November 2011 - Max Zachs

War Resisters International

Dear Friends,

I have now been a Quaker Peaceworker two and a half months and although I got off to a rather bumpy start things have definitely levelled off in the recent weeks and I am starting to feel much more settled.

My placement is with War Resisters International who are located in the chaotic intersection outside Kings Cross Station. Things don’t get much less chaotic as you make your way inside, up the rickety stairs, past a mountain of bicycles covered in stickers like ‘Go Green or Die!’ and into the jumbled but welcoming space which acts as the international headquarters of this 90 year-old organisation.

War Resisters International is an organisation for peace in the true sense, it was formed in the 1920’s to act as a support for conscientious objectors who were often prosecuted and imprisoned as well as being shunned and ostracised by their families and communities. Over the years many Quakers may have been supported by WRI in their struggle as conscientious objectors. WRI believes very strongly that the ‘Right to Refuse to Kill’ is an undeniable human right.

It has an equally long history of promoting nonviolent action against the causes of war.
For me as a person and as a Peaceworker I am always striving to listen to and follow my own moral compass and to walk in truth. This is not an easy task and I feel bombarded by messages and pressures most of the time, it’s often hard to find the truth in things when surrounded by so much rhetoric. One of the main messages of WRI is; “No to all War, whether it is waged by a state, a liberation army or by the UN. Wars, however noble the rhetoric, are invariably used to serve some power-political or economic interest. War leads to suffering and destruction and we say No”.

I have come to appreciate the way the WRI community has managed to stay so close to their truth and how this brings a level of simplicity to everything they do and, more importantly, the way they do it. That has to be the best thing about working here - the processes by which things are done are modelled on the world they would like to live in. That means I am trusted to do my best and respected for doing it. It won’t come as a surprise to anyone who knows me that the women in my family have spent the last 25 years loudly telling me through various disasters, “You have a problem with authority!” Well not anymore - at least not when I am at work!

I am currently working on a project that will bring people from all over the world to a three day conference in Germany. The focus of the conference will be “Countering the Militarisation of Youth”. I will be developing a whole bunch of workshops and talks that address issues like: How do the military recruit? How do the military create a culture where violence is normalised? What strategies are currently being used to counter military recruitment? I’ll also be doing all the really fun bits like logistics - plane tickets, visas, budgets etc. I may have been partially cured of my problem with authority, but I am as allergic as ever to spreadsheets.

One day a week of my placement is dedicated to working with ForcesWatch UK, an organisation that aims to highlight the unethical recruitment practices used by the Armed forces in the UK. ForcesWatch believes that “The military fails to properly inform potential recruits of the risks, difficulties and legal obligations of an armed forces career”. Research has shown that it targets vulnerable social groups, including young people under 18 and people from poorer backgrounds, and part of my job will be providing research and analysis on how that is happening as well as strengthening the network of educators who are dedicated to peace activism in its varying forms.

I have been thinking lately about all the different ways the military pervades society, conditioning us from an early age to accept violence as normal. This is achieved in a number of ways, like through the strategic use of language or by creating a culture of militarism.

I remember watching the carnivals and parades in my home town in Kent with the military bands marching alongside the carnival-queens and my mum pointing at the smartly dressed kids in military uniforms and saying “you could do that, you might learn some discipline!”.

A few years after that I joined the cadets and spent many hundreds of hours shining my boots, practising my drill, climbing ropes and getting into fights with the boys. Later still I earned a scholarship to a private school and endured a sustained campaign from my teachers to consider the military as an option since my parents were obviously not going to be able to afford the fees at university like the kids in my class. In my late teens, desperate to find the money to go to university, I attempted to enlist in the Armed Forces for 7 years in exchange for them paying my tuition. Thankfully, despite passing all of the exams and completing the 5-kilometre run and the 50 sit-ups, I failed to complete the 15 full military press-ups and was told to come back next year.

I never had any desire to kill anyone; I just wanted a better life. I was half a press-up away from becoming a university educated trained soldier. The work that I am doing as a Quaker Peaceworker is about counter recruitment. It’s about saying “no to violence and no to war, killing is not normal”. It’s very exciting to be part of this work and I feel incredibly privileged to be here.

Max Zachs