IF ONE DOESN'T TAKE A STAND, CHOSE A SIDE, DOES ONE SEEM UNCARING?

It's hard to take a stand sometimes. To say "I believe in THIS". I DON'T believe in THAT". It means sticking up for something, and having the facts to back it up and not being afraid of criticism. It means you believe in yourself enough to not lose sleepless nights if one or many turn against you saying, "What you believe is totally wrong."

If you don't chose sides, does that mean that your opinion isn't worth much or that you see both sides as possibilities?

I highly admire people who believe in something and stick up for it. But I cannot always be that way. When I am confident about knowing most of the facts, or when it is a personal viewpoint dealing with feelings, people, comunication, I can stick up and fight. But if I am not 100% informed about something, about politics or history or geography or factual information, I don't feel I can say THIS IS RIGHT, because honestly, I am not completely sure.

I believe however that everyone needs to have a say, everyone needs to be heard and everyone may have something in their opinion that may be of value. I try my best, and although it is not the strongest voice heard, at least it is always better than total silence, total indifference.

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Comment by Clicia Pavan on February 7, 2009 at 3:03am: As a poet I am, I respond with poetry

The key to happiness
Clicia Pavan

Look for another
Look at your friend
Accepted their way of being
love people for who they are
not as you want them to be
It is not difficult to accept people
as they are

But as they really are!
It is difficult, but learn to love
is listening, listening with eyes and
listen, listen with the soul and
with all senses

Love is a song from the heart
Gradually, you will learn
to love and you will understand that
Love is not to
is involved or receive
is accept faults and qualities

Love is above all respect
Love to you and accept your limits
Love your neighbor and to God
Love because love is the key to happiness
For peace and harmony in the world

Comment by lazytyke on February 6, 2009 at 9:42pm: Too many words are spoken. They come from the human ego which believes itself superior to all things. From silence only can love come which means no side should be chosen. To choose a side, you lose true love and put yourself immediately in conflict with the side you did not choose. Putting yourself in conflict generates more conflict. Force is met with equal force.

love and ipeace

lazytyke

Comment by Carlton Jackson on February 6, 2009 at 8:29pm: We can never know all the facts, we can only know perspectives based on the experience and environment of the time. Ralph Waldo Emerson in his essay XI on the Intellect said this... "You have first and instinct, then an opinion, then knowledge, as the plant has root, bud, and fruit. Trust the instinct to the end, though you can render no reason. It is vain to hurry it. By trusting to the end, it shall ripen into truth, and you shall know why you believe."

Choose compassion and consequential thinking. Make choices for yourself based on how it will effect others and the environment. You cannot choose for others. Choose to be the peace maker and bring the issues to the common denominator then begin the process of mutual cooperation and growth.

The world is curved as is truth, so be true to yourself regardless of the leverage against you.

carlton

Comment by Enitan on February 6, 2009 at 6:44pm: I really think you have said something that many of us ponder within us but rarely share. Many things in life are not so clear cut; there are many gray areas. What seems so wrong in some situations could be the perfect answer in another.

Some things in life tend to resolve themselves with or without our help in ways that may or may not please us; while others, lend themselves very easily to taking a specific side. Should we always take one side versus the other side? I personally don't think so because that mindset blinds us to other possibilities such as inaction and silence or quiet/covert neutral action probably; both different from the "black or white" perspective.

We cannot always ascertain all the facts in a given situation. Neither can we always decipher or comprehend the motives or the intent of another person's heart. We all do take a stand; hopefully given our best assessment of a situation, that stand may be to be silent or to take yet another path.

Each individual Ultimately has to live with himself/herself and the intent of his/her own heart. The wisdom in it all is to know when to act, where to stand, when to be silent and when to be still. Where ever we choose to stand we will all share in the outcome in varying degrees

Comment by rose on February 6, 2009 at 4:00pm: What one "seems" and what one "is" can be *very* different things, depending on who is judging the "seeming."

I've come to a place in my life where I really don't care what others think of me (does *that* make me uncaring? :)) What I *am* in any given moment is where I mine the value in my life ... that is where I mine the intentions *and* actions of what I create in my life - and in yours.

There are times when I am silent ... there are times when I am vocal ... just as there are times when I AM ... and times when I DO.

In my experience, silent intentions are food for the actions that make manifest in our worlds ... and so both are as vital.

Peace.

Comment by rose mary dekant on February 6, 2009 at 2:22pm: wisdom & knowledge of love & peace to all.

Comment by Elisabetta on February 6, 2009 at 2:12pm: Good question!!

Well, it is hard for a human being not to take sides.
But it is harder to remain neutral.

I think that in all conflicts there is a truth and a lie on both sides...
It is up to each one to find the truth, without manipulation.
I am with you, It is imperative to know 100% about the conflict, before one takes sides.

Moreover, I think that to be on one or the other side is what seeds hate among people.

Manipulating minds through propaganda and media
is the worst sin that a human being can do against another human being.

A better world would be built teachig people to think by themselves and in my humble opinion,
the only way to achieve peace is to remain neutral.
That doesn't not mean to allow people to do wrong, but if people are neutral,
they would not act by emotions... they would think before acting on both sides.
I know, this is utopia, maybe one day we will be better humans.

Comment by Sabriyah Fatimah on February 6, 2009 at 1:45pm: With some issues there is no black and white, right and wrong. Sometimes it takes more courage to say "I don't know" or "I don't know enough about it yet to decide." or "I don't think either side is right."

Comment by 2D Steve on February 6, 2009 at 12:43pm: People re-create the tragidy around them..

We need to GET IT - and do it FAST!

The burning issue?

A fiat monetary supply which is spreading VALUE thin...

MONEY is just a socially acceptable form of natural selection..

it is the evolution of natural selection!

But it will take us all..

Currency (money) is like a river, which is always growing wider..

eventually the water gets so thin, that the river evaporates in the sun..

and then we will have nothing.

WE NEED TO FIGURE IT OUT!!! SOON!!!!!!

Namaste

Comment by Scott on February 6, 2009 at 12:37pm: Hello Stephanie, and all at iPeace,
The issue of 'not taking sides' is a huge one for Peace advocates & activists everywhere.
Its complex in many cases, and the recent Israel-Gaza conflict is a prime example. I actually spent a number of hours in correspondence regarding merely the description of the war - reprimanded for not calling it 'Israels invasion of Gaza' from some people from the socialist left. Reprimanded by the 'pure' Non Violence advocates for showing concern about the imbalance of the Gaza conflict, and the US involvement - the politics, and for my support of those raising the issues.
There are two levels of thinking and involvement regarding war & the wish to eliminate it in my opinion.
1- We have the immediate crisis. We can do 'this', right now, to save lives. Noble & needed, but not necessarily adhering to Non-Violence. This is the conventional domain of the modern 'socialist left' - immersed in the arguments of the issue at hand, and essentially so. I support this approach & its need.
2- We need to solve the underlying issues of why Violence is still with us, we need to 'be' Non-Violent in every way for the sake of non-contradiction, and thus not even support any defensive response of a violent nature. Personally this is my position for long term solutions.
For me, the truth is exactly half way between the two extremes, the duopoly. Both responses to war are needed while war exists on Earth.
To those who say that one must 'take a side', well, that is the wrong way of approaching conflict. One must control the damage to people & humanity now, and plan for its non-recurrance. It is a different way of thinking, one that often appears lacking in emotion to those close to the human consequences. The emotion is frequently replaced by hard work..
It could also be described as a balance of emotion vs rational thought. We need both to make accurate decisions - ignoronce of either is not right.
With Peace
Scott