In memoriam

The Nuclear-Free Future Award ceremony coming to the
U.S. capital provides an occasion for a little thought experiment.
What would have happened if? We know that Benjamin
Franklin tremendously respected the political organization of
the Haudenosaunee (also known as the Six Nations of the Iroquois
Confederacy), and enjoyed a lengthy discourse with their
chiefs in Albany in 1754. Suppose Franklin and the framers
of the US Constitution would have modeled their thinking
on the Haudenosaunee‘s Great Law of Peace? Then women
already would have been
enfranchised in the governing
process, and need not have
waited until the ruling gentlemen in Washington ratified the
19th amendment in 1920. Traditional Haudenosaunee clan
mothers still select the male chiefs; if after three warnings a
chief continues to behave unwisely, the clan mothers strip him
of his position. Whether an action is wise or unwise is determined
by its impact on the well-being of the seven generations to
come...
April 28, 2015 – New York. At the UN Review Conference of
the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), Sebastian Kurz, the Austrian
Foreign Minister – on behalf of 159 countries* – delivered
a joint statement focusing on the catastrophic humanitarian
consequences of nuclear weapons. (By the way: the United
Nations in New York City and the Onondaga Nation Territory,
the seat of government of the Haudenosaunee – exit 16 on Interstate
81 just south of Syracuse – are the only sovereign tracts
of land existing within the boundaries of the United States.)
Kurz‘s statement was met by a wall of silence by the old guard
nuclear powers of the Security Council: Russia, the United
Kingdom, France, China, and the United States. They were joined
behind that wall by four other nations possessing nuclear
arsenals: Israel, North Korea, India, and Pakistan.
But wait a second! Where is Germany? It‘s not one of the 159
joint statement signatories, and it‘s not one of the nuclear powers
(however much it formerly wished to be) – yet still it joined the
silent faction hiding behind the wall. Shame on Germany, for
that wall will crumble. Because it‘s a wall built upon negative
thinking. Upon such a foundation no alliance can last.
The mindset of governments that build and maintain weapons
of mass destruction denies
rationality, and torpedoes
the opportunity of civilized
human conference. Which
maybe explains why, at
the highest international
political levels, no honest
discussion concerning human
rights can be fostered,
and no nuclear treaty
can be considered as truly
binding. Thought experiment:
what would the clan
mothers do? They would
take a chief like Barack
Obama and three times
they would warn him to
actually follow through on
his Nobel-Prize-bait, global peace rhetoric. If he still didn‘t pay
more than lip service to the seven generations to come, they
would cast him out of office.
Our Nuclear-Free Future Award recipients walk their talk: we
are honored to honor Sister Megan Rice, Mike Walli, Greg
Boertje-Obed, Cornelia Hesse-Honegger, Tony deBrum,
Alexander Kmentt, and a group of Cree activist youths from
Mistissini on James Bay.
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