‘PCS 211’ Category

Does The Punishment Fit The Crime?

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/24/magazine/mag-24lives-t.html?_r=1&ref=capitalpunishment After the MayDay Conference on Capital Punishment I was intrigued as to the argument Blecker made about wanting the punishment to fit the crime. This brought up the debate in my mind as to which is worse, life in prison or death? If we want the punishment to be as harsh as the crime, […]

Adding to the Curriculum

After today’s discussion, I’ve been thinking more about nonviolence and its strengths and weaknesses. I think that one of its main weaknesses is that its not as commonly practiced compared to more violent actions such as war. Nonviolent movements are a relatively new solution to social issues which means its not as familiar or casual for people […]

Celebrating Bin Laden’s Death

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/03/my-take-why-post-bin-laden-partying-made-me-cringe/ The different celebrations that happened the evening the US found out Bin Laden was dead was far and wide. Within this blog post, it is clear that there were many different emotions expressed from students across college campus’s. After seeing the images and the partying that was happening at these large schools, do you […]

When stubbornness meets structural violence

At a time when Aljazeera’s homepage constantly details Syria’s violent crackdown on protestors, the BBC proclaims the same and then some in Libya and Afghanistan, the New York Times discusses the latest in murder and mayhem, and the Peace Studies course address the militant tendencies of the United States, it is easy to overlook some […]

The Influence of War

In class yesterday we talked about the influence that war has on our culture. Something that really stood out was how the war influenced the production and sales of toys. It amazes me how a topic that is actually very violent can create such a popular attraction for kids. This seems wrong to me in […]

The Focus of Anonymous

The other day in Intro to Peace Studies, we viewed some propaganda from the group Anonymous. During their call for Operation Payback, to avenge Julian Assange after several major companies (Amazon, MasterCard, &c) withdrew their support for WikiLeaks, Anonymous called access to the Internet “a basic human right,” and that Anonymous’ chief complaint is that […]

Death Penalty for Terrorists? For Anyone?

It was announced today that the military is pursuing the first capital punishment case against terror suspect. Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri is being charged with planning the bombing attack on the U.S. Navy vessel, which was in the Gulf of Aden near Yemen and with heading the aborted attack on the destroyer USS The Sullivans in […]

Is The US Becoming More Militarized?

Today in America I believe that we view our country as being “all powerful” and in some aspects this assumption may be true. However, I do not believe that we are becoming more militarized by any sense. Sure we may have spend more money on homeland security and deployed more troops overseas than in the […]

An Imaginary Dichotomy

With the recent controversies over the company known as Wikileaks releasing governmental cables and reports from embassies and agencies, questions of war media versus peace media has grown. But do categories such as these even really exist? So often, we as humans, try to dichotomize the world into artificial categories that would not exist without […]

Peace, Politics and Christianity

Is Christianity a peaceful religon? Good question. I do not think it is possible to give a clear yes or no answer, mainly because history has shown that religion and politics are inextricably linked. Both have had and continue to have influences on the other. In the past, Christianity has played a huge part of […]