Gandhi's grandson shares lessons of peace, nonviolence

"You must be the change you want to see in the world."

One of the most famous quotes spoken by Indian political leader Mohandas Gandhi was the center of discussion at a presentation Thursday afternoon in the Cape Florida Ballroom in the Student Union.

Arun Gandhi, grandson to Mohandas Gandhi, spoke to an audience of more than 500 people on the teachings of his grandfather as a part of the 2011-2012 theme "People Power, Politics, and Global Change" for the UCF Global Perspectives Office.

Gandhi's presentation, titled "Lessons Learned from My Grandfather: Non-Violence in a Violent World," focused on how hate and anger leads to violence and ways to control it. Gandhi grew up in South Africa where discriminatory apartheid laws were in place, and got a first-hand look at the violence caused by the laws after being victim to beatings from both whites and blacks for the color of his skin. After spending time with his grandfather in India, he soon learned about nonviolence through understanding violence.

"The first thing I learned from Grandfather was understanding anger and how to channel it," Gandhi said. "We must channel anger, rather than abuse it."

Gandhi said that approximately 80 percent of the world's violence is generated by anger and there are two forms of violence committed everyday: violence against nature and violence against humanity. Violence against nature is throwing away natural resources, which can lead to society over consuming, which causes many to live in poverty, which is also called violence against humanity.

Anikah Hossain, a freshman majoring in biomedical science, has always stood behind Mohandas Gandhi's teachings and found the presentation very informing and it was helpful in getting people to listen to the message of nonviolence and peace.

"It's definitely possible," she said when asked about stopping the violence in the world. "But only if people listen [and not disregard] what everyone else thinks."

Gandhi believes that it is important for everyone to look at themselves to see what they are doing wrong through their everyday actions. There is physical violence, he said, that results in the physical harm to another, but there is also a second form of violence: passive violence. Passive violence is where you are still hurting someone though your actions or words, whether it is directly or indirectly, consciously or subconsciously.

Passive violence is committed every day and is what generates the anger that leads the victim to want to seek justice for what wrong has been done to them.

"Justice has come to mean revenge," Gandhi said. "Justice should mean recognizing [those who have done wrong did so out] of ignorance."

In a culture of violence, Gandhi said that we believe that we are naturally violent people, but we really are not. Violence is not something that we are born with; instead of it being a learned behavior that is helping us exist, it is destroying our humanity.

"It's important to promote Gandhi's teachings of nonviolence," said Trevor Persaud, the Student Government Association's diversity initiatives coordinator. Persaud is also in charge of Global Perspectives' and SGA's "Conversations for Change," and he believed that having Gandhi speak was important to educate the students about his grandfather's teaching when there is so much hatred and violence in the world.

"By setting a key example," Persaud said, "students can learn how they can make a difference in the world from the message he [Gandhi] speaks of."

Gandhi believes that one of the problems faced today by many is the absence of respect. In today's society, many believe they need to tolerate one another, but not respect one another. It is only when we are able to be respectful and understanding to others that we will be able to accept our humanity and move forward.

Gandhi's closing statement involved the meaning of peace, which was told in the form of a story of an Indian king who was searching for the true meaning of peace. Peace, the story said, was not dependent on solely one person or one action.

"If someone finds peace and locks it away for him or herself, it will surely disappear," Gandhi said. "If you let it interact with nature and those around you, all can benefit from it and work to make this world a better place for future generations."