Women Flagging the End of Wars

 

The bluster of men at the beginning of wars is like a cocking of language—their words oiled and weaponized against their doubting selves, against their enemies, and against rhetoric advocating peaceful solutions. The ammunition is boxed and peddled with convincingly glorious slogans: “God is on our side,” or “Whatever may be our fate, the cause for which we fight is just and righteous and must prevail.” These exact quotes and similar sentiments were voiced by both Union and Confederate soldiers at the start of the American Civil War. 

Ten of my ancestors fought in that war—five for the North and five for the South. I find it absurd to think that if any of those men had swapped their home regions some hundred years before the war, Northerners to the South or Southerners to the North, the side each man fought for would probably have shifted. Men convince men to fight. Peruse any military history, and the faces in command are men’s. Their prerogatives and responsibilities have led civilizations into and through countless wars across generations and around the world. Some wars were justified, and some were not. Women were a footnote, but this is changing.

In 1865, the Confederate Army’s white flag of surrender was a hastily found dishcloth purloined from a woman’s kitchen. It was a signal, as if a flagging of the beginning of women’s role in ending wars. After the Civil War, newly available educational opportunities elevated women into the public sphere. As predicted in the Bahá'í writings, they will use their influence to end wars: 

“So it will come to pass that when women participate fully and equally in the affairs of the world, when they enter confidently and capably the great arena of law and politics, war will cease; for women will be the obstacle and hindrance to it.” — ‘Abdu’l-Bahá

The diversity and creativity we already see among women who have won the Nobel Peace Prize suggest an incredible tapestry of women-led approaches to dislodging war as a means of solving problems. Wangari Maathai, an African professor, founded the Green Belt Movement, in which women planted trees to prevent deforestation and economic instability. This effort helped make a democratic Kenyan government a reality. Leymah Gbowee developed methods to help traumatized child soldiers from the Liberian Civil War and brought Christian and Muslim women together to work for the end of that conflict. She befriended another woman, Kiki Katese, who founded Ingoma Nshya (New Drum), which brought together women from opposing sides of the Rwandan genocide to bond and rebuild their lives through drumming or by running ice cream shops! In America, Jane Addams was elected a delegate to the first Peace Convention at The Hague and, in the same year (1915), became the founder-president of Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom. She encouraged President Wilson to advocate for establishing the League of Nations. The following description of her intellectual skills exemplifies one woman’s capacity, grounded in her education.

“In an era when the mental capability of women was still questioned, Addams’s breadth of knowledge on a variety of subjects was formidable. The journalist Ida Tarbell considered her “one of the best-read women that I have ever known.” But unlike most experts, Addams remained open minded to other viewpoints. “Her mind had more ‘floor space’ in it than any other I have known,” recalled the feminist author Charlotte Perkins Gilman. “She could set a subject down, unprejudiced, and walk all around it, allowing fairly for every one’s point of view.” — Neil Lanctor, Lit Hub, 11/1/2021

Women have the potential to make world peace a reality. Their innate reluctance to violence, abhorrence of sending their sons to battle, and “that they are more philanthropic and responsive toward the needy and suffering” (Bahá’í Writings) all bode well for their role in bringing about world peace. Maybe not in this century, but in one to come. Flag it as possible.