“I don’t believe it is possible to be neutral. The world is already moving in a certain direction and to be neutral, to be passive in the situation like that - is to collaborate with whatever is going on. And I, as a teacher, do not want to be a collaborator with whatever is happening in the world. I want myself, as a teacher, and I want you as students, to intercede with whatever is happening in the world” – these words belong to the famous historian, writer, political scientist and simply one of the most honorable persons of our time – Howard Zinn. As a man, who primarily seen in the surrounding people individuals, not racial differences, belonging to a particular nationality, cannon fodder in the war, he shows a personal example of a hero of our time.
Howard Zinn is referred as one of the most influential writers of his time. His book – the one that is best at revealing the eyes on the reality ("[Babylon-5,Crafts Book] You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train PDF By Howard Zinn Ebook Or Kindle Epub Free"). All his life he had been struggling for rights of those whom he found abused and disregarded. He is - the one who began lots of strikes in order to fight injustice.
His works are full of tears for fellow citizens and full of disdain towards those, who finds destroying people’s lives some kind of entertainment. In his life, he saw death himself – from 1943 till 1945 Zinn was a voluntary soldier – a bombardier in the WWII. After the successful execution of the order of the crowning device of a French town (which happened exactly after the war’s end), he finally gives up on the government and its “justice” – “It was a turning point of my political consciousness I began to question the total goodness of the “good” war. Only then did I start to think about my role in that bombing.” (You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train). After these events, he returns to his homeland and in his condemnation of the system starts the anti-government action, support for which he sees in the awareness of people in the true "face" of the state, in the events that were left out of history books.
But what made him a man he came to be? What had ignited a spark in his heart which soon enough determined his fate? The first turning point in his life came to be the Times Square demonstration when he was a boy of 17. It was a peaceful sort of manifestation, but, nevertheless, it was quite violent. It is than that he not only realized, that the government simply did not want to hear people and so was not intended to do anything by its will, but also that here is a way to make state figures reckon with public opinion. “I guess the police are not neutral. I guess the government is not neutral. There must be some truth to the radicals.” ( You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train). From that moment, he began to plan the way of this situation to change.
However, he emphasizes that if there is a real way of making something in a correct way, then it is by doing it together .Zinn saw the method of conveying the will of the people in public demonstrations, rallies, which by their nature were peaceful strikes. “Nonviolence does not mean acceptance, but resistance, not waiting - but acting” (Zinn, Declarations Of Independence ) “Democracy – is not just a counting up of votes, it is counting up of actions. Without those on the bottom, acting out their desires for justice, as the government acts out its needs the scales of democracy will be off. That is why civil disobedience is not to be just to be tolerated if we are to have a truly democratic society, it is a necessity.”(Zinn, Disobedience And Democracy 25). He was quite right in his guess: such great deeds as making a revolt cannot be made by a single person. The only way to do so is by sticking together.
Then he faced a problem that lots of people did not even know what they were fighting for. If on the one hand it can be said that the majority of adults are aware of the political situation of those times, the same is not true for the country’s younger citizens. Zinn had been a brilliant history teacher – with getting a job as a teacher early on in Spelman College and then at Boston University, he gathers appreciative and attentive students, who become another fresh spark in the flame of new manifestations. By educating youth the true course of things in the country, what role actually played key solutions of the USA, he raised a generation of intelligent people who now try to do whatever it takes for the good of the Motherland, but not the government. “I was very conscious about the role of the historian and how historian, who didn’t use his knowledge to play some role in what was the most serious issue before the nation, was somebody who is neglecting his duty - to education to students.” (You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train). The role of a historian indeed is in clarifying the truth to people and in avoiding the repetition of past mistakes of humanity.
He saw the right and the wrong; he saw the society from within. He stood there, on strikes, like one of them. Zinn hailed the requirements of equality and freedom with all the others. He was chosen by people as their leader because of his attitude towards them - not intending to be higher than them, but teaching them how to be higher than they are. The origins of this lie deep in his childhood full of poverty and hardship. “Well, my interest in a labor movement came so naturally. I’ve grown up in a factory-working family. My father was a waiter, a member of the waiters’ union.”(You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train). It was the reason of his tolerance to the poor and people of the different nationalities. Since his childhood he had been the same as they were – deep below under the line of the well-off life.
Besides, in addition to supporting the disadvantaged population, anti-war organizations, Howard Zinn also provided his full assistance to representatives of African-American origin, which in those years was nonsense. The infamous among the officials historian could not stand racial intolerance. Starting from teaching at Spelman College, where he faced prejudice even towards children: “A student from Forsyth, Georgia, wrote: “I guess if you are from a small Georgia townyou can say that your first encounter with prejudice was the day you were bornMy parents never got to see their infant twins alive because the only incubator in the hospital was on the ‘white’ side.” What I had known in my head about race prejudice now touched my heart” (Zinn, You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train 20). Zinn personally stood up for blacks and, moreover, defended their interests in court. He knew that no human would endure for so long and one day the rust chain will be broken. “They were often bitter experiences, but they nurtured the angel that would one day become a great force and change the South forever.” (25). People with the different skin color do not have to suffer because their appearance is different from ours.
Unlike his colleagues, he studied history not only from books and long-forgotten texts but from people, whom this history touches. He had been contacting people, helping them, learned each of their story in particular. He explained them the importance of history, showed them the truth in return. “History is important. If you don’t know history, it is if you were born yesterday. And if you were born yesterday, anybody up there in a position of power can tell you anything, and you have no way of checking up on it.” ( You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train). Each person ought to know history for this is the only way not to be manipulated by other people or to make mistakes which could have been avoided.
It is very clear from these observations that his method of influence on the situation in the country was the awareness of its citizens and their integration and collaboration. Moreover, he prefers to personally participate in the events of creating history, paying tribute to the old one, however. Thus, a few decades later after WWII, he returned to the French village, which was ruined after testing a new kind of weapon on it. Due to opened in unveiled archives, Zinn discovered the names and families of the deceased, imbued their grief, and wrote two of his famous books under the influence of this revelations: The Zinn Reader and The politics of history. ("Howard Zinn: "To Be Neutral, To Be Passive In A Situation Is To Collaborate With Whatever Is Going On""). The last thing he would do is to be quiet, inactive, simply observing, how his homeland had been drifted apart and citizens continuing to suffer.
Born in poverty, he became richer with every smile of oppressed in school child, a war veteran, who had cursed the government in every innocent killed. Zinn was the guiding star for those who until then were afraid to raise their head, for those who by fate were deprived of it. “It is the great challenge of our time: How to achieve justice, with struggle, but without war.” (Zinn, The Zinn Reader 266). May be one day government will understand.
Works cited
"[Babylon-5,Crafts Book] You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train PDF By Howard Zinn
Ebook Or Kindle Epub Free". New Books Online Library 2016. N.p., 2016. Web. 26 Mar. 2016.
"Howard Zinn: "To Be Neutral, To Be Passive In A Situation Is To Collaborate With Whatever
Is Going On"". Democracy Now!. N.p., 2005. Web. 27 Mar. 2016.
You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train. Deb Ellis, Denis Mueller, 2004. Film.
Zinn, Howard. Declarations Of Independence. New York, NY: HarperCollins, 1990. Print.
---. Disobedience And Democracy. New York: Random House, 1968. Print
---. The Zinn Reader. New York: Seven Stories Press, 1997. Print.
---. You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train. Boston: Beacon Press, 1994. Print.
