Challenge

People’s Guide to the World Peace Challenge:

 

 Our project is more than just a film. It is a call for action with many moving parts. The fluid design and vision of this project is in place to facilitate organic growth and engagement. To that end, timing is everything. The purpose of this guide is to open the door to the most effective practices that will enable our supporters, Sam’s Ride for Peace and the World Peace Challenge to make an impact in changing the way we respond to conflict as individuals and communities.

Our 3 Calls for Immediate Action:

As you watch our videos and read and understand the World Peace Challenge, we would like you to consider any of our 3 calls for immediate action that best suits your ability to show that you want to “Meet the Challenge”:

1. Join Sam’s Ride for Peace.

• Raleigh–Meet us at the send off and show the media that we have the support of the people. (Hillsborough Street at the Bell Tower in Raleigh May 9^th at 8:30) If you bring your bike, you can ride to 2 miles to the capital building with us and we will take your message the rest of the way for you to DC.

 

• Washington, DC— We want to arrive at the Iwo Jima Memorial with 100 cyclists.   We went from 4 riders last year to registering 30 and counting who are starting from Raleigh with us.   We need the DC area to pull together for the final stretch.

 

1. Film or photograph yourself accepting the World Peace Challenge and challenge someone else.

• Read the first lines of the World Peace Challenge into the camera and either email it directly to us at: filmsforworldpeace@gmail.com , or post it on Facebook with the hash tag #worldpeacechallenge. Be sure to challenge other people to do the same. We’ll put your video in the final montage in our feature documentary.
• Video is not your thing? Take a photo of yourself holding a paper with the words “I accept the World Peace Challenge”.

1. Contribute money to support the cause of non-violent conflict resolution and the call for a peace economy.

 

• We are now accepting contributions to help fund our initiative at: www.igg/at/2015worldpeacechallenge

The Vision:

 

The World Peace Challenge is a call for action that we will carry in Sam’s Ride for Peace. As we reach each destination on the route, it allows us to ask the people to get involved by affirming the challenge as we film them. This will amplify our call for a peace economy which will be the focus of the challenge after the ride.

 

The ride will kick-off from Hillsborough Street in Raleigh at the NC State Bell Tower which has inspired the work of another VFP project “Swords to Plowshares”. We will invite the media on the morning of Saturday, May 9^th, where we will gather and ride down the famous Hillsborough St to the capital building with the public. There the public can stop or they can continue to Louisburg College where we will be hosted for the first night. The campus has a “Peace Pole” and we will gather their for different peace commemorations including a public affirmation of the World Peace Challenge.

The ride will culminate at the Iwo Jima Memorial where we will publically invite representatives to meet us and participate in a public World Peace Challenge Affirmation in the presence of the spirits of those who lost their lives to violence in the hope for peace.

The World Peace Challenge will be annual event to recommit to a peace agenda that is not political party affiliated. We are excited to use this as the kick-off event for the National Veterans For Peace’s Legislative Week.

The goal of this year’s campaign:

1. Build engagement and community.
2. Diversify and motivate groups that support non-violent conflict resolution.
3. Target audiences are diverse and younger veterans and students.
4. Through the World Peace Challenge, we want to identify potential partners whether representatives or civilians who want to collaborate on efforts to bring about a foundation for a sustainable peace economy where liberty and prosperity both flourish.
5. Our goal is to prove that diverse people united by vision are more powerful than money!

 What can the people do to help us achieve these goals?

1. Share this link with everyone:   www.igg/at/2015worldpeacechallenge

It is very important that we direct all traffic to this site.

2. Subscribe to youtube.com/filmsforworldpeace and ask others to do the same.

3. Share their voice with us and allow us to amplify it in our film, our ride, our peace affirmation and our call for a peace economy—but how? See number item 4.

4. We would like everyone to issue the World Peace Challenge to people everywhere. We invite all to film themselves with their cellphones or on their computers reading the World Peace Challenge Affirmation followed by their own personal one-minute peace statement, vision or suggestion and challenging someone else by to do the same by simply sharing our indiegogo link (www.igg/at/2015worldpeacechallenge ) with #worldpeacechallenge written in their message.  They can either send their video to filmsforworldpeace@gmail.com or post it on www.facebook.com/filmsforworldpeace or post it on your own facebook page with our indiegogo link and the hashtag in their message.   If you only contribute $15 to our indiegogo campaign with a comment showing the link to where you posted the video, we will put your video in our montage at the end of the film. We want thousands to have their voice in our film and let our representatives know that we the people have chosen a new course of action.   Once again, all we need is $15 to make this happen and we will carry your voice to DC. Please challenge people immediately to do this. Meanwhile, we will be issuing the challenge on college campuses and to our representatives. Each veteran is more than welcome to get involved in sharing the challenge. We challenge you to help us get 300 videos and photos by June 30^th—the day we reach DC by bike.

We invite everyone to read and carefully consider accepting and affirming the World Peace Challenge.

The World Peace Challenge

“I aspire to transform conflict into discovery without aggression and to seek environmental, economic and social justice through peaceful means.  

I challenge myself not to fight fire with fire and to respond to anger and greed with wisdom.”

–To cultivate harmony within my person, my home and my community.

–To stand against all forms of oppression while not oppressing. 

–To support those who are non-violent and to defend my self and others against physical violence. 

–To attack problems not people, cultures, religions, classes, genders or races.

–To honor my positive values and needs and not seek gain from another’s loss.

–To neither reject sincere efforts of reconciliation nor impose solutions on others. 

–To acknowledge the potential of all people as equal co-creators of positive change. 

–Ahmed F. Selim, 2015