Colman McCarthy

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Meet Colman McCarthy -
TEDx Talk:  I'd Rather Teach Peace

Colman McCarthy was born March 24, 1938 in Glen Head, New York[1][2]), an American journalist, teacher, lecturer, pacifist, progressive, an anarchist, and long-time peace activist, directs the Center for Teaching Peace in Washington, D.C. From 1969 to 1997, he wrote columns for The Washington Post. His topics ranged from politics, religion, health, and sports to education, poverty, and peacemaking. Washingtonian magazine called him "the liberal conscience of The Washington Post." Smithsonian magazine said he is "a man of profound spiritual awareness." He has written for The New Yorker, The Nation, The Progressive, The Atlantic, The New York Times, and Reader's Digest. Since 1999, he has written biweekly columns for National Catholic Reporter.

(Photo: Speaking at the "White House Peace Vigil", June 4, 2006). 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WXCmks2fC0

Since 1982, Colman McCarthy has been teaching courses on nonviolence and the literature of peace. In the fall semester of 2006, he taught at seven schools: Georgetown University Law Center, American University, The Catholic University of America, the University of Maryland, The Washington Center for Internships, Wilson High School, Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School and School Without Walls. In 25 years, he has had more than 7,000 students in his classes. In 1985, he founded the Center for Teaching Peace, a nonprofit that helps schools begin or expand academic programs in Peace studies. He is a regular speaker at U.S. colleges, prep schools, high schools, and peace conferences, and gives an average of 50 lectures a year. The titles of his lectures range from "How To Be a Peacemaker" to "Nonviolence In a Time of War." Including lectures and interviews, McCarthy has had more than 30 appearances on C-SPAN.

As a pacifist, journalist, and ethical vegetarian, he was awarded the Peace Abbey Courage of Conscience Award in Sherborn, Massachusetts for his nationally syndicated column in The Washington Post.[7]

McCarthy also won an Alicia Patterson Journalism Fellowship[8] in 1998 to research and write about mentoring, tutoring, and literacy at Garrison elementary school in Washington, D.C.

In 2010 he was awarded the El-Hibri Peace Education Prize.[9]

He also won the 

• Olender Peacemaker Award [1] (1996)
• Pax Christi Peace Teacher Award [2] (1993)

Colman's son, John, has made a full-length documentary titled Bandit about peaceful anarchy in Colman. The film contains a wide variety of interviews Colman did that centered on his views on pacifism and animal rights. Notable examples are his discussion of Thanksgiving and a debate with Pat Buchanan. It premiered at the Avalon Theatre in Washington, D.C.

• Disturbers of the Peace: Profiles in Non Adjustment
• Inner Companions
• Pleasures of the Game
• Involvements: One Journalist's Place in the World
• All of One Peace
• I'd Rather Teach Peace
• Strength Through Peace (editor)
• Solutions to Violence (editor)
• At Rest With the Animals
• My America (contributor)
• Contemporary Anarchist Studies (contributor)
• In the Name of Profit (contributor)
• Peace Is Possible (contributor)