truce.
Speaker 4:And I was a part of a street organization and they told me, the older fellows on the yard said, there is a truce. And now, I'm young, I'm ignorant, I don't really know much about the world. I didn't know what a truce was. So I had to go get a definition. What is a truce?
Speaker 4:And essentially they said, we are not gonna fight each other on the yard. And I was incensed because I realized that you're saying that you could have a long time ago determined that we had peace between us, which would have meant a lot of my people could have survived the violence that we inflicted on one another, and I too could have avoided some of that harm. So somebody just made that decision. Of course, there were circumstances in the larger community that, you know, that motivated that decision. But that was the beginning for me to think about, okay, now I don't have to be on guard against harm.
Speaker 4:So what do I stand for? What do I want? But working myself out of the anger and the resentment that have become part part of who I was, it has been a thirty year journey. And as my friend Stacy says a moment ago, it's a journey that I'm still on. I have to think about what it means to be nonviolent with my son.
Speaker 4:I have to think about what it means to be nonviolent with my wife. I have to think about what it means to be nonviolent with my colleagues at work. I have to think about what it means to be nonviolent with the people I encounter in the streets, the woman that was hurriedly trying to get past me yesterday as we were driving. And I had this inclination to do something with my hands in the mirror, but I restrained myself from doing it because I thought to myself, how many YouTube videos have I watched where it all started with a hand gesture, sign language, and the next thing you know, there's a pistol being pulled or some my window's shattering because someone decided to pull a pistol. So to me, that's not the world I wanna reside in.
Speaker 4:And I think this non violent approach that you all are talking about is far more intriguing and inviting to me and my soul than this other world that I have since left behind.
Speaker 1:If you're just tuning in, dear listener, we are talking on Nonviolent Austin Radio Hour here, k o o p dot o r g ninety one point seven FM here in Austin. And we were focusing on principle one today of doctor King's Kingian nonviolence principles, which is nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people.
Speaker 4:For courageous people.
Speaker 1:That's right. I appreciate you bringing in your spiritual influence, inspiration. It's cool because I also come from I have a a deep spiritual practice, and I'll tell you that I had lost that for a while. Mhmm. And it's really when I embraced that this was going to be how I choose to spend my time in beloved community.
Speaker 4:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And I reconnected with a spiritual practice and I'm holding a book called America's Racial Karma
Speaker 4:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:An Invitation to Heal by Larry Ward, PhD who actually transitioned recently. But my practice is Zen Buddhism in the tradition of Thich Nhat Hanh, who is a nonviolence ancestor for sure. And you just shared your story about getting frustrated, you know, by, you know, just a daily moment, right, that that we all experience. And I am taking Zen in the art of saving the planet right now, of course, with the order of interbeing. And they're really pushing the boundaries for me in my intellectual mind, which has its limitations on the connectedness or the separateness of or perceived separateness of humans and other plants, animals, but even minerals.
Speaker 1:And one of the the nuns mentioned and shared that she was really frustrated one day with a printer. Right? Thich Nhat Hanh was about to give a big speech, and she needed to print something out to help him refer to. And she got really, really frustrated. And in that moment, she softened her stance towards that printer, an inanimate seemingly inanimate object made of the mineral world and saw the connectedness of energy and decided not to try something different.
Speaker 1:She softened her stance on it, the printer ended up working, and then Tai Tighnehon delivered his speech. But that was an invitation for me to think about how I physically even move about the world, and even with nonhuman objects, and the interconnectedness of energy moving not just takes it to a whole other level of nonviolence.
Speaker 2:Interesting. And part of what I'm getting from what both of y'all are saying is is we need to be nonviolent toward ourselves in the sense of acknowledging that we too are works in progress. Mhmm. And I've got a a quote I wanted to share with y'all from, this wonderful book called Gandhi the Man, which we were looking at beforehand by Echnath Easwaran, and the subtitle is the story of his transformation. And Gandhi is a great example of somebody who fairly early in his adult life said, I'm not who and what and where I want to be and took up an a daily practice of meditation on scriptures.
Speaker 2:And they say that for him, it was mainly, the Bhagavad Gita, which was one of his Hindu scriptures, especially chapter two, which I'm gonna read from in a second. And I'm pretty sure that's what this is from even though it's in this book, not the Bhagavad Gita, and and the sermon on the mount. So he remained a Hindu, but he he found Jesus to be such an example of the nonviolence that he was trying to increasingly become himself. So those were the two scriptures that on a daily basis, he would meditate on. And, but this this passage, like I say, I'm pretty sure it's from chapter two of the Bhagavad Gita.
Speaker 2:So it's Arjuna who's the the humble chariot driver, but who turns out to be the divinity who's who's teaching in here. He says, all those I love who are in and this is in the context of of what Gandhi, you know, took on in terms of his transformation, but also gives him that courage that he manifested through his adult life and working for Indian independence. All those I love who are incapable of ill will and return love for hatred, living beyond the reach of I and mine and of pain and pleasure, full of mercy, contented, self controlled, of firm resolve, with all their heart and all their mind given to me with such as these, I am in love. Not agitating the world nor by it agitated, They stand above the sway of elation, competition, and fear, accepting life, good and bad, as it comes. They are pure, efficient, detached, ready to meet every demand I make on them as a humble instrument of I of my work.
Speaker 2:So again, this is divine working in the world, working for justice, etcetera. The the action of love in the world, if you will. Who serves both friend and foe with equal love, not buoyed up by praise or cast down by blame, alike in heat and cold, pleasure and pain, free from selfish attachments and self will, ever full, in harmony everywhere, firm in faith, such a one is dear to me. So that was Gandhi's project for himself through all of his life. You know?
Speaker 2:And and when people asked him about, you know, this goal of working toward India Indian independence, he he would say, well, my real goal is to see God face to face. You know? So just to be, pursuing that kind of, and and for him, oftentimes, was really ascetic in terms of, you know, fasting, etcetera, but hours a day in meditation, but with a very active practical, you know, application of, you know, organizing and, you know, millions and working toward the big goal of independence. Yeah.
Speaker 4:I think one thing I'll say first of all, again, we wanna thank you for tuning in to K O O P ninety one point seven FM radio listening to the nonviolent Austin radio hour with our friends Stacy and Jim and myself, brother Robert, Tyrone, Lily. We're talking about non violence principle number one. Non violence is a way of life for courageous people. And so we share that today because we want every we want you to know that everything we're gonna talk about on this show is rooted in this identity. It's rooted in our hopes for a world where justice grows out of love and not out of anger and resentment and violence.
Speaker 4:Now, we know that that's not everyone's position and we understand that people hold and have the right to hold different views about how they wanna resort you know, how they wanna resolve the conflicts in their lives. But for us, we've taken the time to study and we are continuing to study these these values and these principles. And and and as we bring guests on the show and we interact with people, you know, our queries from them to them will be through this lens. We we you know, we'll be filtering these conversations through this lens. We've got some interesting guests coming up in a couple of months.
Speaker 4:And so stay tuned for those conversations. I wanna pass it back to our lead host, miss Stacy.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Well, I'm I'm running the board.
Speaker 4:Mhmm. Very important task.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 4:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:We're all we're we're co creating this. So back to doctor Ward, who was also in the Order of Interbeing, which is, the the practice of engaged Buddhism in the tradition of Thich Nhat Hanh. In this book that I mentioned, America's Racial Karma, An Invitation to Heal, there is a chapter called continuation, and there's a Nina Simone quote. I'd tell you what freedom is to me. No fear.
Speaker 1:And I bring that because the root as I understand it of many hateful, harmful actions is often fear. I think that's why doctor King chose nonviolence as a way of life for the courageous because fear is a human feeling, it's an inhuman emotion, we all experience it. And yet the difference in a a nonviolentist is that fear doesn't stop one from acting. The fear of going against dominant culture, the fear of speaking out against racism, capitalism, other forms of oppression. There will be societal backlash to being countercultural.
Speaker 1:And that is something through the practice that we can develop strategies to cope within ourselves and in community with others who are on our path of nonviolence and commitment to nonviolence to to to withstand. So my question that I'm gonna pass to my cohost is related to fear and courage. And how does that does that land with you and how does that ring true to your experience on the path of nonviolence?
Speaker 4:I think that's an excellent question. And if you wouldn't mind, Jim, I'll jump in that first. Go for it. I had an experience when I went to a retreat with my dear mentor, doctor Jerry Taylor, professor I met at Abilene Christian University, and also a dear friend and confidant that I've learned the meaning of love through the relationship with him. So he takes me to this place called Leb Shemaya.
Speaker 4:It is a retreat. It's a place where you go and practice quiet. Right? So they have these little small cells they call them. No pun intended.
Speaker 4:But there's little space you go in. It's just got a bed. It's got a prayer nook. It's got a shower. And it's got a door that you dare not go out because of animals all over the facility.
Speaker 4:And you don't wanna go out there. It's no lights at nighttime. So it's the only place you can talk is when you walk off the grounds. And so one day I decided to walk off the grounds and I went to this path and I'm out on the path and it's a couple of miles to get to the path. But as I'm walking down the pathway, there's these two fences on each side of of the pathway.
Speaker 4:And on top of the fences, on both sides, are vultures.
Speaker 2:Now,
Speaker 4:I've never I'm from the city. I've never seen vultures up close.
Speaker 2:They've made their beaks. They're beautiful in the air and ugly up close.
Speaker 4:They are the most horrifying birds I've ever seen in my life. And when I tell you, I looked up up there on that fence and I saw rows of of vultures, I I I had to stop. And I wanted to turn around and go back, but I had come too far. And so I made up my mind that the only way forward was through. And so what I did was I kept going.
Speaker 4:I took one small step at a time. And I cautiously looked with my eyes at the birds just to see because in my inside of me, I thought they're gonna swoop down on me and start plucking at my head.
Speaker 2:You go along saying, I'm not dead yet.
Speaker 4:I'm not dead yet. No. I didn't do that. But I didn't wanna be dead either. So I was very ginger in my steps, but I kept walking.
Speaker 4:And I learned something that day. I learned about fear and I learned about courage because nonviolence is a way of life for the courageous. I learned that walking forward can be done through fear. In other words, the absence of courage is not the absence of fear. It's the persistence in spite of fear.
Speaker 4:It's the determination. It's the resolve. It's the willingness to keep taking a step even when you are sometimes in terror. And when I faced opposition in this life, I can tell you quite honestly, that's the place that I've been because I'm a human being, And I have not found a way to divorce myself in totality from the things that frighten me. But what I've got to learn and what I've had to learn how to do, because it's the only way that I've been able to maintain my mental health and my freedom, is I've got to learn how to walk even if it's one small step at a time.
Speaker 2:They often say that the go ahead.
Speaker 1:We're gonna pause for a couple of community announcements.
Speaker 4:We have to do that. Okay.
Speaker 2:Well, this is good transition though. They often say that that in the the gospels of the New Testament, the most common phrase Jesus uses, fear not. Don't be afraid. And I think he was saying, you know, don't acknowledge he wasn't saying not to acknowledge that emotion that you say is natural to us, Stacy, but he was saying, go forward. Take that step, in spite of.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That's what courage is.
Speaker 4:Thank you. Thank you, Jim.
Speaker 1:We'll be right back.
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Speaker 1:You are tuned in to k o o p dot o r g ninety one point seven FM here in Austin, Texas. You are listening to nonviolent Austin radio hour. I am your host, Stacy Frazier, joined by cohost Jim Crosby and brother Robert Tyrone Lily. And we are list talking about principle one today. That's our cent our center from which we are having both understanding conversation, grounding the listener is we spend a lot of time, each of us, and collectively, thinking about meditating on Doctor King and the nonviolent way of life being for courageous people.
Speaker 1:And Jim, think I'm gonna turn the mic to you to see where are you sitting right now with this.
Speaker 2:Okay. I wanna share with everybody a brief restatement from doctor King about principle one and then a story real quick that I think is it dovetails perfectly with, you know, what we've been saying. So, this next book I'm holding in my hand is The Nonviolent Life by, father John Deere, who is a beloved teacher of mine. He's got a chapter in there called doctor King's to do list. And so I'm just gonna read you what he says about principle one.
Speaker 2:But in in the to do list is the six principles and then the six steps or six stages of a nonviolent campaign. So but here's what he says about, principle one. First, nonviolence is the way of the strong. We've been talk talking mainly about courage, but oftentimes, doctor King would talk about it in terms of strength as well. Nonviolence is not for the cowardly, the weak, the passive, the apathetic, or the fearful.
Speaker 2:Nonviolent resistance does resist, doctor King wrote. It is not a method of stagnant passivity. While the nonviolent resistor is passive in the sense that he is not physically aggressive toward his or her opponent, his mind and emotions are always active, constantly seeking to persuade his opponent that he is wrong. The method is passive physically, and I would I would change that to say, is not violent physically, because it can involve a lot of marching, singing, etcetera, that are physical, but strongly active spiritually. I think that was that's what we're emphasizing when we look at the first part of this principle, way of life, you know, thinking about it.
Speaker 2:We've talked a lot about our spiritual practice, you know, and taking it on as a way of life. The method is passive physically but strongly active spiritually. It is not passive nonresist nonresistance to evil. It is active nonviolent resistive resistance to evil. And I would often substitute the the word injustice for evil there.
Speaker 2:So yeah. But if we could transition real quickly to a story that I wanted to share that that, Rob's story reminded me of. This is from a wonderful little book called, turning 15 on the road to freedom, my story of the nineteen sixty five Selma voting rights march. And I bought it last year in Selma when I was there, with you, Stacy, and and it's by Linda Blackman Lowry. And she was actually 14 through most of the two weeks of the Selma campaign and then turned 15 actually on the march.
Speaker 2:But this is before that, where she talks about going to the rallies and and, being there on Bloody Sunday, you know, on the bridge. And so when she first started going to the the mass meetings, etcetera, she says after that first time, she talks about being fearful. And they were, you know, going to jail. They'd already started going to jail and stuff, skipping school, going to the rallies downtown, and and getting jailed. She said after that first time, I wasn't so afraid.
Speaker 2:So she's acknowledging the fear because I was with my buddies, and we knew we had each other's back. So I think, Stacy, you said something a while ago about community and just this whole sense of doing it in community. And we've been talking certainly with the no king stuff lately about the importance of numbers, you know, getting the attention of of the powers that be. So I wasn't so afraid because I was with my buddies, we knew we had each other's back. What we could do with each other's backs, I don't know.
Speaker 2:Those white policemen had billy clubs and guns, but we held on to each other, and we figured there was safety in numbers. And then she transitions to from, I would say, from community to music, which is another aspect of community. It helped when we sang we shall overcome. Singing those words made us believe we could do it. We could overcome the hate and racism.
Speaker 2:Every time I sang the line, we're not afraid, I lied a little, but it was important to sing it. The people who weren't afraid sang it the strongest and the loudest. The sound of their voices was like a warm blanket on a cold night. It made me feel a little stronger and more protected. Then I could sing a little louder too.
Speaker 2:We sang it to everyone we knew. We were on our way. We would not be ignored, and we would not be stopped.
Speaker 4:I just wanna if did you have did you okay. I wanna just add one last piece to the philosophy part of this conversation, and it comes directly from the Presbyterian outlook on nonviolence, Kenyan nonviolence. Nonviolent resistance requires more courage and personal, spiritual, and moral strength than violence. It is easy to give into our human impulse to strike back when we have been struck. Nonviolence is more is a more challenging but effective path.
Speaker 4:It redefines courage as standing open and vulnerable before evil and the enemy rather than as a closed, defiant, and ready to strike individual. Nonviolence requires courage of the heart. And, you know, we talked we wanna talk about a little bit about stories. Right? Because how do we apply this?
Speaker 4:What what does this apply to in the midst of our time that we're in today? And this, I think, is a good point to transition. I have a little story, really, as an update of sorts on the Sonya Massey case. Right? Some of you may or may not know about this case.
Speaker 4:But, you know, in in order to to be nonviolent resistant, right, there has to be something we're resisting. What are we resisting? So that's what this story is designed to illustrate for us. Right? So we're gonna we're gonna just use this story as a predicate for identifying the thing that we oppose.
Speaker 4:Former Illinois deputy Sean Grayson was found guilty of second degree murder in the death of Sonya Massey on October 2025. The jury rejected the initial first degree murder charge after deliberating for six hours, which was influenced by Grayson's testimony that he felt threatened by Massey. Now if some of you don't recall, this was an incident that occurred last year, I think, or the year before. I think it was last year where an officer was called by the resident of the home to her home because she felt a burglar or a prowler was around her home. When the officer got there, they came in.
Speaker 4:Instead of being there to protect her, they perceived her as a threat. She had a pot of hot water on the on the stove, and she went to, you know, adjust the hot water on the stove. The officer, who was quite a distance from her, told her to get away from the pot without even giving her much time to get away from the pot. He decided to open up fire, shot her dead in her face. She died on the scene, tragically, from another horrific case of police violence against a citizen.
Speaker 4:Caused a lot of national uproar. There was a lot of attention focused on the case. This case has come to the through the court has gone through the legal process, and the result has been that officer deputy Sean Grayson was found guilty of second degree murder. The jury rejected the initial first degree murder charge after deliberating for six hours, which was influenced by Grayson's testimony that he felt threatened by Massey. The verdict has drawn strong reactions with Massey's family expressing anger and disbelief while some legal analysts found the verdict unsurprising given the evidence and the judge's instructions.
Speaker 4:Okay. The verdict, a jury found Sean Gracie Gracie guilty of second degree murder in the shooting death of Sean of Sonya Massey, and the the the it was the the verdict was delivered after six hours of deliberation. And the jury's reasoning for this particular, so there was a there was a prior charge. Grayson had initially been charged with first degree murder, but the jury opted for a lesser charge. The jury's reasoning, the conviction suggests the jury found Grayson's self defense claim based on his belief that Massey was a threat.
Speaker 4:This is an African American woman. This is a white male in a police uniform with a gun. This is a small woman in her own home near a pot of water. But he said that he felt threatened. Based on his belief that Massey was a threat, the jury found that to be a mitigating factor in the shooting, though they rejected a first degree murder conviction.
Speaker 4:Massey's family was disappointed with the verdict viewing it as a miscarriage of justice and believing the conviction should have been for first degree murder. They highlighted that the evidence showed Grayson threatened to shoot Massey and that she was unarmed. Now oftentimes when these cases come to court come to the light of the day did you want to point out something? When when these cases come to the light of day, you know, they evoke all kinds of emotion, all kinds of responses. And in this instance, I remember watching TikTok and YouTube.
Speaker 4:There was a litany after litany of commentator. Often, there were police officers that were getting on there commentating about the the the the their perception of what the events entailed. Some defending it. Some some decrying it. Right?
Speaker 4:But, you know, the thing that I don't wanna hone in on, what in this instance, what was the enemy in this instance? What is the issue? Is it the person that pulled the gun? Is it the gun? Is it the idea that was in the mind of the person that pulled the gun?
Speaker 4:Is it the woman that was killed by the gun or the bullet? These are questions that I think I wrestle with. I know that in this instance, you know, very very on the surfaces, a white officer kills a black woman. How often does this happen? Right?
Speaker 4:But is the response what is my response going to be to this? Do I you know, I hear these incidents occur and you hear people say, lock him up. Put him in jail. You know, he he needs to be punished to the full extent of the law. I have a problem with that, fundamentally, because I've been incarcerated.
Speaker 4:And beyond that, I don't believe that there's any real benefit that's gonna derive to this family, to Massey, to society by incarcerating mister Grayson. What he did is reprehensible. What he did is, you know, not excusable at all. Right? But I believe that we have to get to a place, and this is why I've gravitated towards King and I violence because I am open to exploring new ways of seeing myself and seeing the world around me.
Speaker 4:And the thing that occurs in between us, which is conflict, I'm open to a new way of exploring and investigating and and peeling back the layers of that. So I'll say this and land my plane here. In this story, in my mind, Grayson, as offensive as his actions were and the deed he did, is not the problem. The problem is the idea that resided in his mind that saw this woman as a thing or a person to be afraid of. And what is that idea?
Speaker 4:Now the the mystery here is that until we I'm sorry. Did you wanna chime in?
Speaker 1:And Mhmm. The problem could also from a different angle be toxic masculinity and patriarchy. So it's not just racism. It is an interplay of these isms of these systems that are oppressive in nature and
Speaker 2:Principalities and powers.
Speaker 1:And I and I wanna say we are almost we have about thirteen minutes left, but you are tuned in to Nonviolent Austin Radio Hour, k o o p dot o r g ninety one point seven FM. And these conversations are so deep and meaningful that it is hard to stay on the the fifteen minute minute mark. So
Speaker 4:wanna chime Go back back in, please. I wanna chime back in. So notice that I did not say racism. I don't know what he did this for. He said he was afraid.
Speaker 4:That's what he said. But until we have a system that allows for us to have some unhostile or nonhostile way of engaging people when they step across the line of social sensibility, then we can't necessarily know for a certainty. Now, I can surmise. I can speculate from here at infinitum. But the only person that knows what really caused him to do what he did was the person who did it.
Speaker 4:And then under our current adversarial system, he he would be he would be causing he would be causing himself harm if he really disclosed his motivations. And so so he has to keep it a secret because he's opposed to the defense who well, he's he's the he's the defendant, but he's opposed to the prosecutor. The prosecutor's opposed to him. And there's supposed to be a a nonbias panel of, you know, judges, meaning the jury, evaluating all of the facts. Right?
Speaker 4:But in but in that room, you know, of course, we know they walked into a charged room with a charged atmosphere that that that that creates a climate that they have to deliberate in. I don't wanna get into all the details on that or the perspectives on that. I just simply wanted to say, as I think about this story, I ask myself, what is the true enemy here? Is the true enemy now, on the surface, we could say it was him. Right?
Speaker 4:That's the surface. But I believe that there was something far more ominous that was residing within him, in his mind, in his heart, if you will, that needed to be explored that needs to be explored. And our current criminal system, criminal legal system, does not allow us to get at that truth. It's flawed. And the idea that we can lock our way up out of all of this is ludicrous.
Speaker 4:It's ludicrous that in some way, you know, maybe somebody can derive joy or peace from knowing someone goes to prison for the rest of their natural life. Maybe someone can. I I could not. Now mind you, what's happened to Massey and her family has not necessarily occurred to me, that kind of harm. But I've experienced harm before.
Speaker 4:Things have happened. In my life, there's there's things that have that have been unjust that have happened to my family. And I've had to make a decision how I wanted to respond to the people that were responsible for it. Mhmm. So I'll just yield there and simply say to to the to the listening audience, what do you think?
Speaker 4:You know, what is the problem here? What is the issue here in this story? What what are we opposed to when we stand in nonviolence against oppression? Are we opposed to the person or to the principle on which that person is representative of? I'll pause there, pass it to the next.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Thank you. Brother Robin, thank you for bringing that example of something recently and how we can apply these principles to real societal moments everywhere. Right? And I'll last thing I brought today is actually a teaser for next month.
Speaker 1:We had talked as a group about bringing my grandmother's hands for next month. And if you haven't read it yet, that's from Resma Minicum. And coincidentally or not, doctor Ward brought up this passage by Resma Minicum. He says, this is from my grandmother's hands. One of two things will happen.
Speaker 1:Ideally, America will grow up and out of white body supremacy. Americans will begin to heal their long held trauma around race, and whiteness will begin to evolve from race to culture and then to community. The other possibility is that white body supremacy will continue to be reinforced as the dominant structured form of energy in American culture, in much the same way Aryan Aryan supremacy dominated German culture in the thirties and early forties. If Americans choose the latter scenario, the racialized trauma that wounds so many American bodies will continue to mutate into insanity and create even more brutality and genocide. Then doctor Ward says, when we look at ourselves in the mirror, we must ask ourselves truly, is this the America we wish to continue?
Speaker 4:That's a powerful question. Not no. This is not the America that I wanna continue in. Jim, you I was just gonna know what?
Speaker 2:The the the our quick aspirational response to your question you left us with a minute ago, Rob, is is principle three, and we're always bouncing back and forth between these principles and letting them interpret each other. But problems not people, attack forces of evil not persons doing evil. So we'll get to that at some point in the next few months and and explore that more fully. But what I wanted to do is a quick pop quiz. What's the full name of our sister organization, the Selma Center?
Speaker 4:The full name of the Selma Center? The Kenyan Center for Nonviolence
Speaker 2:Truth.
Speaker 4:Truth and Reconciliation.
Speaker 2:Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And you you emphasized truth a minute ago and I just wanted to say, you know, model somewhat on South Africa and their experience, I guess. And and Mhmm.
Speaker 2:You know, what does societal repentance, if you will, look like? What what would it take for that reconciliation to happen? And I think being realistic about our history, not trying to erase our history, you know, just kind of the the reverse of a lot of the direction that, you know, the anti democratic directions we seem to be heading or the powers that be seem to wanna take us in.
Speaker 4:So Two things come in my mind real quick I wanna say, Jim. One was when when I was incarcerated, I remember studying history. And I enjoyed reading history. And and and I will tell you that I got angry reading history. Right?
Speaker 4:And I remember at some point, the anger started to become more pragmatic. It became more directed. It became more refined. And at some point, decided I needed to I needed another expression besides anger. But what I learned was that anger was part of the journey.
Speaker 4:Right? You can't see you can't read about wrong and not have anger. And I would I would encounter other young men that I would encourage to study and read and they would say, man, I don't wanna read that stuff because I just get mad. And I would try to tell them, man, that's part of the process. Don't run from it because you're afraid of that emotion called anger.
Speaker 4:And that's the thing that I wanna tell our listener. You know, there's a lot that has happened in our society. There's a lot that's happening now. You know, injustice provokes that emotion called anger. But anger is not the place that we reside.
Speaker 4:It's just a bus stop. You know, we evolve from that into greater places of, you know, human value and virtue that that would lead us to more elevated solutions. And I'll just yield with this. Rwanda and Burundi, I read about what transpired. They had a, you know, genocide there.
Speaker 4:Right? Intra fratricidal genocide. Right? You know, Tutu and and and Hutu. Yeah.
Speaker 4:That's it. Tutsu and the Hutu fought against one another. Remnants of the colonial past. Right? And they had a truth and reconciliation, you know, moment of reconciling afterwards.
Speaker 4:Right? And that because that was this was Neighbor who had killed Neighbor. And they had to figure out a way besides incarceration or retaliation because, you know, those were the two prominent options. And they decided reconciliation. They decided to, you know, truth.
Speaker 4:They wanted why. What happened here? Because until we understand why somebody's motivated to do a thing, the forces that produced that one incident will continue to perpetuate themselves and engender other expressions of that same wickedness. And so it's so important for me that we explore you know, we don't just react to these things that are happening. You know, my natural reaction is to, ah.
Speaker 4:But the truth is that, you know, this this is more complex. I don't know what I don't know this this officer Grayson. I don't know his story, and I'm not saying that his story is any more important than than than than Sonya Massey's story. I'm not saying his humanity is any more important than Sonya Massie, but I'm saying the humanity of all of us that come after them are his. Mhmm.
Speaker 4:And sending that man to prison, locking him up for the rest of his life, that is not solving anything. Although it may slake someone's blood vengeance Mhmm. It will not solve the problem. Because the problem is not him. The problem is the idea and the mind that resides in him.
Speaker 4:And that's the thing that must be uprooted.
Speaker 1:We're flirting dangerously close with time today. So Keep
Speaker 2:us on track. Keep us on track.
Speaker 1:Oh, my final my final piece today would be that anger can be a powerful source of creative construction. And so when I learned that anger is not to be feared, it is that reaction that you just mentioned to anger. That's where the power lies, and that is the empowering moment is what do you do with that anger? Do you harness it in the direction of love and justice, or do you harness it in a perpetual cycle of harm and violence. We are Jim, you get the you get your last word, but I will say that the Selma Center, our teaching home, I go every year.
Speaker 1:If you're interested in coming, the next one I heard yesterday from my Inca Jackson is gonna be March. It's gonna be our level one training followed by the annual bridge crossing of the Jubilee.
Speaker 2:Jim? Just
Speaker 4:real quick announcement. Thank you for the conversation today, everyone. Thank you for listening, and we just wanted to share that there's a couple of things happening this weekend, Saturday, November 8, 11AM to 11:45. Texas Book Festival, Writers League of Texas, table signing. There'll be a tent out there at the end of Congress And 8th Street.
Speaker 4:Come on out there and see your lovely host. Saturday, November 8, two to 7PM Brave Fest, Central Machine Works, 4824 East Cesar Chavez Street. There will be book signings going on. It's open to everyone. And on Monday, November 17, 05:30 to 7PM, inside our book community event with After Violence Project.
Speaker 4:An inside book project will be taking place. It is invite, you know, friendly, but nonetheless. What's the book, brother Rob? It well, one of
Speaker 2:the my books book
Speaker 4:my book Inside Out Inside Out.
Speaker 1:Alright. Find us on if you're interested in hanging out more with us, our Facebook group is the place you can find us. Nonviolent Austin on Facebook.
Speaker 4:Peace and peace.
Speaker 2:And I'll start us off next time with this song, my embodied trauma.
Speaker 1:We are
Speaker 2:Tribute to Resma Minnickum.
Speaker 1:So thanks for that instrumental, Jim. We'll see you next time, y'all.
Speaker 2:K o o p h d one h d three Hornsby. The
Speaker 9:following is a nationally syndicated news program broadcast by licensing agreement with Co op Radio. The views expressed are not necessarily the views of Co op Radio or its board of directors, volunteers, staff, or underwriters. From New York, this is Democracy Now.
Speaker 10:ICE agents have assaulted Evanston residents, beaten people up, grabbed them, abducted them, taking people off the street once again because of the color of their skin. It is an outrage.