eradicate."
Tippett also acknowledged the influence of the non-violent resistance
campaigns of Gandhi and Nehru in India. His letter ended: "I imagine
that
only by the endurance of individuals who refuse (non-co-operation) can the
madness of war be in any degree shortened."
To be a conscientious objector was to invite public opprobrium. As Tippett
later wrote of his time in jail for refusing to accept the quasi-military
options offered him: "To the screws, we conchies were the lowest of the
low.
Our crime was despicable."
Conscientious objection to war relies on the individual being convinced that
refusing to wage war is a more effective form of
resisting evil than
fighting back or supporting pre-emptive strikes. Its critics argue that
peaceful protest is itself only possible because of the threat of force.
Sixty years ago, Tippett was confronted with this argument in a letter from
Ralph Vaughan Williams:
"I will not argue with you about your pacifist scruples which I respect
though I think they are all wrong. But I do join issue with you in the idea
that it is anyone's business at a time like this to sit apart from the world
to create music until he is sure that he has done all he can to preserve the
world from destruction and helped to create a world where creative art will
be a possibility."
Mahatma Gandhi likewise faced the key question of whether non-violent
resistance would be of any use against the absolute evil of a Nazi empire,
a
question that echoes down the wars. John Briley's script for Richard
Attenborough's Gandhi boils this down to a crucial exchange in jail between
Gandhi and the Life magazine photographer Margaret Bourke-White:
"Do you really believe that you could use non-violence against someone
like
Hitler?"
"Not without defeats and great pain, but are there no defeats in this
war,
no pain? What you cannot do is accept injustice from Hitler or anyone. You
must make the injustice