“If you got a bad gene, you’ve got to know it. And you got to deal with it because otherwise you will inflict chaos on the world and we’ve done it. We have to know both,” Zogby said. “We were born with the genocide against indigenous people, we were born with slavery, and we were born with the conquest of the southwest. And in all three instances we kind of defined ourselves as a nation and it wasn’t a pretty picture.”
Over 50 people gathered Sunday at the museum for Zogby’s keynote speech, which was the cornerstone of the “Becoming and Being An American In A Challenging Time” event.
Throughout his speech, the New York native shared anecdotes from his over four decades as a researcher, activist and politician. Zogby’s insights drew on experiences at the highest level of American politics, which included appointments by President Obama to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom and multiple leadership posts within the Democratic National Committee.
Zogby talked about recent measures by the Trump administration to censure US history. Examples cited by the scholar include the removal of an exhibit on slavery from the Independence Mall in Philadelphia.
“What this does is it erases a story we need to tell and know about who we have been and what we have done,” Zogby said. “If you deny the evil side and pretend it doesn’t exist it’s going to come up and bite you. But if you deny the other one and pretend it can’t exist then you lose hope and there’s no reason to fight.”
A night for peace and contemplation
Executive director Alice Young-Basora spoke at the event.
“Inspired by the lives and teachings of Mahatma Gandhi and MLK Jr, this season invites us to reflect on how we practice non-violence in our lives and community,” Young-Basora said about the museum’s ongoing season of non-violence. “Those 64 days are concentrated on discussing, learning about, and acting in non-violent ways. Tonight is one of those things that we’re doing. We thought it was important that Dr. Zogby come out tonight to talk about his work and the advocacy that he does.”
Before Zogby took to the stage, poet Hania Adel Itawi shared several verses that touched on life and her native Lebanon.
“Your commitment to nonviolence is critical because it’s the best weapon against them, what they cannot possibly deal with is nonviolent resistance. That tension between the two sides of ourselves….that struggle is constant,” Zogby said. “It’s easy to be bad. It’s easy to knock out somebody’s windows, shatter the glass with a gun in hand. But the harder part is to resist that urge and do it peacefully and call to your better angels.”
In rapt silence, audience members listened to Zogby’s analysis of the ongoing war between the US and Iran. The consequences, according to the researcher, will be felt for generations.
“I think the genocide in Gaza and this war with Iran are going to shape the world for the foreseeable future at least,” Zogby said. “Instead of finding no side and creating some kind of stability and some framework for cooperation we end up exacerbating conflicts in each of the various situations. And I worry now that with the Iran War all of those tendencies that are moving in the direction of more chaos are only going to be more exacerbated.”
Civic engagement and non-violent resistance are key to making a difference, according to the scholar. As examples he cited David Miller, who famously burned his draft card in 1965 to protest the Vietnam War.
“It was quite a shock to the campus but was also an inspiration,” Zogby, who was a student in Syracuse at the time, recalled. “It was one young man, by himself saying I won’t go.”
According to Zogby, political engagement and understanding the consequences of war will be key in affecting change.
“It starts with an election, it ends with an election, but it also means an active populace that says ‘this cannot be done in our name anymore. We are not going to contribute to produce a system that only pays attention to how many weapons have we sold to how many countries.’ Because that’s what this is about at the end of the day,” Zogby said.
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