A History of Violence Journal

What does “peace” mean anyway? Peace means the absence of violence. It means living in harmony with the people who surround you, whether they are family or neighbors, co-workers or bosses, fellow students or faculty. But does peace go so far to mean that we are submissive to those with more authority or those who are stronger than we are? Or does it mean that we pick and choose our battles so that when we make a statement people know that the point we are trying to make is important to us? In ‘A History of Violence’ Tom Stall decided that he wanted to pick and choose his battles carefully. He was tired of the violence of his mob past and chose to live the simple life of a small town businessman, the owner of the local diner. He buried his violent past to live in harmony with the ‘ideal’ small town America. He had the ‘ideal’ family, a wife and two children, and even owned his own home. But was he fooling himself by thinking he could live peacefully?

Tom Stall believed that he could live peacefully, and he did, for 13 years. That must have seemed like a blessing to him, no bloodshed, no fighting, he possibly had even stopped looking back to see if he was being followed by the mob. But a series of circumstances brought his peaceful world to an end, circumstances he could not ignore because he knew the type of person who had just walked through his diner door. He knew because 13 years prior to that day he was involved with those same people and thought he had escaped. Through the action to save the lives of people close to him a torrential chain of events quickly ensued. The media attention, his photo and home announced on local and national TV, the quick rise to celebrity status allowed the mob to find him. He thought he was in a peaceful environment, but his violent past followed him to his safe haven.

Does peace mean that we are to be submissive to those who have more power or those who are stronger than we are? Are we to be in a state of fear of violence or emotional turmoil so that we give way to those who are stronger or more cunning than we are? Does peace mean that we are to always be submissive? I do not believe that peace means to be submissive. If we live in a submissive state, always bending for others to have their way, we will end up with a meaningless life. If our life is not meaningless it will be impossible to do those things which we deem important in our own psyche. By denying our psyche we can end up with mental problems or we could become irrational and physically violent and harm those who are around us. If someone is always submissive to others it is quite possible that they have been abused, oppressed, or brainwashed. That is not living in peace, it is living in fear or a state of ignorance. If we allow ourselves to remain in that state we are not living in peace, we are living in a sub-life. It also means that when someone stronger or more cunning comes along we have to bend and change to please them. So if we are always submissive we would always be doing the whims of those who are stronger or more cunning than we are. This was shown through the life of Jack Stall and his interaction with the local high school bully. Even though Jack was more cunning with words, the bully seemed stronger and was definitely more aggressive than Jack. All through the school year Jack took the verbal and emotional abuse from the bully and he tried to maintain his own ground through cunning words. Jack was submissive to the bully because he did not want physical abuse. He wanted to avoid pain and injury so he submitted to the verbal abuse that the bully gave him. May be it was a sense of empowerment after he aided his father in what he believed to be defending their home and the turning point was when he picked up a shotgun and shot one of the mobsters, but after that attack he gave up cunning words to escape his bully. The next time his local school bully verbally assailed him, Jack became physically violent. Afterwards, when Tom questioned Jack about his mode of handling difficult situations, Jack retorted that they don’t solve problems by hitting people, they “just shoot them.”

Are we really fooling ourselves by thinking we can live in peace? After all, there will always be someone in this world who is stronger or more cunning than we are. If we are to live in peace, how is it to be done? Who is the person who decides what peace is and how it is to be enforced? Or do we each go to an isolated area where there is no contact with other humans so that we can live in peace? What is peace? Is it achievable? Or is it an impossible dream that we gaze wistfully at from our strifeful world? I believe that we can live in peace, and that it is obtainable, but people must be willing to live in peace with each other. There must be a putting aside of differences, a choice to live in harmony, the desire for peace in order for there to be peace in the world. Peace is achievable through the antithesis of peace by standing firm for our beliefs even if it means fighting for them. In order to have peace in the future we must put aside peace for a short while. We must choose our battles carefully to make our statement for peace have more meaning. If we pick and choose our battles carefully what we stand up for will have more meaning. This can be demonstrated through language. If someone constantly uses colorful metaphors, slang, and four letter words all through their speech it becomes commonplace. In today’s society almost all forms of media widely use these metaphors, four letter words and slang. However when ‘Gone With The Wind’ came out and Rhett Butler said “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn” the language was more impressive and made more of a statement. All through the movie he could have used language but he didn’t. He waited until the time when it would be the most effective and when it would make the greatest impact. We must pick and choose our battles carefully to make the most effective statements possible. If we find that smoking cigarettes is dangerous do we go up to every smoker and forcefully take away their cigarettes? Or do we find a more effective means? Taxation of cigarettes, making them less accessible, restricting areas where they can be smoked in public, etc. would be more peaceful and would have to be agreed upon by the majority of people before it was passed into law.

So who decides what is peace and how it is to be enforced? I believe that the majority of people in the society should decide these matters. It is a tricky subject because people should be allowed to voice their own opinions about peace, what it is, and what steps of action will be taken to enforce peace. But to obtain these opinions people must be free to make their own decisions without undue distress. Another tricky matter is that in making the decisions concerning peace everyone should have a voice and no one group in society should be pinpointed for correction without having the ability to voice their opinions as well. Society should not pinpoint one group to discriminate against or annihilate just because they are different. But the question keeps going back to who decides these matters? What if the society as a whole decides that people who write with their left hand are deviants and should be annihilated? What should be the determining factor that society is wrong and that left-handed people are not deviants that should be removed? The questions are a never-ending cycle, always going back to who. Who decides? Who enforces? Who is the one responsible for maintaining peace? The answer that keeps coming to my mind is that peace lies inside each one of us. It is up to each person to decide whether something would cause turmoil or maintain peace and to take the proper steps of action in order to maintain peace. It is up to us to decide who to put in authority to maintain civil peace. It is up to us to decide what laws to agree upon to maintain peace in society. Peace, ironically, is individual. When individuals are peaceful, society will be peaceful. When societies are peaceful, the nations will be peaceful. When the nations are peaceful, there will be peace in the world.