Monday, October 6, 2025
Time: 6:05 PM
Song: Wrote A Song For Everyone
Artist: Creedence Clearwater Revival
Mode of Consumption: Listening to “Green River” album while eating supper.
Link to song: https://open.spotify.com/track/07txaZjD9Y9dGUgLpbf0Cr?si=9f4f6bb9d7f04115
I finished reading a short book about Gandhi this evening. It was a concise reportage of his life and his lifelong struggle to gain India’s independence from British rule.
It wasn’t a topic that I frankly knew that much about.
For most, they would assume this meant that Gandhi’s peaceful resistance was targeted solely at the British.
While encouraging the British to relinquish control was a goal, Gandhi’s tactics were more often geared toward the Indians around him. His goal was an independent and unified India.
The reality that took shape despite his efforts was an India fractured by religious rifts, chiefly between Hindus and Muslims.
The eventual pact included the formation of Pakistan and a wave of violence instigated by both sides. Gandhi had feared that result, and he firmly believed any independence had to be accompanied by unification of the people of India.
His final fast – his chief tactic for causing change – did succeed briefly to end hostilities between the groups, but that was shattered days later when a radicalized Hindu shot Gandhi before prayers.
I don’t know exactly what followed, but I can only assume violence. I also know that India remains a country ravaged by inequality and massive amounts of poverty.
I think the lesson here, and Gandhi’s message which was formed by Hindu, Muslim and Christian teachings, is that there is no path forward to freedom if that path doesn’t invite all.
So, if you look at the world today, whether in India or America, and determine that the only solution is to restrict someone else’s freedom and to create borders (whether physically, politically, or legally) between you and them, then it’s likely you don’t have any real solution. It will only perpetuate the problems.
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