World peace – one person at a time

By Tom Joyce

Editor’s note: The opinions expressed in this column are those of author Tom Joyce and are not representative of the thoughts or opinions of Tompkins Weekly. 

Members of Ithaca Catholic Worker and others have been gathering at an Ithaca

corner on Saturday mornings for over 20 years, to speak up for peace among nations, nuclear disarmament, and for nonviolent solutions to human conflict. There is a shared comradery among us that encourages us in all of our other work for a peaceful world.

We communicate respectfully with signs to passers-by and avoid responding with insult or vehemence to those who disagree with us. In fact, we try to interact with everyone who goes by waving, making eye contact, asking drivers to honk their horn, and chatting, when possible.

What are the goals and motivations of those of us who come week after week? We all have a First Amendment right to voice our opinion about our governments’ policies and actions.

It is important to use that right. There are many ways to do that. This peace presence is one. It gives passers-by one broad opinion: the use of military means to try and resolve human conflicts is counter- productive. It invariably creates more military violence.

Writing this opinion piece is another way. I thank those of you reading it for listening. In both cases, we rely on you and the passers-by to the peace corner to respond and make your opinion known.

Different issues have come in to focus as the years have gone by. In the last couple of years, we have called for NATO and Russia to negotiate and stop the war in Ukraine. Currently, we also demand that our government stop arming Israel’s relentless war of genocide against the Palestinians.

This October our peace presence focused on nuclear weapons. The U.S. and the other four initial nuclear armed countries (there are now nine countries with nuclear weapons) signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1970. Article IV of the Treaty commits us to mutual and eventual nuclear disarmament. Have you heard of the U.S. dismantling any nuclear weapons systems as a step to encourage other countries to do the same? It hasn’t happened. The NPT Review Conference, upcoming at the United Nations is another opportunity for disarmament.

Instead, the Trump administration is embarking on an expansion of our nuclear weapon systems (actually begun in the Biden administration); the 2026 National Nuclear Security Administration’s budget going from $19 billion to $25 billion. We are, as are the Russians and presumedly the Chinese, developing long range missiles that fly below radar detection, placing us back in a first-strike nuclear arms race.

The sign that I’m holding – Dream A Nuclear-Free World -doesn’t tell that whole story, but it can inspire a passer-by to join our movement.

What have we learned from our experience on the corner? On occasion, I count the number of car occupants who beep their horn or wave in support of our message for peace. Most often, the average over the years has been one per minute. On Saturday, November 8, 2025, there were 217 in just over an hour. I can’t even guess at the number of cars that go by; it is a very busy corner. But it is telling me that more people view our military spending as wasteful and not really serving our needs.

There are drivers who express their disagreement with our sign and sentiments; perhaps five or six on any Saturday morning. And who knows what the multitude who pass by are thinking? We are always happy to converse with someone who has a different perspective. It can be hard to make that happen, even when we hand out flyers to pedestrians.

Recently, I had a good experience with a pedestrian on the corner, who shared, reluctantly they said, that they knew their view of a current conflict wasn’t shared by “you” or most people. I encouraged the person to tell me more, which they did and I could say that, actually, I have similar feelings. We agreed that we should talk more about the conflict.

Stop by the peace corner next Saturday morning and let’s talk.

Tom Joyce has been a peace activist since speaking out against the Vietnam War as a teenager in Youngstown, Ohio, where he was born and raised.