On Writing Pacifist

Looking at Specifically

Jesus Christ

Mahatma Ghandhi

Martin Luthor King Jr.

Beast Wars: Transformers

Avatar: The Last Airbender

Mobile Suit Gundam Wing

(slight Spoilers for the last three)

Yes some of these are going to be more controversial than others due to what Hindsight has given us.



Would still like other people’s thoughts on this as I am not the smartest person in the room, and would like to have some areas changed for the better depending on one’s views.



Pacifism as defined on Dictionary.com

An Opposition to War or Violence of any kind/ refusal to engage in military activities because of one’s principles or beliefs/ The Principle or Policy that all differences among nations should be adjusted without recourse of War



Go far enough, and this could include things such as capital punishment as violence is violence. This also means a “just war” is to be avoided if at all possible.





However most people have no idea what it means. Many treat being a pacifist as being passive. Being passive is being inactive; not reacting visibly to something that is expected to illicit emotions or at the very least reactions; to be acted upon by an outside source instead of acting on own volition; not participating; docile.



While there are elements of submissiveness and restraint used in both, a Pacifist is not passive, and to maintain their none violent ideology they have to be an active part of the world around them. Even if its just a local level, their world instead of things on a city, national, or global level, they do have to “fight” for it.



We live in a world that says armed conflict and violence is awesome, and to not have such views, especially in certain points in history, such say during WW2 and the Vietnam war. People that have these beliefs put their lives on the line, and in many cases quite literally.



So lets look at some cases



In the old 90’s cartoon Beastwars, a direct Sequel to Gen 1 Transformers, two groups of decedents of the initial groups (heroic Maximals and villainous Predacons) land on a strange world and adapt to it by taking alternat forms based on the local fauna. Of the heroes, thee come to mind as being mortal pacifiss: Optimus Primal, Rhinox, and Tigertron.



Optimus Primal would rather be exploring the galaxy and studying what he finds, but will fight and will even be an aggressor in something if it means protecting his comrades and the natural world around him. He even gives a Truce a chance as he is a Maximal and its their duty. That said, he still goes to battle with a pair of twin barreled cannons hidden in his forarms, a pair of missile launchers that are hidden on his back, and a pair of curvy swords. Just because he doesn’t want to destroy his enemy, that he is open to amnesty and mercy, does not mean the enemy won’t be in a scrap heap if they take things too far.



Rhinox is very much the same way. One of the physically strongest charters he is able to hurl Megatron like he is a sack of rice at one point, and even gets the war mongering Dinobot to toe the line with a good neck grab and telling him he’s in a bad mood. Also his primary weapons are a pair of guns the fans have dubbed “the Changuns of Doom!” Yet if given the chance, would rather stay back and smell the rosses. His passion is science, research, and invention. This does not mean he is not going to use the fact his alt form is a Rhino to stop him.



There is also Tigertron. Desspite being a Siberian Tiger, and often thinks like one, he would rather live in peace with the world around hm than be a force of destruction, even leaving the war for a half an episode due to the damage they were causing (and his tiger girlfriend was killed in the middle of one skirmish).



Despite this, they fight, but they also try to use peaceful means. Be it with struggling with comrades (Rattrap doesn’t mind scrapping bots, even has a large collection of bits of the character Waspinator; Dinobot is a Predicon warrior through and through, despite being on the Maximal side; Cheetor is impetuous; and various toy only Maximal that have a shoot first, take prisoners fourth or fifth) and of course Predicons who are aggressive and conquering by nature. Just because they don’t like war, dose not mean they won’t take up arms; it means they will give peace a chance, and if possible negotiate first.



In Avitar: The Last Airbender, Ang is the titular last of his kind that we know of. He refuses to kill (on paper I don’t think everyone he throws around survive that) and when he doses kill its usually when he’s not in control of himself (such as when the Prenotification of the Sea takes over him in his Avitar State). Much of his struggle in the series is keeping this, especially as they grow closer to fighting Fire Lord Ozai directly; one of the more frightening villains in children’s fiction as he has no problem with casual genocide, and is the reason Azula is 50 shades of messed up at only fourteen, and Zuko has that massive scar on his face.



When Ang finally fights him, its literally to opposing view points clashing as much as its super powers. And while many feel Ang should have just killed him, I think the literal Desus Ex of Energy Bending is a much better one. Ang takes away Ozai’s ability to fire bend. The one thing that made him feel superior to all other things in the world, he is reduced to just a man; a normal man. A normal man any of his supporters can see reduced to what he is, and the pitiful state. It’s a fate worse than death and the only way to keep future fighting from happening as if he did die, he would be a martyr. For crying out loud, we still have War Criminals from Fascist Germany that have continued to flee justice seeing they have done nothing wrong, and people that idolize that idiot from Austria despite being more a hinderance to his war effort than an actual asset. What’s to say the same wouldn’t happen in the Fire Nation with likeminded attitudes?



Next up, Jesus Christ. While I view him in a different like than others due to being an active Christian, most people do not have a problem with our Lord and Savior even if they are not of the faith (its his faithful they have a problem with). When conflict was aimed at him, he brushed it aside for the most part of fought back in a manner that was calm and collected, but not violent.



Why was he asked If they should do taxes? Say yes, he supports Rome (their conquerors). Say no, a rubble. How he response: Give the coins minted in Ceasar’s image to Ceasar, and give your self (who is made in the Image of God) unto God.

The woman caught in adultery? Besides the fact where is the guy as legaly he had to suffer the same fate, Christ ignored them for the most part until they were at their most frustrated. If he pardoned her he would have supposedly Broken the Law of Moses, but if he condemned her where is his save everyone message? So he tells them the one without sin gets to throw the first stone (something no mortal save for Jesus).

The list continues. The only time we see him get violent is when he is driving people out of the temple for depending on the translation, for turning the most sacred place in Judaism into either a place of commerce or a den of thieves (I prefer both…I have been to malls before). And that was to braid a whip, which takes hours to do right, and chase people out. He took stands, he fought not with a fist or a sword but his wit, but he was far from passive.



Same with Mahatma Ghandhi. While some aspects of his life have darkened his reputation, there is a reason he was for the longest time the considered the Go to guy for an image of peaceful protests. See also Mother Teresia in this regard, but he didn’t want armed conflict, or an armed revolution. Yet he fought to give respect and independce to the people on the Indian Sub continent, liberating it. Even using ways that would get the point across in the most effective ways while still holding on to these ideals.



Martin Luthor King Jr. also did likewise. There is a reason he went to Alabama: he knew that just by dong a peaceful, legal march the powers to be would react as they did, thus you had the police brutality and firefighters pushing people back with firehoses strong enough to strip bark off of trees. His methods worked. There is a reason all other civil rights movements (Chicano rights, Asian Rights, Gay Rights, Disabled Rights) started up after his Black Rights Movement; why people are still inspired to carry the torch he lit to this day.



Of course lets talk another bit of my childhood, Gundam Wing. The first taste of the Gundam franchise to the Mainstream public and a major reason anime became popular in the west again, Gundam Wing was an awesome show. Far from perfect, even goofy at times, but it tried. In the areas of Paciafism, well lets let Profesor Otaku take us to school on where it gets right and wrong in this video.





For the too long didn’t read part of the video, part of what it gets wrong, and what some people on either side of the real world get wrong about Pacifism can be summed up as this line from the video: When you live in a world where giant roots can cut battle ships in half you better hope you got a lot of people real interested about not killing each other anymore.” While it’s a pity we don’t have real world mecha, the sentiment is still there: With as much time, energy, research, and money the world has put into warfare in all its forms over our species short history, in order for Disarmament and total pacifism to work we suddenly need to stop trying to do the arm conflict thing on a drop of a hat.



Its been a while since I watched the show, but at one point Zecks monologues that one of the things that needs to stop all wars is to have one so ugly is scars us as a species. The problem with that is we have had many over our history. Ghengis Khon dropped the Carbon Footprint by 700 million tons in his wars, and both World Wars should have been the end of war with the nightmares they brought but we all know it didn’t.



To make it work you have to realize a few issues bar its path. Pacifism is a continual process, much like say one’s faith or the scientific method. If its not evolving, changing, flowing…it becomes stagnant, and as we all know: Stagnate water is not good for one’s health. You also need to be prepared to be a martyred for the cause. It will get you kill, and people will have died for it, and not everyone is ready for the ultimate sacrifice. This doesn’t mean be stupid about it, but a target is going to be on you: Be ready for it. We also have to deal with the economics of it. As long as we have rich twits with a chip on their shoulders and those with next to nothing trying to make ends meet we are going to suffer as violence is fun and economical for the former, and the only means to get anywhere for the latter.





So what areas did I and my examples get right, where did they go wrong and how to make a pacifist character that isn’t a load.